Sermons 2023
Transcript
"Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister (serve to bring up) questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith " (1Tim. 1:4)
I've chosen to expound five verses in Second Timothy. The Book of Second Timothy was written by the apostle Paul to encourage Timothy. It was written to Timothy Paul's Son.
He called them the Son of the Lord to encourage him in his history. Because Paul was going to he looked at his life and said, I've reached the end. I'm ready to be offered.
This is the final time for me. And the Apostle Paul knew his time was coming, and he wanted Timothy as a strong evangelist that was going to go out and preach, teach, hold the churches together, and do all the things that needed to be done. But Paul wanted to warn him and give him some ideas about the future and about life in general.
It's more than just a prediction of the future, and I want to show you some of the lessons that we can learn along with things we don't want to be in the Book of Two Timothy, chapter three. I'm going, to begin with, verse one. He tells Timothy but realizes this.
I'm reading from the New American Standard Version unless I announce another translation, but realize, that in the last few days, difficult. King James says perilous, but it means difficult. Difficult times will come.
Perilous or difficult. Hard means hard to deal with things that might be hard to deal with. They may be dangerous, they may be difficult, they may be hard, they may be stressful.
Okay. They could be violent. Violent seasons.
The word times is the Greek word that means seasons. Do we have seasons? Yes, you have a season here, you have a season there. The season lasts for a short time or a certain amount of time.
The winter season, sometimes you get tired of it. You get sick of it. You say, there are too many winters, or it's a hot season of the summer.
You get sick of it. It could be too hot for you. And you say, Boy, I wonder this.
When are we going to get some cooler weather? It's been so hot. Difficult seasons will happen. Very difficult.
Hard to deal with. Hard to deal with. Violent.
Dangerous. Difficult. Have we had difficulty in the world? Have there been difficult periods of time? Of course.
Have there been difficult periods of time? If you lived in Babylon and Persia was invading it, would that be a difficult period of time? Absolutely. What about if you were Rome in Rome and the Vandals and the Ostragoths and all these people were wanting to invade Rome? Rome has gone down because it's so corrupt, and they just went into Hedonism completely. What happens then? Sure, difficult times.
There are always going to be difficult times, but when are they going to happen? He says, realizing, that in the last few days. Now we have to understand that phrase, last days. When did the last days begin? Well, the Bible has definitions for this.
Take a look at Hebrews, chapter one, and verse two talk about how God in times past has spoken to our ancestors through prophets in different ways, through different prophets. But in these last days, God has spoken to us, not by dreams. You don't get a prophecy through dreams.
You don't get a prophecy through voices. God has spoken to us in these last days in his or by his Son whom he has appointed heir of all things, through whom he created the world. So the last days started when God sent Jesus Christ to the earth.
James, chapter five and verse three says, your gold and your silver have rusted and their rust will be a witness against you and will consume your flesh like fire. It is the last day that you have stored up your treasure. It is in the last days that you've stored up your treasure in the last days.
One Peter, chapter one and verse five says, who are protected we are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Last days. Last time.
One Peter one and verse 20 says, for he was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for your sake. This is Jesus Christ has appeared in these last times for our sakes. And in One John, chapter two and verse 18, John writes to the church there it says, children, it is the last hour.
And just as you have heard that Antichrist is coming even now, many Antichrists have appeared from this we know that it is the last hour. Now, the last time started when Jesus Christ came. So does it mean that it's going to happen in your lifetime or my lifetime? Spend the last time.
Okay. And there will be seasons, periods of time that will be very difficult to deal with if you were in World War I. And this poem that you just heard, Flanders Field, if you were in World War I, it was a very difficult time.
World War I was brutal. Brutal, brutal. They allowed mustard gas and poisons and things like that to be allowed.
And they finally outlawed it. You can't do that. Okay? Now, the word perilous or difficult or violent is the word also used in Matthew.
It's used in Two Timothy three, verse one. Difficult, violent, possible could be violent, dangerous times. You see the same word in Matthew, chapter eight in verse 28, talking about these demons.
