Wolves, Pigs, and Hogs

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry.

Michael Lee Abendroth here. Our slogan, �Always Biblical, Always Provocative, Always in that Order. I hope the first is right. I know it can�t be technically. Always trying to be biblical. I don�t always try to be provocative anymore, but if I had to pick an order, it�d be always in that order.

So that part�s still true. No Compromise Radio started, I think, 11 years ago, and I kind of needed an outlet, basically, so I didn�t jam in a bunch of no-coat discernment stuff in the pulpit on Sunday mornings.

And then as time has gone on, we�ve either devolved, evolved, matured, or none of the above to get where we are today. You can write me, Mike, at NoCompromiseRadio .com. I don�t know, my breathing, I think I have some kind of allergies or something, or exercise-induced asthma.

I might have that. ThePactum .org is my brother�s new podcast. My brother and I are taking a bunch of people to Israel. If you�d like to go, you can write me, Mike, at NoCompromiseRadio .com. Pat always has more people than I do to go to Israel, and so therefore, we�re hoping that the NoCo slash Bethlehem Bible Church folks outweigh the Pat Abendroth folks.

I mean, he usually has more people than he has more sway, he has more moolah for the bribes, I mean, the entrance fees. It�s hard to be in certain countries without kind of doing what they do, right? So well, you can get into the Garden of Gethsemane, but if you want that quiet little spot over there behind the gates, there�s a little money you might have to give.

It�s just kind of the way things go. But all that to say, we are on the radio here, podcasting, trying to encourage you to talk about the Lord Jesus Christ, to think about Him, the one who never compromised, and who, when we watch what happened at Calvary, no attributes of God compromised, all simultaneously on display for us to watch.

God doesn�t have sovereignty and have justice and have love. He is. And speaking of which, I think this fall, it�ll be J .V. Fesco, Matthew Barrett, myself at Omaha Bible Church with Pat Abendroth at a conference about the Trinity.

So that should be good. Will you be a Schleiermacher type person who says, �Ah, give me practical stuff. The Trinity�s not practical. I don�t care about it. Or will you be, you know, Omaha, Nebraska, early October?

Well, we shall soon find out. I�m trying to think if there�s anything else I need to announce. I don�t think there is. What I will do, I think, beginning in a couple episodes or a couple weeks, I�m going to do a long series on the law and gospel.

Brandon Kimber of the American Gospel Movies has a station now, a TV station, the equivalent thereof online, called American Gospel Television Network or something, AGTV. And you get some free shows, and then you get a complimentary pass for a while, and then it�s a monthly or yearly subscription fee.

So I did five shows for him on video. Law and Gospel, Ben Mercedes, who films my other stuff, filmed that. And I think I�ll do my kind of no-co version of the same topic. I�m not going to do the same thing to somehow, you know, that�s his, I don�t know if it�s his property, Brandon�s property, but I want to make sure people have a reason to watch.

And by the way, when I watch those videos by Brandon, while Ben did a great job filming, Brandon also did a great job of editing. And I hope my messages about law and gospel are equal to the filming and the editing, because the graphics and everything else for that show, the first two I�ve watched on American Gospel Television, excellently done.

I mean, just first class. A lot of things, you know, we just kind of get on by and get along to go along and all that stuff, kind of no-co, Nebraska-style, see a galley, but that was done so well. I have been thinking through false teachers and false teachings as I�ve been working through the book of 2 Peter.

False Teachers in 2 Peter 2 and Matthew 7

And as you know, if you�ve been listening to the show at all, 2 Peter 2 is all about false teachers. I�m certain that Peter learned from his master, the Lord Jesus, how to think about false teachers. I�m sure it was a regular thing.

Even when Jesus said back in Matthew chapter 7, I�m sure this has influenced Peter, �Beware of false prophets Jesus said, �who come to you in sheep�s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits.

Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes? Are figs from thistles And we know the answers to those questions. They should be very obvious. Beware of false teachers. Now when you look at a sheep, you�ll see a lot of things, including the wool and stuff like that.

