Transcript

Take your Bibles and we’re back to 1 Timothy 1 as we continue our exposition through this New Testament book. It’s called a pastoral epistle. It’s the Apostle Paul writing to his young disciple Timothy, as he’s left Timothy in charge of the church in Ephesus, and in case he doesn’t get to him to address some things directly, he’s telling Timothy, “Now here’s the way you’re to fashion and function as the church, the bride of Christ.” We call it beautifying the bride. Beautifying the bride, that is, how are we as God’s instruments, first of all, we ask the question why would God leave it in our hands? It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s an astonishing thought that God’s work on earth he has ordained to, ah, be led by himself but through men yet he’s given us his sure word to follow and we’re all, we have to be very careful that we’re not following, ah, gimmicks and fads and the wisdom and cleverness of men in the church but following God’s word, and Timothy, the, the epistle to Timothy is a, a very practical book that gives us much of what we’re to do as far as the fashion, the structure and then the function, how we act as God’s church.

Now right out of the gate as Paul’s writing to Timothy, he fervently warns and commends Timothy to the task of guarding sound doctrine and he really continues that emphasis in today’s text. Ah, I guess, ah, one of the things that, um, is wearisome, just to be quite honest, wearisome to those of us in the pastorate who take our calling seriously, is the unrelenting nature of false teaching and false doctrine that comes into the church. It never ends. About the time you think, “Well, we saw that coming and we kept that from being a negative influence,” then another one comes from another avenue. It just continues. But it is good to know that the Apostle Paul faced these same difficulties and as he’s training Timothy, that’s the first thing he talks to him about, “Be on guard.” As a matter of fact, when Paul writes to Titus, he tells Titus to guard sound doctrine. Ah, we’re to be vigilant, intentional in guarding the church from those things which would lead us from sound doctrine and sound practice within the church.

So here we go, 1 Timothy 1. We’re looking at verses 8 through 11 this morning. If you’re visiting with us or new here, ah, this, the mainstay of our pulpit is verse by verse, chapter by chapter, expositional preaching through the word of God, that way it gives us what God is saying and not my ideas which really don’t count, alright? 1 Timothy 1:8, Paul says to Timothy, 8 But we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully, 9 realizing the fact that 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, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, or murderers 10 and immoral men and homosexuals and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching, 11 according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted.

I’ve entitled this “False Teaching in Every Age.” Certainly in Paul and Timothy’s day they were combating some false teaching and, ah, from Paul’s writing to the church at Colossae, we see two major streams of false teaching that come into the church. Ah, first of all, there was the Jewish influence of the day that kept continually striving to bring in works and legalism into Christian doctrine, and then on the other stream was the Greek philosophers of the day and there was constantly an effort to bring great philosophy into the church, and so whether Paul’s writing to the, the Colossians and telling them, “Beware of bringing philosophy into the church,” or like here and in many other New Testament epistles, Paul is saying, “Be careful. Don’t let the Jewish legalist and the teachings of law come into the church as far as how you get saved,” he says, “You’ve got to stay vigilant.”

Now, I. in our outline from verse 8, Paul’s and Timothy’s fight to make right use of the law. Paul’s and Timothy’s fight to make right use of the law. Again, this was one of the particular heresies that was creeping into the church at Ephesus and my, as a matter of fact, all through the ages of Christendom you see this in one form or fashion, with one set of clothing or a different set of clothing, legalism or the teaching that men need to embrace works or law to obtain a right standing before God always creeps into the church. It always is there.

Now subpoint A, the law is used to lead us to Christ. That’s the right use of the law. Now that’s not the way the false teachers were teaching it but what Paul is saying is the law is good but we want to teach you the right use of the law in the church, not a, a, a heretical or erroneous use of the law as you use it in the church. In verse 8 he says for ” we know that the Law is good.” You see, what would happen, these guys would sneak into the church and they’d say, “Now, if you really want to be saved, believe on Jesus but you must also keep the 10 Commandments Moses gave the Jews.” Well, so when Paul would refute that, they’d say, “Oh, you’re rejecting God’s law,” and Paul would say, “No, I’m not doing that at all, it’s just that you’re misusing the law.” So Paul originally starts out by saying, “Our problem certainly with the false teachers is not that the law is bad but the way you guys use God’s law is wrong. That’s where you’re messing everything up.”