When he came to the other side, into the country of the Gadaras, two men who were demon-possessed met him as they were coming out of the tombs. They were so extremely violent. The same Greek word is used in verse one difficult, violent times, difficult to deal with.
These men were difficult to deal with. They were violent that no one could pass by. So we see, that's what verse one means.
We realize, that in the last days from the time of Jesus all the way to the end, wherever the end will be. There will be periods of time that will be hard to deal with, hard for people, whether there are famines, whether there are wars, whether there are disease epidemics like the bubonic plague that happened in Europe. Those were difficult times, like things that happen around Asia and Europe and the ancient civilizations.
Yes, very difficult times. Now, beginning in verse two and all the way through there are the Apostle Paul lists 19 different negative words about people. About people.
Okay? Verse two says so, and verse one, realizes, that in the last days, there will be very difficult times to deal with. They will come. They will come.
Now, they're not going to sustain forever. There are seasons. There are seasons in which there will be lots of difficult times for verse two.
Now, for men, the Greek word here is Anthropos. It means it's a word that can be translated as, men. But it's also a word that that can mean both men and women and people in general.
Okay? Mankind for mankind, for humans will be lovers of themselves, lovers of self selfish. Let me ask you a question. If there's a difficult time and it's a serious famine and there's not enough food, do you think the average person will say, well, I'm going to go out and find food for so and so and find food and everybody's starving? No, they're going to keep it for themselves.
There are prophecies and statements in the book of Deuteronomy and places where people have eaten human flesh. There's the wife that looks so tender and nice. But in the midst of this famine, when her body is craving food and starving, she gives birth to a baby and then eats the afterbirth and hides it from her husband so he doesn't get it.
People get selfish. For people will be lovers of self. Now, the Greek word here is Philaltos.
Phil altos. Phil Felia means friends or lovers. They love themselves.
They love this. A loving friend. Okay, Peter, do you file me? Do you love me? And Peter said, Lord, you know I'm your good friend.
He used agape, but he said, you know I love you. But he used a different word. But philaltos can also mean love.
Okay? And this is philaltos, self-love. In the end time, men will be self-lovers. They love themselves.
We have the word altos. We use it as an auto. Auto.
The Greek word is auto. It means self. We say it with an automobile.
What's an automobile? It's self-propelled. Doesn't have to have somebody drag it. It's self-propelled.
You put gasoline in it or electricity in it or whatever you want. It's some kind of steam in it. And it's self-propelled.
It doesn't have to be dragged by somebody else. We say automatically. Something that happens by itself.
You don't have to go over and remember to do it. It does. It is automatically self-motivated.
Self-driven. Okay, so men will be self-lovers, filet Agtos. They will be money lovers.
And it's the Greek word for love of silver. They will have a love of silver and that means money. Silver was a term for money.
Okay, so they'll be lovers of self. They'll be lovers of silver. And why not? Why won't they be lovers of silver? Well, if you're selfish and you're for yourself, silver and money can buy you what your selfish self wants, okay? What your selfish self desires.
So, yes, I love myself first and then I want money because the money can buy me what my selfish self wants. That's how it works. Also in Romans, we have the word they will be let me read this.
Self-lovers, money lovers. Boastful. You see the same Greek word in the Book of Romans, chapter one and verse 30, it says that they're boastful.
Okay? Use the word boastful. That means they brag about what they have, okay? Hence, they brag as though they were a vagabond boastful. Presumptuous.
One passage in Greek says, oh, woman, you boast about your clothes. What does that about a boast about my clothes? What point is that? They're boastful. They're arrogant.
Let me read that. Listen to what he listed here. Self-lovers, money lovers, boastful.
Arrogant. Arrogant means it's a Greek word that means showing yourself above others. Haughty.
Proud. Okay. What does God say? James four and verse six.
God is opposed to the proud, as opposed to the person that is proud. You see it in James four and verse six. You see it in one Peter, chapter five and verse five two times.
The Bible says God is opposed to the people who are arrogant. They put themselves up. The word proud is the same.
