Gracious and kind Father we have
who will never forsake us. We've been looking in 2 Timothy
chapter three and verse, we had looked at some of these verses
last week. We'll read beginning in verse
12. It says, yea, and all that will
live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. But evil
men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being
deceived. But continue thou in the things
which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of, knowing
of whom thou hast learned them. And that from a child thou hast
known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto
salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture
is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,
that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all
good works. Now we are certain that even
as Paul began this chapter writing to Timothy and exhorting him,
this know also that in the last days perilous times shall come.
And then he goes into a list of those characteristics that
are quite common among all of humanity. Now sometimes people
look at this list as though this is some thing that's gonna happen
and all of a sudden people are gonna start being like this.
When I got news for you, people have always been like this. And
what these things that are described here are the descriptions of
man in his natural state. And man in his natural state,
apart from the restraining grace of God, will go as far as any
of these descriptions can go. There's no limitations upon men
except the grace and mercy of God. So the Lord's mercy is that
we are not consumed. That's what the prophet said
of old. He said, thy mercies are new every morning lest we
be consumed. And so lest a man look at this
list and say, well, boy, I'm not among them, he needs to think
again because this is the description of man. And in the last days,
perilous times shall come. Men shall be like this. These
are the last times. We're not waiting for an age
that's going to break upon the earth that can be called the
last days. These are the last days. This
is the last time. There's not another one to come.
This is the day of salvation. This is the day of the Lord Jesus
Christ. This is that day wherein the
full revelation of God to men as to the redemption of men has
been made plain. Jesus Christ is the Redeemer.
We don't have any other message. There's no other message yet
to come. We're not gonna have some revelation of some mystery
that's not yet been set forth before us. This is the truth
of God. And so we declare it unto you.
And he says here that as these evil men and seducers shall wax
worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. That is the way
men are. And he's speaking specifically
about those who would come preaching a message which is not the gospel. Now, we are not, we must never
think that somehow or other we are the repositories of God's
truth. And that we have all answers
and that we've, you know, if you don't agree with me, then
you're wrong. That's not the point. But whoever
does not agree with what this word sets forth is a liar. I mean, that's just the sad fact
of the truth. You might differ from me on what
something might specifically mean, you might have a clearer
or a cloudier understanding of some things. But we all, if we
are the followers of Christ, bow down before this book, not
because it's a book, not because it's words on a page, but because
we believe that these are the Holy Scriptures given to us from
Almighty God. Now how do you convince a man
of that? Well, I'll tell you a simple thing about that, and
it's in two words, you can't. I mean, you can argue till you're
blue in the face with somebody who says, well, I don't think
that's just written by men, it's not anything. Well, not much
I can do about that. Men will believe that, men will
go their way. But when the Lord convinces a
man of the truth, he can't, He can't get away from it. You know,
evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse. Error grows. Brother, we were talking earlier
this morning and Brother Al was speaking about how that using
a compass or you could say in using a transit or something,
a surveyor, whatever. If you get one degree off or
even a half a degree, That doesn't mean much in a short distance.
But when you get off a mile away, that makes a big difference.
It's a great error. And so that's the problem with
error of any kind, is that it will wax worse and worse. It
grows upon itself. Because you see, it's easier
for us to believe a lie than it is for us to believe the truth,
because we're geared towards believing a lie. See, we're inclined,
we're like on a hill, and we're already headed downhill. And
it takes a great force and power to turn us and get us in the
way. And that's why it is that we
need to be careful, even as Paul speaks about to Timothy earlier,
as we've looked at it, about those that swerve. That is, they
move just a little bit. Now maybe the doctrine of, say
for instance, and we sometimes are accused of talking too much
about this, I don't know how you can, but that's what they
tell us sometimes, about the sovereignty of God. Now, some say, well, you need to not
quite be, don't talk about that so much. So you need to tone
that down a little bit. Well, brethren, that's the beginning
of error. The sovereign glory of God never
needs to be toned down. It needs to be shouted from the
housetops. Men need to know that there's
a God in heaven. who does all things according
to the good plans of his will, and there's none that can stay
his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? Now if you swerve
away from that even slightly, you are ultimately gonna get
into a ditch somewhere. You need to know that is the
truth. That God has an elect people.
Now, I know that's not a popular doctrine, and it's a thing that
strikes at the heart of man and his desire to exalt his free
will, and he's just gotta have control over his destiny. It belongs to him, you know.
