The Danger of Pursuing Godliness for Gain - 1 Timothy 6:3-5

We are going to continue in our study of first Timothy and now

only a couple weeks left in the study in a series that we've

been calling Trustworthy Church. And as we begin to close this

study of the letter from Paul to Timothy, it's worth pointing out

maybe the the answer to that that one word series title, what

makes a trustworthy church And if you had to to do a survey of

everything that we've been studying.

It's clear that so much of what makes a church a trustworthy

place for God's people to seek him and make him known.

It is a product of trustworthy people.

So, so much of what we have studied is to, from the words

design, how to honour worthy leaders and servants and those

within the church that are giving God glory and living

their lives according to how God has designed.

And it's also a trustworthy church is not just honouring the

worthy, it is also exposing and separating from the

troublemakers. And as we begin to close the

book, we will come back to where we started, where the, the the

kick off to the sermon series was Paul explaining to Timothy

that there were people within the church then.

And there are people within the church age we live in that are

not necessarily trustworthy. And that is something that we've

studied. And today we will take another

look at that. And specifically today we will

look at one of the realities of the church age from now until

the return of the Lord that makes someone untrustworthy.

And it will come right out of the scripture that we read.

And that is some pursue God and have a form of godliness as a

means to gain. So breaking news this morning,

not everyone who is following Jesus actually loves Jesus or

pursuing a church community is actually pursuing Jesus.

And not everyone who is teaching from the Word is actually

pointing people to the living word, Jesus.

There are some that consider the whole operation of godliness and

the label of Christianity as some other end to the means, a

means to some other end than Jesus.

And so as we get into it today, the word is going to give a

profile or a resume of people to watch out for within a church

that claim Jesus but do not actually live for Jesus.

And so to get us started, let me see if you can relate to a

couple of the categories that that I think are are true of our

church day. There are some who consider

godliness as a means of great gain in the form of political

gain. So we'll start with the big

picture. How many of you have listened to

a speech by a politician as he's campaigning and he ends his

speech with God bless you and God bless these Great American

or great United States of America?

Of course you've heard it because they all say it.

Every politician from the beginning of stump speeches to

now at the very end are going to say, you can trust me because

I'm blessing you with God. And what they're actually doing

is they're showing an appearance of godliness.

But to get the end, which is actually a vote.

So let's get maybe more specific.

I, I have not been in the dating world for over a decade now.

Thank you to my wife for allowing God to pluck me from

that world. But rumor has it there are some

in the world of Christian mingling that claim to be

Christian, and they have a form of godliness that they're

actually using as a means to an end that is not Jesus, namely A

fleeting moment of pleasure. So breaking news, not everyone

who has Christian in their online dating profile is

actually picking up their cross and following Jesus.

They might just be looking to gain some initial trust.

And more specific to what we'll look at today, not everyone who

has a pulpit or platform in the world of Christianity is

actually pursuing Jesus and pointing people to Jesus as the

ultimate end. Unfortunately, we live in a

church age that is adjacent to something called the Christian

industry. There are an annual revenue

stream of billions of dollars that are passed from one

Christian to the next in the form of buying music and buying

books and supporting influencers and platforms that allow some

people to view that as a means not to Jesus, but to platform

and to financial gain And the world that we live in.

Breaking news, do not be surprised when some people claim

Jesus and have an alternative end in mind.

This is what we're looking at today, so that the point of the

Scripture from Paul to Timothy is twofold.

One, that we would be able to see the resume of a treasure

seeker and we would also be able to be cleansed from things

inside of our own hearts. But by the grace of God go all

of us, that we would pursue Christianity and not Christ.

So with that in mind, read with me chapter 6 starting in verse

three. He says if anyone teaches

otherwise and does not consent to wholesome words, even the

words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which

accords with godliness. He is proud, knowing nothing,

but is obsessed with disputes and arguments over words from

which come envy, strife, reviling, evil suspicions,

useless wranglings of men, of corrupt minds, and destitute of

the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain

from such Withdraw yourself. So he gives Timothy a profile

and then he gives Timothy a protocol on what to do when

these people make their themselves known within a

church. It's a serious problem in the

Church of Ephesus 2000 years ago.

And it's a serious problem that we need to be aware of that

exists for our church age as well.

So he goes all the way back to where we started in chapter 1,

Be mindful of heretics, of those who twist doctrine for personal

gain. And in verse three, he gives us

a profile of what to look out for.