Now when we talk about God’s law, it would, ah, serve our purposes just to remember the Decalogue, the 10 Commandments as a summation, it, it, it, all the rest of the law is built off of that foundation stone or that centerpiece, those 10 Commandments. Now what has happened is the Christian Gospel has reformed the law back to its good and rightful use. The law was never intended to bring men to righteousness. The law was never intended to make you justified in the sight of God, indeed it can’t do so. The Bible tells us, in fact, it’s the law that condemns us. It’s right and good, it’s just that we’re bad and when we’re already bad and already fallen, the Bible says our hearts are desperately wicked when we see the law of God, we see that we can’t keep it. Strive as we may, we continue to fail and we stand condemned but the Christian Gospel takes the law, reforms it back to its good and proper use because if you try to use the law to obtain righteousness, by the way, I like to say it if you try to use the law to obtain a right standing before the Triune and holy God, it fails every time.

For example, Romans 3:20, “because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.” It just can’t do it. The law, it cannot save you. Galatians 5:18 says, “But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under Law.” The point being when you’re born again, when you believe on Christ, truly saved, the Spirit of God comes into you. You’ve had a spiritual new birth and so you’re becoming one who’s led by the Spirit. In other words, you, you’re not led by keeping a law as far as obtaining a right standing before God. You’re under a different dispensation, that is, the dispensation of grace and the work of the Spirit through the Gospel.

The right use of the law, what Paul is implying is, is to become an instrument to point us to Christ and the free offer of salvation by faith in Christ. Galatians 3:23 and 24, “But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith.” So Paul says the right use of the law is to see it as a tutor. It, it, it guides you along. It, it brings you along so that you might see that it can’t save you, only Christ by his death on the cross and the free gift he gives you can possibly save you.

I, I’ve just returned from quite a long road trip as Pam and I went out to, to Dallas and met with Jesse Barrington and his wife Danielle, the pastor of our church plant, Grace Life Church of Dallas, and boy, the church is doing good, and they’re doing well, but man, it was a divine appointment. We had a great time with them. There were some issues, the church is not in trouble but there are just some issues I need to speak with them about and I didn’t know what they were until we began talking. But it was a great meeting and then we took our time and went through Houston and then along, ah, to [unintelligible] Louisiana, and then up north from there to Brook Haven, Mississippi, where one of our new church partners, Chris Shephard, is pastoring and another place where it felt like just a, a divine appointment, and it’s so encouraging to me to see these brothers for years now they’ve been putting in place a thoroughly biblical approach to their ministry and they’re seeing God’s hand of blessing and I’m so glad we got to be a part of mentoring and encouraging them along.

But as we were on that road trip from Dallas all the way through to Brook Haven, Mississippi, ah, we were following road signs, and you know, it never one time occurred to me as we were traveling down the interstate to embrace one of those road signs or to, to rest at a road sign, or to find satisfaction in the road sign. We never did that. We only found rest and satisfaction when we reached our next destination. The next destination was the place that we said, “Ah, we’re here. Ah, we can go to that nice restaurant we’ve been talking about. Hey, we can relax for a while.” The road sign never got the emphasis, it just pointed us to our place of rest, our place of satisfaction, that is, our destination. And friend, that is exactly what Paul is saying here that the law does for us. The law is a road sign. The law points us to our place of rest. It’s not our place of rest. Don’t rest in the law, you’ll be badly disappointed. It can’t get you to God. Don’t make the law your place of rest, it only points you to Christ.

Well, it does a little more than that, doesn’t it? First the law condemns you that you’re undone and you need a Savior, and then it tutors you or guides you to Jesus Christ. Galatians, ah, 3:24, ah, we talk about how the law is a, a tutor and it, ah, sometimes corrects us, it sometimes firm to us, it sometimes disciplines us, but it’s all that it might bring the right outcome. I’m gonna talk about church movements toward the end of my message but there was a movement sometime back called the church growth movement or the seeker friendly movement, and they be, began to put a big emphasis on telling pastors, “Stop preaching the law. Stop preaching about how men are transgressors. Stop preaching about how men are sinners. They already know that,” they would argue. “They need to be told how to make it on Monday morning and how to overcome life’s difficulties, etc. etc.” Well, that’s, that’s, that’s being smarter than God because God uses the teaching of the law and the fact that we’re sinners and transgressors of that law to get us to Christ.

