Turn with me, if you would, to
2 Timothy chapter 4. 2 Timothy chapter 4. I've been thinking about this
one verse of scripture for a long time. Really, the last few months. I thought about it very heavily
last week and then one of the brethren read from this chapter
in my study Wednesday night. And I want us to look at this
for our Bible study this morning. I feel led for us to declare
this this morning. I consider this a message or
a Bible study for preachers who need to know what to preach. I have wondered that so often. What do I preach? Especially
whenever I first was called on to preach. What do I preach? You know, before a man stands
up and preaches, he ought to really assess, what do I preach? So I consider this a message
for preachers who need to know what to preach, and I also consider
this a message for hearers who need to know what to hear. There's something we need to
hear, there's something we don't need to hear. Verse 1, 2 Timothy
4 verse 1 says, I charge thee therefore before God and the
Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead at his
appearing and his kingdom. This is what Paul charges Timothy
as Timothy takes over pastor of Ephesus. He said in verse
2, preach the word. Preach the word. A man who is
very dear to many of us. A man who is an elder pastor
to many of us. Somebody I esteem very highly
for the works sake. He told me time and time again,
preach the word. I remember one time he got his
Bible out and his was laid out like mine and he touched it right
there. He said, you see that? Preach the word. And then he
drug his finger in it just like that. Whatever it says, preach
the word. That was a big light bulb moment
for me. Okay, now what do we do with
this word and how do we twist this word and go about this word
to make this word say what we're trying to say? Whatever it says,
preach the word. That's a biggie. Preach the word. If men would do that, we'd have
no problems. Preach the word. We are not trying
to preach a doctrine. That could be a shocking statement
to Calvinists. We are not trying to preach a
doctrine. We have not selected a doctrine
that we like better than all the other doctrines. And now,
you know, we've sided with this doctrine. This is the one we're
going to go with. And we're going to spend the
rest of our days trying to convince not only ourselves, but everybody
else of this doctrine. That's not what we're doing.
That's not what we're doing. We, by God's grace, are going
to preach the Word. What we do here is so straightforward
and clear and simple. So simple. We preach the Word,
whatever it says. God's Word is our doctrine. It is our doctrine. We are not
going to throw out one of God's words because we don't believe
it fits into the doctrine that we've convinced our minds of.
I don't care much for that verse. No, no, no. God's word is our
doctrine. It is our doctrine as he has
declared it to be. in the context He's declared
it to be in. By God's grace, we're going to,
verse 2 says, preach the Word, be instant. That means stayed
upon, fervent. It doesn't matter if it's in
season or out of season. It doesn't matter if it's popular
and everybody loves Spurgeon at the moment or nobody loves
it. We're going to preach it in season, out of season. Reprove,
rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine. Doctrine means
words. It means teaching. It means instruction. We're going to reprove, rebuke,
and exhort with long-suffering. That means patience. With patience
and with the Word itself, with the teaching of the Word itself.
You know, we don't have to go around rebuking each other. Do
you know that? We don't have to go around rebuking
each other. God's Word will do that. All we have to do is preach
the Word. Just preach the Word. Now I want
us to look at three things in this. Number one, I want us to
look at the warning against not preaching the Word. Verse 3 right
here says, For the time will come when they will not endure
sound doctrine, but after their own lust shall they heap to themselves
teachers Having itching ears. Itching means tickling. They
will heap to themselves. They'll pile up teachers who
will tickle their ears. Tell them what they want to hear.
They'll love that. Verse 4 says, And they shall
turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto
fables. They'll be turned to lies. We
need to be warned of the great danger. of not preaching this
word and not hearing this word. When I first came here and I
first started preaching, I thought I'm a little too heavy in turning.
I turn more than anybody. I wear people out on turning.
The longer I go, I'm almost five years in to pastor in this church. I want to turn twice as much
as I did when I first got here, and the reason is because Every
wind of doctrine is out there. People have heard it from a child.
They've grown up. They're indoctrinated in lies,
in something. Religion is so full of lies.
Religion is so wrong. It's so phony. We are not in
religion, are we? We're in the Word. And the only
way to open men's eyes to God's Word is to get in the Word. Preach
the Word. Preach the Word. Turn, turn,
turn. Preach the Word. So we need to
be warned. We must preach this Word and
we must hear this Word. Our Lord said, take heed what
you hear. Take heed. Don't turn, but in
1 John 4, verse 1 says, try the spirits. That means preachers.
whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone
out into the world. Every preacher that I come across
is on trial with me. I cannot accept him. He's a preacher. Hey, brother, great. No, sir. Every preacher is on trial with
me until I find out, do you preach this word? Try the spirits, whether
they have got many false prophets. Almost all the preachers in the
world are false prophets. Almost all the preachers in the
world are false prophets. Is that too big a statement to
make? Almost all the preachers in the world are false prophets.
Whole countries are full of false prophets. Can you imagine that?