He says if anyone teaches otherwise and does not consent

with wholesome words, even the words of Christ, Wholesome and

sound and healthy doctrine is what Paul is continually trying

to get Timothy to protect within his church.

And and one of the things that we can look as a profile to

watch out for is when people do not consent to wholesome

doctrine. It's not just what people

promote, it's also what people reject.

And what we are doing in a journey through Scripture is

we're looking for sound or wholesome or healthy doctrine.

Early in our series we defined sound or healthy doctrine as the

truth of God's Word that benefits your life.

When you study the Word and it is wholesome and it is sound, it

brings you to a place in that particular area of your life

that promotes the abundant life. It should not be a burden.

It should not distance you from people or from God, but it is

good for you and healthy. And there are some who reject

the wholesome understanding of God's Word and then he says that

they don't even consent with the words of Jesus.

Again, I say there are some that claim Jesus and don't agree with

what he says. One commentator said it's like a

vegetarian who doesn't like vegetables.

Christians who reject the teachings of Christ, and they're

simple and they're wholesome teachings of Christ that those

who are seeking something other than God will find a way to

reject. I love where we were at in our

study in our midweek service, Leviticus 19.

It says love your neighbor as yourself.

What a wholesome and practical and simple teaching of Jesus.

And yet from the very beginning of Jesus teaching that there was

some who would say, yeah, but who's my neighbor?

Why don't we get a little bit more serious about how to define

the teachings of Christ so that we can get more serious about

how to not consent? And it's very interesting to me

that those who are legalistic and heavy-handed with the word

are always so serious about the 10 commandments, and they're

always so repulsed by the Beatitudes, humility, poor in

spirit. Peacemakers and others are more

concerned with what day does the Sabbath fall on and what feasts

and what laws and what things have to be, have to be something

that's part of your healthy Christian life.

The teachings of Jesus are wholesome and they're sound and

they're simple. He says love God and love your

neighbor as yourself. Be weary of people who are

continually crying that the teachings of Jesus are too much

milk and not enough meat, He goes on to say.

They're also going to be people first for proud but knowing

nothing, obsessed with disputes and arguments over words from

which come envy, strife, reviling and evil suspicions.

In that one verse we have in this profile 3 words that

describe those who have godliness but not God.

They have delusion, they have disputes, and they cause

division. So we start with delusion.

It says they're proud, but they know nothing.

The people that have a form of godliness and they're very

excited to tell you everything that they know, but under the

surface of their pride, there's actually no substance that

represents Christ. There's an easy way to see this

in the outside Orthodox version of proud but know nothing.

And there's the door to door missionaries.

I see them in my neighborhood, see them set up outside of, you

know, the the library or Boise State Mormons who will knock on

your door. And they with so much pride or

confidence will tell you all about the lost revelation that

they've come to restore. And they can argue with you over

what is truly grace and what the importance of a work and why you

still need a temple sacrifice. They have so much confidence,

but under the substance of their knowledge lacks the actual

picture of who Jesus is. You can see the same thing with

the Jehovah's Witness. They have confidence to stand on

the corner and invite you into a conversation.

And some of us don't have enough confidence with the truth to

engage with them. It's like I can't talk to them.

They are very, very confident in what they know and they will

tell you all about why Jesus is not actually God, He's actually

just the Archangel Michael. And they will show you their

proof texts and they will be unconvinced by anything that you

share with him. They have so much confidence and

underneath it all is a a substance that lacks a true

knowledge of God. So it's easy to see it in the

confidence to knock on a door, but it's also a reality in each

one of our own lives. We live in an age where every

single one of you have in your pocket the library of all

Christian thought and commentary of all time.

We should be the most confident generation of the Church of all

time. You have every scroll, you have

all of the writings of the church fathers, you have every

letter and sermons to go with them in your pocket.

And while it is a blessing, it can also be a danger because

with your confidence, is there actually a substance Or as Paul

warns, the church in Corinth, does the knowledge puff up?

Are we so busy about learning that we're actually not living

the gospel? And so Christians can be just as

proud as door to door missionaries.

People can be proud in their special knowledge.

How many of you have met someone who is going to tell you

something you never knew about Jesus because they know the

original Greek or the original Hebrew?

Here's the reality. You can know Greek and you can

be fluent in Hebrew and you can still be wrong.

See the Pharisees. Some people have amazing

spiritual resumes. Some people, maybe even here,

got saved in a Billy Graham crusade.

What a powerful time to come to the Lord.