Brothers and sisters, we do not have a better way to preach the Gospel than God’s way. Every time guys come along and they’re clever and they’re smart, they end up bringing ruinous results to the church. So whether the law’s correcting us or condemning us, whatever it is, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s striving to point and guide us to that place of rest in Jesus Christ and salvation by faith in Christ alone.

As a matter of fact, as Paul’s writing to Timothy here, he first says, verse 8 again, “we know that the Law is good,” then he says this, “if one uses it lawfully.” Lawfully. What, what a play on words here. In other words, it’s unlawful to use the law wrong. It’s unlawful to use the law, if you will, unlawfully, that is, if you try to use the law to obtain a right standing before God, if you try to use works and legalism to obtain righteousness before God, you’re using God’s law unlawfully. You’re breaking God’s law in how to use the law. That’s pretty much where Paul is coming from here.

You know, the law, in effect, is like the light of the dawn. It can shine the true light on our condition. Everything can be dark. You know, I like to deer hunt and I get in the woods before the sun comes up and it’s amazing, you’re sitting there and you, you’re looking around and you can’t really see anything and it’s, it’s kind of mysterious and then all of a sudden the sun begins to come up over the eastern horizon and the dawn light, and then everything’s exposed. Everything is clear. There’s none of those boogeymen out there you thought might be hiding behind a tree somewhere.

Well, the law does that as the Spirit of God takes the faithful preaching of the truth of our sin and the truth of God’s law, the Spirit of God causes the light to come on in your heart and in your soul and you begin to see, you begin to embrace, “I am a sinner too. I need Christ as my Savior also.” It’s a dawning of a light and what a paradox this is because when the law was given, ah, Exodus tells us it was given in darkness and in thundering and like the smoke of a furnace on Mount Sinai as Moses was up there receiving the law, all this darkness and trembling and thundering yet for us, it’s meant to be a light to expose our condition that we might see our great need for Christ.

Now, he goes on in verse 9 and he says, “realizing the fact.” Now he’s saying, “Timothy, we’ve got these guys sneaking in the church,” and I’m adding words Paul didn’t say but this is his point, “We’ve got these people sneaking in the church, they consider themselves theologians, they consider themselves learned experts of the word of God, i.e. the law of God, and they’re trying to force on you that you’ve got to keep these rules and these laws and by the way, they also say, ‘And we really know what the rules and the laws are.'” You see, there really is, it’s all, folks, at the end of the day – are you listening to me – at the end of the day all false teaching’s about power and control and that’s what these legalists, they’d come in and say, “Now you’ve gotta, you’ve gotta follow our teaching if you really want to be a true Christian. It’s not just believing on Jesus,” they’ll say, “Now that’s good but,” they throw in that conjunctive word, “you’ve gotta add on these laws as we will explain them to you.”

So they wanted control of the church and Paul said they don’t know anything. As a matter of fact, back up in verse, um, ah let’s see, verse 7, “wanting to be teachers of the Law, even though they do not understand either what they are saying or the matters about which they make confident assertions.” He said, “They don’t know what they’re talking about. They sound intellectual. They sound like they know what they’re talking about but they don’t know anything. They’re trying to lead you astray from simple faith in Jesus Christ in order to maintain or obtain rather, a right standing before God.”

Now verse 9, “realizing the fact that law is not made for a righteous person.” Interesting statement, the law is not made for a righteous person. Well, think about it for just a moment. If it were possible for someone to be born without a sin nature, which is impossible we know but sake of illustration, if you could be born without a fallenness, without a depravity in your heart, and you lived your life in perfect righteousness, you would never need a law because all that would ever fill your heart and all that would ever fill your actions is honoring the law and obedience to the law. Or once you’re saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, because Jesus Christ died on a cross and there hanging on the cross he took your judgment you deserved for being a law-breaker, he took it all, by the way, he’s eternal, he took all your judgment and punishment from your past, your present, and your future when he died on the cross. So he’s taken all your judgment and all your penalty in your place so therefore by faith in what he did for you, you stand as just before this holy God. He said, “Now that kind of righteous person doesn’t need the law to gain righteousness because Christ already gained it.” If you have to do something, Christ had to fail in some way, Christ would have been deficient in some way. Christ’s person and/or Christ’s work would, would have been wanting in some way if he didn’t finish it all for you. That’s why he says here the law is not for a righteous man. Once you’re righteous in Christ Jesus, the law can’t aid you or help you become anymore righteous than Christ makes you.