What does Jesus mean when he says, �who come to you in sheep�s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves We�ve all seen that picture of a wolf, and then draped over the wolf�s head, it�s kind of a sheep head, and the sheep�s hide, and I wanted to say fur, but you know, it�s wool.

We�ve seen that, but what does Jesus mean when it says, �who come to you in sheep�s clothing, but are inwardly as ravenous wolves Now for certain, false teachers are trying to show that they�re not dangerous.

They�re not trying to let you know their wolfish insides, as it were. They�re not trying to show you how lewd, crude, insatiable they are for sin, and for immorality, and for lawlessness. They probably are well-mannered, and mild, and kind, and sweet, and everything else.

That�s true, but I also think there�s probably something to be said for what did shepherds wear. Shepherds probably, if you think about it, wore things like wool. It was hard for shepherds to wear polyester a couple thousand years ago.

So one writer said, �False prophets do not deceive the flock by impersonating sheep, but by impersonating the shepherd who wears sheep�s clothing in the form of his wool garments. False shepherds often disguise themselves as true shepherds.

That�s fascinating to me, and very, very insightful. These false prophets come to you in sheep�s clothing, they�re saying the right things, they have the right vocabulary, again, they�re kind, and well-mannered, and cool-looking maybe, and hip, depending on what generation you�re in, and they�re certainly not coming with a horde of black angels, and death sickles, and pitchforks, and horns, and stuff like that.

It�s subtle, it�s beguiling, it�s insidious, it�s deceiving, and the text says, according to Jesus in Matthew 7, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. And I really want you at No Compromise Radio Land to understand how ravenous a wolf could be, because if you do, you�re going to get the point that Jesus is making all the more.

If you study wolves, just for a short amount of time, you will figure out quickly that in their environment, they are called apex predators. The European wolves can get to be about 100 pounds. They are very, very well-equipped to do what they do in the economy of the ecosystem.

God has put scent glands between their toes that leave a chemical marker so it can navigate over large expanses of territory, and also let other people know that that is their territory, not other people, but other wolves.

They have long canine teeth, and they can deliver 1 ,000 kpa�s of pressure, and that is about 1 ,450 pounds per square inch. And that�s really what they try to do. If you think about how hard can a dog bite, well, it�s a double bite for a wolf.

And gray wolves, they have a strong bite, and they can crush bones. In addition, wolves in certain parts of the world carry all kinds of harmful parasites and worms and other things, and can be infected as they bite people, bite things, bite sheep, bite other folks, other animals, I mean.

When they track, like a moose or an elk or something like that, they go for the haunches, and they go for a mass bleeding spot, and they can bite, causing a wound up to 15 centimeters in length. They know how to bite the throat and sever the windpipe and jugular veins.

They know how to carry off their prey and commence feeding, even if the animal that they�re eating is still alive. Ravenous. Ravenous wolves. I am certain Peter never forgot that, as Jesus made that address on the Sermon on the Mount.

Irenaeus, an old church father, said a very well-known quote for this kind of thing. �Error, indeed, is never set forth in its naked deformity, lest, being thus exposed, it should be at once detected.

But it is craftily decked out in an attractive dress, so as, by its outward form, to make it appear to the inexperienced more true than truth itself. And that is a fact. That's a fact, Jack. These false teachers are crafty, they're sneaky, they do covert language, they sneak in by deception and mislead people, poor unsuspecting folks.

They bewitch others, and they themselves are known by Paul as deceitful workers. You have to be careful what they say, what they don't say it, how they say it, what they mean by certain words. They have the right vocabulary, but wrong meanings.

And of course, in the context of Matthew 7, when Jesus said this, they're the ones, the false teachers, that deny that there's a narrow gate and that there's few that find it. These are evening wolves, Zephaniah calls them.

They tear their prey, according to Ezekiel, these false teachers, and you will know them by their fruits. And that's really the point today on No Compromise Radio, as I hear kids running in the back hall there, is you can know false teachers by their fruits.