No. The destiny of men's in the hands
of the Lord. And you know, that hardens the
hearts of some men. But it causes some men to fall
on their face and cry out, oh God, have mercy upon me. And so you see, that's how the
Lord separates between the sheep and the goats. And there are
sheep and goats, according to the good pleasure of God. As
he causes some to cry out for mercy and others to be hardened
of heart and say, I'll never believe that. Even though they
read it in the scriptures. You know, it's not like this
is a hidden doctrine. I don't know why it is that,
you know, some say, oh, you need to be careful with that. Friend
of mine had a man that he respected a lot was a preacher, told him,
and he was excited about when he had learned that God had a
chosen people in the earth. And he went to this pastor, and
the pastor told him, yes, that's absolutely true and all that,
but then he said, but don't you ever preach it. He said, because you can't build
a church like that. He says, you'll run folks off.
Well, dear brother, a lot of folks need to be run off. You
know, if the truth of God runs you off, go out the door, because
I mean, you know, it breaks my heart to see anybody that won't
believe the word of God. But the fact of the matter is
that the truth is God's truth, and we are sent to declare it.
And seducers will not declare it. Seducers will tell you some
of the truth, They'll lead you up to it, and they'll dance around
it, and they'll say, well, you know, we believe that, but we
don't want to preach it. Heard a fellow on the radio one
time, a big church in Jacksonville, and buddy, he was preaching there,
and it was great. And I would say, man, what in
the world? I never knew they preached that kind of stuff at
this church. And then he got to the end of his message and
he says, now, what you've been listening to is what we teach
on Wednesday night. But he says, if you come on Sunday,
you won't hear this. And I'm thinking to myself, well,
wait a minute. I mean, what are you telling me? You're telling
me you're gonna preach one thing one day and you're gonna preach
something else another day? Brethren, that's seducing, that's
waxing worse and worse, that's moving away and I'd venture to
say that ultimately they will go away from that truth and the
Wednesday night truth will be thrown out the window because
it comes too hard. And we're not interested in having
hard doctrine. Dear brethren, the words of Jesus
Christ melt the heart. And these things, I mean, the
tender mercies of God is that which we declare in the gospel.
It's a gospel that's meant for sinners, for wicked men. Oh, come to the Savior. He said, come unto me, all you
that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And
that is exactly true. And it can't be emphasized enough.
It's a fact. But those that will depart from
the gospel will depart from the gospel. And they will continue
to deceive and continue to be deceived. Because a man is in
deception if he believes that anything that is found in this
scripture ought not to be declared, or ought to be somehow de-emphasized. May the Lord give us a mind and
a heart to receive his word, because you see, you won't receive
it, neither will I. I mean, the truth of God cannot
be received by the natural man. He just won't have it. It just
ain't, it's just not, listen, he don't want to hear that stuff. Oh, that the Lord might give
us tender hearts. And so he exhorts Timothy, he says, evil men will
wax worse and worse, but See, there is a but. Now, I remember
one time Farrell Griswold made this statement. He says, you
can always tell the sheep from the goats because the goats are
always butting. Now, he uses a but in a good
way here. He says, but keep in mind this
but, he said, evil men shall wax worse and worse but. Remember
this, you are not of those that would seduce me. He said, we're
not sent with that message. I've not declared it unto you,
and you know better than that. He says, but continue thou unto
things which thou hast learned. Don't swerve from them. See,
when God's pleased to teach a man the truth, he teaches a man the
truth. Don't turn from it. But continue
in those things which thou hast learned and hast been assured
of. Oh, how often has the Lord taught us and then backed it
up in our mind and heart by the Spirit of God, showing us that
these things are indeed true. Thou hast been assured of them,
knowing of them, knowing of whom thou hast learned them. Now,
I don't think he's talking about himself, although he said that
Timothy was his son in the gospel and that he had taught him many
things. But he said, I want you to remember who it is that taught
you these things, because it wasn't Paul that taught him.
