Peter - Session 11 (Exiles Who Discern)

But I'm excited, this chapter is one of my favourites in what

we've been going through with First and Second Peter.

So if you would go ahead and turn to Second Peter Chapter 2,

2 Peter 2 · chapter mention

that's what we're talking about tonight, the entire chapter.

So the good news is you've got a lot of extra fill in the blanks.

There's a lot to cover in this, but it's very important and

extra important considering world events that have happened

recently. What I'm calling tonight is

exiles who discern. They're all named after exiles

every session because these are letters that were written to

people who are actually exiles where they live.

They were Jewish people, but they were living in the Roman

Empire in different cultures they didn't belong to.

And I'll just share one of the the stupidest mistakes I made in

my young adulthood, which was where I learned a little bit

about counterfeits. And so when I graduated high

school, my my family, they went in and they purchased a gold

necklace for me. It was a gold necklace with a

cross. It's very nice, very beautiful

chain. And then while I was in the

parking lot at Walmart, a guy approached me and said that his

jewelry store was going out of business.

So he was selling jewelry from his car.

And I looked at the chains he had.

And I thought, well, that chain's a lot bigger than the

chains I have. So I bought it, swapped out the

chain, put the original chain in my pocket, went to the movies,

and after about a week, maybe a week and a half, I started

having this little green stripe on my neck because it wasn't

gold, it was counterfeit. By the way, just to make that

story a little worse, that that original gold chain fell out of

my pocket while I was at the movie theater.

So I had to get a new one later on.

But that was my own lesson. Everybody knows what the concept

of counterfeit is, even if you don't use the word counterfeit.

If you've ever played Monopoly or ever been around people who

play it, because I also know there's a lot that hate

Monopoly, you know what counterfeit money looks like

too. And if you've ever been tricked

by a counterfeit, then you know how frustrating that can be.

Maybe for you it was fake designer clothes that fell apart

after one wash. I don't know.

I just got back from Albania and I saw a little girl wearing

designer sport pants and it said adide, yes, on the side.

So I mean, we all have fallen prey to something counterfeit

before. One of the things that holds

people back from deeper faith is we don't want to be deceived.

We don't want to believe something that's not true.

And that's fair. And I'm going to tell you what,

if you are an honest Christian and you're a Christian for 30

years, there will still be things that are hard to wrap

your head around. And sometimes you'll still say,

I want to make sure I understand this.

I don't want to be deceived. I get it.

This is the kind of thing that Peter's addressing in this

entire chapter. There's no way I could really

chop this chapter up without talking about all of it.

He knows that the church is not always going to be destroyed by

obvious enemies. Peter knows that sometimes the

biggest threat to the church comes from the inside and it

comes from voices that sound spiritual or leaders that look

spiritual, or it comes from teachers who use God's language

but they twist it for their own gain so falsely false teachers

always slip in unnoticed. They promise freedom and they

actually bring people into slavery, which we'll talk about.

This is not just a 1st century church problem.

This is our problem too. There are self-proclaimed

prophets on social media. There are books and podcasts

that mix in just enough truth with a lot of error, and they

put a lot of false teaching out there.

And it's a very real problem that we face.

So this week's chapter is really sobering.

And Peter does not hold back in it.

He exposes the arrogance and greed and destruction of false

teachers and reminds you also that God knows how to protect

you. So not only does he expose the

danger, but he also gives you the hope that no matter the

danger that's out there, God is able and willing to protect you

from it, which is important because if we don't know both of

those, then we either shut ourselves off from everybody or

we just accept every teaching that we're given.

Both are dangerous. So this session is for anybody

who's ever wondered, how do I know who to trust?

It is for anybody who's ever wondered, how do I recognize

real from the fake? It is for a tired Christian

who's tired of empty promises. And this is really just for the

church as a whole because our witness depends on on us keeping

our eyes fixed on the real Jesus and not just a counter version.

So the first section we're just going to go through through the

1st 3 verses. If you're brand new to Renewed

Mind Bible studies, this is where your blanks will kick in

and you'll see it's called recognizing false teachers.

If I do miss a blank, hopefully I won't.

But if I do, I'll ask you at the end and I can fill in anything

that you're missing. Here are the first 3 verses.

But there are also false prophets in Israel, just as

there will be false teachers among you.

They will cleverly teach destructive heresies and even

deny the Master who bought them. In this way they will bring

sudden destruction on themselves.