The false teachers, though, had infiltrated the church at Ephesus and, again, they were great syncretizers, they were great and clever at mixing the Gospel of Jesus Christ, putting a twist on it so that no longer was it really the Gospel anymore, kinda sounded like it but the way they twisted it, it no longer really was the Gospel. Then they’d add these works on there, the old Jewish law works and say, “Now that’s what you’ve gotta do.” But there’s a real lesson for us and, again, I’m gonna get to this a little more thoroughly in just a moment, but the lesson is for us that we have to be mature, we have to be discerning, we have to be alert, and you need to pray for your church elders because we’re required by God for your behalf or on, on your behalf, to guard sound doctrine for this church and establish the church on true doctrine.

So we have to be careful with all of these add-on things that keep coming down the pike. “Well, now we believe what you believe at Grace Life Church but we’ve found that we ought to add this on, and we’ve also found that we ought to add this thing on, and that really makes you effective, and that really makes you a sound and true church.” The problem is as you look at most of these add-ons, you can’t find one-half of, of one thimble full of biblical support for the add-ons. They’re not necessarily all wrong or evil but if you tamper with them and toy with them and play with them a while, Satan is crafty, he’s seductive and he’s patient. He knows if he can get us to embrace some other things a little bit, given enough time it could supplant what is essential and then it becomes a real big problem.

Well, not only, first of all, in, in talking about the right use of the law, it’s an instrument God has given not to save us, it can’t save us, but to lead us to Christ who can save us. Now B in our outline as we’re talking about Paul’s and Timothy’s fight for the right use of the law, the law is helpful to restrain the wicked. He goes into this quite thoroughly in verse 9 and, man, what a list of wickedness does he lay before us. So he first says the fact that law is not made for a righteous, it’s made to restrain the wicked. But we know that a society needs laws, a culture, a people need laws, ah, we’re all fallen sinners. We need laws because you’re not just gonna go out there and drive 55 miles an hour, you’re gonna go 75. You need a restraint. We all need that. It’s there for to help us have a better and sane and wholesome and stable culture. We need rules and we need laws but to obtain a right standing before God, we do not look to the law.

As a matter of fact, Romans 7:5 is an interesting verse. In Romans 7:5 the apostle says, “For while we were in the flesh, the sinful passions, which were aroused by the Law,” notice that, “were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death.” He said actually if you try to ah, bring law into your life and say, “Boy, I’m gonna really please God by, by working hard to keep these laws,” he said there’s a sense in which the, the, the, your fallen heart sinful lust is aggravated and stirred up by the law to make you even worse. If, if, I’ve seen this so many times in church life where sometimes very well- meaning folks, they’ll read somebody’s book. If I could tell you the times I’ve had people come to me and want to change the church because they read somebody’s book, I said, “Well, I’m sure there’s some good in that book but we’ve gotta keep reading The book.” All those other books may have some help every now and then but be careful when you take somebody’s new book and you think, “Boy, that’s the way to do it.” I, I, I was reading a book just recently by a man and I like this man, and he was talking about this whole new approach to do church, the problem is that same man told me face- to-face in a conference not too long ago that both of his churches were absolute failures. Absolute implosions yet he’s written a book on how to do church. Here’s what I’d advise, guys, do it for about 20 years, then write about it. Write your book after you’ve done it for a while instead of writing your book upfront. My point, my point is that, ah, when you bring in these extrabiblical rules and requirements and think, “Now this is what’s gonna make us really spiritual and really right with God,” there is a sense in which the rules, the law itself stirs up more rebellion. Now don’t misunderstand me, be balanced, have to have some rules, have to have some laws in our homes and our marriages and our culture, of course, but they cannot make us righteous before God.

