WWUTT 693 Disqualified Regarding the Faith?

2 Timothy 3: The Last Days, False Teachers, and Those Disqualified Regarding the Faith

It's hard to believe, but we've got some men and even some women out there whose responsibility is to teach the truth, and instead they oppose the truth, and they're disqualified regarding the faith when we understand the text.

You're listening to When We Understand the Text, an online Bible ministry so that we may know all the riches freely given to us by God. For questions and comments, send us an email to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com.

Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. We continue with our study of 2 Timothy chapter 3 verses 1 through 9. The Apostle Paul writes to Timothy, but understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty, for people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness but denying its power.

Avoid such people, for among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.

Just as Janus and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also opposed the truth, men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. But they will not get very far, for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men.

Andy Stanley’s Claim That Christians Should Unhitch from the Old Testament

For an example of those who have an appearance of godliness but deny its power, I used a sermon that was recently preached by Andy Stanley, a series that he did in April, a three-part series entitled Aftermath, and it was the third part of that series that got the most attention, because it was in part three that he said Christians needed to unhitch themselves from the Old Testament.

I was playing a portion of that sermon yesterday, I didn't get all the way to the part that I wanted to play because I try to allow myself 20 minutes to do the Bible lesson, I need to be wrapping it up by then.

So I wanted to come back to one last clip from that particular sermon, picking up where I left off yesterday, where Stanley says that the Ten Commandments are not important, and he outright says that you don't have to follow the Ten Commandments.

Here is Stanley.

The Old Covenant, the Old Covenant Law of Moses was not the go-to source regarding sexual behavior in the church. More importantly, and perhaps more disturbingly, that's a word, or offensively, the Old Testament, or the Law and the Prophets as they called it, was not going to be the go-to source for any behavior in the church.

Now to make this point, because this is so important, I originally in my notes, I was going to put a screen up here that said, in other words, that means thou shalt not obey the Ten Commandments. But I knew someone would take a picture of that, and it would define me for the rest of my life.

So I'm not going to put it up there, but I want you to hear me say it. Here's what the Jerusalem Council was saying to the Gentiles. You are not accountable to the Ten Commandments. You're not accountable to the Jewish law.

We're done with that. God has done something new. Besides, he would say to them and he would say to you, thou shalt not obey the Ten Commandments because those aren't your commandments. Yours are better, and yours are far less complicated, but they are far more demanding.

Because you see, look up here. When you begin to view every single person you meet, red, yellow, black, or white, rich, poor, vulnerable, not vulnerable. When you begin to view every single person you are eyeball to eyeball with as made in the image of God and a potential dwelling place for the Spirit of God, you will treat them well.

You will not need chapter and verse. You will do for them what God, through Christ, has done for you. Any questions? This was a new and better day.

That is a prime example of theological liberalism, ladies and gentlemen. All you need is love. You don't need the Ten Commandments. You don't need chapter and verse. All you need to know is that Jesus told you to love your neighbor, and you need to look at other people as being made in the image of God, and then put those two things together.

You will instinctively know how to treat another person well, which is completely subjective. I don't think Stanley just unhitched Christians from the Old Testament in that sermon. I think that he unhitched them from the Bible entirely.

In Matthew chapter 22, a lawyer approached Jesus and asked him this question, and you know this. Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law? And Jesus said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.

This is the great and first commandment. Where did Jesus get that from? It's written in Deuteronomy, the law of Moses. Then he goes on, verse 39, a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Where did he get that one from? The book of Leviticus. And then in verse 40, on these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets. The Ten Commandments are divided up into what we refer to as the first and second table of the law.

The first four commandments are vertical. They have to do with our relationship with God. The next six commandments are horizontal. They have to do with man's relationship with one another. So what are those first four commandments?

The first one is I am the Lord your God. You will have no other God before me. The second commandment is you will not make any graven image and worship it. The third commandment is do not take my name in vain.

And the fourth commandment is do not disrespect my day. You will honor the Sabbath and keep it holy. Those are the first four commandments. The next six again are horizontal commandments. And the first of those horizontal commandments is you will honor your father and your mother.

The second one is do not murder or that would end up being the sixth commandment. The seventh commandment is do not commit adultery. The where am I at? Eighth commandment would be do not steal. The ninth commandment would be do not lie or bear false witness.

And the 10th commandment is do not covet. And I memorized those 10 commandments a long time ago. You know why? Because that was what Jesus' answer was. The greatest commandment is the first four. You will love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

The second greatest commandment is the next six. You will love your neighbor as yourself. It's all important. All of the law and the prophets point to those two essentials. And Jesus said plainly in Matthew 5 .18, for truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot will pass from the law until it is all accomplished.

