God's House Rules #13 - "How God's House Stay Gospel-Centered" (1 Timothy 4:1-10)

1st Timothy, that's where we've been. First letter from Paul to Timothy, 1st

Timothy. And we continue on with a sermon series that we've been in called God's House Rules. And this morning we come to 1st

Timothy chapter 4. 1st Timothy and chapter 4. So 1st Timothy chapter 4 and we're going to look at the first 10 verses this morning.

So 1st Timothy chapter 4 and verses 1 to 10. And if you've got one of the red hardbacks we give away, that's on page 1052, 1st

Timothy 4 from verse 1 through to verse 10, page 1052 in the Bibles that we give away.

If you're able to do so, can I invite you to stand with me as we come to this reading from God's word? 1st

Timothy chapter 4, beginning in verse 1 and reading through to verse 10. Brothers and sisters, these are

God's words to us this morning. Now, the spirit explicitly says that in later times, some will depart from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons.

Through the hypocrisy of liars, whose consciences are seared. They forbid marriage and demand abstinence from food that God created to be received with gratitude by those who believe and know the truth.

But everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, since it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.

If you point these things out to the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, nourished by the words of the faith and the good teaching that you have followed.

But have nothing to do with pointless and silly myths. Rather, train yourself in godliness.

For the training of the body has limited benefit, but godliness is beneficial in every way, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.

This saying is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance. For this reason, we labor and strive because we have put our hope in the living

God, who is the savior of all people, especially of those who believe.

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will remain forever. Let's pray and ask for his help as we come to that word this morning.

Well, Heavenly Father, we ask as we come to your word and as we come with our ears open, we trust, with our hearts open, we trust to hear you speak.

May your spirit do a work in helping us to hear and helping us to see and in helping us to understand.

Father, may the words that are said do the work that you have purposed them to do.

Not because they are my words, but because I pray they are a reflection of your words. And Father, it's our habit to pray for other area churches during this time.

And so we take a moment to pray for our friends at Cornerstone Christian Church back in Medford. Thank you for Pastor Quentin and just his faithful labor there.

Thank you for Pastor Mark, who serves by his side and pray for their entire elder and deacon team there at Cornerstone.

Pray for Pastor Quentin as he's preaching through the letters to the Hebrews this morning. Pray for their upcoming

Cornerstone lectures in the month of March. What a wonderful ministry that is, providing a concentrated time of teaching from God's word.

Pray you bless all their ministry efforts for your glory. Father, we thank you that we have brothers and sisters who are proclaiming the same

Jesus and seeking to uphold the same truths that we do. Pray that you bless their ministry there and bless the ministry of your word here as we come to it.

And we ask it in Jesus name and for his sake. Amen. Please be seated. In the last few years,

I've had the theme of gospel centrality very heavy on my heart and on my mind as a preacher of God's word.

But when I say that, I can't assume that everybody agrees with the language of gospel centrality.

So for a moment, let me just ask the question. Should the gospel be central? Now we can all say yes, but I never want us to just say things.

I want us to think deeply about the things we say. So let's think deeply about this for just a moment. Should the gospel be central?

I would like to think that God thinks so. After all, he is the central character of the gospel. He's the one who gave the gospel.

Without father, son, and Holy Spirit coming together, there would be no gospel message. So I think we can agree.

God thinks the gospel is important. But have you ever thought about this? Do you realize the devil knows the gospel is important?

You have to think about it. If the devil didn't think the gospel was important, he wouldn't spend so much time trying to mess with it, would he?

I mean, you read the Bible and he does a lot of things in trying to mess with the gospel. Sometimes he will just try and flat out distort it.

So remember when Paul writes to the Galatians, Galatians 1, 6, and 7, and he tells them, I'm amazed that you are so quickly turning from the grace of Christ to another gospel.

There's a phrase he says that sometimes I think we can be tempted to miss. Galatians 1, 7, he says, not that there is another gospel, but there are some who are troubling you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.

So sometimes the devil will try to distort the gospel. If he can't distort the gospel, well, he just tries to deviate us from it.

That was the problem that the Corinthians faced. Second Corinthians chapter 11. The second Corinthians 11, 3 and 4,

Paul says, but I fear that as a servant deceived Eve by his cunning, your minds may be seduced from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

For if a person comes and preaches another Jesus whom we did not preach, or you receive a different spirit, which you had not received, or a different gospel, which you had not accepted, you put up with it splendidly.

If he can't distort it, he'll try to deviate us from it. And if he can't distort it and he can't deviate it from us, well, he'll just try to distract you from it.