Proud, arrogant. I'm above other people. No, none of us is above other people.
We're supposed to look at people and consider others better than ourselves. That's what the scripture says. So they are money lovers.
They're boastful, they're arrogant, they're self-lovers first, money lovers second. Boastful, arrogant. Well, if you love yourself so much, you're going to boast about everything, even if it's not very smart to do it.
revilers. The Greek word here means slanderers. Slanderous, evil speaking.
It comes from the Greek word that means blasphemy. It's the Greek word blasphemous, meaning defaming, denigrating, and demeaning. Speaking demeaning and hateful words about somebody.
Now, when you do it to other people, the English translators want to translate. They distinguish that from God. If you're slandering other people, they use the word slander.
Speaking badly of other people. If you speak badly of God, it's called blasphemy. Speaking badly of God, god's no good.
God. Just cheat. God.
Jesus cheats on me. God doesn't keep his promises. Those are blasphemous words.
See, you're speaking evil about God, that is called blasphemy. All right, let's go on with that same verse. Now, we're in verse two listen to how many statements people will be self-lovers, money lovers, boastful, arrogant, and blasphemous against other people.
Then we'll say, bad thing. Disobedient to parents. Now, the word disobedient here is used in several places.
In this case, disobedient to their parents. But listen to how it's used. In Titus One and Verse 16, we read this.
They are people who are not really true Christians. They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny him being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good deed. It's used also in Romans One, verse 30, where Paul writes, they were slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, and boastful.
See? You see, some of the same words he used in Romans, used in Second Timothy, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, impersuadable, not compliant, disobedient, contumacious. They're disobedient. They're not going to put up with anything.
Now, when you're disobedient to your parents, what happens? This is the form of the breakdown of society and the breakdown of the family. A society is made up of different people in different families. You could be a family of one.
You live by yourself, you're a family of one. If you live with another person, you're a couple. You may be a family of two.
If you have three or four children, you're a family of five or six, and so on. But disobedience to parents has to do with the breakdown of the family. They're impersuadable.
The word disobedient means I won't be persuaded, I will not be compliant. I will be contumacious. I mean, again, I'll just strike down.
I'm going to do what I want, okay? Disobedient to parents. That is the hallmark of the breakdown of society. I won't be persuaded, I won't listen, I won't do anything.
Then he writes further, ungrateful, ungrateful. The Greek means a Christos and grace and thankful mean charisma. Let's say charisma.
Let's say grace means it can also be trading thankful. Let's return thanks. Let's give thanks to God.
That's for the word charism. But the Greek word puts an a. Anytime you have in Greek, the word a followed by virtue, it means not that virtue, not thankful.
A charismas, Christos. They're not thankful. You see it in Luke, chapter six, verse 35.
But love your enemies and do good and lend expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great. And you will be the sons of the Most High. For he God the son most high is kind to the ungrateful the actress, they're not grateful.
And to the evil. God is even kind to evil. He's kind to the people who don't thank him.
There are people eating all over the place, getting sunshine and vitamin D, fresh air, and all the blessings of the earth. They're not thankful. They don't care.
The unholy and they're unholy. Now, this is Two Timothy three and verse two. All these words are used.
They're unholy pertaining to being in opposition to God. They're in opposition to what is sacred. They're unholy.
The view that certain actions make holy beings and place off limits to their agents invites the connotation of moral turpitude. In other words, I am so lacking in any moral thing, I have no regard for anything that's holy or right or respected. I don't care.
I walk in and spit on a church or a place that's supposed to be looked on. In other words, they're wicked, they're revolting against God, or they're revolting against a well-minded person. They're not a well-minded person.
The only other place that this word unholy is used is in One Timothy one, verse nine. I'm going to read it here, realizing the fact that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane. Here, the same Greek word is used in One Timothy nine, as is used in Two Timothy Three.
And verse two unholy people who care nothing about the sacred, nothing about what's right, nothing. So Paul writes in One Timothy One, verse nine, they are the ungodly and the sinners. They are the people who are not spiritual and nothing is sacred to them.