Paul was an instrument that the Lord used, but the Spirit of
God taught him. And he says he taught him these
things, not just when Paul came along,
listen to what he said, and that from a child that has known the
Holy Scriptures. Oh, what a privilege Timothy
had to grow up in a family where the Word of God was taught, where
the truth of God was set forth as being the truth of God. I
can't think of a greater blessing a child could ever have growing
up than such as that. To be taught the truth of the
Word of God. Now because a child is taught
the truth of the Word of God doesn't mean he's going to believe
it. But it does mean that he'll always
know that the ones that taught it to him believed it. He'll
know that it is the truth whether he wants to admit it or not. From a child thou hast known
the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation
through faith which is in Jesus Christ. Now see, the scriptures are not that which give us life. I mean, a man can read this Bible
till he's blue in the face, and he can be just as ignorant of
the truth when he gets through reading it as he was to start
with. I remember a fellow one time
told Charles Spurgeon that he had read through the Bible five
times on his knees. And Spurgeon told him, well,
you'd have probably got more out of it if you'd sat in a chair. You can't call something to come
to pass. I mean, you can't learn the scriptures
by making it hard on yourself or something. The Spirit of God. You know,
it's better to, people, I've had a lot of people brag about
how many times they read through the Bible. Well, I don't care
how many times you read through the Bible. What's more important
to me is Has the Spirit of God taught
you anything out of what you've read? If you only ever read one
chapter out of one book, if the Spirit of God has laid the truth
of God upon your heart, you are a blessed person. The scriptures do not give us
life, but they do give us light. and just what the gospel is.
You see, the gospel never brought life to anybody. You can preach the gospel, and
some men won't believe it. Some wants the same gospel. They
all heard it. What about on the day of Pentecost?
I don't know how many people were gathered there on the day
of Pentecost. But evidently, according to what the scripture
tells us, there was only 3,000 of them out of every how many was
there that believed it. It's ours, what must we do to
be saved? The rest of them said, man, these
guys are coming off the deep end. I mean, this stuff here,
we don't want anything to do with it. So the gospel does not
bring life, but the gospel is ordained of God to bring light. See, it brings life and immortality
to light. It causes us to see if God gives
us life, quickens our mind that we might receive it. And so it
is that Paul's reminding Timothy that the blessing that he had
in learning the scriptures and the fact that as the Spirit of
God taught him, Remember of whom thou hast learned these things. And they are able to make thee
wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Now we hear a lot today about
you need to have faith. Brother, if you just had faith,
if you just had enough faith, you could just be healed of any
disease you ever had. You just gotta have faith, and
the reason that you don't is because you don't have faith.
Well, dear brethren, those are seducers, because that's to miss
the mark of what faith is, and Paul defines it right here. He says, through faith, which
is where? Well, you gotta have faith. Well,
that's not the faith you need. See? He says the faith is where? It's in Christ Jesus. See, our faith is Christ. That's our faith. That's the
faith once delivered to the saints. Christ is the savior of sinners.
And he gives men the gift of active faith that they might
believe it. But what do they believe? See,
it's not enough to believe. Oh, believe, believe, believe,
believe. We hear that all the time. But brethren, you can believe
all sorts of stuff and it won't help you a bit. But to believe Christ. is to believe that you have no
help or hope in yourself, but that all of your hope is in Christ. See, that is to rely upon Christ.
That's what faith is. Faith is casting oneself upon
Christ. Our hope is built on nothing
less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
praying, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. And so it doesn't matter
if you search the scriptures and know a bunch of stuff about
the scriptures. They're able to make thee wise
unto salvation through the faith which is in Christ Jesus. Paul
said, I'm crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live in the life
which I now live in the flesh. I live by what? By the faith
of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Now
I know some translations of the scripture put the word in in
there and that's why I have a problem with some of these other translations
because that to me is a swerving from what the truth of what is
recorded here in Paul's words in the King James Version. Now
the King James Version is not You know, I'm not one of these
guys that believes you can correct the Greek with the King James,
but I do believe that the King James Version is a blessed version
of the scripture that the Lord has given. And I believe that
when Paul said, it is the faith of Christ, he's talking about
a faith which is in Christ, not a faith which is in the man,
that is in Christ. See, there's a difference in
having faith in Christ and having a faith which is in Christ. I don't know if you see what
the difference is there. I hope you do. But you see, our faith
is Christ, what Christ did. That's our hope, not what we
did. Sometimes you have people say,
oh, well, brother, when did you believe? Well, it doesn't matter
when you believe. What matters is what did you
believe. See, that's what's important.
Because you can claim to be a believer, but what have you believed? Christ
is our faith. Through the faith which is in
Christ Jesus, all scripture is given by inspiration of God and
profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for
instruction in righteousness. All scripture. Not the part you like. You know, Brother Ed was telling
us about, you know, the study course, going through the book
of Romans that he was in one time at a place. And he was looking
forward to them talking about the ninth chapter of Romans.
Well, when the time came for him to go through the ninth chapter
of Romans, the teacher skipped over that and went to the 10th
chapter. Now, why'd he do that? Because
see, there's some things in the ninth chapter that causes you
to scratch your head and say, well, wait a minute, that's not
what I thought. See, there's a lot of things
in the scriptures not what you thought. And a lot of people
come to the scripture trying to find something that they thought.
