Sunday Sermon: A Divine Jealousy For You (2 Corinthians 11:1-4)

You are listening to the teaching ministry of Gabriel Hughes, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast, we feature 20 minutes of Bible study through a New Testament book.

On Thursday is our Old Testament study, and then we answer questions from listeners on Friday. Each Sunday we are pleased to share our sermon series, presently going through the letters to the Corinthians.

This is the sermon that was preached last week from our pulpit. Here's Pastor Gabe.

The Danger of False Teaching and the Need for Truth

I got a question this past week by email. It was very brief. It was just three sentences. But because of the, when we understand the text ministry, sometimes I field a lot of questions about a variety of different topics.

And this was one of those particular topics. A fellow by the name of Neil emailed me and he said this, I have a question about something that I have heard lately. What is this book of Enoch? I would like some wisdom on this.

I don't know who to trust anymore. It's a very simple question and it would seem otherwise innocuous to you. As I read that, you might be going, yeah, what is the book of Enoch? But in your spirit, you're not troubled by not knowing what that is.

But this individual has emailed me who is troubled in his spirit by something someone told him about an extra canonical book, something that we don't have in the Bible that isn't inspired by the Holy Spirit.

And someone has said something to him about that book that has caused him great vexation. There is nothing in this world that causes more grief, more anxiety, more stress, more depression, more uncertainty, more hopelessness than bad doctrine.

It is the number one cause of human angst that we are taught the wrong thing instead of the right thing. Especially in this particular season right now where we've got the election coming up on Tuesday.

You are being bombarded with all kinds of statements from all different directions. Some true statements, but mostly a bunch of hogwash. People that are trying to manipulate your mind or your heart to vote for them on issues that they think that you should care about.

It's an appeal to the emotions oftentimes, not so much an appeal to facts and information. Most of these political issues are reaching out to what you feel about a particular something, not weighing the evidence and then coming to an informed decision.

It might be disguised as that, but that's not ultimately what the politicians are after, at least not in this day and age in which we live. We are not really an information people. We are people who are driven by our feelings and our emotions.

And it's amazing considering the time in which we live. You realize you have more than an Encyclopedia Britannica inside your pocket, and yet we are not a people who are driven by information and knowledge.

We are driven by what feels right, by what we're passionate about, by what we think should be true and what I think is true, therefore should be true for everybody else, and we impose our feelings and our opinions on everyone to think exactly like we do.

And it is this kind of mentality that is behind all kinds of lies that are being fed in our culture right now, especially in a culture in which there is no such thing as absolute truth. And you'll hear it over and over again, someone saying, said, there are no absolutes.

There is no such thing as truth. Is that a true statement? Then your argument has just committed suicide. There is truth. And we know this as believers in Christ, for our Lord Christ has said in John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life.

No one comes to the Father but by me. And my friends, we weigh everything that goes on in this world according to what God has said in his word. Anything, even political issues and political matters need to be weighed against the word of God.

These are not things that exist in a vacuum. You don't go to school and hear certain things taught to you in respective subjects and then go, well, that's school, but the Bible doesn't have anything to say about that.

Yes, it does. Or watch the news some night and you hear some political pundit say something and you think to yourself, well, that's just politics. The Bible doesn't say anything about that. The Bible does.

And all matters of truth are weighed against the knowledge of God. There are going to be people who are going to come among us and they are going to claim to be prophets. And not just prophets of God.

Even in the political things that are going on right now, you have prophets, right? You've got people going, this is the most important election that there has ever been. The future of our nation hinges upon this election, a midterm election, really?

Who's going to sit in the Supreme Court? Who's going to be in Congress? Who is going to say yes or no to Donald Trump and take a stand against this man? Who's going to be able to control the narrative going into the next presidency and on and on it goes.

There's prophets everywhere. People are trying to forecast the end from the beginning. And if they are not speaking according to what Christ has said in his word, if they have not submitted their own thoughts and hearts to the will of God, then what they are saying is likely false.