So the lessons of Galatians, Galatians 2, 4, Paul says to a church that was actually facing this very threat of distraction from the gospel.

Galatians 2, 4, he says, I'm saying this so that no one would deceive you with arguments that sound reasonable.

That people wouldn't come and say things that sound good and would take you off course from the message of the gospel.

Again, if the gospel wasn't that important, the devil wouldn't apply that much effort to messing with it, would he?

So heaven knows the gospel is central. And even the kingdom of darkness knows the gospel is central.

But here's the question I want you to think about this morning. How many Christians would properly recognize that the gospel is central?

Sure, we will say we believe the gospel. Sure, we'll say the gospel is important. But is it central?

There are lots of things that would like to compete for being central. But my contention over the last few years, my conviction over the last few years is that there is nothing more important than the gospel.

This should be the thing that we judge everything by. This should be the thing we judge churches by. This should be the thing you should judge those who preach in churches by.

This is the thing you should judge the ministries of a church by. If a church does not have the gospel at its center, it's suspect.

And I know that sounds harsh to say, but it's the truth. If a church does not have the good news of Jesus Christ and him crucified and that permeating its culture at the center, if that is absent at very best, we need to ask some questions.

And so my question this morning, I'm going to be very earnest in this message because like I said, this is a matter that concerns me deeply.

My question this morning is this, if that is true, if the gospel is central,

I'm going to ask, should it be? It is central. If the gospel is indeed central, if the gospel is indeed the most important message that has ever been given to humanity, if that is true, and if that's true, if it deserves to be our center, then the question becomes,

I want to speak very specifically to our house this morning. How does Redeemer Bible Fellowship, how does this church become and stay a gospel -centered church?

If the gospel is indeed central, then how can we, quite frankly, act like it is?

How does God's house stay gospel -centered? Well, this morning, that's what

I want us to consider as we come to 1 Timothy chapter 4 and verses 1 through 10. I think Paul's going to give us some very helpful insight into how

God's house stays gospel -centered. This morning,

I really want to just put one central truth before your eyes, one central idea I want you to think about this morning.

It's very simple. It's that the church must pursue everything it does.

Made a slight typo there. The church must pursue everything it does in life and ministry in the clear light of the gospel.

The church must pursue everything it does in life and ministry in the clear light of the gospel.

Again, on the surface, a very simple point, but I want to point out that as we come to this passage, as simple as that should be.

I was watching one of my favorite TV shows from the UK, and there's a scene in the show where the character basically, he's a criminal.

So the character's about to go pull off a crime. And well, two characters, and one speaking to the other one.

And the character is much more cautious and quite frankly, more intelligent than the other guy. Says to his friend, like, there shouldn't be any problems with what we're trying to do here, right?

And his friend actually has one rare moment of genius where he says, in theory, it shouldn't be.

But the theory has to match the practical. Well, I'm going to put it to you though, when it comes to this statement

I just made, that the church should pursue everything it does in life and ministry in the clear light of the gospel. There's a very clear danger that the theory doesn't match the practical.

So how can we ensure that the theory matches the practical? That we don't just say the gospel should be central, but the gospel actually is central in the life of our body.

That's what I want us to consider this morning. For the rest of our time, I want to consider two directives that flow out of our text that will help us to become, and I'm going to add the words, and stay gospel -centered.

So two directives that flow out of our text that will help us become and stay gospel -centered.

This passage is actually not that hard to break down in terms of structure. It cuts actually quite evenly down the middle.

So our first directive is going to come to us in verses one through five. Our second directive will come to us in verses six through ten.

So one to five, six to ten, nice and simple. Two directives that flow out of our text. How can we become and stay a gospel -centered church?

I'm going to put it to you that that can only happen when, point number one this morning, you reject demonic alternatives to the gospel.

You reject demonic alternatives to the gospel. So for a moment, think back with me to our last message.

We were in 1 Timothy 3, 14 through 16. And in our last message, remember we ended with this rousing reminder from Paul of the actual gospel message.

So look at it in your Bible, 1 Timothy 3, 16. He says, and most certainly the mystery of godliness is great.

He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the spirit, seen by angels, preached among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.

Again, I won't rehearse everything I said. Last week, you can go and catch the recording of that. But we ended last time with this glorious reminder of what the gospel message is.

And that the gospel message ultimately centers on a person, a person called the Lord Jesus and who he is and what he has done.

This is the message that the church is called to proclaim. This is the message that is supposed to be the church's center.

But don't be fooled, everyone. You see, not everybody is on the same mission.

And not everyone who claims to speak truth, if I can put it plainly, is actually about that life.