How do we try the false prophets? By the Word. Turn with me if
you would to Jeremiah 23. Jeremiah 23 verse 1 says, Woe be unto the pastors. Buddy, that's a serious statement
to me. Woe be unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the
sheep of my pasture, saith the Lord. You think about it. God's
people generally, some young people have the privilege of
growing up under the truth. We got some kids in this nursery.
And I pray the Lord will bless the fact that they, by God's
grace, might grow up under the truth. But most everybody is
pulled out of religion. They're under these false preachers
who are telling them lies and running them here and running
them there. And they're trying this and they're trying that. And
that's what he's saying. Those are my people. They're my sheep.
I haven't called them out yet. But you're scattering them all
over the place. Woe be unto the pastors that
destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture, saith the Lord. Look with me at verse 16. Jeremiah
23, 16. Thus saith the Lord of hosts,
hearken not unto the words of the prophets that prophesy unto
you. They make you vain. They make you vain. How can we
identify a message of these ear-tickling preachers who are turning men
and women away from the truth? How can we identify that? It's
all about you. It's all about you in this way
or that way. Whether, you know, one man's
preaching you've got to work your way to heaven or whether
one man doesn't even ever mention heaven or hell. It's all just
a social It's all about you. It's all about how you can become
a better person. That's what it's about. That's
what the message is about. They stand up and they say, now
this, you know, based on the word, this is how God wants you
to be. You know, He's told us these things, how He wants you
to be, and if you'll start doing this, and if you'll start acting
like this, then you're going to be a better person in society,
and you're going to be a better husband, and you're going to
be a better father, and you're going to be happier in the world,
and you're going to be healthier in the world. There's a diet
we follow based on the Word of God, and it's all about you. Our Lord said, don't listen to
them, they'll make you vain. they'll make you vain. The gospel
is about Jesus Christ. If we're not talking about Jesus
Christ, we're not talking about the gospel. The truth is the
danger and the warning of not having Him and not being in Him. The truth is who He is and what
He has done. It's all about Christ, all about
Christ. Verse 16, right here in Jeremiah
23 says, thus sayeth the Lord of hosts, hearken not unto the
words of the prophets that prophesy unto you. They make you vain. They speak a vision of their
own heart and not out of the mouth of the Lord. And that's
so true. They're just making stuff up. This sounds right to
me. Verse 17, they say still unto
them that despise me. The Lord hath said. That's what
they say, well, you know, God says. Somebody told me the other
day, well, you know, God wants us to be happy. And I wish I
would have said, could you show me that? What what chapter versus
what book is that in? Happy is he that hath the God
of the sinner, Jacob, for his help." Absolutely. But what verse 17 is saying,
the Lord hath said, you know, you shall have peace and they
say unto everyone that walketh after the imagination of his
own heart, no evil shall come upon you. They stand up and they
cry, peace, peace, when there is no peace. Verse 21, I have
not sent these prophets. They ran. I have not spoken to
them, yet they prophesied. Verse 25, I've heard what the
prophet said that prophesy lies in my name, saying I've dreamed,
I've dreamed. Verse 28, the prophet that hath
a dream, let him tell a dream, and he that hath my word, let
him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat,
saith the Lord. What he's saying is, preach the
word. Preach the word. And he said in verse 31, I'm
against them. In verse 32, he said, I'm against
them that prophesy false dreams, saith the Lord, and do tell them
and cause my people to err by their lies and by their likeness.
Yet I sent them not, nor commanded them. Therefore, They shall not
profit this people at all, saith the Lord. Nobody is going to
be saved under their message. Nobody. And what the Lord is
saying is if I don't deliver them out from under that message,
they're going to be damned because of that message. So the great
warning has gone out to all of us. Preach the word. All right. Now let me give us, here's the
second thing. I had three things I wanted to
say and I'm going to speed up. The second thing, I want us to see four reasons
to preach the word. All right? Four reasons to preach
it. The warning against not preaching
is very clear. Four reasons to preach it. Number
one, God said so. Period. No comment needed. Number two, We preach this word because men
and women are actually saved by it. And that's amazing to
me. That always encourages me to
keep preaching it. Always. Men and women are actually
saved. Now weren't God's people saved
from the foundation of the world? Absolutely. God said so in His
word. Well, weren't people actually
saved when Christ died on the cross of Calvary? Absolutely. God said so in His Word. Turn with me if you would to
Romans 1. Romans 1 verse 16 says, For I am not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ, the preaching of Christ, the declaration of Christ, for
it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to
the Jew first and also to the Greek. That's why we preach this
word. That's why we preach this word.
We have loved ones. We have people we've never met
before. Our heart's desire for men and women is that they might
be saved. There is one way sinners are
converted from death to life, blindness to sight, deafness
to hearing. One way. First Corinthians 121
says, It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that
believe. It pleased God by what men consider
to be foolishness. It pleased God by The foolish
man who stands here, a sinner before other sinners. But this
is how it pleased God to save. The declaration of God's word.
Our Lord said in Mark 16, go ye into all the world and preach
the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized
shall be saved. He that believeth not shall be
damned. That's why we preach this word.