Many will follow their evil teaching and shameful

immorality, and because of these teachers, the way of truth will

be slandered in their greed. They will make up clever lies to

get hold of your money. But God condemned them long ago,

and their destruction will not be delayed.

Well, that was not preached on quite as often, is it?

Certainly not while we take up the offering.

But Peter does not waste time easing into the subject.

He is saying very plainly, there were false prophets in Israel,

just as there will be false teachers among you.

And that word false isn't just about being slightly off.

So we do need to be careful with this.

Sometimes we'll hear somebody teach something and say they're

a heretic or that's blasphemy. No, they just made a little bit

of an error. They're a human being.

This is not about accidentally being slightly off.

The word there is pseudos, and it means here's your first

blank, intentionally deceptive or counterfeit.

Anytime you hear pseudo before something, you always think it's

a fake version. So this means intending to

deceive, right? And so their aim is not to

clarify the truth to you. It is actually to cloud it from

you. And this is what makes them so

dangerous because they don't come announcing themselves at

false. Who would do that?

Who would come in and say I'm I'm here with a bunch of lies?

They always secretly introduced destructive heresies.

And that phrase carries the whole idea of like something

being smuggled, like contraband, sneaking in things that are like

teachings that just split God's people from their foundation in

Christ. The verb that Peter uses for

deny is the word our no MI. It means to announce or disown

completely. Disown is your blank.

So this was not just a disagreement on doctrine, it was

a betrayal of the master who bought them.

Most of the churches around here we are able to work with because

we have disagreements on doctrine, but not on the

foundation of God. But there are some local

ministries that actually advocate for things that are

sin, and we can't partner with them as a church, but we can

still love them as humans. So in Peter's day, some of the

most dangerous heresies did not deny God outright.

And I'm going to lay this out for you.

They just distorted God. There was the Gnostics.

I'll spell that for you. That's your blank Gnostics.

Capital GNOSTICS. So the Gnostics, by the way,

that word translates to knowledge.

They claimed that salvation came through hidden insight or making

ordinary believers feel. Here's your blank inferior.

So the Gnostics, they believe that there was secret

information that you had to know.

And if you were wise enough, spiritual enough, if you grabbed

a hold of this secret or special information, well at that point

then you would really get to know God.

So that of course, made a lot of people feel inferior.

If you've ever been around somebody who airs it out like

they just know so much more about God than you do, it makes

you feel like, well, you're not the person I want to go to.

Then there was a group of people called the Antinomians, and that

basically translates, just so you know, into like against the

law. And they twisted grace into

permission. They actually taught that

holiness that's your blank didn't matter.

Could you imagine ever walking into a Church of Jesus today and

hearing a preacher say holiness doesn't matter?

But that's what they were teaching.

And then the dosatists, they denied that Jesus actually even

had a physical body. They said he only seemed human,

which undermined the fact that he suffered and he died and he

had a resurrection. That's your blank.

These distortions, these kinds of people, they all crept in

quietly, but they all carry massive consequences.

So not much has really changed to this day, to be honest with

you. The groups of people are a

little different, but false teaching still always promises

life but always delivers destruction.

And sometimes it comes wrapped up in prosperity.

That's your blank there. How many of y'all have heard a

preacher that's real heavy on prosperity before?

How God just wants you to be rich and happy and that's, I

mean, I don't think he wants you to be sad and miserable, but

that's not the sole purpose of his existence, right?

So they'll teach you, follow God and you'll get rich.

It becomes something that is very much transactional with the

Lord, and the Lord doesn't thrive in that.

Neither do we. Sometimes false teaching is

wrapped up in something called progress.

That's your next blank. In other words, these would be

churches that say the Bible needs updating to fit modern

culture. It does not.

We do need to properly interpret what it's trying to say.

And some of them are cultural laws.

I had shrimp today. I don't feel guilty.

But what I'm telling you is if you try to modernize the Bible

so it feels more comfortable, you're in error.

And sometimes it comes as personal freedom.

This one is probably the most prevalent and accepted freedom

is your blank there. This whole thing about you do

you, God will just understand you're almost there.

You are welcome to live the life that you want to live.

However, I love you enough to tell you what the Bible says and

it's up to you what you want to do with that.

But while God may understand, it doesn't mean God will approve.

And even a new age practices that are very popular today,

like crystals or trying to manifest things, you'll hear the

same whisper that deceived them in the Garden of Eden, which is

really, you don't need God, you can be your own.

