2 Timothy 4:3-4 - "For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suite their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths."
Paul is communicating something to his child in the faith, Timothy, be ready false teaching is coming. Some that is going to be easy to recognize and some that is going to be difficult to discern, and so he tells him in V. 5 - "... always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."
He admonishes him to know the truth, and preach the truth, even when you are getting blasted.
Today we have the same charge, as false teaching surrounds us, and each day it seems to be something different and if we are not careful we can fall victim to the seductive language the devil uses to pull us in. I see so many blogs, Facebook posts, articles, blasting doctrines and religions, and men, faithful and unfaithful. How do we stay alert and guard against our hearts being deceived?
I think to answer that question we must look at the root behind why so many get deceived. I think so often it is those who don't understand who God is, what He is like, what pleases Him, and what does not please Him. And we take our assumptions about Him and create our profile of Him, and so often it is based not on what we read and study in the narrative of the entire Bible but our own personal feelings, and that is dangerous, because I know my heart and I know how wicked and self-serving it is.
So our answer to the question is, we must know who the Scriptures say God to be, I know simple right? But has the power to change how we see God and how we rejoice in Him, this is how Paul warns Timothy to be sober-minded and alert and how he warns us today.
Over the course of the next year or so we are going to look, two times a week into the character of God and the Gospel, and look to what the Scriptures as a whole say to this. I think so often we walk through assuming we know things that are not true at all. My aim in this blog is to explore and inform us, so that we may be sober-minded and ready to do the work of an evangelist.
We will lean heavily on the Scriptures and on faithful men to help us increase in knowledge and understanding. I hope that this is helpful and truthful, that it nourishes your soul and mind.
NEXT WEEK - 3/28- The Independence of God.
About Me
- Fellowship Church Lubbock
- We are not perfect, but we have been saved by the one who is. He did it by grace alone, through faith alone, on the basis of Christ alone, for the glory of God alone, revealed infallibly by the Scripture alone.
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