The third reason to preach it is, I'm going to just quote some
of these. Romans 10 tells us, faith cometh by hearing and hearing
by the word of God. We need faith. We need it so desperately. We
need it so desperately. When the trials come When sickness
comes to us or our family, when the money gets low, when the
whatever it is, you know what we need at that moment? More
money? No. A healing? No. You know what we
need at that moment? Faith. Faith. That's what we need is faith.
How do we get faith? Faith cometh by hearing this
word. That's how faith comes, by hearing
this word. That goes hand in hand with the
fourth reason, to preach the word. With the faith comes spiritual
growth. With the faith comes spiritual
growth. Go ahead and turn with me to
1 Thessalonians 4. First Thessalonians 4 verse 18
says, wherefore comfort one another with these words. comfort one
another with these words. All of our comfort is in God's
Word. That's where our comfort comes
from. In God's Word. Do we want more comfort? Man,
I just wish I had a little more comfort. Well, how do we get
it? In God's Word. It's right here in the Word.
Don't turn, but 1 Peter 2, this is, I'm sorry, yeah, 1 Peter
2, this is verses 1 through 3, it says, Wherefore, laying aside
all malice, and all guile, and all hypocrisies, and envies,
and all evil speaking, as newborn babes, desire the sincere milk
of the word, that you may grow thereby. If so be you've tasted
that the Lord is gracious." This is how we grow in grace. Again, don't turn. 1 John 5 verse
13 says, These things have I written unto
you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you may
know and that you have eternal life, and that you may believe
on the name of the Son of God." Our hope, our assurance comes
from this word. It grows. He said, I've written
these things to you that you may know. that you may know that
you have eternal life. So, we've seen the warning against
it, reasons to preach it. Now, last thing. What are we preaching when we
preach the Word? What are we preaching when we
preach the Word? What has God written in this
Word? What is it all about? What is
our subject matter when we preach God's Word? In this word, from
the first page to the last page, there is one great question asked. And in this word, from the first
page to the last page, there is one great answer given. All right? Here's the question.
Go ahead and turn with me to Job chapter 9. Job 9 verse 1 says, Then Job
answered and said, I know it is so of a truth, but how should
man be just with God? That's the question. That is
the great question all through this book. I don't care what
book in this Bible it is, that's the question of that book. How
should man be just with God? He asked that same question again
in Job 25. How can a man be justified with
God? How can a sinner be justified
with God? He said, how can a man be clean
who is born of woman? He said, I've looked around.
I've seen us. Nobody's fooling me. We're all
sinners. They try to be holy rollers,
but they're not fooling me. How can a man be clean who is
born of a woman? How can a sinner be justified
with God? Here's the answer. Here's the
great answer of the book. Turn to John 1. John chapter
1. John 1 verse 1 says, In the beginning
was the Word. The Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. Verse 14 says,
And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld
His glory. The glory is of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. Preach the Word. Preach Christ. Preach Christ. How can a sinner be justified
with God? Preach Christ. Preach the Word. Preach the glory of the Word. The absolute glory of the Word.
What is the glory of the Word? Don't turn. It's printed on the
front of our bulletin. Every time we print a bulletin,
we say, I've determined to know nothing among you save Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. Jesus Christ crucified. That is the glory of this word. That is the amazing glory. We sing amazing grace. What is
amazing grace? Jesus Christ crucified. Amazing grace. That's how a sinner
can be justified with God. Jesus Christ crucified. God forbid that we should glory
in anything save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's
it. We preach the Word. We preach
the Word in the Word. We preach the glory of the Word
in the Word. And if we do that, not only will
sinners know how a man is justified before God or a woman is justified
before God, not only will sinners know how, If we preach this Word,
and if God's Spirit sends faith to believe it, sinners will be
justified before God. One of my greatest fears when
I started preaching was giving a false hope to men and women
by saying, this is what God's Word says, this is the truth,
and if you believe this, you're saved. I feared giving men and
women a false hope. But what if a visitor comes in
who has never heard this? And what if God does not give
them faith to believe it? You know what I finally found
out? It is impossible. for a man or a woman to believe
this Bible if God does not choose to give that man or woman faith
to believe it. It's impossible. You don't have
to put a fence around Christ crucified. You don't have to
put a fence around the glory of God and try to keep people
out of it. You declare this is what God's Word says. about us. This is what God's Word says
about God and He said that Christ came to die for a certain particular
people that He chose to save. And if God chose them, God will
send faith to them and they will believe it. And as soon as they
believe it, they're saved. Weren't they saved before the
foundation of the world? Yes, God's word said they were. Weren't
they saved when Christ died on the cross? Yes, he said they
were. You know what else he said? As soon as he gives that faith,
boom, in a minute we're going to see by faith. And they say,
you know what? I think I believe it. I think
I have seen it in the eternal holy word of God. And I think
I do believe I'm a sinner. And I think I do believe God
is holy. And I think he is going to judge
this world. And I do see where Christ didn't
just die for everybody. He did what he did. And I think
he's God. And I don't think he's trying
to do anything. I think it's over. I think it's
finished. I believe that. You're saved. You're saved. So may God cause us to believe
it. Alright, you're dismissed.