Some people have been baptized by famous church leaders and

studied under famous pastors, and yet your spiritual resume

does not give you authority in and of itself to speak to other

people about who Jesus is. The only thing that is actually

valuable is how we can point people to Jesus, not special

knowledge and not spiritual resumes.

That's why in Romans we can relate to a culture, but also to

a church culture that professes to be wise but can actually be

fools. I love what Jesus says in

Matthew Chapter 11. He prays and says, Thank you

Matthew 11 · chapter mention

Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden

these things from the wise and prudent and you have revealed

them to babes. There are times when I get just

as much encouragement and revelation from the Lord,

listening to my children pray as I do listening to theologians

debate. The Lord is no respecter of

people. We do not live in a Kingdom

where God is waiting for people to climb the ascent of academia

so He can finally give them the special revelation of His good

plans for salvation and the church age we live in.

God loves the humble. God loves those who have hearts

like rich soil that just receive the truth, listen and obey.

So we have people who are delusional.

They think they know more than they do.

And we also have people that are obsessed with disputes.

Read it again. Obsessed with disputes and

arguments over words. I love what the ESV says.

It says an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels

about words. Once again we see a a

description of the church culture that looks very similar

to just human culture and unhealthy craving for

controversy. And one of the reasons this is

probably a symptom of an unhealthy or untrustworthy

church for all the ages is because it is a human condition.

There is clearly a supply and demand when it comes to the

craving for controversy that just lives within the human

heart. How many of you have noticed

that every news feed and breaking headline is now

breaking news? You know these people know our

psychology. We know that if it's breaking

news, we can't turn away. We got to find out what it is.

Hopefully you've noticed that breaking news is now normal

news. You don't have to click on that

if you don't want to. How many of you noticed our

obsession with courtroom drama? We see people go through the

trial of the century and we TuneIn and we wait for results.

We have an unhealthy obsession with controversy.

It's why celebrity gossip and all of the tabloids can make

millions and millions of dollars.

Because there's something inside of the human heart that wants to

know, and it exists in the human heart and it gets sanctified in

the born again heart. But we have a temptation to go

the other way. There's a supply and a demand.

And not only is the demand there, but the supply is

something that people enjoy giving.

This is why this is a message that is often and mainly named

at teachers because it feels good to be the teacher or the

person in the circle that can come with the special knowledge

in the revelation can be obsessed over being right and

winning the argument and saying I told you actually had a real

time reminder of the obsession that lives in all of our hearts

to be right and win the argument.

Last Sunday especially. This is probably especially

wrong of me to do on Mother's Day because it has to do with

something I had to be right about with my wife.

But after church got out, the one thing that she wanted was to

go on a family hike. So we went, I saw some of you on

the hike. It was good to see you had the

same idea. And we're all hiking.

The kids run ahead and it's just me and my wife walking side by

side with my parents and, and she just noticed them running

ahead. And she asked my parents, who do

you think the fastest person in our family is?

And I was like, well, that's a silly question, you know?

And then she goes on, not to promote me, but to remind them

that she ran track in high school.

And so my wife looked at me and she says, do you think it's you?

To which I said on Mother's Day, I don't think it's me.

I know it's me, you know? So my dad, Sage, the wise

patriot of our family that he is, he sees me obsessing over

the controversy, the need to be right back and forth, pacing my

eyes. And he says, son, let it go.

In a sense, that is what Paul is telling Timothy.

You've got to learn to let things go.

And of course, I couldn't. So before I knew it, I was

emptying my pockets and she was emptying hers.

And we picked a tree off in the distance.

And my parents are here. They can attest to my moment of

great pride when I challenged my wife on Mother's Day to a foot

race. And in my pride, I will say, and

then we'll get right back to the sermon.

I was so confident that I let her have a two or three second

head start. And of course I passed her, you

know, like Forrest Gump breaking the, the, the, the braces off

his legs. And I get to the tree 1st and I

look at her and I was like, well, that settles in.

She goes, well, I'm faster in the beginning.

It's obsession to be right. And it it lives in the hearts of

all of us. There's something that will come

into your life and you will say, I can't let this one go.

I have to be right. And there, this is not just a

one to one problem. This is something that happens

all the time with theology and doctrine and Jesus and church.

And some come in and they obsess over singular issues and they

make that the platform by which they will supply and demand the

need to give and receive controversy.

You've guys have probably all been around a small Bible study

setting, or a church fellowship time, or just two believers at

the workplace. And it goes from believers

enjoying the the common grace to be in the family of God to

believers arguing about something that seems so little

in the grand scheme of things. Matters of soteriology.

