1st Timothy 6 20 Oh Timothy Keep that which is
committed to that trust Avoiding profane and vain babblings and
oppositions of science falsely so-called Which some professing
have aired concerning the faith Grace be with thee. Amen. O Timothy. That word O, one letter, that's
a hard word to say. It's gonna sound stupid if you
say it just in normal conversation. You can't just use that word.
lightly If I said OD pass me the salt
the verdict it'd be see what sounds stupid It just doesn't
sound right, and I know it wasn't spoken here But the sentiment
is the same There's a lot contained in that word. Oh It means that
this is consequential and In this case, it's of eternal consequence. Oh, Timothy. It means that Timothy keeping
what he is told here to keep is vital. It expresses what a calamity
it would be if it were not kept. It's a word that puts whatever
it's interjected into on new ground, on urgent, decisive ground
Listen to a couple of places in scripture where it's used
in Romans 11 30 for as ye in times past have not believed
God Yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief Even so
have these also now not believed that through your mercy they
also may obtain mercy For God hath concluded them all in unbelief
that he might have mercy on upon all, oh. Oh, the depth of the riches,
both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are
his judgments and his ways past finding out. You see, the type
of context that this word, oh, is reserved for, oh, the depth
of the riches. both of the wisdom and knowledge
of God. And then in a whole other sense,
in Galatians 3.1, listen to this one, in a completely different
direction. Oh, foolish Galatians, who have bewitched you that you
should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ have
been evidently set forth, crucified among you. The gospel has been
preached to you so clearly. Who is it? How is it that you're
bewitched from the simplicity that's in
Christ? Oh, foolish Galatians. How? Who? Why? So here it's, oh, Timothy, keep. How important this is, how vital.
How consequential. Guard, watch, protect, take care
for the gospel. What is committed to Timothy's
trust is nothing other than the gospel of Christ. The word of
truth, the words of eternal life. That which is the savor of life
to some and the savor of death to others. Guard it, watch over it, care
for it. I was talking to an old friend
of mine who called me up out of the blue not long ago, really
just a few weeks ago. He was at one time my best friend.
Years ago, it's been probably 35 years since I talked to him,
except for this time. He just called me up, wanted
to talk about the end times. whether I was pre-millennial
or post-millennial or amillennial and why. And I did my best to
say I'm none of that and here's why. Because the message of scripture
is Christ and not chronology. How many times does the Lord
Jesus have to say the times you're not going to know them? But I spoke to him for a good
long while and we had a very pleasant conversation, very enjoyable
to talk to him again. We laughed a lot about some of
the shenanigans we got up to when we were younger and some
really fun memories we talked about. And we were old buddies
again until he blasphemed God. And I tried to be as nice about
it as I could be, but you know me, sometimes it's, it's hard
for me to do that. He perverted the gospel of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And I made him mad and we'll
probably, we'll never speak again. It wasn't ugly. It wasn't, you
know, as bad as it has been before talking to different people about
the gospel. But I doubt if we'll ever speak
to one another again. And you know, what did he say
that was so horrible that it was worth destroying a friendship
over, albeit a very distant friendship and neglected one? You know what
he said? God loves everybody. And he gives
everybody a chance to be saved. You can't say anything more horrible
than that. There is nothing more horrible
than that. And when he said that, I didn't sit there and think,
well, I better defend the gospel here. I just told the truth. And how can you not when it comes
to that? You can't agree with that. You
can't let that slide. I was just telling him the truth
before I even knew I was doing it. And that's the way it's got
to be. That's what the Lord does. But the way that we keep that
which is committed to our trust, more importantly than like that,
that's a very rare situation that comes up a few times in
a lifetime. But the way that we keep that
which is committed to us in a much more important way is by everything
we do and say. Particularly when we have an
opportunity to be a witness of the grace of God in Christ Whether
from a pulpit or when a friend is hurting or in your children's
bedroom We are to live the gospel that
we claim to believe and testify of our Lord whenever we have
opportunity to That's what the hope was that
not what this whole book was about first Timothy as we've
looked through this book verse by verse It's about living the
gospel in the church and in your daily life, but listen it speaks
primarily in this book of the integrity of the gospel message
itself and Thumb back over to chapter four real quick, and
let's remind ourselves in 1 Timothy 4.6. 1 Timothy 4.6. If thou put the brethren in remembrance
of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ,
nourished up in the words of faith, words to be believed. What is to be believed? in order
to have eternal life. The words of faith and good doctrine,
good teaching, whereunto thou hast attained. But refuse profane
and old wives' fables, and exercise thyself rather unto godliness. Now, as we trace this word godliness
in the scriptures and in this book that we've been looking
through, We see that it doesn't mean you being like God. That's
the way religion interprets that. We're not to interpret scripture.
