To Catch A Theological Smuggler - [2 Peter 2:17-22]

Well, we have been growing, dear church. Lots of new people coming, and you might ask yourself the question, why are new people coming? And maybe there are several reasons for that. One is we are open for worship services, and so people come because some churches are closed.

I think that's legitimate. But I think another reason why people are coming out of the church is the churches that they are leaving continue to give them a dose of, a regular dose of, and only a dose of, more law.

I could explain it this way. Driving down the 495 the other day, traffic is kind of back to pre-COVID traffic, and they have a little thing on the side of the freeway there on the side of 95, 495. How do you say it again?

Can I say that, 495? I can say it. I like definite articles. On the side of 495, and they have some place that you can go for a little sabbatical. What do they call those things? Rest stop. And you know what I like to do at rest stops?

I like to go to the rest stops, and then pay the money to sit in the IndyCar simulator to drive for another hour. Remember when I was in high school and I was taking driver's ed classes, and I had to go to the simulator, and you would be driving this old car, and there would be a dog that would run across, and we'd have to slam on the brakes, but not too hard.

I mean, nobody drives for hour upon hour after hour, goes to the rest stop, and then wants to drive more. And all week long, we are bombarded with to do things, and to accomplish things, and to achieve things.

And the last thing Christians need on a Sunday morning is to be told this, drive more, drive faster, drive harder, do more. That's the last thing Christians need. Christians, of course, can be told to do things, that's certain, but not at the expense of preaching the person and work of the Lord Jesus.

You know why I think people are coming to this church? Because they're tired of driving harder and faster to only go on a Sunday rest day to be told you need to be doing more. And so if you take your Bibles, please, and turn to 2 Peter chapter one, we are going to make sure we get a good long look at the Lord Jesus Christ, so that because of gratitude, because of glorifying Him, because of it's the right thing to do, then we can size up false teachers.

There's nothing wrong with doing things in light of gratitude, but there's everything wrong with doing things when there's no focus on the object of our faith, the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm quite certain that people could go to church week in and week out and hardly ever hear about the wonderful person and work of the Lord Jesus.

You're adopted, dear Christian, into the family of God. God accepts you in the beloved. You're forgiven. You're justified. God's not at war with you anymore. You're reconciled. And you say, well, if you talk that way, people might take advantage of that.

Well, they might, they shouldn't, but this is the way we talk to Christians. If you're not a Christian, of course, you're not adopted. You're a father of Satan. But for Christians, as we come together to worship, you need to be reminded of the person and work of the gracious and merciful Lord Jesus Christ.

And I think that's why BBC is growing. Now, chapter two is where we are in 2 Peter. And if you're new to the church, we're going verse by verse through books of the Bible so that you might get to know them for yourself.

It would be wrong if you went home today and said, I got everything out of that myself before the sermon, pastor didn't help me understand context and flow or anything like that. I want you to understand this for yourself.

And you have paid my bills this week so I could study to preach to you. And 2 Peter two is all about false teachers, but to remind you of the Lord Jesus so that you continue to rest in him, even though there's a world full of false teachers.

I want to reconstruct to you the person and work of Jesus from chapter one alone. Maybe I could put it this way. If you had no other chapters in all the Bible, but 2 Peter chapter one, what could you learn about Jesus?

Is there enough in here about Jesus? I mean, why did not Peter just say chapter two verse one is the start of the book. False prophets also arose among the people just as there will be false teachers among you who will secretly bring in destructive heresies.

Why didn't he start there? Why chapter one? Why does it exist? What could you learn about Jesus Christ pulling off on that rest stop of a busy week to be encouraged, to be refreshed, not to do more, not to just accomplish more, not to achieve more, but to remind us who Jesus is so then we can survey the landscape through the lens of a risen savior.

What could you learn about Jesus so that we might be prepared for chapter two and the onslaught of the false teachers that exist maybe even in this church, certainly in evangelicalism? Well, it could start off in chapter one verse one.

What could I learn about Jesus? He's called Jesus Christ. Christ means Messiah. All the Old Testament promises of this anointed King who would rule, all the Davidic promises are found in Jesus Christ.

He is in fact the Messiah. He actually sends people to tell us about him. See that in verse one, an apostle of Jesus Christ. We could learn in chapter one, if that's the only book of the Bible we had, the only chapter we had, God wants us to know.