They kill their fathers and their mothers. I'm reading this from the complete English Bible. I mean, the common English Bible.
This is the translation here, one Timothy one, verse nine. They are people who are not spiritual and nothing is sacred to them. They kill their fathers and their mothers and murder others.
Disobedient to parents. You see how they don't care at all what their parents ask for or do. I don't care about my father's values.
I throw them out. Second Timothy. Now, in verse chapter three and verse three, Paul continues with these very negative.
You don't want to be any one of these things. Okay? In verse two, men will be self-lovers, right? People. Not men alone.
Women, men, everybody. Self lovers. Lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents.
Ungrateful, unholy. Now, in chapter three and verse three, unloving, irreconcilable. I'm reading from the New American Standard Version, translating these Greek words as malicious gossip without self-control, brutal, haters of good.
Let's take the first one. Unloving. I think that's translated in some without natural affection.
In other words, these are people who lack good feelings for others, thereby jeopardizing any way that that relationship is going to succeed. For example, there's political and the familiar. There are essentials.
These are essential to a well-ordered society to have friendliness. You see, people hi, I have neighbors. I don't know them.
I walk down the street and sometimes they're up two or three blocks away. And if I see them, I say hi. Hello.
Or I walk out of my lawn, I'm doing something outside and somebody walks by and they say hello. And I'll say, Hi, how are you? Friendly. We want to be friendly.
But there are people here in unloving lacking good feelings for others. In a well-ordered society, you can't have that. You don't want hard-hearted, unfeeling without regard for others.
I don't care what happens to you. In a good society, we consider everybody worthwhile, everybody worthy of help. This person fainted.
Oh, let's all, you know, step aside. Let these people go. I'm not stepping aside.
I was in line. I don't care what he what. No.
In a well-ordered society, you have to have feelings, feelings of good feelings toward others. You don't want to be hard-hearted and unfeeling. You don't want to have any regard for others.
Here in Romans, you see the same word they are without understanding, disloyal, without affection, and without mercy. That's Romans one, verse 31, the same Greek word, without affection. And it's translated unloving in the New American Standard version, but it can be translated without natural affection.
In other words, they lack good feelings toward others. The next word that Paul uses in two, Timothy three, and verse three is irreconcilable, another way. That Greek word can mean a truce breaker.
You make a truce, we make peace. We say we're going to complete this. We're going to reconcile.
No, I'm not reconciling. It means one who is unwilling to negotiate a solution to a problem involving another person. People have to have compromises.
In your marriage, do you always get your way? I have to have my way. I don't care whether my wife has her way. I don't care whether my husband has his way.
I want my way. Are you irreconcilable? You can't reconcile. You can't compromise.
Truce breakers, they don't want to do it. They're unwilling to negotiate a good solution to a problem involving someone else. That's called irreconcilable.
They break truths. They will not do it. So they're unloving.
They have no feelings for people. They're irreconcilable. They don't want anything to reconcile.
It's got to be my way or no way, and that's it. When you're in a marriage, when you're in a relationship, you know what the word compromise means. You have to have a way of compromising that.
You give this, I'll do this, and you get this. No one gets it all. No one gets all their way all the time.
And I've dealt with clients in marital disputes. I finally say, look, folks, if we're going to settle this, we have to be willing to come. But you can't have it all your way all the time.
It has to be shared to take turns. One person wrote a book on the things. Everything I need for life, I learned in the first grade.
Your teacher taught you to share. Okay, you did use the swing for a little bit. Now you got to share so and so's, got to use the swing.
You learn it. You learn compromises. There are people that still can't compromise irreconcilable.
They break a truce. They have to have their way so badly. They're so self-loved that they can't stand it if they don't have their way.
The next word is translated in the New American Standard Version as malicious gossip. The Greek word here is diablos. They're like devils.
What is the thing the devil does? He engages in slander accusations and slandering a person by saying bad things about a person. Now, we have laws in the United States and most of our states and cities have laws against slander. What's the slander? If you do something libelous, it meant you wrote it down.