Not everyone waving a Bible and talking about Jesus actually knows the Bible and knows the

Jesus who is at the center of that Bible. As we come to chapter four, the mood shifts a little in these opening verses.

Gone is the sort of triumphant tone and the resilient sound of the previous paragraph.

The last paragraph was pretty positive. But as we come to this section, gone is the light tone and the positive outlook.

Instead, there's a serious warning. So look at verses one and two. Now, the spirit explicitly says that in later times, some will depart from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons, the hypocrisy of liars whose consciences are seared.

It's interesting that at the time of Paul writing, he uses this language of the spirit explicitly says that this was happening in the present at that time.

Now, we're not told how the spirit did this. We're not told when the spirit did this. We're not told who the spirit spoke through.

There's an element of mystery as to what Paul means here, or what Paul is talking about, I should say, when he says that the spirit is explicitly saying what he says.

But can I put it to you that while there is some mystery to the how and the when and the who of all this, the content of what the spirit was saying, again, look at verse one, that in later times, some would depart from the faith.

That reality that there would be people who bring in false teaching. That's not a mystery in the

Bible, actually. So Jesus himself, our Lord and Savior said, Matthew 7, 15, be on your guard against false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravaging wolves.

Paul will pick up that language. In fact, he will use the same language Jesus did. Acts chapter 28, excuse me, verse 28.

Be on your guard for yourselves and for all the flock. Again, see that language

Jesus talked about being on guard. Now here's Paul saying you should be on guard, language of the flock, language of the flock being used here.

Be on guard for yourself and for all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as overseers to shepherd the church of God, which he purchased with his own blood.

I know that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you. Again, Jesus talked about savage wolves.

Savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Men will rise up even from your own number and distort the truth to lure the disciples into following the hem.

As much as I fear the modern church tends to either ignore this or try to downplay this, Paul's teaching is real.

The reality that there are people out there who are saying things that as Paul says in other places, they should not be saying.

That reality is real. I've labored that point already a number of times in our study of 1

Timothy. So I'm not going to labor it again. What I do want to focus on, however, is the dimension that Paul adds to this here.

Because Paul does something uniquely that he hasn't done so far in this letter. So again, look at verse 1.

Now, the Spirit explicitly says that in the later times, some would depart from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons.

We can be tempted to think, especially in our theological camp sometimes, in our, as I like to say, cul -de -sac in the

Christian neighborhood. Oh, we can be tempted to think that false teaching or better yet false gospels, we can be tempted to think that they're just the product of somebody just who got it wrong.

You know, kind of like, you know, they started reading the Bible and then they started reading the

Bible upside down and started reading it in English, we read left to right, but they started reading it right to left.

You know, it was just, they just misread things. They're just not paying attention. Now, let's not downplay that.

There's an element of truth to that. So Peter himself says it in his day, 2 Peter 3 .16.

He talks about the people who took Paul's writings, not having the wisdom to understand them. And he says that the untaught and the unstable will twist them to their own destruction as they do the other scriptures.

So yes, there is a sense in which false teaching is the product of people who are untaught and unstable, twisting the scriptures.

Yes, that is true. But can I say that that is not the whole story? Yes, people will misunderstand the

Bible, but there is another side to this. And like I said, it's a side that I think at times, especially in our camp, we don't talk about as often as we should.

I can put it like this. Beloved, the reality is that false teaching at its core is not merely a matter of the mind.

It's not merely intellectual. It's not merely somebody just didn't read something right.

They misunderstood something. They didn't quite get the big picture. There's an element of truth to that, but there's more to it than that.

Beloved, false teaching is not just intellectual. It's spiritual in nature. If I can just put it plainly, false teaching is truly demonic.

You know, I have a lot of love in my heart for the Anglican commentator, Dr. John Stott. John Stott, in his commentaries, put it like this.

He said, we tend not to take this fact sufficiently seriously. Scripture portrays the devil, not only as the tempter enticing people into sin, but also as the deceiver, seducing people into error.

I like what John Stott said, but there was another John who had something else to say about this. First John chapter four in verse one. He said, dear friends do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God.

He said, John says, don't believe every spirit that is out. It's interesting. John doesn't say don't believe every teacher.

I've always wondered about that. Why didn't John say, don't believe every teaching?

Don't believe every teacher. Don't believe every message. For years

I've wondered, why did John say? Dear friends, I grew up in the

King James Bible. And the King James Bible says, beloved, believe not every spirit.

Why does he say spirits? Can I put it to you that he says spirit, because catch this teachings either come from the spirit of God anchored in the word of God, or they come from some other spirit rejecting the word of God.