He reveals himself, not just in nature, but also specifically in scripture that he sends people to teach us about himself. We could also learn this about Jesus. To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing, chapter one, verse one.

Here's what that means. By sovereign will, by the free will of God, he gives Christians faith. He gives an unbeliever faith and they become a Christian. It's sovereign. You could learn that God is sovereign when it comes to election and sovereign when it comes to who goes to his holy heaven.

What if you only had second Peter one to learn about Jesus? What else could you learn? Verse one, by the righteousness of our God and savior, Jesus Christ. You could learn this dear Christian, that God, the righteous God, expects righteous living to get into heaven.

No unrighteousness. Well, we're unrighteous and we've sinned and so we need a righteousness earned by another. We could learn that Jesus, the God man, was under the law of God and he kept the law, not for himself, but for us, so that now we stand before God as completely righteous.

What else can we learn? Verse two, Jesus is gracious and he gives peace. Jesus, of course, is grace incarnate. And when you think about grace, don't think of substances, don't think about gas and you're driving down the freeway and you run out of gas and they need a little more grace.

It is Jesus incarnate. You would know that, especially if you're a Christian, God has been gracious to you. He's been merciful to you. He also not saves you, just not only saves you, but verse three, what could you learn about Jesus?

It's his divine power that is granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. You could learn about Jesus that he not only saves, but he sanctifies. He not only justifies and counts you as righteous based on the work of Jesus, but he also says, I'm just not gonna leave you where you were.

I'm gonna help you live a holy life. The power of the spirit of God. You could learn that Jesus knows the future because he said in verses 12 and following to Peter, this is how you're gonna die and you are gonna die.

We could learn in verse 14 that he's the Lord. We could learn in verses 16 and following that he is the majestic glory and in the triune nature of God, the father says to the son, this is my beloved son.

It is good and right for us to get a good long view of who Jesus is before we deal with the assault of the false teachers. Does this strike a chord with you? A woman named Martha welcomed him into her house, welcomed Jesus.

And she had a sister called Mary who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?

Tell her then to help me. The Lord answered her. What did he say to her? Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.

That's so good to be reminded that the ultimate worship is not doing, we will do in light of God's graciousness to us, but to sit at the Lord's feet and to remember if that's not on Sunday morning service, you're at the wrong service because all week it's law, law, law, law.

Guess what? Inside your heart, law, law, law, law with conscience. I would like to be reminded of the person and work of the Lord Jesus. And Peter knows that. He might've denied Jesus once, twice, three times, but he will not deny him again.

And before Peter attacks any problem, before you attack any problem, I'm anxious, I'm fearful. There's relationship problems. Something's going on at work. You have to do it through the lens of the person and work of Jesus Christ, because what you don't need is for me to say, do more.

I could say in light of who Jesus is, this is what you should do, but do more is the wrong way to go about it. And of course, after we learn about the Lord Jesus and are reminded about him, we have to deal with this issue of false teachers.

I wish they didn't exist, but since Jesus, the true teacher exists, there will be false teachers. And what you might be saying is, you know what? The false teachers, they've got liturgettes. They've got compact centers.

They've got all kinds of money. They got nice suits, $20 ,000 watches. There's even a thing called pastor's sneakers now online where the pastors are wearing five, 10, $15 ,000 sneakers on a Sunday morning.

I just want you to know, Marshall's, 59 bucks. They're not sneakers either. I didn't do that for a service. Take that out of the video. If Jesus is the way, the truth, the life, if every one of you, in fact, you will die and stand before God, a holy God, a righteous God, you're going to need to be rescued.

You're going to need a savior. You're going to need somebody who lived the life you should have lived, who died for the sins that you committed and conquered death. You're gonna need that. And so I love 2 Peter because it's a good template for all of us.

You just can't walk into life saying, you know what? Don't be anxious, don't be anxious, don't be anxious. I just have to try not to be anxious and this, that, and the other, whatever particular issue you're working on or through, it needs to be through the lens of the person and the work of the Lord Jesus.

Will these people be judged though? Verse three of chapter two, their condemnation from long ago is not idle and their destruction is not asleep. They have nice clothes, they have nice cars, they have nice mansions.

And you know what? Maybe God is asleep at the judgment wheel. I mean, maybe he forgot. I mean, it's kind of hard to run the universe, I would imagine, and kind of busy. Lots of things going on in Israel now and other places.