You wrote down things about a person and you defame them. You accuse them. You use words that hurt their reputation and hurt their standing in society.
You held them up to ridicule. That's libel. You can be sued for libel.
Slander is what you're talking about it. You're saying bad things. You talk about this person being bad and this person doing this and this person doing that.
That's called slander. And here, the Greek word is used for slander, and it's translated as malicious gossip. They are Diabloi.
They're like devils. Diablos. They engage in slander.
Slanderous. One who just wants to tell bad things about everybody. Slander accusations.
What's one of the devil's chief tools? Slander. Did you see Job? Do you see this? He doesn't know. Yeah, he won't love he doesn't love you.
The next word is translated in the New American Standard without self-control. Now, Krates is the Greek word for control. Self-control.
But it's the Greek word an into the front of Krates. A. Krates, meaning you don't have it.
You're powerless. You have no power. You're impotent.
You have no self-control. You're desolate. Okay? Self-control is one of the fruits of the spirit.
You have to have control. Otherwise, you're like a car. Do you ever see what happens when a person loses control of a car? They swing too fast.
Now, the car is currently then they cut this way, and they can't try to get the car. And the car is going up on two wheels, and they're trying to get control of it. It's out of control.
If you have no self-control, you're just careening around in life. No control, no direction. You don't have control of yourself.
You don't get hold of yourself, control of you. Everybody wants to control somebody else. That's what they want to do.
I want to control what you do. But what about controlling what I do? I have to control what I do, not what I do. And this is what people all over the place how many parents who want to control their children don't have any control over themselves? They're out drinking too much.
They're out neglecting their kids, and spending too much money. Don't save anything because they don't have any control. Get control of yourself.
Don't try to get control over somebody else. And here, these people have no self-control. They're without it.
So when you don't have control of yourself, you become powerless. Powerless and what's the first step in Alcoholics Anonymous? We admitted we were powerless over alcohol and our lives had become unmanageable. That's step one in the twelve-step program for Alcoholics Anonymous.
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol. Now, what that means is that the alcohol can't get off the table and jump into you. But once you drink it, once you take it in, then it sets up a craving and you start to lose power over it.
You got to avoid it. If you're an alcoholic, you must avoid it. It's an addiction.
So people can you imagine if I am totally selfish, right? Lovers of self. I love myself and now I have no self-control. That means I'm just going to do anything myself once, give myself anything.
These are going to be difficult times when people are going to lose their self-control during difficult times. You and I don't want to do that. We want to have control of the self.
The next word in verse three, okay, the next verse in verse three is what? It's brutal. They're brutal, which means they're savage. The Greek word is only used here.
There's no other place in the New Testament where this Greek is used. But it generally means not tame. They are savage, like savages.
They're not tame. I don't care what they have to do. There's no rule or regulation, no civilized way of acting.
They have no way that they do it based on proper respect for others. No, they're savage. They don't care.
The next word is haters of good. This is the last word in verse three. Haters of good.
The Greek word is now if you said lovers of good, it would be Philagathos. Philagathos. Agathos is good.
This is agathos. Not lovers of good meaning without the love of the good. In some cases, it means abhorrent goodness as opposed to what is good.
Generally pertaining to a lack of generous interest in the public good. I don't care what's good for people without an interest in the public good. I don't care.
Throw bottle cans out. You don't care. If you pollute society or the roadway, you don't care.
You don't care about what's good for society. You don't care. In other words, these are like people who become psychopaths or anti personality disorders or anti-proper behavior disorders.
They can't control themselves and they don't care when you don't control yourself. Plus you don't have any interest in doing what is good. You are Philagathos.
You don't care about being good. Loving good, loving what is good. No interest in the public good.
You can imagine how this is destruction, disobedient to parents. There goes the destruction of the family. I don't care about I'm unloving.
I don't have any care for other people. When people get this way and perilous times or times of stress and difficult seasons when that season hits look at what happened in World War II. Look how people behave.