Now there is certainly true information in this world that is given to us by people who are not believers. Even a person who is an unbeliever can know that the sky is blue, right? But yet all knowledge that is presented to us is to be weighed against this.

For our hope in this world is not in the next election. Our hope in this world is not going to be in that next job promotion. Our hope in this world is not going to be in getting good grades, although we should certainly strive for those things.

But our hope and our promise is always Christ. There is an urgency in Paul's message. Now his letter to the Corinthians takes on a little bit more urgent tone because he's shifting gears a little bit into directly confronting the false teachers that are among them.

And there are false teachers. As this letter is being read before the entire congregation, there are likely false teachers that are sitting right there and hearing Paul's words read aloud to the church in Corinth.

This is not unlike Paul's character to do this. When you read in the book of Philippians, he wrote a very friendly letter to the Philippians, thanking them for the gift that they had sent to him. And he uses that opportunity to thank them for the gift and also to encourage them in spiritual matters and their growth and sanctification in Christ.

But you get to chapter 4, and there in Philippians chapter 4, Paul also takes a chance to call out a couple of women who were squabbling in the church. And he said, I entreat Jodea and Sintesh to agree in the Lord.

He even puts their names in the letter. And so whoever it was who was charged to read this letter aloud to the church in Philippi, they're reading that and get to Jodea and Sintesh, and you had to know that Jodea and Sintesh were sitting there going, oh boy, slinking down in their chairs because they just got called out by the apostle Paul.

But his effort here was not to bash anybody. He wasn't trying to feel superior over someone else. It was so that these sisters would agree, that they would behave as sisters in the body of Christ, rather than squabbling and disagreeing and therefore bringing that tone of division into the body.

That was why he did that. It was with a very loving spirit. And so likewise here, he's going to call out some false teachers that are even sitting among the Corinthians as this letter is being read. But doing this is not because he wants to look better than these guys.

He loves and cares for these Corinthians, and they're being led astray with lies. And there's nothing more damning or more destroying than false teaching. My friends, false teaching is the very thing that led to the world in the state that it's in right now.

With Satan in the garden saying to Eve, did God really say, you won't surely die if you eat that fruit? For God knows if you eat it, you will become like him. And our world has been subjected to futility because Adam and Eve listened to the deceiver instead of the creator.

Paul even calls attention to that here. In verse 3, I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. He's doing this for their benefit.

He loves these Christians. And lies will lead a person away from the kingdom and straight into hell. And Paul does not want that to happen. So how does he begin this section that we've started now today?

Chapter 11, verse 1, he says, I wish you would bear with me in a little bit of foolishness. What does he mean by that, a little bit of foolishness? Well, he's about to boast in himself. And he hates that he's about to do this.

He can't stand that he's about to go where he's about to go in this letter. But he knows that he has to because he's contending for the hearts of these people who are being led astray by false teachers.

What did we just have at the end of chapter 10? In verses 17 and 18, Paul says, let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord. For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends.

So what Paul is going to do here now, going into chapter 11, is that he wants to show the Corinthians that he does not commend himself. And that it is actually the Lord who has approved of him. That's why he's an apostle of Jesus Christ.

The Lord has called him out, has singled him out for this work of preaching the gospel in the world. Even though, at the time that Jesus called Paul, he was persecuting Christians. He was even on the way to Damascus to arrest Christians for believing in Jesus.

That was what he was on his way to do. And yet it was on that road that Christ appeared to him. Struck him blind and said to Ananias, I'm going to show him how much he's going to suffer for my name, and he is going to be my missionary to the Gentiles.

And so, God has approved of Paul. God has commended Paul. And what Paul is going to do in boasting in himself is showing them that he is the one whom God has approved to be an apostle. These other guys are not.

In fact, Paul will even go as far as saying that they're Satanists. Because they preach a different Christ and a different gospel. He does not pull his punches on this. So Paul says, I wish you would bear with me in a little foolishness.

Do bear with me. And in your English translation here, you have that with an exclamation point at the very end. Do bear with me. I don't know how this is supposed to be understood in the Greek. I've looked at the Greek, but I don't read Greek.