Now on the other side of the coin, he says in verse 9, the “law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are,” and in a broad sense unrighteous. I mean, the unrighteous, the unbeliever has a lawless heart. He says first of all in verse 9, look at it there, they are “lawless and rebellious.” The law is good for the lawless and rebellious because it helps hold them in check, it helps restrain them from being as bad as they could be. So the law is for those who are unsaved and are still in their fallen nature to be lawless and rebellious. These are those who are carried by their fallen passions, driven by the winds of wickedness in their own soul, and they’re driven this way and then their lust takes them another way, and at every turn the lawless man finds a restraint, in one sense or another the law of God is there. The law of the land corrects them and it corrals them. They have to pay taxes so they can’t just spend their money anyway they want to. The law says you’ve gotta turn left here only. The law says you have to stop here. You get divorced and the law says you have to pay child support or alimony. You want to go a certain speed but the speed limit sign says, “No, you can only go this speed.” Endless regulations. Endless policies and laws confront men daily and there’s some good in that.

Now we need, we’re always trying to perfect our laws and, by the way, we’d be much wiser as a country if we’d go back to this book for our law base and get away from this silly, ever-changing sentimentality and emotion-driven nonsense we see in our culture today where you, we never know what’s wrong anymore. All, all one liberal’s gotta do is feel deeply about it and we’re all bigots again instead of finding out what does the word of God simply state and that’s principled and right for everyone. Well, that’s a side note. That’s not in my notes. That’s a side point.

But the point is that wicked men need the restraints of law. Righteous men don’t need it because their heart is to do right but wicked men must have the external restraint. Sometimes it’s the consequence of his own indulgent choices that constrains him. He wants to smoke, he gets emphysema. He wants to drink too much, he gets cirrhosis of the liver. He’s overindulgent at the table, he becomes obese and gets diabetes. Constant rebukes and restraints and then there’s that inner conscience and the Bible speak, excuse me, the Bible speaks of the restraining work of the Holy Spirit among the unrighteous world. You’d better be thankful, read Revelation and you’ll see what’s going to happen when God removes the restraint, just wickedness run amok, and one sign of godliness in a country is when they throw away moral standards and just want to follow every lust that comes across their depraved hearts and minds. That’s where we are in America today and the gall to cover up this ungodliness under the banner of compassion and love and fairness.

That’s just the depravity of men’s hearts and minds. We need restraints. We need guardrails. We need laws for the ungodly and the wicked. That’s what Paul is saying, and all of these restraints and all of these guardrails and all of these constrictions the world puts on people are all but little prophets prophesying of just this is a tiny example of what’s going to happen at the end time when you face God before his holy law and you’ll come up short there also.

He continues on in verse 9 talking about particular types of the unrighteous, the ungodly and sinners he talks about in verse 9. The ungodly are those openly opposed to God. The, the ungodly are those who find no one they feel is worthy of worship and honor and obedience. They’re their own god.

Then he says not only the ungodly and sinners but the unholy and profane. To these folks nothing is holy, nothing is sacred. They serve their desires. In effect, they serve their lusts period. Would you have ever dreamed if you’re as old as I am, would you have ever dreamed we’d live in a country where everyone now is defined by their sex drive? You’re who you are by your sex drive. It’s a, it’s a base, a, a, a, fallen lower than the animals’ way of viewing life. We are holy ones made in the image of God. The God image is on every person. We’re not like the beasts and we’re not like the animals and we were never intended to follow our lust. Sexual pleasures are given by God for the marriage relationship. Yes, it’s wonderful and good, but these are unholy and profane people that say, “I’m my own lord and I’m my own boss and what I feel is right and good, and I demand you celebrate it.” That’s the spirit of the age. He says those kind of people need restraints or they’ll destroy your whole culture.

He continues on, now he talks about, ah, family relationships. He says in verse 9, he says, “and those who kill fathers and mothers.” Kill might be a bad translation. It can be used that way but it has more the idea of striking. These are those that are so calloused, so full of what their, they want for themselves they will trample over, they will strike their parents physically sometimes and sometimes maybe with their tongues. They strike those that they ought to honor and love and cherish in their lives.