And so all of these movements, they all echo the same old lie,

which is that you don't need Christ, you just need a secret

or a method or yourself. It is only modern Gnosticism in

disguise. That's your blank.

It's modern Gnosticism in disguise, Gnosticism.

And Peter wants you to know that a lot of people are going to

follow these destructive paths. Why?

Because it's attractive to our ego.

It really does appeal to our pride and our desire and our

greed. And that's why verse 3 really

stings when it says in their greed they will make up clever

lies to get a hold of your money.

The Greek word for greed there is playonexia.

It means an insatiable craving for more.

Craving is your blank and it's often at the expense of others.

That is different than just a desire because a craving is

something that will drive you. If you've ever been extremely

dehydrated and your body craved water, you get this.

And so it's the hunger that says that there's never enough, which

is why it's so easily corrupts spiritual leaders.

That's your final blank in the section.

It's so easily corrupts spiritual leaders.

From 1st century false prophets to 21st century prosperity

preachers, the temptation to use God for gain is alive and well.

It's hard because it's an industry and we have to be on

guard for it. Why?

Because Peter says judgement is coming.

God is not mocked. Just as he dealt with false

prophets before, he'll deal with false teachers now.

But the church's call is not to chase every counterfeit, but

instead to cling to truth so tightly that the fake can't ever

fool us. Couple personal insight

questions. These ones, they're just for you

to fill out on your own. If they're helpful, one of them

is, where have I seen subtle half truths slip in a Christian

teaching or culture? And how can I guard against

them? And the second one is, do I have

a tendency to follow spiritual voices based on popularity or

charisma rather than testing them against Scripture?

All right, next few verses. Second Peter chapter 2, verses 4

2 Peter 2:4

through 1010, a means we're just doing the first half of verse

10. This is called God's judgement

and rescue. Man, aren't you glad that those

go together? So here's what Peter says.

For God did not spare even the angels who sinned.

He threw them into hell in gloomy pits of darkness, where

they're being held until the day of judgement.

And God did not spare the ancient world, except for Noah

and seven others in his family. Noah warned the world of God's

righteous judgement. So God protected Noah when he

destroyed the world of ungodly people with the vast flood.

Later, God condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and turned

them into heaps of ashes. He made them an example of what

will happen to ungodly people. But God also rescued Lot out of

Sodom because he was a righteous man who was sick of the shameful

immorality of the wicked people around him.

Verse 8 it says, yes, Lot was a righteous man who was tormented

in his soul by the wickedness he saw and heard day after day.

So you see, the Lord knows how to rescue godly people from

their trials, even while keeping the wicked under punishment

until the day of final judgement.

And verse 10, the beginning of it says he is especially hard on

those who follow their own twisted sexual desire and who

despise authority. That's fun.

Who's ready to write the next song for K love?

Listen, Peter wants his readers to understand this, that God is

not apathetic to the reality of evil.

And I'll be honest, I've been a Christian my entire life, and

there are times that it feels like God is apathetic to the

problem of evil here. Have you ever been struck with

something that has just been so horrific?

Right now, we've just seen something in the public, but

maybe just something in the private where you're like, God,

where are you? It feels like he doesn't care,

even though you know that he does.

And Peter is making sure that his readers know that God does

care, that God does judge it, but he also rescues his people

through it, not always from it. And so to make that case, he

reaches back to three major examples that everybody in this

Jewish exile audience would have known by heart.

He talks about fallen angels, Noah and the flood, and he talks

about lot in Sodom. Each one of those stories shows

the same truth, that God will not let rebellion go unchecked,

and he will never abandoned the righteous in the middle of it.

So he begins with what is the most mysterious one where he

says God did not spare even the angels who sinned.

We're not given every detail, but Peter is most likely

pointing to Genesis six or two traditions about rebellious

angels who crossed God's boundaries.

That's your blank there. Crossed God's boundaries.

If you want to know more about these theories, I'll see you

Sunday. The word that he uses for hell,

there is the word Tartarosus. It's a word that's borrowed from

Greek mythology, and it referred to the lowest, darkest prison of

punishment imaginable. So Peter takes that cultural

term that would have been very familiar to them, and then he

uses it to make a theological point.

If God could send even powerful angels into prison, no one is

above his justice. It is a serious reminder that

status and strength and even your spirituality do not exempt

anybody from accountability before God.

And then Peter moves on to Noah's story.