Let me say that again. Teachings either come from the spirit of God anchored by the word of God, or they come from some other spirit rejecting the word for a moment.

Let me pause for a second. This raises the stakes, doesn't it? If we rightly understand this, doesn't this make the issue of false teaching just a little more serious than just somebody misunderstood something?

We can't just bury our heads in the sand and think this will just pass us by, can we? If false teaching is truly demonic, if it truly is as Paul describes it, come back to our passage.

Actually, say in first John, if you're not there, turn there. Actually, we'll be there in just a moment. I want to point something out there. But Paul is right in first Timothy.

And these people who depart from the faith do so because they're paying attention to deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons.

If false teaching is demonic, and if we can agree that the demonic is dangerous, and please ignore what our culture tells you.

I've just noticed it of late. It seems to be like this explosion of horror movies and messing around with the occult and stuff, almost as though it's not that big a deal.

According to the Bible, the demonic is actually a very big deal. The demonic is not just a big deal.

It's quite dangerous, actually. And if false teaching is demonic and the demonic is dangerous, well, how do we determine?

I think it's a fair question to ask. How do we determine if a teaching is demonic or not?

Is there some way we can tell whether a teaching is the product of deceitful spirits and whether it's the teaching of demons?

How can we know? Ah, I think we can. Let me give you this.

I think this is real easy. This is not rocket science, in my opinion. If you want to know if a teaching is demonic or not, might

I suggest one thing? It's three words. Check the center.

Check the center. In fact, I told you, if you weren't in 1 John 4 already, turn there with me. I want you to see something there.

1 John 4, in the Red Bibles we give away. That's page 1084. 1 John 4, 1. So let me read that passage in full.

1 John 4, 1 through 3. John says, Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

This is how you know the spirit of God. Ah, okay. So this is how we can know a teaching that comes from the spirit of God.

Okay, good to know. How do we know, John? Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.

But every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the

Antichrist, which you have heard is coming. Even now, it is already in the world.

Again, in one sense, it really isn't that hard to determine if a teaching comes from God or it comes from somewhere else.

All you have to do is, in fact, say it with me. Check the center. Check the center.

If Jesus's person and his work are the center, you have a pretty good indication that it's coming from God.

If something else is central, at the very least, we need to ask some questions.

So again, how do you know if a teaching is demonic or if it's not? Check the center.

Come back to 1 Timothy 4 with me, because Paul doesn't just say where this teaching comes from.

Again, look at 1 Timothy 4, 1. Now, the Spirit explicitly says that in later times, some will depart from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and the teaching of demons through, verse 2, the hypocrisy of liars whose consciences are seared.

False teaching comes from the evil one. It's spiritual in its nature, but the evil one sends false teaching.

It comes through people who have abandoned the truth. And notice how

Paul describes his people. He says, through the hypocrisy of liars whose consciences are seared.

The word for seared here is actually an interesting word. We still use it in English, actually. If you ever heard of somebody who has a wound and the wound has been cauterized, that's the word here.

Cauterization is the process where you apply high heat to a wound. It can be used negatively, but it can be used positively.

There's a sense in which some cauterization is good. If you've got a wound, from what I understand anyway, you typically can cauterize that wound to prevent further infection and to try and speed along the healing process.

Cauterization is not bad when you've got a wound that needs it. But think about this with me for a moment.

Is your conscience a wound as God created it?

Is your conscience a wound that should be cauterized? No, cauterization is great, but there's a time and a place for it.

It would be akin to me, as you all know, I have an obsession with grilling and smoking things. It would be akin to me saying

I want to make a steak. For what it's worth, I'm not a big steak person for a number of reasons, but it would be akin to me saying

I want to grill a steak. Actually, this happened this past summer. Some of you remember my mom and my sister came to visit.

Made dinner for them one night. I'm kind of whizzing around doing three different things. I was making barbecue chicken.

I left it on the grill and I made the bonehead mistake of leaving the chicken skin side down with a bunch of sauce on it.

Of course, the flame shot up and the chicken burned. I was annoyed for multiple reasons, most of which was my mom and my sister are here and I'm meant to be cooking for them.

Thankfully, it was just one piece, so we were able to make it work. That's a time where I don't want something being cauterized.

And I think your conscience is acting the same way. That's something you don't want cauterized. That's something you don't want seared or charred beyond recognition.

That's a dangerous place to be. In fact, those of you who've been following in this series, hasn't Paul had something to say about the conscience already?

If you forgot 1 Timothy 1 .19. Remember, he tells Timothy that Timothy is to be somebody who is having faith in a good conscience.