You know, they want something that'll back up what they think's
right. Well, Scripture's not given to
back up what you think's right. The Scripture is given by inspiration
of God in order to correct the children of God. See, we need
correction. We need instruction. Why? Because
we're born contrary to the way of God. Now a lot of people don't like
that because they like to think, well, you know, some of us are
just kind of already, you know, we just want to follow the Lord.
No, no man wants to follow the Lord when he's born. That's why
the Lord said to Nicodemus, Nicodemus, except a man be born again, he
cannot see the kingdom of God. And so it is that the scripture
is given by inspiration of God. Now I hear sometimes people say,
well, I was inspired by God. There's a commercial on the radio I hear
from time to time, and this fellow says he was inspired by God to
start this charity. Well, you know, I don't want
to say what somebody is or isn't. That's not what I'm sitting out
here to say. But you need to be careful how
you use the word inspire. Now, we may inspire one another
in one thing, but it's quite a different thing to be inspired
by God, because if God inspires something, it's absolutely correct.
In other words, when David, wrote the Psalms, he was inspired
to do so. He didn't just sit down one day
and say, well, you know, I think I'll just sit down and write
something here. Now the Lord, you know, from time to time,
I have written a few songs and this, that, and the other, but
I wouldn't ever say they're inspired. I may be led by the Spirit of
God, but there's a big difference in saying someone is inspired
of God because you see that's what it says about the scriptures
that they are given by the inspiration of God. The inspiration of God
is never wrong. It's absolutely correct. And
so you can be sure that the scriptures are without error. It's profitable for doctrine.
for instruction in the truth. Now, you know, all men are not
given the same measure of understanding of Bible doctrine. And we must
never think that all men are going to learn Bible doctrine
to the same extent and in the jot and tittle like perhaps others
are. But it's not necessary. There's
really, the main doctrine that I would emphasize, two things,
I've said this before, you've heard me say it. Two things that,
these are doctrinal truths, but they're foundational truths.
They're truths taught in the Word of God. One is that you
are a sinner for Almighty God. Now I can tell you that, and
it's an absolute truth, but only by his grace can he cause you
to know yourself to be a sinner. As Joseph Hart says in his hymn,
a sinner is a sacred thing. The Holy Ghost hath made him
so. See, all men know that they have
sinned. You couldn't go somewhere and
probably find anybody and say, well, I've never sinned. No,
people know they have. That's just natural knowledge.
But see, not all men have the knowledge of what sin is as David
did when he said, against thee and thee only have I sinned and
done this evil in thy sight. See, only the Lord can make a
man be a sinner in his own mind, in his heart, to know that he
has nothing to bring before God. See, as long as a man thinks
he's got something that the Lord will be proud of, I'm gonna make
the Lord proud of me. Well, no you're not. You can't. Because everything you do is
tainted with sin. And apart from the grace of God
to give you an understanding that the only righteousness that
is acceptable in the sight of Almighty God is the righteousness
of Jesus Christ. And that brings us to the second
point of doctrine. One, you're a sinner. Two, Christ
is the Savior of sinners. Now if you get those two things
right, you can't be wrong. Because you see, Christ saved
sinners. He doesn't save all men who have
sinned, but he saves all sinners, because remember, a sinner's
a sacred thing. The Holy Ghost has made him so.
Because a sinner will fall on his face and call out, oh God,
be merciful to me, a sinner. A sinner will cry out, oh pass
me not, oh gentle Savior, hear my humble cry, while on others
I'll call and do not pass me by. See, that's the place where a
sinner will be. calling out for mercy. He'll not be making deals
with God and say, oh God, if you'll do this, I'll do that.
No. Oh God, have mercy on me. Just like buying Bartimaeus.
He was sitting by the wayside. And he couldn't say but one thing,
and the people said, be quiet when he started saying it. He
said, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. And they said, don't bother the
master. He's busy. He said, Jesus, thou
son of David, have mercy on me. And he was getting a little farther
away. And he said, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. And the greatest thing that ever
happened in all the world happened that day. And the scripture says,
and Jesus stood still. He stopped because he heard the
cry of a sinner. He stopped. because one of his
sheep needed him and he knew right where he was. Oh, what a gracious Savior he
is. So those are the two things of doctrine that I would hope
that you learn that is impressed on your heart by the Spirit of
God. Because that's the doctrine.