The flood was not just a children's story with animals on

a boat, even though most churches have it painted in a

nursery somewhere, including us. The story of Noah is pretty

dark. It is literally God's sweeping

judgement on human corruption. Genesis 6 talks about violence

and wickedness and every thought of man's heart being bent on

evil. Every thought of man's heart

being bent on evil. So, as we know, God preserved

Noah and his family. Peter even calls Noah a preacher

of righteousness. You ever read the story of no

one thought, man, he's a good preacher?

No, because he doesn't preach. He just builds a boat.

And then when the flood goes away, he gets drunk because he's

so stressed over it. It's what happens in the story.

But the word there for preacher is K roots, and it means a

herald or a public announcer. Public announcer.

What Peter's getting at is this. Even if no one listened, Noah's

very life and obedience proclaimed God's standard to the

world around him. Sometimes we're so stuck on, I

don't have the words, I don't know what to say.

How do I share it with other people?

If you are obedient to God, your life will do a whole lot of

talking. I'm not saying don't use your

mouth as well, but the obedience is everything.

So that proclaimed God's standard to the world around

him. And so for Peter's audience,

this was an encouragement that even if your faith feels lonely,

remember they're exiled. Even if the majority of people

mock you, God always honors the faithful minority.

He knows how to protect those who walked before him.

And then the final example that he gives, well, Peter references

Sodom and Gomorrah, 2 cities that are infamous for their sin

and ultimately have been reduced to ashes.

But these cities were not just destroyed, they became a lasting

example. They were never rebuilt.

Their ashes told the world that rebellion has consequences.

So tucked inside of this story, though, is, is somebody named

Lot. And again, this is a little bit

of a different view than we would have.

We don't look at no one think of him as a preacher.

We also don't normally look at Lot and think of him as somebody

who makes a lot of good decisions.

He had to get rescued a few times, if I remember Genesis

well. But Lot is someone that Peter

calls a righteous man, tormented in his soul by the wickedness he

saw and heard day after day. That phrase is so relatable

because Lot wasn't untouched by the culture around him.

He was actually worn down by it. We're a lot more like Lot than

Abraham, guys. He was worn down by the culture

around him, grieved in his spirit, and he often

compromised. That's your blank.

Lot often compromised, but God still rescued him.

You know what that's called? That's called grace.

Sometimes we think being righteous means being flawless.

That is a in and of itself flawed method to go about.

But Peter reminds us that righteousness can look like

being heavily distressed by sin but still clinging to God in the

middle of it. Heavily distressed by sin, but

clinging to God in the middle of it.

And so Peter's point here is that the Lord knows how to

rescue the godly and to keep the wicked under punishment until

the day of judgement. So the word for rescue there is

through. Am I?

It means to snatch or deliver or draw someone safely out of

danger. Think about anybody remember

Lassie? I shouldn't remember the show

Lassie. Timmy's in the well snatched him

just at the last second. I grew up watching a lot of Nick

at night. I'm sorry.

So it's the same word that Paul uses in Colossians 113 when he

says that God has rescued us from the Kingdom of darkness.

And so that's the promise. God doesn't just warn us about

the flood or the fire. He always pulls us through it.

I believe that's a blank of yours.

He pulls us through it. So what does that mean in 2025?

Well, it means that we should not mistake God's patience for

his permission. Often times we look at things

and we wonder why XY and Z get away with something.

Or we wonder why we're not being held accountable for XY and Z.

It is not permission in either case.

It's patience. The angels, the world of Noah,

and the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah all thought that they

could continue unchecked, and they were all wrong.

Today, people make the same mistake.

There are whole industries that are built on greed and

exploitation. Entire movements celebrate

rebellion against God's design. And just like in Peter's day,

here's your blank. Sexual immorality and rejection

of authority are often praised as freedoms.

And Peter's warning us that they're not freedoms, they're

actually chains. Whether or not you see it, God

will deal with it. So it also means we don't have

to fear being swept away with the wicked.

Just as God preserved Noah in the flood and Lot in a fire, He

knows how to guard his people. Sometimes he rescues us out of

danger, and other times he just sustains us through it.

Either way, his hand is always on his children.

And that means here's your blank.

We need to live with both honesty and compassion.

Honest in that God's judgement is real and sin has real

consequences. Compassion because many people

are mocking truth today and they're just like lots of

neighbors. They're blind to the danger that

they're in. So our job, man, I can't.

I can't. I wish I could just say this

sentence over and over again. Our job is not to gloat at their

destruction, but instead we are to live as preachers of

righteousness through our own obedience.