I remember what he said about that, which some have rejected and have shipwrecked the faith.

I'll repeat what I said back then, because it was a few weeks ago or almost a couple months ago. Paul's teaching is not just intellectual.

It's a matter of the conscience. That something has happened in the conscience. The conscience has gotten off direction.

Paul uses a different analogy here. That in our passage, he says the conscience has become seared. It's hardened.

It's desensitized. And as a result, the devil uses that to bring about false teaching in the church.

In one sense, we can say that false teachers are spiritual puppets. Sure, they have a role in their teaching.

But the hand that controls them, in the real sense of the word, is diabolical from the devil himself.

And Paul doesn't let the false teacher off the hook, because notice he says through the hypocrisy of liars.

Yes, so the teaching comes from the evil one, but it comes through people. And these people have willingly let themselves be that.

So he says that they're liars. They're not telling the truth. And he says that they're hypocrites. They're claiming to be one thing, claiming to speak for God, while in actuality, they're speaking for someone else.

They are liars and they are hypocrites. And that toxic cocktail, as it were, of being a liar and a hypocrite, it makes them perfect pawns in the devil's game of deception.

Again, I ask, have the stakes of this hit you yet? This is why we can't be casual and calm and bourgeois, as it were, where the gospel is concerned.

This is why we must reject demonic alternatives to the gospel.

Even a degree of deviation can lead to untold spiritual damage.

And here's the thing. Did you notice that Paul says they're paying attention to deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons?

It's not that the devil doesn't want anything to be said. Think about this.

The devil is more than happy for preaching and teaching to happen. Again, sometimes we can be a little naive about this.

He's not bothered by the existence of preaching and teaching. In fact, he will gladly give alternatives.

So in some cases, he's more than happy for practical preaching to happen. 10 tips for this, 5 keys for this, 7 principles for this.

Oh, he's more than happy with that. Yeah, do that 52 Sundays a year. Not a problem. Maybe in this room, that might not be one that we can be tempted by.

All right, let's talk politics and social issues for a moment. I've lost track of how many pastors have told me, the one standing in front of you directly, that I am failing in my duty because in my sermons,

I don't address political issues. After I tell them to shut up, because quite frankly,

I take my job very seriously. I usually will. Actually, I'll let them tell me what

I'm supposed to say first, then I tell them to shut up. I'm that polite at least. But usually they'll say, well, you're not talking about the liberal agenda out there.

One guy was upset with me because he was like, I've been watching your sermons for ages. Thanks, I guess.

But he was like, I've been watching your sermons for ages. You never talk about like the transgender issue. I've had a number of people,

I've had a number of people in the last year, tell me I need to be deported because I don't protect the American way of life. Then I was more than happy for that to be breached.

Maybe he knows the audience that you're speaking to, you don't have the political stuff, that's not going to get them. So what does he do? He'll just get you on a more emotional self -help tip.

So how many sermons, how many churches do you go to? Or have you've heard of anyway? Sermons are like how to beat anxiety, how to beat fear, how to develop self -worth.

As I like to say, it's basically psychiatry and church clothes. Now, after I usually tell these people to shut up,

I like to remind them that in and of themselves, these things are not bad in their place. I actually do think the

Bible is a practical book because God has given us a book that addresses all of life.

Now, it may not address all of life to the detail that you would like, but it does address all of life.

For what it's worth, I like to remind these people that I am actually politically conservative. So actually, transgenderism does profoundly bother me.

I do think that political liberalism is bad for society. I'm a student of history, I can prove that. I'm not an

American, so I let Americans defend the American way of life. As for emotional health and self -help, do

I think that God wants us to be emotionally healthy? Absolutely, I think he says a lot in his word about that. But what

I like to remind these folks who, at this point, are generally annoyed with me, and I'm pretty annoyed with them, so there we are.

But what I like to remind them is a word, I like to remind them of a phrase that I've used multiple times already, haven't I? The center.

Those things might, depending on the topic, be good, but catch this, they are not weighty enough to be the center of our message.

Remember years ago, I went to a conference and I heard a guy from, what was he? He was from Kenya, that was it. Christian Luanda preached an amazing message about keeping the

Bible central in your ministry. And he said something, a phrase that I heard, and I was like, oh, that was good,

I'm gonna remember that one. He said, the human soul is too weighty a thing to be lifted into the presence of God on the twigs of human ingenuity.

Here's the problem with the practical guy, the political guy, the emotional self -help guy.

All of them have a message that it would be like me trying to lift up my son, Garrett. He's a tank.