It's not a foreign language. It's written in our language.
And you can look up the original language and see specifically
in cases where there might be a variance. But this word godliness,
it doesn't mean us being like God. And we want to be imitators
of God. Of course we do. But that's not
this word. Exercise thyself unto godlikeness. The word means reverence. It's
not you being like God, it's you acting like God is God. If you preach or teach or say
at all that God loves everybody and wants to give everybody a
chance, he wants to save everybody, that's not godlike. You're not exercising yourself
unto godliness. To say that God loves his sheep
and that he saves every one of them, not one is lost, that's
godlike. And you're exercising yourself
unto godliness to say that and to live that, to live according
to the fact that God's on the throne and that he does as he
pleases. And of course, you're doing that
by God working in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure,
Philippians 2.13. We get no room for boasting there. But look at our text now. There
are two ways that ungodliness is perpetrated and can be identified,
and that's something we've seen before, so we won't spend a lot
of time on it, but notice he said profane and vain. It's not just throwing out words. These are specifically the ways
that people pervert the gospel and not preach the truth. As
Paul put it in 1 Timothy 4, 7, where we just read, profane and
old wives' fables. Profanity, profane, is a perversion
of the truth. It's taking scripture and twisting
it, taking it out of context, making it say what you want it
to say. Taking God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten
son and ignoring the whole rest of scripture and saying, well,
that means everybody that ever lived the world. No, it don't. You just have to read the Bible
to see that that's not what it means. It's not complicated. It's not some code you have to
figure out. You just read the Bible, and
you know when he says world, he's talking about it not being
limited to the Jews. And you also know that everybody
God loved is saved. For whom he did foreknow, he
also did predestinate, and call and justify and glorify. So, Profanity is perversion of
that. The truth of the gospel of the
successful, victorious, sovereign savior of sinners. And old wives'
fables is stuff that's just made up. It's just made up. It's just a story. It's just
an old wife. It's a myth. These are the two
ways. They take scripture and pervert
it, but also they just make stuff up. And we're to guard the truth
from such perversions as God loves everybody, and Christ died to save everybody,
we're to guard the truth from that, from perversions of, they'll
use scripture to back that up, even though it's taken out of
context and it contradicts everything the scripture teaches. And we're
to guard the truth from stuff that's just made up completely.
Or just irrelevant to the truth. Not even in the Bible. Such as
the shape of the earth. For example, there are true things
and then there's the truth. The truth. And it's committed
to our trust. The gospel is committed to our
trust. Do we ever think about that?
Do we ever live in the reality of that? The gospel is committed
to our trust. What that means is to consign
to one's faithful keeping. Hence Paul saying, keep that.
Keep that which is committed unto you. It's committed to your
trust. God doesn't trust our flesh.