Warning by both our words and our example that another way is

possible in Christ. Quickest way to get me mad on

the Internet is to have some sort of Christian rejoicing over

some sort of negative thing that has befallen somebody who's not

a believer. It just it.

It's the only thing that generally makes me question

somebody's Christianity that's not in my notes.

All right? Modern equivalents that happened

today, they're just really easy to spot.

I want you to think about how normalized sexual immorality is

in entertainment today. I want you to think of

authority, just in general, any kind of it, whether it's

parental or governmental or spiritual, and think about how

often it is mocked or dismissed. And think about how quickly we

tend to shrug at injustice as long as it doesn't inconvenience

US. Peter's audience lived under

Rome's corruption, and we live under our own cultural

pressures. So where do I feel tormented in

my soul by the brokenness of the world around me?

The reason I ask you that is because if you can find that,

that's often a key place that the Lord may be calling you to

serve or make a difference. And the second one is, how can I

trust God's power to rescue me not just someday, but right in

the middle of my trials? All right.

The rest of verse 10 through verse 16 is called the arrogance

of false teachers. What does Peter say about these

false teachers? Well, he says in verse 10, these

people are proud and arrogant, daring even to scoff at

supernatural beings without so much as trembling.

But the angels, who are far greater in power and strength,

do not dare to bring from the Lord a charge of blasphemy

against those supernatural beings.

These false teachers are like unthinking animals, creatures of

instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, says.

They scoff at things that they do not understand, and like

animals, they'll be destroyed. Their destruction is their

reward for the harm that they've done.

They love to indulge in evil pleasures in broad daylight,

their disgrace and a stain among you.

They delight in deception even as they eat with you and your

fellowship meals. That's a scary verse.

They commit adultery with their eyes and their desire for sin is

never satisfied. They lure unstable people into

sin and they are well trained in greed.

They live under God's curse. They've wandered off the right

road and followed the footsteps of Balaam, son of Bayor, who

loved to earn money by doing wrong.

But Balaam was stopped from his mad course when his donkey

rebuked him with a human voice. Anybody remember the story of

Balaam? It's one of the weirdest ones in

the Old Testament. Why isn't that one painted in

all the kids classrooms? Let's make a note, OK, Peter's

language, I want to be very clear, his language in this

section of Scripture is absolutely blistering.

He says about false teachers that they are not just

misguided, they are arrogant and reckless and they're

destructive. And he describes them as

scoffing at supernatural beings. Now that word in the Greek is

doxis, which means glorious ones or angelic powers.

This is a subject for another day.

This is way too deep of a rabbit hole, but notice that it says

the angels don't dare to scoff at these supernatural beings.

There's a lot more in the spiritual realm than just angels

and demons. That'll be something we'll go

over over the next month. This is really intense because

Peter points out that even the angels themselves, meaning

beings that are far greater in power than us, they approach

these realities with humility and reverence.

But these false teachers, they just barge right in with pride

and they mock what they don't understand.

Why? Because their pride blinds them

to spiritual realities and they're assuming they've got

that permission that we were just talking about.

The consequences haven't hit yet.

So Peter then compares them to unthinking animals or creatures

of instinct. The Greek word there is a logos,

and it means without reason or irrational.

In case it's not obvious, this is not a compliment.

It means they live only for their appetite and impulse, not

by wisdom or submission to God. At a goldfish one time.

And I just thought, man, I'm not feeding him enough because every

time I put food in the bowl, he seemed hungry.

He died. Sometimes animals don't have the

instincts to stop. And this is the picture that

Peter is painting of these kinds of false teachers for us.

They're driven by whatever urge comes up next, and it'll

ultimately lead to their destruction.

You all have seen it happen, too, probably with a dog.

It's just that a dog doesn't eat so much that he dies.

What does he do? He throws up.

We'll get to that later on tonight.

OK You're welcome. He goes further, calling these

false teachers a disgrace and a stain.

Can we just pause for a moment in the year 2025 and commend

Peter on how sick of a burn that is?

Even today? Could you imagine just looking

at somebody and saying you are a disgrace and a stain?

Have a great time tonight with whoever you talk to.

But listen, he calls them a disgrace and a stain.

Where? At the very fellowship meals of

the church, He's not talking about non believers.