Then he says murderers. We all know what murderers are. We live in a culture today that murders unborn babies by the millions and marches in the street and celebrates it. He said those kind of people need restraints. Brothers and sisters, once you start down this trail, once you start down this funnel it’s hard to get back up.

Then he says immoral men. I think, let’s see, we’re down to verse 10 now, and immoral men. He continues to describe the unrighteous who need law. The immoral men. This has the idea of paying for sexual pleasures, prostitution would be included.

Then he uses homosexuals. The word homosexual here literally means men in the wedded, in the marriage bed. Two men in the marriage bed. It means men having sexual relations. These are the unrighteous. These need a law.

Then he says kidnappers and the word kidnapper here is, is literally the idea that means a slave trader, those who would capture men and steal their liberty and rob them of their human rights and their dignities. Now to be honest, the New Testament never directly prohibited slavery but there’s a reason for that. About half the population of the Greco- Roman empire were slaves. If the Christians had started a social revolution to, ah, absolve slavery, certainly there’d have been a slave revolt and Caesar would have slaughtered them all. That’s just the way the Romans worked. So the biblical wisdom was far better because when you follow biblical truth, when you follow the truth of Christianity and set in order those divine principles, then it will completely undermine and remove the practice of slavery among a people which happened in the United States of America because the men who wrote our Constitution put biblical principles about the dignity of humanity in the Constitution and given some time that very Constitution rid this country of slavery. Sure, there were errors. Sure, there were failures and nothing can be said too strongly about the evil of slavery but you do understand that back when the United States had slavery, the whole world had slavery. Men of every skin color enslaved one another or others of different skin colors. It wasn’t just an American issue. But here’s my point: here once again the New Testament says a child of God cannot go on living the way God wants him to and enslaving another human being. He said these kind of people, they need laws. They need laws.

Now he goes on in verse 10 and he talks about liars and perjurers. Um, a liar and a perjurer is one who either in out-and-out dishonest, in his dishonesty tries to destroy someone or those who spin things, those who twist things, those who leave out pertinent facts in order to condemn someone or put them in the worst possible light. Now he’s not mentioning everything that can possibly be mentioned but he’s saying those who come to a right standing before God and Jesus Christ do not need laws in order to have that right standing or either to have a motivation to do what’s right. Their hearts have been changed. They desire to please God and honor his law once they’re changed. He said but the unbelievers, those who have not come to Christ, there is a fitting place for the law in their lives because it is a restraining force and without that restraining force, kingdom after kingdom, country after country destroys itself from within. Unfortunately our country is now on that path but listen to me, child of God, the church of Jesus Christ has survived the fall of every kingdom that’s fallen and every country that’s fallen. God takes care of his church. Amen? Now I’m an American, my forefathers fought in combat for this country, I’m a flag-waving American, I’m a patriotic American, but at the end of the day I’m a Christian first, and by the way, those make the best Americans.

Now II. So Paul is writing to Timothy and challenging him, Paul, “Timothy, you and I have gotta keep fighting for the right use of the law.” The law leads us to Jesus Christ and the law is an effective restraint for the unbelievers but it can’t make a believer righteous, only Jesus does that. Now II, our fight continues. Now when I say “our” here, I mean us. I mean Christians of every age that live as long as we’re believers, as long as we’re in a church, we’ll need to continue to be intentional and vigilant and deliberate to keep the guardrails up so that we stay within sound doctrine and not allow false teaching to creep into the church.

Look at verse 10 again, if you will, the very last section, “and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching.” It’s almost like Paul said, “I’ve listed,” and what a list he listed, “I’ve listed wicked teachings and wicked practices and there’s lots of other stuff that’s gonna come along too and if it, if it contradicts the Gospel, if it violates the Gospel, if it’s viewed as essential with the Gospel, that’s contrary. You must be vigilant to keep it out of the church.” Sound teaching here, the phrase “sound teaching” means whatever is healthy, whatever is right, whatever is wholesome.

Now we go to verse 11, he says, “according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which we have been redeemed.” Literally that means the Gospel of the glory of God and here’s the point Paul’s making: Jesus Christ and his Gospel which converts the church, brings God the most glorious glory. God’s greatest glory is seen when his Gospel is faithfully held and preached, people are converted, they join his church, and his church is loving and cherishing and walking in the sound doctrine of the Gospel. He said if anything interferes with that, if anything undermines that, if anything tries to supplant that, if anything is added to look like it’s equal to that, it’s gotta go. That’s all contrary to sound teaching.