I'm not a Greek scholar. So somehow these words are being said in such a way that is very expressive and passionate. I am going to appeal for your hearts. So bear with me as I say what it is that I'm about to say.

It's almost as if Paul is saying, don't think that I'm boasting in myself for my own benefit here. I'm doing this for you. You need to know the difference between true teachers and false teachers. And Paul is saying, I'm a true teacher.

He hates that he has to qualify himself that way. He wishes that it would be evident on its own, and the Corinthians would simply weigh the facts. But because they're being led astray by these guys who are even dogging on Paul, saying, look at this guy.

He's not even that great a speaker. Paul has to show them that I am the true teacher and they are the false teachers. I come in the name of Christ. They come preaching a different Christ. Verse 2, for I feel a divine jealousy for you.

You might read that and go, isn't jealousy bad? Aren't we supposed to not be jealous? This is why Paul says it is a divine jealousy. It's a holy jealousy. I don't want to share you with any false teacher.

And know my heart, and I've said this to you as well as your pastor, I want the same. I don't want to share you with any false teacher. Now, that doesn't mean that I'm not willing to share you with any teacher.

For if you've ever come to me and asked, hey, what other resources can I read or listen to to continue my devotions throughout the week? What other teachers are there that you would recommend? I'll give you a list of teachers.

In fact, when we were interviewing Philip and Christine for membership last week, that was the question that they had. What are some other materials that you as a church use in your teaching? And I said to them, one of the first resources that I send a person to, if you want to listen to some more great sermons and teaching, is download the RefNet app on your phone.

The Reformation Network. It's basically talk radio on your phone, but it's all biblical teaching. And I approve of every single one of those pastors that they choose for that particular app. The Reformation Network.

Some of the men who have taught me, Albert Moeller, R .C. Sproul, Voddie Bauckham, John Piper, John MacArthur. Those are many of the names that you will hear on that particular network. All great names.

And we've got a shelf full of books in our little small library back here as well that are all approved materials for your benefit. So it's not that I'm not willing to share you with any teacher, but, my friends, I don't want to share you with any false teacher.

I don't even want the dollars that we collect as a church for the purpose of ministry to ever be used for any false ministry. And that's one of the reasons why, at the last business meeting, we as a church decided to withdraw funds that were being given to our Smoky Hills Association, because they were using those funds to advance a church that we just don't agree with.

And so this is a divine jealousy by which we operate. May it not be boastful. May it not be a prideful thing. May it not be a thing where I know better than you. We do this because we love the truth. And we know that Jesus said in John 4, the worshipers that God is looking for will worship Him in spirit and in truth.

We can't worship God the way that we want to worship God. We worship God the way that God has said He is to be worshiped. God is the author of truth, and so we must obey Him. What He has said is true.

That is true. And, my friends, it is binding on every single person. No one gets to decide their own truth. It's true for you whether you want it to be or not. I didn't know the speed limit through here was 30.

So you can't write me a ticket because I believe it's supposed to be 65. Good luck getting out of that one. Whatever the law is, the law is binding on every single person, right? Same way it works in civic government.

So it works that way in the kingdom of God as well. What God has said is the truth is true for every person. And so what we know as believers in Jesus Christ is there are many people in this world, the majority of people in this world, who are living and acting in a way that is contrary to this truth.

Sometimes they get things right. I believe that it's wrong to steal from my neighbor. Good. You do that commandment pretty well. But in the meantime, they are living in ways that are contrary to God. They don't worship God.

They don't honor Him as God. But their hearts are darkened by their foolish pride and desire to do what their flesh desires. And so therefore they break the first and greatest command, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

And as James says, if you break one commandment, you're guilty of breaking the whole thing. And so we know that those who have broken the law of God are going to be judged by God. A day of judgment is coming in which God is going to pour out His wrath on all the ungodly.