And he's like, well, you know, I'll get to the false teachers when I get to them. Verse four though reminds us, God doesn't fall asleep when it comes to judgment. When angels sinned, what happened? Cast into hell.

When everybody on the world, except Noah and his seven family members, what happened there? He didn't spare them. The worldwide flood on the ungodly. What about Sodom and Gomorrah? With the exception of Lot and some family members, all condemned to extinction.

God is not asleep at the judgment wheel. And so we get a good picture of who Jesus is and what he's done and how we can rest in him and trust in him and be empowered by his spirit. And now we size up false teachers and we see what they do.

And we say to ourself, okay, they're going to get it. We can rest in that. We can make sure we don't have to worry about false teachers. They're bad role models, don't follow them. And so today we come to our passage verses 14b through 22.

We made it all the way through verse 22 at the first service. And I think we can make it through on this service as well. We're going to look at verses 14b through 22. And I'm going to give you seven nos for an outline.

N-O, not N-O-S-E. Seven nos so that you say no to false teachers. He said, they're going to sneak in. They're like, you know, to catch a smuggler, to catch a drug smuggler. People try to bring in cocaine and they make pallets of cocaine.

They put it in boa constrictors. They swallow it. They sneak into places. They sneak the drugs into places. And false teachers sneak into churches too. But here we're going to see the effects of false teaching so that you say, I don't want to do that.

You know, I was reading this book about false teachers and my friend is reading a book about false teachers written by a false teacher rather. And I think I need to warn them. Seven nos when it comes to saying no to false teachers.

So you know what's behind the scenes. These false teachers that deny the Lord Jesus, that say He's not the only begotten Son. He's not begotten of the Father before all worlds. He's not God of God. He's not light of light.

He's not very God of very God. He's not begotten. He's made. He's not of one substance with the Father. He not for our salvation came down from heaven was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary and was made man.

He's not any of those. And especially the part we don't like as false teachers. He shall come again with glory to judge the quick and the dead. We don't want the judgment part. By the way, who was the first person that ever denied judgment?

The judgment of God. These false teachers are like Satan. You surely won't die. You're not going to die. We need to be on high alert. Seven no's so that you say no to false teachers. Number one, why should you say no to a false teacher?

They have no eternal perspective. The first no is they have no eternal perspective. They're in it for today. Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. Get everything today. Look at verse 14b. They have hearts trained in greed.

Second Peter chapter two. Accursed children, forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. It followed the way of Balaam, the son of Baor, who loved gain from wrongdoing, but was rebuked for his own transgression.

A speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet's madness. It would behoove all of us as Christians to remember that we are to have an eternal perspective. There is a day that we'll die and meet God.

There is a day that the Lord Jesus will come back. And even in the Proverbs, the Proverbs teach us that the fool says only today, no tomorrow. No consequences, no forethought. If I do this cause effect, what will happen?

It's the wise person in the Proverbs that says, if I do this, there's a payday tomorrow. There's a consequence the next day. These false teachers have no eternal perspective. So why would you listen to them?

Look at what it says in verse 14. They have hearts trained in greed. We get that word gymnasium from the word training. You ever go to the gym, the gymnasium? And what do you do at the gym? Well, you go to the latte bar, of course, is what you do.

No, you train, you do reps, you do sets. You're working out, you're drinking protein drinks and creatine and other things. That's the word here, gymnasium. These false teachers, when it comes to greed, they work out.

They plan, they do things, they're active. And they work out so much, they pretty much have a PhD in greed. Their doctoral dissertation is how to extract money from Christians or so-called Christians.

Napoleon, the great theologian said, well, everybody's a theologian, right? Either good or bad. Napoleon, I am surrounded by priests who repeat incessantly that their kingdom is not of this world, and yet they lay hands on everything they can get.

I find it fascinating as a side note, probably less than five times in 25 years, we've talked about money from this pulpit or I have. How can the giving be above the budget? Because if you show people the glories of Christ Jesus, you freely give, do you not?

I don't have to harangue you for money and all the different reasons we need money and the incessant barometers and everything that seemed to be shrinking and not growing. No, on the other hand, they're in it for the money.

We're filling pews, it's nickels and noses. What does Peter say? And it is one of these you better duck. Accursed children, you heretic, you're gonna be under the curse of God. False teacher, you're in it for money, you're in it for now.