What is the responsibility of man? What is our duty? What has God called us to do? The duty which God requires of man is obedience to his revealed will. Micah 6 .8, he has told you, oh man, what is good.

And what does the Lord require of you? But to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God. Ecclesiastes 12 .13, fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.

Psalm 119, verse 4, you have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently. And once again, John 14 .15, which I believe I quoted yesterday, Jesus saying to his disciples, you will show me that you love me when you obey my commandments.

When did God first reveal to us the rule for our obedience? And the rule which God first revealed to man for his obedience was the moral law. And where do we have the moral law best summarized? That would be in the Decalogue, otherwise known as the Ten Commandments.

Do you really think that Jesus is telling Christians, there is not a need for you to have to be moral anymore? There is no commandment by which you have to follow in order to understand what it means to do justice, and love mercy, and walk humbly with your God?

Are those ambiguous terms? How do we even understand what that means to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself? The Scriptures. Romans 15 .4, for whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures, we might have hope.

And there in that letter that Paul is writing to the Romans, he's not referring to the New Testament there. He's talking about the Old Testament. In 2 Peter 1, verses 16 through 21, we read Peter saying, for we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was born to him by the majestic glory, this is my beloved son with whom I am well-pleased, we ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.

And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

Christ Fulfilled the Law, and Salvation Comes by Grace Through Faith

Now, the law guides us in all understanding of morality and God's expectations for his people to live upright and godly lives in the present age. What the law is powerless to do for us is save us. You cannot keep the law to be saved.

You could follow all those laws until you are blue in the face. It does not make you any better in the presence of God. We find in the law our inability to keep it, and we will fail, we will stumble, we will fall flat on our face time and time again.

We will be no more closer to God at the end of keeping all of those laws than we were before we started. So we were powerless to keep the law, and it's in breaking God's moral law that all have sinned and fallen short of God's glory.

No one can keep it, all fall short of it. And so we needed a savior to cover over our sins for our rebellion against God and our breaking his law and our moral failure to be as holy and righteous as he.

But it wasn't just the fact that we were striving for God and we couldn't quite make it there. I mean, we were in outright rebellion. We just didn't even want to follow the law. And because of the sinful nature that is within us, whenever the law was presented to us, our nature wanted to rebel against it.

The law says, do not covet, and in response, we wanted to go covet something because we just did not want to obey God. It was in the rebellion that we had in our flesh. What we deserve for that is to be destroyed.

We deserve death, but that is not what God gave us. He gave us mercy and grace through his son, Jesus Christ. Because Christ came and fulfilled all the law and the prophets. What that means, which Stanley doesn't understand, what it means when we read that Jesus fulfilled all the law and the prophets, doesn't mean he abolished them.

It means that he kept perfectly what we could not do. We couldn't keep the law. Jesus did. He did it all perfectly, and he became in his life our representative so that when he went to the cross, he became our substitute by his death.

The perfect spotless lamb for us whose blood that he shed on the cross covers over all of our sins. There is not a sin that we commit that is not covered by the blood of Christ because Christ kept all the law perfectly.

So when we break it, Jesus kept it, and his blood covers over our sins. And then realizing that salvation is only through Jesus Christ and not through our moral character, because we've got no good character before God, we could not keep the law.

We beg God for mercy because we rebelled against him and because we broke his law, and he shows us mercy and grace through his son, Jesus Christ. We are clothed with the righteousness of Christ. He has taken our sin upon himself.

By faith, he has clothed us in his righteousness. By our faith in Jesus, he has cleansed us from our sins so that when God looks at us, he does not see the sinful, wretched creature that was deserving of his wrath, but rather he sees the righteousness of Christ, the righteousness by which he kept all the law perfectly.

We've been cleansed of our sins, and now we are justified. We are received by God. We are worthy to be able to stand in his presence. And now, having been clothed in Christ's righteousness, we can honor God in a way that is acceptable and pleasing to him.

Whereas before, all of the things that we did were filthy and dirty, wretched rags. That's what we have in Isaiah 64 .6. All of our best deeds were as filthy rags before a holy God. Now, being clothed in Christ's righteousness, we are able to offer ourselves as holy, pleasing, and acceptable living sacrifices unto the Lord.

And this is our spiritual act of worship, Romans 12 .1. So now we are able to love the Lord, our God, with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. Now we are able to love our neighbor as ourselves. And we are able to do these things according to God's moral law in a way that is right and pleasing to him.

Christ did not abolish the law. He fulfilled it. And in keeping the law as our substitute and clothing us in his righteousness has made us right to be able to honor God by our obedience. That is the mark of faith for a Christian.