And the only way to be saved from this day of judgment is faith in Jesus Christ, who is the only righteous man who ever lived and fulfilled all of the law. And He did that for our benefit. As we've read here in 2 Corinthians 5, verse 21, For our sake He became sin who knew no sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Jesus Christ, when He died on the cross, took our sins upon Himself, and He clothed us in His righteousness. So now when God looks at us, He doesn't see the filthy, wretched sinner that is worthy of His wrath.

He sees a righteous man or woman of God who is deserving of His love. And He has shown us grace in this, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. So let us now come boldly before the throne of grace, knowing that we are received by God because of what Jesus Christ has done for us.

The way, the truth, and the life, no one gets to the Father but through Christ. So we must warn this world that they are guilty of breaking the law and the commandments of God. That by trying to follow their own truth, they're actually proclaiming that their truth is greater than God's truth.

And for a belief or a mindset like that, for living your life in such a way, what you deserve is eternal separation from God. And we do not want souls to be damned to hell. We want them to be saved into eternity.

And so we go out with the gospel so that they would hear the gospel and turn from sin, and they would live forever with God. Same way that we were saved, so they would be saved by hearing the truth and believing it.

And the truth offends. It offends every single person who wants to go their own way. But the truth saves. And it doesn't matter if we're offending another person by sharing the truth with them. We actually love them more than they love themselves, than they consider or care about themselves.

Because they're acting in a way that is contrary to God, and there will be judgment for that. We desire that they would not follow in the ways of the lies of the deceiver, but instead come to know the truth of the Savior.

And Paul says, I feel a divine jealousy for you since I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a pure virgin to Christ. Back in verses 5 and 6, I'm sorry, chapter 10, verses 5 and 6, Paul said, We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive to obey Christ, being ready to punish every disobedience when your obedience is complete.

We are currently, as we are Christians in this world, being sanctified. If you have been justified in Christ, if you've become a believer in Jesus Christ, your sins are forgiven, you are completely justified, but you're not yet fully sanctified.

Sanctified means being made holy. We are continuing to be made in the image of Christ. As it says in Romans 8, 29, we're being made like Christ. So your conversion didn't end the moment that you said, God forgive me of my sins.

The walk of faith began on that day, and it continues to this very day all the way to the day that you die and go and join the Lord forever in eternity. Paul said to the Philippians, I am confident of this very thing that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it on the day of Christ.

So this work was started and it continues, and it does not come to completion until you die. So you must submit your whole self to God. Heart, mind, spirit, strength unto the Lord. Romans 12, 1, in view of God's mercy, present your bodies as a living sacrifice unto God.

This is your spiritual act of worship. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 6 that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, and so we must honor God with our body. Paul says that when he came preaching the gospel in Corinth, he betrothed them with the gospel.

They were divorced from the ways of this world, their enslavement and their bondage to Satan and his ways, and instead they were united and married to Christ, to one husband who is referred to in the New Testament as the bridegroom.

We have this beautiful picture in the book of Revelation at the end of all things of Jesus receiving his bride who is coming to him who is washed in white, purified and clean. And my friends, that's all the saints together when we are one in glory and we are presented to our Savior as a pure and washed bride.

Just as a bride comes to her husband down the aisle clothed in white so we would come to our Savior the same way. And just as a husband receives his bride to himself, not holding anything against her, but she is now new with him and he vows to cherish her forever so we have the same from our Lord Christ.

And the vow that Christ makes to us, the oath that he commits to us as the husband of the bride, as the groom of the church, is not like the oaths and vows that we make in this world which can be broken.

Some of you have maybe gone through a divorce or you've seen your parents or loved ones go through a divorce. There's no such thing as an easy divorce. I don't care what anyone says. And I've had friends that have gone through that and have said, oh, you know, it's for the best.

It's not. Our words can be broken. Our words can be changed. We can pledge one thing and then lie and go a completely different way. But that's not the way our Lord Christ is. He doesn't make promises like we make promises.

He makes promises that he keeps. And he keeps forever. And so as we have been betrothed to Christ, all those who are believers in him, we have this guarantee. As it says in 1 Timothy 3, though we are faithless, God remains faithful for he cannot deny himself.

Paul says, I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a pure virgin to Christ. But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, so your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and a pure devotion to Christ.