Look how Hitler did, and Mussolini, did they care at all. Did he care anything at all about the German people? No, they didn't care. They didn't care what they had to do. Hitler, at the very end, sent out these young kids, teenagers, young kids.
They were part of the Hitler Youth. Send them out to fight. They got slaughtered.
They got killed. Slaughtered. Did he care? No, he didn't care.
Loved himself. Haters of good. Didn't care.
What's good? Verse four, two, Timothy three, verse four. Another list of things treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. So let's take a look at that.
Treacherous, the Greek word is predates. It means a betrayer. See, you could translate a Greek word in many ways because it can mean treacherous, it can mean a traitor, it can mean a betrayer or one with no loyalty whatsoever.
Treacherous. They have no loyalty whatsoever. The same Greek word is used in Luke, chapter six, and verse 16.
Judas, the son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor, okay, a prototype. He became a prototype. That's what he was.
He was a traitor. He had no loyalty in the end. What he wanted to do was no loyalty to Jesus, a loyalty to something else, I don't know what it was, but no loyalty to Jesus.
Treacherous, heavy tray. Reckless. The Greek word is reckless.
It means heady. The Greek word means falling forward. I'm so impetuous and rash, I'm reckless and thoughtless in psychology, I used to call people like that impulsed.
They live only by impulses. The tendency to it's the very tendency of a lynch mob. What do I do? We're reckless.
That's enough. Only have heard enough. That's a nice lynch of them.
They're not reasonable. Reckless. They don't care about falling forward.
Just want to act on the lightest thing. It's used in Acts, chapter 19, verse 36. They started yelling and screaming because they said these men are enemies of, you know, they we have we have the great goddess Diana.
Not so here's Paul trying to tell them about the true god. And there you all, Diana is a great goddess. Diana is a great goddess.
Diana is a great goddess. And finally, God comes along and he says let me read that in Acts. Therefore, since he said, look, wait a second, everybody knows that Diana is our goddess.
Therefore, since these facts are undeniable, you must calm down and don't be reckless. That's how the common English translation. Common English Bible? Don't be reckless. The same Greek word, hidey.
Don't be falling forward. Don't have the tendency of a lynch mob. You can get people worked up.
How do people work themselves up? Great is they are Diana, the God is great. They're just yelling the same thing over and over. Some religions use God is great.
God is great. I've heard from church members, God is great. Well, of course, God is great, but what's the.
Point here. You're just making a statement, working yourself up without a thought of what's going on. Reckless heady, impetuous rash.
That's thoughtless. They're thoughtless. They're not doing anything with thinking.
Just yell stuff and then get all worked up. The next Greek word is translated as conceited, which means high-minded or puffed up. Puffed up conceited.
They're blinded to their own self, and they're so puffed up that they're almost in a psychotic state, they're mentally ill. It's used in One Timothy, chapter three, and verse six. He must not be a new convert, or he might become conceited, puffed up, and fall into the condemnation of the devil.
If he's conceited, he falls into the condemnation. The devil will accuse and accuse. And you see it also in One Timothy six, and verse four.
He is absurdly proud, understanding nothing. That means conceited. Absurdly proud, but he doesn't understand it.
He's so far up in his own head that he thinks he's so great that he can't even see what's going on. In other words, he has a sick preoccupation with just speculation and crazy ideas. From such these, Paul says, the strife and quarrels from such these derive strife, quarrels, insults, and wicked suspicions.
I'm reading that from the McDonald's Indiamatic translation of Timothy six and verse four. When you're absurdly proud, so puffed up, so conceited that you are blinded, can't see the truth, can almost be mentally ill, you get so conceited, all thinking about how great you are. In verse four, the next praise after conceited is lovers of pleasure.
That Greek word is phil. Edonos. The word edonos comes from the Greek word edon, from which we get hedon.
It's philhidonos, and we get the word hedonistic. The Greek word for hedon. Hedonistic.
Pleasure lovers. There was a group of Philosophers who said that the best thing in life was to just be pleasurable, and have pleasure. That's the best thing.