How many people have turned off 2 Christians debating over how

God in His Amazing Grace and mystery activates the heart to

respond to the free gift of salvation?

How many people have debated over the functions and the

timing and the the age of baptism?

How many people have come and and desired to see more altar

calls or less? And all of these little debates

about how the functions of everything should work can cause

some to not even be able to continue with us.

The question of the end times, the question of the culture wars

and woke and anti woke. As the pastor, I can tell you I

receive all of the complaints of people who have a singular focus

that just doesn't make it to the sermon quite enough.

And they exist for all of time. And this is the profile.

And the question isn't whether or not we can have healthy

debates. The question is, what is the

fruit of all of these conversations?

It can come down to arguing over words.

Paul will say. So then he will say, you've got

people who have a delusion thinking they're right when

they're wrong. They're disputing over

everything. And here is how you know that

God is not the aim, that there is some alternative means to an

end. The fruit is division, delusion

and disputing, and what flows from it is division, not the

fruit of the Holy Spirit and the unity of the body of Christ.

It says that end comes from it, envy and strife and reviling and

evil suspicions. For this list, we could

summarize the teaching of Jesus on the Sermon on the Mount.

You will know them by their fruit.

What comes and flows from the conversations and the teachings

and the obsessions of your life and the people that you're

listening to? Very quickly, he says, envy.

The resentment towards others for their success or position

within the Kingdom of God. An unhealthy obsession with

someone else in their role. The pastor's church is growing.

They must be doing something that is not quite biblical.

Or they're soft on sin or they're seeker friendly and

overflow from their suspicions is just a heart of envy, he

says. Strife.

Other translations will say quarreling.

Just constant arguing and fighting.

Argue over everything. Arguments driven by pride and

promoting rivalry, he says. Reviling, watching out for

people who have nothing nice to say.

These are just violent and abusive words for every other

ministry or every other believer or every other denomination or

every other position of the the debates of doctrine.

And there are those who cannot say anything uplifting and

edifying about someone else. And then there's evil

suspicions. Everything is motivated with a

suspicion that there is some underlying motive in someone

else. And it will come up in the the

way that they critique every sermon and every Bible study and

every mission of the church. Everything has got some

underlying thing to it. To teach on compassion has made

me a communist. To teach on the roles of men and

women has made me a misogynist. To teach on honoring authority

makes me a cult leader. To teach on loving your neighbor

makes me soft on sin. And these are just, you know,

from my position sharing the word of God in all of the ways

that people have a singular obsessive focus that can not

move forward in the Kingdom of God, but finds everything as a

reason to to continually splinter and separate.

And then he goes on in the next verse to say, which is the point

of all of this useless wranglings.

Pointless. No one wins.

Your endless argument is not actually saving souls.

Your debates over how God saved has lost opportunity to actually

see God save. The old saying you can win an

argument and lose the soul, you can win the Bible study and lose

the student. And there's all sorts of ways

that this message has been made a loud and clear to those who

are no longer with us. So often throughout the

Trustworthy Church series, we've thought of of ways that this is

appropriate and good for us to learn because there have been

times that others have been failed by our lack of of doing

these things well. And no doubt there are some on

the outside looking in and just consider the modern day version

of Christianity and endless debate about doctrinal issues

that are that are so tribal that people who just say, I would

rather not go at all. And so this is the profile that

Paul is painting Timothy to watch out for.

Watch out for those who are delusional, divisive, and that

caused the vision. This is a danger for all of us.

And now the point of it is, Timothy, what do you do with

these people? Calvary Boise?

How do you become people who have a culture of honor and

love, receiving wholesome doctrine and not going down all

of the different rabbit rabbit trails that cause division?

And this is where we come to in verse 5, useless wranglings of

men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who

suppose that godliness is a means of gain from such withdraw

yourselves. So he gives a little bit of a

symptom that's causing the the the problem.

And he says that these are men of corrupt minds, destitute of

the truth. And I've heard some comment on

this verse and say, yeah, what you're dealing with here are

mentally crazy people, destitute in the mind, depraved of truth.

These are those who will say, if Paul had a word for it, he would

have called them narcissists. He would have called them, you

know, the the the names that we diagnosed for people who go

obsessive over anything. But I think what is actually

happening is it's not so much a mental illness as it's Paul

describing everyone's mind who doesn't have a renewed mind in

Christ. What he's actually describing is

minds that are depraved of truth and destitute of truth are how

everyone normally thinks. These are actually very normal

minds. This is how the whole world

actually thinks. The world is happy to turn

everything into a means of an end.