I find it mind-blowing that the way we're introduced to Satan in Scripture, in Genesis 3, verse 1, is him saying these words, Did God really say? That's the first thing Satan says in the whole Bible.

And he's still whispering that lie to us now. That's the way he tries to implant doubt. We read, we hear, we study. Somebody taught it to us in Sunday school when we were a kid and then we grow up and we question whether or not that was even true.

And we hear the deceiver, the accuser whispering in our ears saying, Did God really say that? Did God really mean that? This past week I read an article from a church. It's a very well-known church, a mega church here in the United States.

And the lead pastor was suing someone for saying something that he believed to be slander against himself and against his church. Now, whether or not it's true, I don't know. I've not studied the specifics of the case.

But he's suing a fellow believer. He's suing someone else who claims to be a Christian, who claims to also be someone who fears God. And they were alerting other people to the false things that he will do at his church.

And they will even sometimes on this website get testimonies from people who have come out of this church to warn them about the deceptions that are going on. Now, I know that's the nature of the website.

Again, I hadn't studied the specifics of it. But my alarm red flag started going up when I was reading this article about a pastor suing another Christian. I went, hmm, what did Paul say to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 6, that we should not go into lawsuits against other believers?

And he goes as far as saying, why not go ahead and suffer wrong? Like, do you believe that this other person is truly treating you unjustly? So what? Isn't it better to just go ahead and suffer wrong instead of believer going against believer in court and this in front of unbelievers?

Like, you're letting unbelievers try cases that you should be able to handle between brothers. Just let yourself be defrauded rather than putting that kind of witness before an unbelieving world. Jesus said the same thing in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5.

If your enemy smacks you on one cheek, turn to him the other cheek. If he demands your cloak, give him your tunic too. If he says go one mile, go two miles with him. It would be better to just be wronged than to have these things escalate to this point of division that will no doubt infect the body of Christ and be a poor witness to the rest of the world.

So this pastor is taking another believer to court. And I read the article. The article was written by this pastor. And he used all manner of scriptural justification for his actions. I mean, it was filled with Bible verses.

He basically started saying, I know the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 6 that you're not supposed to take believers to court. But here's what I found. And then he starts going through all these other passages.

Here's what I mean by bringing up this example. Here's why I bring that example up. He's saying that, I know the Bible says this, but I can make it mean whatever I want it to say. He's given in to the lies of the deceiver.

When he reads in 1 Corinthians 6, you shouldn't take other believers to court. What he heard Satan say was, did God really say that? I bet you can find something else in there that God said that would actually give you permission to take your brother to court.

And the pastor was listening to Satan rather than listening to God. This is one of the reasons why we need each other and we need the guidance of many counselors, as is talked about in the book of Proverbs.

In Ecclesiastes, Solomon said that a cord of three strands is not easily broken. We should not rely on our own wit, thinking that we're always going to be the right one and we are the gauge for how to interpret what the Scripture says and what God's truth really is.

For one brother might interpret a verse one way and another brother might interpret that verse to say something else. We need the accountability of one another. Furthermore, we need to receive correction when it is given.

For Proverbs 12, verse 1 says that he who loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid. That's in the Bible, kids. That's an acceptable use of the word stupid. We must be willing to be corrected.

For Paul even gave this instruction to the church in Colossae, in Colossians chapter 3, that we are to encourage and admonish one another. To admonish means to correct with goodwill. We are supposed to look out for one another and keep one another walking the path of righteousness.

As we read in Psalm 23 this morning, for His name's sake. We don't correct one another so we can look better than somebody else. It's because we do these things to the glory of God that we might be able to stand before God one day.

My brothers and sisters, we stand before God as the pure bride of Christ. And we are laboring to purify one another before God that we may grow together in maturity into the head who is Christ Jesus. Yet Paul says that, I'm afraid your thoughts are going to be led astray from that sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one that we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one that you received, or you accept a different gospel from the one that you accepted, you put up with it readily enough.