It would be like me trying to lift up my son on a platform made of twigs.

It would be hilarious, that video would go viral, but it would be ridiculous, why?

Because he's built like a tank. Guess what? The human soul is infinitely more weighty than the weight of my son.

And the human soul cannot, there's no message, as it were, that can bear the weight of the human soul and the need of the human soul, like the gospel can.

And here's the thing, we might not get that, but the devil definitely does. So what will he do?

Instead of giving us a platform that can hold up the human soul, he will gladly substitute it for a platform made out of spiritual twigs.

Did you notice, come back to our text, look at verse three. Did you notice the examples Paul gives in verse three? He says, they, these liars who are hypocrites, whose conscience are saved, he says, they forbid marriage and demand abstinence from foods that God created to be received with gratitude by those who know and believe the truth.

For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, since it is sanctified by the word of God and by prayer.

Food and abstaining from marriage. In fairness, we're not entirely sure what the origin of these two things were.

Paul just notes that this is what they were saying, for what it's worth, I personally think he has Judaism in mind.

He's talked a lot about the law, remember back in chapter one? There were Jewish groups in the first century who believed that true holiness was to be found in rejecting all earthly pleasure, including the pleasure of marriage.

So there were groups who did teach this in the first century. And if you read the law of Moses, which Christians should read the law of Moses, it does talk a lot about food.

So for what it's worth, I think it has Judaism in mind, but we don't know that for certain. But regardless of what the specific issues were, here's the problem.

What these people were saying were going against God's purposes. So look at the passage again.

This is the first story, they forbid marriage and demand abstinence from food that God created to be received with gratitude by those who know and believe the truth.

Catch this, where the gospel makes men free to serve God and to enjoy the things of this life appropriately, this false gospel only served to enslave people.

But God's purposes were kind of running at this level. Their purposes were running at this level.

They were just completely crossing each other. God made everything to be enjoyed in its proper place, including food and marriage.

But these people were saying the exact opposite. Those were the issues in that day.

But here's the thing. They may not be the issues today, but the problem remains the same. Other things becoming the center.

Their center was food and marriage, apparently because Paul explicitly mentions it. Those were the threats at that point.

Those were the demonic alternatives being preached to the gospel. But here's the thing. Those were the demonic alternatives back then.

The question we need to stop and ask, by the way, this might be a good question for us to think about on Wednesday night, join us Wednesday night at seven.

What are the demonic alternatives to the gospel in our day? And here's the thing, as we think about that, thankfully, we don't have to think about what our response is.

Whatever the alternatives are in our day, our response should be the same as it was in Paul's day. Reject demonic alternatives to the gospel.

That's the first direct we get from our passage. That's the bad news. That's the negative side.

But there's a glorious positive to this too. Yes, we are to reject demonic alternatives to the gospel, but there's a second directive that Paul gives us in our passage.

And we see that in verses six through 10. So yes, reject demonic alternatives to the gospel. But secondly, retain and display confidence in the gospel.

Retain and display confidence in the gospel. Verses six through 10.

Rather than go down the route of the false teachers, Paul's response was, did you catch this when you read it?

It's radically ordinary. So look at verse six, Paul shifts from talking about them and he starts talking to Timothy again.

If you, those guys can do that over there. But if you,

Timothy, verse six, point these things out to the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Jesus Christ, nourished by the words of the faith and the good teaching that you have followed.

The things that Paul refers to here are, I would argue the things that he's laid out in this letter already. The truths of redemption, the plans of God in and through the church, the need to defend the gospel against attack.

Paul says your job is to, I don't know what he says, if you point these things out to the brothers and sisters.

Timothy's message wasn't new and novel. It was tried and tested.

Paul's message to Timothy wasn't new. And Timothy's message to the brothers and sisters wasn't new either.

It was a tried and a tested message. Timothy's work wasn't as it were, tickle the soul with something fresh and exciting.

It was to anchor the soul with classic truth. If I can put it in one phrase,

Paul calls Timothy to what I heard one preacher years ago say, he calls Timothy to the ministry of reminder.

The ministry of reminder. Timothy was to retain confidence in the gospel and to display confidence in the gospel by reminding

God's people of that gospel, every chance he got. And did you notice what

Paul says? The result of this is to look at verse six. If you point these things out to the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus.

Now, if you've been following this season, first Timothy year should perk up a little bit because that word good comes up a lot in this letter.

Remember what we've said that that word good carries the idea of the noble, the trustworthy, that which can be relied on.

Paul essentially tells Timothy, Timothy, you want to know how you show yourself to be a faithful minister.