No blessing for you, no shalom for you. You're accursed children, you little brats, undisciplined, selfish children, no parents. That's how you act except you're a false teacher. This is not benediction, good word, this is malediction, bad word.

Isaiah 57, children of destruction. Hosea 10, children of wrongdoing. Ephesians 2, you're familiar with it, children of wrath. These are an accursed brood, accursed children. Why would I want to kind of snuggle up to them?

Now, if I did a word association and I said to you, think of an Old Testament character. When I say greed, you say this person's name. And so let's do it. Greed, Balaam. There you go, it's right in the text.

It was not a trick question. I know every time I ask you a question, you think it's a trick question. Balaam was greedy and Balaam said, you know what? I can extract money from the bad guys so we get after Israel.

And here, the writer Peter, very familiar with the Old Testament, knows the example of greed by Balaam. They, like Balaam, verse 15, forsake the right way, they've gone astray. I mean, what do they do?

The right way is to teach the glories of Jesus. The right way is we're not gonna try to extract money. The right way is you're an undershepherd of the chief shepherd. The right way is you get out of the way as the preacher and you don't make it all for today.

What they did is they left the right way. The way, the truth, and the life, let's go off. Not on the right way, not even just the wrong way, but the crooked way, the perverse way. That's what they do.

They're just full of greed and they're just like Balaam. Do you see it there? Following the way of Balaam. He's not called son of Baor in the Old Testament, but that's a play on words, I believe. The son of flesh.

He's so fleshly. He's the son of flesh, that's what he does, who loved gain from wrongdoing. He forsakes the right way, the straight way, the way a prophet should be preaching the Lord Jesus, the Messiah, and he goes off on the crooked way.

Now, if I said to you, where do you find Balaam in the Old Testament? You, of course, would say Numbers chapter what? 22, let's go there. Just let me quickly read to you. Balaam, it's a count that Peter is referencing.

And what Peter's trying to do is say, do you know what? Don't be telling yourself they're nice, they're friendly. They've got a few good nuggets in their teaching. False teachers, they don't have any eternal perspective to get earned for money.

Don't give them your money. Balaam is found in Numbers 22 for our point today. He's a greedy false teacher and God is going to use a donkey to rebuke him. Now, you might be saying to me, if you're visiting, I don't know how a donkey could talk English.

Well, he's not speaking English here, it's Hebrew, so that's one thing. But if God can create the universe by divine fiat world, I think he could probably have a donkey talk. Don't you think so? If Jesus Christ can be raised from the dead, everything else just settles down.

Can God talk through a donkey? The answer is yes. Certainly the Lord Jesus would have said, oh, I forgot all the Old Testament is good and true and right and wholesome and God-breathed and authoritative and profitable, except the whole donkey thing, because that didn't really happen.

It's just a figment of somebody's imagination. No, the Lord Jesus affirms this in his prophetic ministry. Numbers 22, let me just read a few verses so you know what's going on in Peter's mind as he equates greed.

With Balaam. Numbers 22 verse 21, so Balaam rose in the morning, saddled his donkey and went with the princes of Moab, because he wants the Moabites' money, so he wants to curse Israel. But God's anger was kindled because he went and the angel of the Lord took a stand in the way of his adversary, as his adversary rather.

Now he was riding the donkey and two servants were with him and the donkey saw the angel of the Lord standing in the road with a drawn sword in his hand. Donkey turned aside out of the road, went into the field.

Balaam struck the donkey to turn her into the road. Then the angel of the Lord stood in a narrow path between the vineyards with a wall on either side. And when the donkey saw the angel of the Lord, she pushed against the wall and pressed Balaam's foot against the wall.

So he struck her again. Verse 26, then the angel of the Lord went ahead and stood in a narrow place where there was no way to turn either to the right or to the left. When the donkey saw the angel of the Lord, she laid down under Balaam.

Balaam's anger was kindled and he struck the donkey with a staff. Then the Lord opened the mouth of the donkey and she said to Balaam, what have I done to you that you have struck me these three times?

Balaam said to the donkey, because you have made a fool of me, I wish I had a sword in my hand for I would kill you. The donkey said to Balaam, am I not your donkey on which you have ridden all your life long to this day?

Is it my habit to treat you in this way? No. Then the Lord opened the eyes of Balaam and he saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way with his drawn sword in his hand and he bowed down and fell on his face.