The evidence of your faith is going to be your obedience to God. John 3 .36, whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

Notice that belief and obedience are equated there. If you believe, you're going to obey. If you don't obey, you don't believe. The apostles in Acts 5 said that the Holy Spirit is given to those who obey God.

That's Acts 5 .32. To the Galatians, Galatians 5 .7, Paul said, you were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? And it is in 2 Thessalonians 1 .8 that the apostle Paul says that we are to obey the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Repent of your sin and believe on his name. That is a command that we must follow. When Paul wrote to the Ephesians, he even quoted them 10 commandments specifically that they were supposed to follow.

Ephesians 6 .1, children, obey your parents in the Lord for this is right. Now, that sounds familiar. Where have we heard that one? It's the fifth commandment. The commandments were not abolished. They were not something that we were told by the apostles and those who were closest to Jesus that we didn't have to follow anymore.

Rather, what we were told is our obedience to those commandments did not merit our salvation, but Christ who kept all the commandments and did so perfectly has clothed us in his righteousness. So now when we obey God, we are able to do so in a manner that is pleasing to him.

We read in Titus 2 .11, for the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, and this in our Savior, Jesus Christ, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

Declare these things. Exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you. Earlier, I asked you a series of questions as to how we are to understand these things. How do we understand the Ten Commandments?

What is the will of God for our lives? What is the duty of man? Where did I get those questions that I was asking you? I got them from catechism. Specifically, I got them from the Baptist catechism. But this is why Stanley and his followers and his church are susceptible to this teaching that he was espousing in this sermon a month ago, because he and his church have not been catechized.

He does not understand the application of the Old Testament, especially in light of the new, because he's not being catechized. Catechism helps you with the application of what we read in the scriptures.

And that's my alternative to Stanley's teaching. Stanley teaches the way that he does, and he even talked about this at the beginning of this series, which is called Aftermath. He said that he teaches this way because it's the only way that we're going to save future generations from falling out of faith.

No, on the contrary, it has been confirmed throughout church history that liberalism, which is what Stanley is espousing, leads to apostasy. It does not save people out of falling out of faith. Rather, it will lead to them falling out of their faith in vast numbers.

How is it that we help a person understand what the Bible says and how it rightly applies to your life? Catechism. It's not just for Catholics and Presbyterians and Lutherans. It's for it's for Baptists, too.

Of course, as a Southern Baptist minister, I'm going to encourage you to do Baptist catechism, but maybe you'd want to do the Heidelberg or the Westminster shorter catechism. That would be great as well.

But if you would like a good Baptist catechism to do with your family, look up Truth and Grace Memory Book that is put out by Founders Ministries. Go to Founders .org. You can find it on their website there.

Or Becky, I believe, found the books that we use with our kids on Amazon .com. So Truth and Grace Memory Books is what you want to use and that will help you. And, you know, maybe you're the kind of a person that's like, well, I love the Bible.

I love God's word. I love hearing the truth that you teach on this podcast or what I hear on Ref Net or Grace to You. But but I just I'm not a teacher. I don't know how to apply these things. I don't even know how to lead my kids in this.

Do catechism. Catechism would be the way to do it. And those catechism books will give you memory verses to do in addition to the question and answer format. All of that's real good. A great guide on helping your family and preparing them to rightly apply the scriptures to their lives, according to sound doctrine.

We talked about this. We're in First Timothy, primarily chapter six. But if we teach any different doctrine than that which agrees with the sound teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ, then it will lead to bad behavior.

Bad theology leads to bad morality. But sound teaching transforms into godliness. It accords with godliness. When we are taught the gospel and all those things that pertain to the gospel, it produces godliness in the hearts of those who hear it and obey it.

If we don't teach the gospel, what that turns into is what we're reading about here in Second Timothy three verses one through nine. People who are lovers of self, proud, arrogant and abusive. They don't do anything holy.

They don't love good. They love pleasure rather than God. And they have an appearance of godliness, but they deny its power. Men and women who are supposed to be committed to the truth and and instead they oppose the truth.

They're corrupt in mind and they're disqualified regarding the faith. I just pray that men like Stanley and other though others, not just him, but he's just kind of the one that's kind of made the headlines lately.

But guys like him and others who teach this liberal theology, they would realize the error of their ways before it's too late and they would repent and make themselves right before God washed by the water of the word of Jesus Christ, sanctified until the day of glory.

May we all know that conviction in our hearts, turning away from false teaching and clinging to the sound words of the good shepherd, our Lord Christ. God help us.

Amen. This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the word. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we feature New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday and our Q &A on Friday.

Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.