You show yourself to be faithful by reminding people of the message that itself is faithful.

The marker of faithfulness is not the ability to be innovative and creative with the message.

No, the marker of faithfulness is commitment to old truths. I've been teaching the

Bible for a minute and pastoring a lot less, but I've been teaching the Bible for a minute now. And in doing this,

I've discovered one real simple truth about faithful ministry. So much of faithful ministry is just reminding people of things that they need to know.

And in some cases they've just forgotten. So much of ministry is just pointing people back to what

God's word says. It's not, again, it's not new truths that help the souls of God's people.

It's classic truths. Those truths were going to have a benefit in Timothy's own life.

Again, look at the end of verse six. It says, if you point these things out to the brothers and sisters, you'll be a good servant of Christ Jesus, nourished by the words of the faith and the good teaching that you have followed.

There's that word good again. Nourished, built up. This word, in fact, the

ESV translates it as trained up. It's not just, okay, that this builds you up, but it actually educates you as it goes.

Timothy had heard the message from Paul. He had heard the truth from Paul. And he says, as you reflect on this, it's going to have a benefit in your own life.

You're going to be able to help yourself. And then you'll be able to turn around and help somebody else. Timothy would be ministering to himself every bit as much in reminding his people of the truth as he would be helping the people he ministered to.

And sure the temptation to deviate would be there. So look at verse seven. It says, but have nothing to do with pointless and silly myths.

The word for silly is actually kind of funny. It literally means old wives.

That's what the word means. So we have to keep that. We have a word for this in English. So when you say someone's telling you an old wives tale, in fact, the

King James version translates that way. It says an old wives fable. Something that is so silly that only, again, not all old ladies are like this, but have you ever met an old lady who tells old wives tales?

I'm Ghanian. We have a lot of them. Interesting. A lot of them have to do with pregnancy.

In one sense, I'm kind of glad that I was here when I had my kids. Because if I were back home, my mom would not do this.

My mom is a very sensible woman, God bless her. But I know some of the people that I grew up around would have ridiculous things to say, like ways you can determine if it's a boy or a girl.

You know, I think there are some, I've heard some of them, you know, I've been here in the US, so it's not culturally exclusive, I suppose. But it's that idea.

Things that just sound ridiculous. And Paul says, you are to reject pointless and silly, ridiculous myths.

Things that are so silly, they don't merit serious consideration. Especially, catch this, when you put them next to the glorious gospel.

Timothy, you don't go down that route. This has nothing to do with pointless and silly myths. But look at the rest of verse seven into verse eight.

But rather, train yourself in godliness. For the training of the body has limited benefit, but godliness is beneficial in every way.

Since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. Timothy, you are to discipline yourself in.

You are to train yourself in. In fact, the word that's used for train here is where we get our word gymnasium from. A place where you train.

Paul says, you are to train yourself, discipline yourself in godliness.

Godliness in the Bible carries two aspects to it. There is the belief aspect and the behavior aspect.

That which we are to believe and how we are to behave. And Paul says to Timothy, Timothy, you are to discipline yourself in both of those areas.

And here's the thing. Paul is obviously writing to Timothy, but like I've said throughout this series, Paul is writing to Timothy, but he's writing through Timothy to all of us.

Which means by extension, Paul is calling you and I to exactly the same thing.

That rather than be devoted to pointless and silly myths, and there are a lot of pointless and silly myths out there in 2025, by the way, you are to ignore those things.

And you are instead to train yourself, to discipline yourself in godliness.

If we rightly understand the gospel and all of its implications, as we rightly understand the word of God and all of its truths, it doesn't make us lazy.

Not only understand it rightly, it actually gives us motivation for growth.

Just like physical training produces benefit in an earthly sense, spiritual discipline.

And let's be clear what spiritual discipline is. I think sometimes this can get very misunderstood. Spiritual discipline, no disrespect to the many wonderful books that have been written about spiritual disciplines.

I think they're all saying true things. I'm not saying get rid of them. But I think spiritual disciplines, oftentimes we think about spiritual disciplines and we think about Bible reading, prayer, fasting, fellowship, those sorts of things.

I'm going to say, I don't think that's what Paul means by this phrase. Those may be ways in which we do that.

But spiritual discipline actually, I think is quite simple. Spiritual discipline, I would argue, is devoting ourselves to deeper learning about, to deeper meditation on and deeper application of the gospel.

As we are reminded of who the Lord Jesus is and what he has done for us, as we give ourselves to learning that truth from the word of God, as we give ourselves to meditating on it and as we give ourselves to application of it.