That's not it, but he consigns the gospel to us to proclaim
himself and what he did for sinners It's a solemn commission from
the Lord himself we are ambassadors of Jesus Christ What a high calling
that is The way to guard, to watch over,
take care for the gospel is to tell it, to tell it faithfully. It doesn't do sinners a whole
lot of good to tell them what not to believe. That's not the
gospel. And I know many that spend most
of their time doing that, refuting error, showing how much more
they know than other people know. How's a sinner saved though? You expose and oppose and destroy
what not to preach by preaching the truth of Christ. You expose
the error of God loves everybody by proclaiming the simple truth
of Romans chapter eight that all whom God loved he did predestinate
to be conformed to the image of his son. And whom he did predestinate,
then he also called. And then he called, then he also
justified. Everybody he loved is justified
before God. And whom he justified, then he
also glorified. And if you read further in that
same chapter, you see where God's love is. How God can love any
sinner in Christ Jesus. Otherwise it's Psalm 5, 5. God
hateth all workers of iniquity. You can quote John 3, 16 all
day long. And I can quote Psalm 5, 5. God hateth all workers of iniquity. Who is that? You in on that? Those don't cancel each other
out, they're both true. And to understand the gospel
is to see how God can be just. He can be uncompromising in his
punishment of sin and yet justify the ungodly. And it's not a complicated
answer, it's a person. It's the Lord Jesus Christ shedding
his precious blood for those sinners. whom God loved and predestinated
and called and justified and glorified. And there's one other thing we're
exhorted to guard against in this passage. Guard against knowledge. What an interesting exhortation. The word science here means knowledge
in general, But it's not knowledge in general that's warned against
in our text. Because this word also means
a certain knowledge. It means knowledge of facts. I'll give you the exact definition
of it. I've got it a little further down here. So the word science
in our text here, it means Deeper and more perfect knowledge such
as belongs to the more advanced It also means moral wisdom such
as is seen in right living So think about this The knowledge by which God saves. We're not saved without knowledge
of God. To know God is eternal life,
John 17 three. This is life eternal. That they
might know thee, the only true God. And Jesus Christ whom thou
hast sent. But notice the specific knowledge
that that verse talks about. That they might know thee. Somebody, not something. Not
that they might know all about thee, but that they might know
thee. The knowledge of the person of
the Lord Jesus Christ himself now is specifically distinguished
from all other knowledge in the gospel. First Corinthians 2.1,
and I brethren, when I came to you, I came not with excellency
of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God,
Why not? You ever think about that? I
didn't come with excellency of speech or wisdom or human wisdom,
declaring the gospel unto you. Wouldn't you want to declare
the gospel with the right words, with, with, an excellency of
speech in a sense, in other words, say it in an eloquent way and
in a thorough way and with wisdom. Listen, what he's not saying spoken words you couldn't understand
or what we might think is the opposite. The opposite of coming
to you with excellency of speech and wisdom is this, for I determined
not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified." That is distinguished from all
other knowledge and wisdom. And not only that, not only is
it distinguished, but all other knowledge and wisdom has to be
set aside. Not your ability to think, but
you're thinking of other things. You see the difference? You don't
set aside your ability to think, the Lord uses the means of your
understanding to reveal the gospel to you. But it's your setting
aside everything else, because nothing else matters. Christ
is all, you're completing him. You don't need to know anything
else. I'm glad I know earthly things.
I'm glad I can fix stuff and don't have to call an expert
and pay a bunch of money every time something breaks around.
I'm glad for all that. But when it comes to the gospel,
when it comes to eternal matters, nothing else is important. And there's a specific reason
why this is stressed by the apostle. Again, the word science here
means deeper and more perfect knowledge, such as belongs to
the more advanced. In other words, Christ, the gospel
of Christ is not complicated. You don't have to be advanced
in understanding and knowledge and wisdom to hear the gospel
and believe it. You can be a child. And if you don't come as a little
child, you're gonna miss the kingdom of God. You see that? Not only can it be understood
as a child, it's got to be. It's got to be simple faith. It can't be you figuring everything
out. That's contrary to the gospel.
That's a hindrance to knowing the truth of Christ. Why would
Paul warn Timothy against deeper knowledge or knowledge that results
in right living? Because it is empty morality
and or knowledge of doctrinal facts that counterfeits and keeps
people from a true knowledge of the person of Christ. We have
that right in the scripture now. This is not us deducing things.
We see it right in the word of God. Christ himself is salvation
and eternal life. Listen to John 5.39 again. You're familiar with this, 39
and 40. Listen to it. This is the Lord Jesus Christ
talking to the Pharisees, to the religious Jews. And he said,
search the scriptures. He often told them, don't you
know the scriptures? And that's a very humiliating
thing for them to hear. They were the experts on scripture
and everybody knew it. Think about the theologians of
our day. If you sat down and talked to
a degreed theologian, a doctor of divinity or a doctor of theology
today that doesn't know the Lord Jesus Christ, you know what you'd
end up saying? Haven't you ever read the word
of God? He'd be sitting there telling
you God loves everybody and you'd be, wait a minute. That's what
our Lord said to them. Haven't you read? Search the scriptures. They had,
they knew. He's saying, do it. Look at it
again. Read it again. Search the scriptures for in
them, you think you have eternal life. In other words, their knowledge,
their knowledge of the word of God comforted them. That was
their refuge. I know more than you. How many times have you confronted
that in your life? As a preacher, I probably have
more than you, but so many times. Look what I know and look what
other people don't know. That's not the gospel. Search the scriptures for in
them, you think you have eternal life. And they are they which
testify of me. Look at it again. Everything in the word of God
points to Christ. And he said, and you will not
come to me. because you don't know me, you
know the scriptures. How much more clear could that
be? Nothing wrong with knowing the
scriptures, but if you truly know the scriptures, you're gonna
know Christ, because that's all they say. The Pharisees thought knowledge
of the scriptures would save them. It's just another form
of self-righteousness. When the purpose of the whole
of scripture is to know a person, the Son of God. John 20, 30. I noticed different preachers,
you know, they tend to quote certain scripture and just about
every, you know, they, you can tell the Lord has spoken to them
from that particular scripture. You know, this is one of mine.