And the angel of the Lord said to him, why have you struck your donkey these three times? Behold, I have come out to oppose you because your way, sound familiar, is perverse before me. The donkey saw me and turned aside because before me these three times, if she had not turned aside for me, surely now I would have killed you and let her live.

Then Balaam said to the angel of the Lord, I have sinned for I did not know that you stood in the road against me. Now, therefore, if it is evil in your sight, I will turn back. It's a Judas like repentance.

Verse 35, and the angel of the Lord said to Balaam, go with these men, but speak only the word I tell you. So Balaam went on with the princes of Balak. Back to 2nd Peter chapter two. That's the passage that he's referring to that of course the Old Testament saints knew well, Peter knew well, his only Bible was the Old Testament and whatever Pauline writings he had that he made allusion to in chapter three.

When you think of false teachers, you ought to be thinking to yourself, why would I follow them? They have no eternal perspective, they're in it for the money. Positively, we are to have an eternal perspective.

Jesus said, do not store up for yourself treasures on earth where moths and vermin destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven where moths and vermin do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And the apostle sent by Jesus named Paul, he said in 2nd Corinthians four, so we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen. Since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

It is a sign of a godly preacher following in the line of the Lord Jesus to talk about heaven often, the return of Christ often and eternal realities. Johnny Erickson taught of the young lady jumped in the river head first and was paralyzed from the head down, wrote later in her book, Heaven, Your Real Home.

She said, when a Christian realizes his citizenship is in heaven, he begins acting as a responsible citizen of earth. He invest wisely in relationships because he knows they're eternal. His conversations, goals and motives become pure and honest because he realizes these will have a bearing on everlasting reward.

He gives generously of time, money and talent because he's laying up treasure for eternity. He spreads the good news of Christ because he longs to fill heaven's ranks with his friends and neighbors. All this serves the pilgrim well, not only in heaven, but on earth, for it serves everyone around him.

False teaching leads to ungodly living and you wanna just get everything now. Not only that, number two, the second no, why you should say no to false teachers. They have no eternal perspective, number one, and now found in verse 17, there's no edification with them, no real maturity.

You'd like to grow, you'd like to mature, you'd like to say, I'd like to have a deeper appreciation for the things of the Lord Jesus. I'd like to say no to that besetting sin more often, yes to serve other people in the Lord.

Well, you're not gonna get it listening to false teachers. Any change in behavior will simply be behavior modification. It's not going to be real. Verse 17, good metaphors for living in a dry, arid climate in the Middle East.

These teachers, false teachers, are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. Oh, can you imagine? I don't know, when's the thirstiest you've ever been? And maybe you're on a long bicycle ride and you didn't bring enough water and you thought the place was down the street and sometimes I've kind of run out of water and I've almost wanna ride up to people and say, could I have some water from your hose?

Or maybe there's no places and you're like, I just want something to drink. Oh, there's that spring there. There's that spring. I've walked across the peninsula and I'm almost there and there's a spring and you go over there, there's no water.

That's like the false teacher, there's no real substance. It's an illusion, it's a mirage. That's a lot different than when Jesus said to the woman at the well, everyone who drinks of this literal water will be thirsty again.

But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will be in him a spring of water, welling up to eternal life. And then three chapters later, our Lord Jesus said similarly on the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.

Whoever believes in me as the scripture said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. You want no nourishment, you want no maturation. I think this is true. And for the most part, I think our church is understanding false teachers.

But if you've ever met somebody that's been a Christian for 40 years and they're super immature, this could be one of the reasons because they just want to have themselves gutted with and glutted with false teaching.

It doesn't mature people. Waterless springs. He gives another metaphor, mists driven by a storm. I mean, that's interesting, isn't it? They're waterless springs, or Jude calls them waterless clouds. Here, just think of chaos.

Just think of, okay, a mist. You got a storm and you got a mist. What happens to a mist in a storm? I mean, confusion, instability, going all around, blowing around whichever way, hither, thither, pell, mell, off it goes, in and out.

It's almost like, oh, I've got some kind of sin in my life and I'd like relief. I'd like to even know that I'm forgiven. And I think I can capture it. There's the mist of forgiveness and I try to grab it and it's gone.