These are probably these fellowship meals were probably

what were called agape feasts. These were shared meals where

all of the early believers would gather in worship and have

communion together. And for Peter, it's shocking

that these teachers could sit at the table with the church while

living in open deception and indulgence because their eyes

are full of adultery. That's your blank adultery.

The word is vocalis in the in the Greek, and it points to both

literal and spiritual unfaithfulness.

And they lure the unstable into sin, he says.

So Peter's words remind us that sin doesn't just damage the

Sinner, it also pulls others down with it.

These false teachers are luring and unstable people.

They're not just the only ones that are damaged.

So then Peter pulls on the Old Testament story of Balaam there

at the end. And in case you're curious,

that's numbers 22 through 24. Balaam was a prophet for hire

who loved the financial perks of prophecy more than he loved

God's truth. And God did use him at times.

I want to be clear. It's very clear that God used

him at times, but his greed compromised his integrity.

That's the blank. His greed compromised his

integrity, and his story became a warning throughout Scripture.

Peter even notes that Balaam's donkey had more spiritual sense

than he did, rebuking him with a human voice.

It's almost sarcastic the way he does that.

When an animal has more discernment than you, you know

that your pride is taking them off the rails.

And I just want to highlight this because I think it's so

brilliant how Peter wrote this. He calls these false teachers

animals, senseless animals driven by their urges, and then

says, like Balaam, who was corrected by a donkey, a literal

animal. It's a juxtaposition of ideas

that is just absolutely brilliant how he did it.

So what's the take away for us today?

Then? Just like today, there are false

teachers that often show their arrogance by dismissing

spiritual realities. A lot of spiritual leaders out

there will flaunt their freedom or they'll prey on the

vulnerable people. And in the early church, some of

them even twisted God's grace into a license for sin.

I'm sure nobody would ever do that today.

Actually, a lot of people do. The same patterns still emerge.

We've got leaders that mock the authority of Scripture.

They minimize sin. That's your blank there.

They minimize sin, exploit others for money or power, and

they use these spiritual influences to indulge in

immorality. The details change, but the

arrogance looks the same. So those blanks in that

paragraph were vulnerable and minimized, in case you missed

one of them. So Peter's warning for us is

that unchecked pride always leads to destruction, and that

is not a warning for them. Is that a warning for US

whenever we live by instinct instead of by the Spirit,

Whenever we dismiss God's authority and we chase our own

appetite, we are walking the same dangerous path as the false

prophets that Peter's talking about here.

But here's the good news that's tucked away in that warning.

God sees He exposed Balaam's greed with a talking donkey.

Don't think for a second that wasn't a kindness to Balaam.

He will expose arrogance today too.

And our call is not to live in fear of this, but to discern

DISCERN. To discern.

That means to test teaching by Scripture and to value humility

over charisma. And to remember that God always

rescues the humble even as He judges the proud.

So where in my life am I tempted to live by impulse instead of

spirit? And how can I practice

discernment when I hear or see spiritual teaching that feels

flashy but might not be faithful?

Normally we've got 4 sections. There's a total of 5 tonight.

Because I told you this is a very meaty section of Scripture.

Fourth section, Empty promises. He says these people are as

useless as dried up springs or as mist blown away by the wind.

They are doomed to blackest darkness.

They brag about themselves with empty, foolish boasting, with an

appeal to twisted sexual desires.

They lure back into sin those who have barely escaped from a

lifestyle of deception. And so verse 19 says they

promised freedom, but they themselves are slaves of sin and

corruption. For you are a slave to whatever

controls you. Man.

Could you preach A sermon out of that right there?

Just that one verse. So Peter's now painting a

picture for us. I mean, picture these, a dried

up spring. What does it look like?

Dry and useless. Talks of a mist being blown away

by the wind. They're both metaphors.

That would have really stung to them because water was very

valuable. And that was 2 forms of water.

But if it dries up, if it goes away from you, it can't benefit

you. So the Greek word used for

springs is pegi. That means fountains or wells.

Fountains or wells. Remember this, in the ancient

world, a well was life. We just recently went over the

story of Jesus walking by the woman at the well.

So if you were to find a well and then realize it was dried

up, it was devastating. So Peter's point is that there

are leaders that look like sources of life, but when people

draw near, there's nothing there.

And in the same way that word missed, which is homically in

the Greek, it means fleeting, unstable or quickly swept away,

quickly swept away. That's Peters judgement.

He says that they're empty, empty temporary and headed for

destruction. And then in verse 18, he talks

about how they've got empty, foolish boasting.