The world has no problem using all of your interest in a

certain topic to turn it into revenue.

The world has no problem building an audience to make

disciples unto themselves. The world loves those who are

obsessed with controversy. So what Paul is actually getting

at is we have found ourselves looking into those who say that

they're believers and Christians and teachers, but they're

actually people who are just like everybody else.

They obsess over things just like everybody else.

What we're actually the only thing that can actually make

trustworthy church with trustworthy leaders and a church

that is built up of trustworthy believers is to be holy and set

apart, to have minds that aren't obsessing over controversy, to

have minds that are renewed, to now see the world as Jesus has

taught us to through the lens of the Beatitudes says they suppose

that godliness is a means of gain.

I was blessed by this quote from Tim Keller.

He says if you want Jesus just to get your health, wealth, or

happiness, then he's just a means to an end.

And if he's a means to an end, then he's not your God.

Whatever you want more than Jesus is your real God.

If Jesus is just a means to an end, the thing that you're

actually pursuing him to get is what you really worship.

And this is where a sermon can not only warn, but it can also

cleanse all of our hearts. But by the grace of God, we all

struggle with this. And so I'll start with my own

reflection, my own need to be cleansed of making Jesus a means

to some alternative ends. One of my temptations is to turn

the Bible into a book of sermons, and that every time I

read it and every time I study and every time I pray, I'm not

pursuing Jesus, I'm actually pursuing a sermon.

I have the same issue. And so does anyone who works in

ministry. That evangelism, inviting

someone to be part of our church could actually be just a means

to another end. Evangelism could be twisted and

warped in my heart to to not be a soul winner so that I see more

people in the Kingdom of God for the day of eternity, but to just

see more people in the sanctuary of Calvary Boise.

And these are temptations that I struggle with in my role.

But we all have things that could become the end.

That is not Christ. Some of you are here at church

and can relate to a need to have Jesus fixed parts of your life.

And by God's goodness and His faithfulness, He is going to be

your great physician. But if you're only here so that

your marriage can be fixed and your prodigal children can

return and your finances can be taken care of, you're actually

worshiping the thing God will provide.

He will care for you, and he will do it all so that in the

end you can say, God all glory to you.

I now have another story of your faithfulness.

And in the end, that prodigal child returning and my marriage

being healed and my finances being provided for is just

another way for me to declare your goodness to a lost and

dying world. And this is where Paul gives us

an answer and what to do. He says for such people

withdraw. This is not a message then or

now where we present a list of YouTube influencers and corrupt

podcasts and churches down the street that you need to update

your do not interact with list on.

This is a spotlight into the reality of what it means to be a

believer in this world. You will have many people come

to you in the name of Jesus that will not bring you closer to

Jesus. Paul does not say to Timothy

kick them out. He doesn't say put them on the

the list of band teachers. He says withdraw.

Be so in love with the authentic Jesus that you can spot the

counterfeit. Be so in love with sound and

wholesome and good teaching that gives you a life and a life more

abundant and draws you closer to Jesus that you are unswayed by

the click bait and all of the influencers who have something

to sell you and the pastors who are going to take a second tithe

because they need your money. The goal is to create in all of

us a a vision of Jesus that is so rich that it's not clouded by

all of the fog of the church age that we live in and all

generations will have to navigate.

So we withdraw ourselves. And I'll end with actually the

end of this letter. We'll have some more sermons in

it. But I love how Paul gives

Timothy one last charge for this message.

He says in verse 20. Oh Timothy, guard what was

committed to your trust. Avoid the profane and idle

babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge

by professing it. Some have strayed concerning the

faith. Grace be with you.

Amen. Another message of the grace of

God. Another message for those of you

who need the grace to not be condemned by ways you've gone

astray, listening to voices that did not bring you closer to

Jesus. This is a message of grace be

cleansed, exalt Jesus. It's a message of grace for

those of us who have identified the alternative means to an end

that Jesus has become someone that you're using to get

something else grace. And just know that when we get

lost in the hype that is the Christian industry, the warning

is that when we stray concerning the when that happens, we stray

concerning the faith. The reason we end every single

gathering on Sunday morning by holding the the the body in the

blood, the the bread and the cup is so that we would focus once

again today. Our church, our worship, your

very life on the only thing that you will not have your souls

completely destroyed by if you focus on it.

The only Savior is Jesus. Receive once again the wholesome

words of Jesus. Come to him all who are burdened

and heavy laden. Receive rest from your soul, for

your soul, and follow him in a new and fresh way today.