Now, there's much teaching. The Lord taught many things in
the scripture. But the only way that a man will
ever come to the place where he believes in the preciousness
of those things that Jesus Christ taught is by coming that route. Knowing He's the center and knowing
Christ the Savior. Because when those two things
are convinced, when a man's convinced of those things in his mind,
then he'll want to know, well, what does the Lord want me to
do? How would He have me to do it? Where would He have me to
go? What would He have me to do? profitable for doctors are approved
for correction that while you know we all for me correct and
i do i think that's one reason why
the lord gives me a lot now we we bought it a lot of times you
know but uh... how often it is that the lord
is pleased to give us uh... correction now that's what the
word of god before And a godly wife will correct
her husband by the scripture. Oh, that we might be not those
unaccustomed to the yoke, but that we might be those that desire
to be corrected for reproof. Reproof is a strong form of correction. Reproof is whenever the tender
words of correction have not had their and then something a little stronger
needs to be applied. Well, the scripture does that.
You see, as a man comes to the scripture, you know, if you come
to the scripture, you want to learn what the scripture says
about all these different things, you're looking at it wrong. Because
what the scripture's for is to teach you about you. See, the
Lord would teach you many things as you go through life, but the
main thing the Lord will teach you about scripture is how you
are. See, that's the instruction and the reproof, because if you
read the scripture and you come back, if you come away from it
saying, well, you know, I'm doing a pretty good job, then you missed
it. You know, you missed the lesson.
Because the lesson's not to pat you on the back. The lesson is
to cause you to see what you are by nature and to cause you
to flee unto Christ. Help, help me Lord. Help me to
be a man that is accustomed to your yoke and desires of walking
in the way that you would have him to. That the man of God may
be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. Now whenever we spoke about correction,
now notice the last verse or the last words in the verse before
this one I just read. It says, for instruction in righteousness
that the man of God may be perfect. Now if you get properly instructed
in righteousness, you won't be thinking about what you can do
to be righteous. but you'll be thanking God that
the righteousness of Christ is your righteousness. See, God's
people want to be righteous, and we want to walk with the
Lord. But the thing is, each time that we get to thinking
about that and we get to realizing how far we are from that standard,
have you measured up? then you ain't got the right
standard. Because the standard is Jesus
Christ. He's the only one perfect before
God. And if you have not measured
up to that, then you are not righteous in yourself. But he is righteous in your behalf.
And see, that's the instruction there in righteousness. That's
part of what the Spirit of God came to do, wasn't it? To teach
us of sin, our own righteousness, that of Christ, and judgment,
which is to come. For it's appointed unto men once
to die, and after this, the judgment. But we're instructed in righteousness.
And any time you think of the word righteousness, your mind
ought to go to Christ. He is my righteousness. I don't
have any. I used to think I was working
on getting me some, but I know now I don't have any. And the
further I go, the more I realize how far I've got to go, how far
from the Lord I am, but how close He is to me, because He's my
substitute. He's that one who ever lives
to make intercession at the throne of God in our behalf. that the man of God may be perfect. Wow. Perfect. Now we use that word
not generally like the scripture uses it. And when the scripture
says it, it means mature. It means fully grown up. We might
grow up to the measure of the fullness of the stature of Christ.
See, we might be like him. See, that's what it is to grow
in grace. and the knowledge of the Lord is to know that He is
our righteousness and that we desire to be like Him. That the man of God may be perfect,
built up, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. You know,
the Lord, He has ordained that His people should walk in good
works. That's a good thing, but You
know, sometimes people get to thinking about good works, and
they get to going out here, well, I'm gonna do this, this is a
good work, and I'm gonna do it because it's a good work, and
all of this. And their eyes get turned off of the one who has
made our works good. It's Christ. See, no work you could ever perform,
even if it's in keeping with the word of God, would ever be
good, except that Christ has cleansed it. See, even your righteousness,
the scripture says, is as filthy rags in his sight. Now, it's
easy for us to understand how our sin is filthy rags, but it's
quite a different thing, see, to think that your righteousness
is filthy rags. We like to think, well, my righteousness
is what makes God happy. No, God's not happy with your
righteousness, but he's ever pleased with the righteousness
of Christ. Oh, that the Lord might cause
us to be a people that are throughly furnished unto good works with
a knowledge of the righteousness of Jesus Christ because with
that knowledge and upon that knowledge rest all the blessings
of God because coming to the people of God knowing that we
are sinners of the worst sort apart from the grace of God to
restrain us from it But by the grace of God, there's no condemnation. We're the sons of God. We're
the heirs and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. We're those that
are triumphant because of Him. Oh, thanks be unto God that giveth
us such a righteousness as that. May the Lord help us.