Pleasure is it meaning loving pleasure. And the phrase is they love pleasure. Pleasure lovers, rather than or more than rather than in the place of God lovers.
They're not lovers of God. They have only an interest in pleasure. Pleasure lovers, not God lovers.
Proverbs 21, verse 17 warns us of this. Those who love pleasure end up poor. Lovers of wine and oil will not get rich.
If you love that kind of thing, you're going to spend all kinds of money on the things that are pleasurable. Two. Timothy three now and verse five, holding to a form of Godliness, although they have denied its power.
And what's the last statement? Avoid such as these. Let me read that in the new English translation. They will maintain the outward appearance of religion but will have repudiated its power.
So avoid people like these. Avoid all these people. All these things that we started reading from verse one and verse two.
Lovers of self, lovers, love, buddy lovers, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents. Okay, all these things that we just read without natural affection, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossip. Avoid people like this.
You can't be friends with people like this. That doesn't mean you don't like them. But you don't associate with people who want to.
Do you think I have a lot of friends that want to go to bars and sit around and drink and carouse? No, I don't like that kind of life. They will maintain the outward appearance of religion, but they will have repudiated its power. So avoid people like these outward appearances.
Paul's contrast with power in chapter three in verse five. The last part of verse five shows that he regards the form. In the outward form, one is one of appearance rather than reality.
They have an outward appearance of religion, an outward appearance of being with God. One Corinthians, chapter four and verse 19 says this but if the Lord is willing, I'll come soon, then I won't focus I'm reading this from the common Englishman, but then I won't focus on what these arrogant people say, but I'll find out what power they possess. God's kingdom is not about words, but about power.
That's what Paul said in One Corinthians four, verse 19. I'm going to read again in the common English Bible first, Thessalonians one, verse five. For our Gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power, in the Holy Spirit, and with much assurance.
You know what kind of men we were among you for your benefit. So the astounding thing here is that with all these evils of loving money, loving pleasure, and without loving God, all these things are encased in a religious overcoat there's all supposed to be all these people supposed to be in some kind of religion. But religion doesn't help them with their self-control, doesn't help them with love, loving others.
It doesn't do this. So you and I need to get two lessons from this. Number one bad times will come and they will only last for a period.
Are you prosperous now? Well, that's good. It'll last for a season. Are you healthy now? That's good.
It'll last for a season. Nothing lasts forever. Everything passes.
This too shall pass. Are you suffering now? It'll pass. Sooner or later, these things pass.
We need to realize these are seasons. There'll be seasons of difficult times and there'll be seasons of good times. Both of them will pass.
We need to look at ourselves in the light of Paul's words. Are you any of these things? Are you filled? Are you antagonistic? Are you disobedient to your parents? Are you a person that has no respect for authority? Are you out of control? Are you unloving? Unmerciful? Are you a malicious gossip? Do you like to cause trouble by telling people about other people, knowing that it's going to create enormous trouble? We need to take a look at ourselves in the mirror of these words, of Paul's words, and avoid people like this. What if you're that person like this, you need to avoid yourself by repenting, changing your mind, changing your heart, becoming baptized, and being one of God's children rather than the children of the devil.
Join me as we end our services with prayer today. Father in Heaven, the giver of all grace, the giver of all mercy, the giver of healing powers in our body, the one who've given us the Holy Spirit. May we love you more than all the pleasures, because in you we have more pleasure than anything?
In your word. We rejoice. It makes us happy and rejoices as we learn more about it.
All the things that you give us comfort, strength, understanding, depth of wisdom these are the things we rejoice in. We forget all we need to avoid all these others and the people who do them. We give you thanks now, Father, for your mercies and your blessings.
And ask again that you'll hear the prayers of your people. Many of them need your help and need your strength and need your power. We ask that you'll grant them comfort and strength, faith, and that you'll accept their determination to love you, to pray for you, to pray to you, and await your blessings whenever it comes.
We give you thanks for all this. In the great name of our Lord, of our Savior, our soon coming King, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.