What Paul is basically saying there is you are receiving and believing these things. None of these things are being rebuked in the church in Corinth. Who's rebuking the false teachers? Who's saying this guy's not a true apostle?

This guy's not preaching the Christ that Paul came and preached to us. This person comes in a different spirit, a deceitful spirit. 1 John 4 verse 1. Now, the Corinthians didn't have 1 John 4 verse 1, but we have it.

Because it was written later, it was written after this. But in 1 John 4 verse 1, we are told, Brothers and sisters, do not believe every spirit comes from God, but test the spirits. For there are many deceitful spirits that have gone out into the world.

Just because someone comes proclaiming Christ does not mean that they are of Christ. There's this thought that's become particularly prevalent, and I'm not really sure where this comes from. I've tried to trace it.

I don't know. I've found it in numerous different denominations. So it's not in one particular sect or faction of Christianity. But there is this belief or this idea that Satan cannot utter the name of Jesus Christ.

And we have this concept that if somebody comes proclaiming Christ, well, they cannot be of Satan because Satan can't even speak that name. I'm not sure where that comes from. But Paul will go on here in this chapter to say that even Satan presents himself as an angel of light.

2 Corinthians 11 verses 13 and 14,. Such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light, one who comes in the name of the Lord.

So it is no surprise if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness, therein will correspond to their deeds. My friends, understand something as these false teachers. They will look normal.

They will sound good. You will like what they have to say. The fact that they're liars and deceivers is not going to be immediately evident. For Paul said to the church in Ephesus in Acts chapter 20, there are going to be false teachers who are going to rise among you.

He didn't say they're going to come from outside. They will be even within your midst. They will look just like you. What did Jesus say in the Sermon on the Mount? They are wolves in sheep's clothing.

They look like sheep on the outside, but on the inside, Jesus said, they are ravenous wolves seeking to devour the flock of God. So we must be wise and we must be discerning. And we must know the word of God that we contest any false word against the truth and know what is truly come from God and what comes from an opponent of God.

There are many who are going to proclaim Christ, but what they proclaim is a different Jesus. It is not the true Christ. And the Apostle John warned that they would be an antichrist. And so now many antichrists have come.

Whenever we use that term, we tend to think of like one guy. One antichrist is going to come and he's going to stand before the world and he's going to deceive the nations. And we're going to know who the antichrist is because he's going to tell everybody to wear a mark, 666.

So therefore, we're going to, I remember my Bible saying something about that, so I know you're an antichrist. Friends, it's not going to be that obvious. John, again saying, many antichrists have come.

They have come now. They are here now. Anybody who speaks contrary to the knowledge of God is an antichrist, according to what the Bible says. And the mark that they show that they are of the beast and not of the Savior is that the things that they do with their hands and the stuff that they think with their thoughts, mark on the forehead, on the back of the hand, shows that they're of Satan and not of God.

So we must test them according to what God's Word says and know who is the true teacher and who is the false one. There are plenty of examples that I've used with you before about those who preach a different Christ and those who know the true Christ.

One easy example that I go to just about every time is Mormonism. Mormons teach a different Christ. He's a Jesus who was created, not one who is eternal. He is the literal offspring of Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother.

Yes, they believe in a mother god in Mormonism. He is the literal spirit brother of Satan. Satan is the brother of Jesus in the Mormon religion. And that through a process of obedience, he became divine.

And you can become divine as well. You can become a god like he is by following the same pattern of obedience that Jesus gave us by demonstration. That's a different Jesus. That is not the Christ of the Bible.

If it is a different Christ, then His death on the cross is a different atonement. If His death on the cross is a different atonement, then my friends, you're still dead in your sins and you're not saved.

You can't believe in any spirit that calls himself Jesus. You must believe the Christ of the Bible, worshiping the Father in spirit and in truth. There are teachers, it's become very popular even within evangelicalism right now, to say that the atonement of Christ on the cross is not actually an atonement.

That Jesus did not actually shed His blood for the forgiveness of sins. That God did not pour out His wrath upon Christ on the cross and Christ drank the wrath of God where He died there for our sake, on our behalf.