That's the false teacher. Israel followed imposters like this. Jeremiah two, they forsaken the Lord, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, cisterns that cannot hold water. And regularly, even in Jeremiah chapter 14, waterlessness is a sign of abandonment by God.

Like newborn infants, dear Christian, long for the pure milk of the word, that by it, you may grow into salvation. If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. And that's why when we learn the Bible, we learn everything in there.

And you say, well, some of the parts I don't like in the Bible. Well, join the club. Think, oh, look at these angles and these sharp angles and God's justice just shows you our mind. We're finite and we're sinful and we can't explain it all.

But it is our job to say, you know what? This is good for me and I want to be taught all of it. And if it convicts me, great. If it encourages me, great. I'm not gonna pick and choose and cut and paste like false teachers do.

You know, it's like when the kids would say, you can make the Bible say anything you want. Go out and hang yourself. What you do, do quickly. I mean, who wants to be following that kind of advice? I'm thankful to be at a church, Bethlehem Bible Church, where you want the Bible.

J .C. Ryle said, you live in a world where your soul is in constant danger. Enemies are around you on every side. Your own heart is even deceitful. Satan is laboring to lead you astray. False teachers, false doctrine abound.

Be safe, so be well-armed. Provide yourself the weapons which God has given for your help. You must store your mind with holy scripture. Neglect your Bible and nothing I know of can prevent you from error.

If a plausible advocate of false teaching shall happen to meet you. You are the man that is unlikely to become established in the truth. I shall not be surprised, Ryle said, to hear that you are troubled with doubts and questions about assurance, grace, faith, perseverance.

I shall not wonder if I'm told that you have problems in your marriage, problems with your children, problems about the conduct of your family and about the company you keep. So instead, 2 Peter 3, grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Thirdly, why should you say no to false teachers? Because there are no reservations in heaven with them or for them. No eternal perspective, no edification, no reservations in heaven. Why would I follow somebody that's going to hell?

Because they're going to take me with them. Verse 17b, for them, the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. False teachers are going to go to hell, the very hell they deny, the second coming they deny, the judgment they deny.

That's what's going to happen. Why would you want to go on the bus with them? Get off that bus. Future judgment of the false teachers, they might deny it, they might mock, they might scoff. But it's reserved, do you see that?

It's reserved. Loge seats reserved for them in hell. Do you want to follow them? Yeah, but they're so nice. They've got so much. Reserve seats in the blackest darkness. Jude 13, the parallel passage, the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever.

Remember their destiny. You don't want to follow somebody that's taking you to hell. And by the way, they're not saying, come to hell with me. They're saying, come to heaven with me. But it's not through that narrow gate.

It's not through that narrow road. It's the wide road. Our Lord Jesus said, when the son of man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

Why would I want to follow the goat herder? I know you wouldn't want to follow him either. If you turn back to 1 Peter 1, of course, who wrote 2 Peter? Peter, who wrote 1 Peter? Any guesses? Peter, good.

You're smarter than most liberal theologians. Sometime this week, read 1 Peter and 2 Peter together. And you'll see wonderful connections like this. They have hell reserved for them. Don't follow them.

What do we have, dear Christian? What's a real teacher preach? What's Peter teach? The apostolic sent one of the Lord Jesus. Jesus wanted Peter to preach this message. And here's the message from Peter.

Verse 3, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus from the dead to an inheritance.

Think about eternal truths. That is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, reserved are kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

And what is a Christian response to that truth that heaven is reserved for you? Dear Christian, it's reserved. It's guaranteed. What's the response? What's for lunch? Well, the response is, in this you rejoice.

How are you going to go to heaven? Though now for a little while, if necessary, you've been grieved by various trials. Why do we go through trials? So that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes through, though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in the praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Bethlehem Bible Church, though you have not seen Jesus, you love Him. Though you do not see Jesus now, you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory. And what's the end game?

Gloom, darkness, hell, torment? No, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls. By the way, false teachers will tell you if you're going through troubles now, it's because you don't have enough faith.

And the Bible says you're going through troubles now because you're being tested, groomed. What a great truth. Reserved in heaven for me. I know with my actions and attitudes this week, if I could have unreserved that spot in heaven for me, it would have been done.

How about you? The way I live this week in front of God and my family, I have kept my reservation in heaven. Is that how you would talk? Good thing it has been reserved. Back to 2 Peter 2. Why should you avoid false teachers?