Now, these other things I'm talking about may be tools for that, but catch this, doing those things in and of themselves,

I would argue are not spiritual discipline. Spiritual discipline at its core is coming back to the gospel again and again and again and again.

Paul says that discipline has eternal value and it has value in this life too. So in this life, it makes us better servants of God.

It makes us better servants of others. And of course, it holds great promise for eternity.

It points us to the fact that one day we will be in the very presence of God, where we will see his face, where we will see him and be in his presence forever, where we will ultimately know by sight what we now know by faith.

So yes, Paul is right. It does have promise for this life and for the life to come.

And again, it's not just those in vocational ministry who need to hear this. It is all believers who need to hear this.

We must put our everything into pursuing the truth, into loving the truth and to growing in the truth.

We have to be diligent. We have to work hard at keeping the gospel central. Why? Because it's to our benefit when this gospel is central.

And Paul says, see verse nine, he says, this saying is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance.

He says, Timothy, you can bank your life on this promise. Again, think about all those alternative things

I talked about earlier. Can you really bank your life on those things? They're important to be sure.

Some of them anyway. But they're not, again, they're not weighty enough to hold up the human soul.

Of course, this saying is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance.

Verse 10, for this reason, we labor and strive. Paul and Timothy, and by extension, all of God's people who would read these words, they could be faithful in ministry.

They could have hope in a fallen and in a difficult world because catch this, the gospel points us not to ourselves if we understand it rightly.

It points us to God. That the Bible says, this is the one that we have set our hope on.

So Paul says, for this reason, we labor and strive because we have put our hope in the living

God. Who is this God? End of verse 10. Who is the savior of all people, especially of those who believe.

Tough passage, lots of interpretation as to what Paul means when he uses this language. For time's sake, I'm not going to over egg the pudding, so to speak.

Let me just tell you what I think Paul is getting at. The word savior here is being used not in the salvific sense.

I would argue it's being used in the temporal sense and the sense relating to earthly things that God is the preserver of all things.

In fact, this word savior is used that way in other places in the New Testament. So you can almost translate to the, we have put our hope in the living

God who is the preserver of all people, especially of those who believe. God, obviously, by his providence manages all things in creation.

And that is especially true for those who believe.

Now, why would Paul say this? Well, think about what he said. Think back to verses one through five and what he said about these false teachers. The result of the false teaching was a disdain for creation and a disdain for the things that God had made.

God made food and God created marriage. These false teachers were basically teaching you should reject and disdain those things.

Paul says no healthy teaching, godly teaching doesn't create a suspicion of what God has given. It creates a proper appreciation of what

God has given. The gospel reminds us of the greatness of God, especially his goodness to his own.

That as we see the world that God has made, we are reminded of the goodness of God, that he is the God who is the preserver.

He was the keeper of all people. And he has especially shown himself to be that in the lives of those who believe.

He's done that in planning our salvation all the way back in eternity past as father, son, and spirit came together in that glorious conspiracy, as one writer put it, to see sinners come to saving faith.

He did that in making promise after promise and prophecy after promise, prophecy, excuse me, to send a redeemer.

And then he finally fulfilled that promise in sending his son who lived the life that we couldn't live and who died the death that we couldn't deserve.

He did this in sending his spirit to not just raise the son from the dead, but to indwell every one of God's people who believe in him so that they could have assurance that they are

God's children. But I'm pretty much done. Let me just leave you with one thought and we'll come to the

Lord's table. Gospel centrality isn't just something we say like a cute catchphrase.

It isn't just something we say because, oh, it's something we like saying. Can I put it to you that gospel centrality, if we understand it rightly, it's truly a matter of life and death.

It's truly a matter that we must always be on guard to protect.

Why? Because there are always going to be, remember point number one, those demonic alternatives. Well, how do we fight those?

Well, we fight those by retaining and displaying confidence in that gospel.

This is how the house stays gospel centered. We reject the alternatives and instead we display confidence in the gospel as God has given it.

Let's pray together. Well, Heavenly Father, as we come to your word, we are freshly reminded of the fact that this message of the gospel, this message of a savior given for us is of infinite importance.

That is a teaching like none other. It is a message like none other. Father, help us that we would remain centered on this gospel.

Father, help us that we would not be swayed one way or the other by alternative messages, messages that sound good, that we, like Paul said, would not be swayed by arguments that sound reasonable, but that we would stay anchored to your word and anchored to the gospel that is found in that word.

Father, help us to retain and display confidence in this gospel. May we never lose sight of its gloriousness, of its weightiness, of its goodness, not just in our lives, but as we proclaim it to others so that they may find salvation in the son as well.