So I quote it often and I'm gonna keep quoting it. Listen to it.
Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples,
which are not written in this book. but these are written. That you might believe that Jesus
is the Christ. Not that you might know more
than somebody else, not that you might get all your I's dotted
and T's crossed in your doctrine. that you might believe that Jesus
is the Christ, the son of God, and that believing you might
have life through his name. You will not come to me. Search
the scriptures. You think you have eternal life
in your knowledge of the scriptures, but they testify of me and you
won't come to me? That you might have life. It's life
or death. You see why Paul warns against
knowledge? You know, it's easy for people
to say, I believe Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Son of God.
You ever think that that verse is too broad? To believe that
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God? It's easy to say, I believe
Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Son of God. But if you don't
know what a Christ is, do you really believe that Jesus is
the Christ? If you don't know what it means
to be the Son of God, do you really know that Jesus Christ
is the Son of God? Him being the Son of God, means
he does as he pleases. He shall not fail nor be discouraged. Him being the son of God means
that whoever he died to save are saved by his precious sin atoning blood. It means that he shall not fail
nor be discouraged till he have set judgment in the earth. Him
being the Christ means that he finished the transgression, made
an end of sins, made reconciliation for iniquity and brought in everlasting
righteousness for somebody because God said he would. And he did. When Christ himself is not enough, then people begin to take stances
on superlapsarianism and sublapsarianism and infralapsarianism. You're not gonna do that until
Christ is not enough. Then you're gonna get into that.
When you're bored with the simple, clear, plain gospel of the almighty
champion of sinners, you might take a stance on premillennialism
or postmillennialism or amillennialism. If you are removed from the simplicity,
the all-inclusiveness that is in Christ Jesus, then you'll
begin to speculate about things that are not revealed. And you'll
lean on your own understanding rather than just believing God. Oh, and here's the antidote to
that. Here's the antidote to that. Here's the balm. that will,
by God's design and grace, relieve this awful disease of man's knowledge,
human understanding. Listen to Paul in 2 Corinthians
3.12, seeing then that we have such hope. We use great plainness of speech. And not as Moses, which put a
veil over his face that the children of Israel could not steadfastly
look to the end of that which is abolished. But their minds
were blinded for until this day remaineth
the same veil untaken away in the reading of the old covenant,
which veil is done away in Christ. plainness, plainness. May God
give us grace to know nothing save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. May He cause us to abandon that
knowledge which only puffeth up and delight in the gospel of
God's love in Christ Jesus. which alone can build us up in
the faith of Him. Lord, keep us from knowledge
which is falsely so-called. Paul says here it's oppositions
of knowledge that are falsely so-called. It's like he said,
don't believe another gospel which is not another. Don't fall
into this knowledge which is not really knowledge. They call
it knowledge. As I've said to you so many times
before, if you don't know Christ, you don't know anything. Oh, well, I know this and that
and the other. No, you don't. The word of God
says you can't even plow a field right if you don't know the Lord
Jesus Christ. Can't do it. Falsely it's called so-called
falsely because any knowledge which takes away from adds to
or is contrary in any way to the knowledge of the person and
work of our God and Savior Is one of two things it's perverse
or vain Or both May God give us grace to grow
in grace and in the what? Knowledge. There's one knowledge
that's distinguished from all of the knowledge. Knowledge,
may we grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ. To him be glory, both now and
forever. Amen. Amen. Let's bow.