And that phrase empty words there matayates.

It means meaningless, void of truth or hollow.

A member around Resurrection Sunday as a child, getting my

first chocolate Bunny and being so excited.

And you bite into it and you realize it's hollow.

It's a hollow rabbit. They puff themselves up.

They just don't have any substance.

So what's the favorite strategy of these teachers?

Well, it's to appeal to our sinful desires.

And he says especially sexual temptation.

Very, very common in the Greco Roman world where there was

temple prostitution and sexual indulgence, and it was often

tied to religion. That's your blank there.

That's pretty gross and sadly it's really no different today.

There's a lot of false teachers throughout history and in our

time exploit sexual desires for control, power, or personal

gratification. If you preach in the right

direction, you can try and Co opt a whole section of the

population to get behind you because they'll feel like you're

a voice for them. But your job is not to be a

voice for the people. No matter where you preach, your

job is to be a voice for the Lord.

Peter points out that these people especially prey on those

who have barely escaped from a lifestyle of deception.

In other words, new believers. So you're blank.

Is the word young? We're talking about young

Christians who have just left behind their old life because

these are the ones that are vulnerable.

So instead of nurturing them, growing them into maturity,

these teachers drag them back into chains.

And that word lure there is the word de la azu is in.

It's a phishing term. It's like baiting a hook and

dangling something attractive just to trap somebody.

So verse 19, here's the really hard conclusion.

He says they promised freedom, but they themselves are slaves.

And the word freedom there is L eutheria.

It's a prized idea in Peter's world because especially for

those living under Rome, it was the ultimate thing to have full

freedom. And false teachers would offer

spiritual quote, freedom as in freedom from rules, freedom to

indulge desires, freedom from restraint.

But Peter is unmasking it like a lie.

He's telling you this, if the sin controls you, you're not

free at all. You're enslaved.

That's your word, enslaved. And that phrase slave of sin

echoes Jesus's words in John 834 where he says, I tell you the

truth, everyone who sins is a slave of sin.

I don't even have to take a moment to tell you how relevant

this is for today. I mean, this really is an age

where people sell freedom in 1000 ways.

We say things like be your authentic self, do whatever

feels good, follow your truth. And so even, I mean, you would

think like out of all of this, you know, Christianity is under

attack. It's always been under attack,

but sorry if there's anybody here.

There are still people that will read whatever random newspaper

or e-mail they get and read their horoscope and they will

live their life based off of what somebody told them it means

by where the planets were in our universe when we were born.

It's another way of taking the power away from God and

ascribing it to something in the natural instead of the

supernatural. It's just in 1000 different

ways. And I just want you to know all

of culture out there is going to sell freedom through sexual

liberation, through rejection of boundaries.

By the way, every every like big website out there that's pushing

tell people your boundaries is pushing past your boundaries to

tell you to set the boundaries. I'm just going to throw that out

there. These people talk about living

without accountability. There are influencers and

celebrities and sadly there are even pastors that sometimes push

the idea that true freedom is doing what you want without fear

of judgement. And Peter is telling you right

now, please hear me, This is not freedom.

It is slavery dressed up as independence.

True freedom case you don't hear anything else tonight is only

found in Jesus. Jesus, who breaks the chains of

sin and gives the Holy Spirit to live inside of you so that you

can live in holiness. Freedom is not the ability to

indulge whatever feels good in the moment.

It's the power to say no to whatever you want to indulge in.

It's the power to obey the Holy Spirit when things are hard.

It's the Spirit enabling us to live as God designed.

So where am I most tempted to chase promises of freedom that

don't lead to life? And how can I help protect and

strengthen newer believers from being lured back into old

patterns of sin? If you don't answer any of these

personal insights, answer that one and I'll tell you why.

Helping a new believer find their footing in Christ is not

the pastor's job. I mean, it is, but it's the

Christian's job. I'm just assuming that the

pastor is going to be a Christian.

So for the church, this is our job.

OK, to look after our own last section, it's just three verses.

Second Peter, chapter 2, verses 20 through 22.

2 Peter 2:20–22

After all of this challenging Scripture, now we've got the

danger of turning back. He says when people escape from

the wickedness of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior

Jesus Christ, and then get tangled up and enslaved by sin

again, they are worse off than before. 1st 2021.

He says it would be better if they had never known the way to

righteousness than to know it and then reject the command that

they were given to live a holy life.

And verse 22, they proved the truth of this proverb.