And that's really 2 Peter 2. That's all the long intro to 2 Peter 2. You can know false teachers. That's the good news. And you can respond with avoidance, with pointing them out, with turning your back on them, by gagging them, by confronting them, by showing people what they're really teaching.

What you don't want to do is to be charmed by the false teacher, to say, well, you know what, there's something in me that's lawless. Even if I'm a Christian, I've got that kind of the flesh in me and that sin, the presence of sin in me, and that makes me attracted to people that say it's okay to sin.

It's fine. Jesus doesn't care, or he's already justified you, so it doesn't matter for your position, or Jesus isn't going to come back, so live the way you want. You have to be very, very careful. You need to watch out.

Maybe some of the best speakers in all the world are persuasive orators that happen to be false teachers, so you want to be careful. I heard the story of a New York couple, and they received two tickets for a Broadway hit, and there was no information on there, just two tickets, so they thought they would go to the show, and they loved the show.

They returned that night, and their house had been broken into, jewelry gone, valuables gone, and on the pillow, there was a note with three words, now you know. And the writer of the little story about that writes, like that nameless thief, false prophets and false teachers know what people want to hear.

And just because someone's ordained, because someone's a pastor, because someone gets up and says, thus saith the Lord, you have to be discerning. You have to examine everything carefully. You have to be a good Berean.

You have to look at fruits. You have to be a fruit inspector, and you're not looking for perfection in teachers, obviously. There's only one who would fit that bill, and whoever would fit the bill, and that one who did fit the bill has also authorized other teachers to teach God's Word, and those teachers are not practically sinless.

They are not perfectly holy on this earth. They still have a sin principle dwelling within them. The power's gone, the penalty's gone, but Jesus uses sinful teachers. So that's a given, but we need to be careful of the ones who are over the top, who by their fruit show that they don't really know this holy God, the Holy One of Israel.

And if you understand the Holy One of Israel, you want to live a holy life, not to be saved, not to stay saved, but because you are saved. And it is a fact, a theological fact, that false teachers and false teaching that they teach is going to give you a false holy life, a false life, a life that's not proper.

Orthodoxy leads to orthopraxy, or they're tied together in some way, shape, or form. So, too, heterodoxy and heteropraxy, they're tied together, and we have to be careful. I mean, this is just the way it is.

And so the writer, Peter, begins to write this book, 1 Peter 5 chapters, 2 Peter 3 chapters, and he comes to chapter 2 after laying the groundwork in chapter 1, and he's trying to show us the fruits of the false teachers.

Yes, they're sneaking in. God's justice is not asleep. He is going to judge, and He's going to judge with equity and fairness, and He's got a track record of judgment, does He not? When the angels sinned, they were judged.

When those in Noah's day sinned, they were all judged. When Sodom and Gomorrah, as a group of cities, they sinned, they were judged. God judges sin, and His judgment's not asleep. Cracking my neck. Wouldn't that be interesting if I cracked my neck and you could hear it on no-compromise radio?

So, the Lord knows, 2 Peter 2 .9, how to rescue the godly from trials and keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment. And when people are rebellious against God, like angels, when the false teachers are rebellious, they're going to be judged.

When ungodly people lived in Noah's day, and there are ungodly false teachers today, they're going to be judged. When there are lawless people in Sodom and Gomorrah, they are going to be judged. Not just then, but lawlessness would be judged today.

And so, rebellious, ungodly, lawless people, they get judged. And one of the reasons the false teachers are false teaching is because of the rebellious, ungodly, lawless deeds they do. And they're false preachers, false prophets, false Christs, because they're exactly opposite of Jesus and exactly opposite of His teaching.

Jesus is obedient, godly, and a lawkeeper. He is not rebellious, ungodly, or lawless, and therefore, those are false people because they teach the exact opposite of Jesus. If I look at John 5 .36, it says, quoting the words of Jesus,.

But the testimony that I have is greater than that of John, for the works that the Father has given Me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing bear witness about Me that the Father has sent Me. In other words, the false teachers don't do what they're honored to do, honor the Father.

The Son does, but the false teachers do the opposite. The false teachers are the lawless ones. Listen to what Jesus said in John 15 .10,. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love.