A dog returns to its vomit, and another says a washed pig

returns to the mud. Well, here we go.

Peter is describing people who have tasted freedom in Christ

but then go back to the very chains they were set free from.

This is not somebody who's investigating somebody who's

unsure. This is somebody who has lived

for Jesus and then chosen to go live in the world.

He says they're worse off than before.

Why? Because somebody who knows it

and turns their back on it, they have actually deceived

themselves and not just been deceived by the world.

Their conscience gets dulled this way and their heart always

becomes harder. It's very difficult to win back

a brother who used to serve the Lord and now has chosen not to.

Not impossible though. So the word there that is used

in in the phrase tangled up in verse 20, it comes from the

Greek emplico, which means to be entwined, like being caught in a

net or twisted up in thorns if you ever gotten caught in a

thorn Bush or something like that.

I remember as a kid I built a little tree house in this giant

holly holly tree or something. And most of the time I was good,

but anytime I tried to run in and out of it, it snagged on

something. And on a bad day, it wasn't my

clothes. Once you're stuck, every move

that you take actually pulls it tighter.

And so Peter's warning is that sin always entangles us.

It doesn't let you dabble in it without eventually dragging you

in deeper. And then he uses another really

strong word here that we've used in a couple other verses.

He uses the word enslaved. And that word is Doulo.

It means to be made a slave or bound in service.

So sometimes when we read this, we hear it in a poetic way.

In fact, we sing worship songs. I'm no longer a slave to sin.

But it's not just about sin having ownership over you.

Bound for what? Service?

In service to your sin. That sounds a little more gross,

doesn't it? That now you do the things that

your sin dictates? This is what he's talking about,

and it echoes those words that Jesus talked about in the in the

previous section that we talked about.

Everybody who sins is a slave of sin.

So the tragedy here is that false teachers will always,

always promise freedom, but their followers always end up

bound instead. So in verse 21, when he says

that it would be better if they'd never known the way of

righteousness, he's not saying that ignorance saves people.

Some, I've heard, make a case that you shouldn't even share

the gospel with somebody if you know they're not going to accept

it. That is false.

It doesn't mean that they're saved through their ignorance.

What he means is that rejecting light after you've walked in.

It carries heavier consequences, which is the blame.

It carries heavier consequences than never having seen it.

Greater knowledge brings greater responsibility.

Please tell me I'm not the only one that thought of spider man.

OK, thank you. Finally, Peter drives his point

home here with two different proverbs that his audience would

have been very familiar with. One, I promised you we'd get

there, a dog returning to its vomit, referencing Proverbs

2611, and he also talks about a pig returning to the mud.

Both of these images highlight the same truth, that without

genuine transformation, you will always go back to what you know.

You'll always go back to what you know.

Here's why this really matters, Christians.

It's not enough to just learn about Jesus.

Unless you get actual transformation in your life.

At some point, life is going to get hard.

It's going to wear you out. You're going to feel like you

have a lack of hope. This is a season that a lot of

people are struggling with that. And when that happens, you'll

revert back to what you know. The danger is what you knew

before Jesus was not of Jesus. And that's where you have

somebody who walked in the light but chose to go back.

Furthermore, think about it. Dogs eat what makes them sick on

purpose, and pigs, no matter how clean they are, still love to

roll in the mud afterwards. People without the spirits

renewing work will always return to sin, rolling in the mud and

eating vomit. Now, here's where it's really

cool. When you think about the Jewish

culture, this would have been actually pretty graphic to

Peter's audience. Why?

Because in Jewish culture, both dogs and pigs were considered

unclean animals, and he intentionally used both of them.

His audience would have felt the sting because he's saying going

back to sin is like returning to the filth that you've been freed

from. And so for us today, this is a

call for us to persevere. So please hear me when I say

this tonight, even though this is not a typical sermon for

preaching. It's a Bible study.

I get that. But don't play games with your

sin, don't settle for surface level change, and don't treat

the grace of God as a license to drift back into old patterns.

When Jesus saves you, he saves you to transform you, not just

to give you a ticket into the afterlife of your preference.

And the Holy Spirit's work is meant to keep us moving forward,

not so that we can go back. So here's your final blank.

The encouragement here is that God doesn't just warn us.

That would be kind enough of Him.

He also equips us, and through His Spirit, through His word,

through His people, He always gives us the strength to resist

returning to the old life. The question is just whether

we'll stay alert and surrendered and stay connected.