And Jesus meant that when He said it, that He has kept the Father's commandments. He, Jesus, humbled Himself to the point of obedience, even a terrible death on the cross. Humbled Himself to death, even death on a cross.

God didn't spare the angels. God didn't spare those who lived in the ancient world during Noah's time. God did not spare the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, and He did not spare His own Son but delivered Him up for us all, Romans 8 .32.

God judges sin. Martin Luther said,. This flood is also a fearful example, the most horrible one in Scriptures. One might almost despair in view of it, even if we were strong in faith. For when such language and judgment of God go to man's heart, and he thinks of it, that he too shall die.

He must tremble in fear if he is not well armed, since among so many in the whole world no one but these eight only were saved. And you see what the writer Peter is doing by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

There's few and there's many, and the few make it. And the many don't. And there's few when it comes to Noah, eight, few when it comes to Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot has two daughters, and the rest don't make it.

And there are few Christians, but God preserves them. He rescues them. He, the writer Peter, is trying to encourage Christians who are living in crazy times, and everybody's against them, and there are only a few real Christians, and everybody else is going haywire theologically and methodologically and sociologically and economically and everything other-onically.

There's the few and the many, but God knows. He knows how to judge the many, and he knows how to rescue the few. And how do we make sure we don't buy into false teachers if they're secretly doing things?

How do we know their secrets? Can I tell you the secret? Well, the secret would be, not only do they sneak in secretly, but they're gonna talk, and they're going to walk, and they're gonna have conversations, and they're going to have a lifestyle.

And you can look at that and say, hmm, they say the right word, Jesus died. They say faith and grace. They say resurrected. They say Bible. Bible, but their life shows that they must have different vocabulary definitions, definitions of their words.

We have to be very, very careful. Paul said at Ephesus, I know that after my departure, grievous wolves shall enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Paul said in 1 Timothy 4, but the Spirit says expressly that in the latter time, some shall fall away from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons through the hypocrisy of men that speak lies.

In other words, it's not a demon that shows up at your door. It's a man that shows up in your pulpit or at your Bible study, and he's giving you seducing spirits and doctrines of demons through his mouth.

Peter wants us to understand this. Most of us have said in chapter two, verses one through 10a, that's enough, got it, check, marked it off. But Peter won't let you stop because it's more important than most of us realize.

The identification of false teachers by their rotten, corrupt, gross, worm-riddled fruit. We have to be careful, and in our day and age in evangelicalism, there are the many and the few, and everybody kind of wants to be in the many.

You know, that's one of the reasons why people love conferences is because they think, you know, am I the only one who believes this? Am I the only one at the church that thinks, you know what, we're like out here in the middle by ourselves, and maybe our church is the only one that believes this in all of New England.

And then you go to a New England pastor's conference, and you go, oh, there's 60 guys, they all believe the same thing, so encouraging. That's the same kind of thing. When we're standing like Noah, with just our wife and kids, I mean, I guess they have to follow you.

What are you going to do? Scorn, ridiculed, laughed at. Lloyd-Jones said, have you observed the way in which men have joked about the devil during the last 100 years? The Bible takes the devil terribly seriously, but the devil has become a joke in the last century.

That's true. And now we see these false teachers, and you need to run. You need to expose. And I particularly talk to those men today who are pastors and elders, and who are here and say things like, do you know what?

Not on my watch. Not on my watch today. I'm not going to fall for this. I'm not going to do this. I'm going to stand for truth, and I'm going to, because of the good shepherd, I'm going to be his hands and his feet, and I'm going to pick up that staff.

I'm going to pick up that crook, and I'm going to whack away the false teachers. I'm going to go after the wolves, and I'm going to name them. And when they need to be named by Joe Osteen or Joyce Meyer or Stephen Furtick or Living out or Woke, I'm going to name them, because it's that important, since I want to do what the Lord Jesus does.

I want to care for the people that the Lord Jesus cares for. Well, my name is Mike Abendroth, this is No Compromise Radio. We'll see you in just a few minutes.

My time. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's Word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.