And there’s so much of that. As a matter of fact on a very practical note, I, I sit in my office and I just thought about things that have come through the church in the last 50, 60, 70 years. I say the church. Now here’s what I want you to understand, everything I’m going to mention, ah, wasn’t all evil in itself, but it was add-on that looked innocent enough and good churches and good brothers and sisters toyed with it perhaps but didn’t let it supplant the Gospel and that’s good, but every time something floats by, a new trend, a new, ah, ah, ah, niche, if you will, a new add-on to the church that’s not thoroughly taught in Scripture, there’ll be a number of people and a number of churches which will allow it to go too far and begin to embrace it, and it becomes a movement that became to them a monument, it became an idol, and it began to supplant the main thing, it began to supplant the Gospel, and that’s what, in effect, Paul’s telling Timothy. “Timothy,” as a matter of fact, in the next few verses he’s gonna tell him, “Timothy, keep fighting. Don’t let up because there’s just an ever-proneness among fallen men to bring error into sound doctrine.” And, and, and, you really have to be discerning. I mean, it’s hard to, to, to discern and see what’s going on sometimes. I know what some of you sitting out there, you’re saying, “I don’t think much about this stuff.” Well, number 1, you ought to; 2, you better pray your pastors think a lot about it. Your soul is on the line. The souls of your children are on the line. The souls of your children’s children are on the line.

Way back in the 1960s, for example, the big trend, the big movement that people began to embrace was social work. We even had, ah, new departments developed in our Baptist colleges and seminaries to teach social work and that’s not bad, everybody believes in social work. The church should always be concerned about societal needs but it over a little time became the tail that wagged the dog and soon there were churches that used to preach the Gospel, they used to be centered in spiritual ministry of reaching lost souls with the Gospel, began to suddenly and slowly stop preaching the Gospel because they were burning all their energies in this rewarding work of helping the disadvantaged and whole churches, schools and departments in schools became radically liberal and barely biblical if biblical at all. It didn’t start out bad but before long it was just a movement, had some good in it, we’d all agree with that, but before long it became a monument and it became the main thing.

I remember real early in the ministry, I used to hear guys talk about the praise and worship wars, that churches are going to start changing, they’re gonna get do away with the old traditional singing in the church and bring in contemporary praise and worship. That’s not all bad. There’s some contemporary stuff that’s solid and good, but now it’s come to where whole churches and many many of them, they talk far more about the wonderful praise and worship than they do the Gospel behind the pulpit. Now think about that. It’s, it’s not evil in itself but it was a movement that became a monument.

Then there was the seeker friendly movement some time ago, a few decades ago. This is where they brought in new secular marketing strategies and you would study the demographics of all the areas around your church, you’d find, okay, you’d say, “Well, the average guy’s 34, he’s kinda outdoorsy but he likes more liberal politics,” and you’d define this demographic and then you would begin to shape the church to meet what he’s looking for. Now that’s not all bad, it’s just almost all bad. It’s not all bad to know a little bit about your community. Folks, I don’t shape this to meet any demographic. Are you listening to me? Now what are you gonna do a few years later when the demographic changes? You reinvent your church again? Then 5, or 8, 10 years later, as a matter of fact, one, ah, church growth, ah, ah, professor said that these movements change about th th every 15 years. Well, I’m in my 40 or 38 year of ministry, soon be four decades of ministry, I’d have had to change, what? Three going on four times by now. Aren’t you glad we have a sure and perfect word to follow and we don’t have to follow every fad and gimmick and trend and we’re not up here saying every bit of it’s always evil but very easily these things become the tail that wags the dog.

Now we saw this in the seeker friendly or the church growth movement I’m talking about, ah, where they began to radically change what the Gospel was because they were so interested in meeting people where they were. Are you listening to your pastor this morning? Say amen if you’re listening to me. If you preach the Gospel faithfully, you’re gonna upset a lot of people. It doesn’t hit people where they are, it hits people where they ought to be, realizing that they’re sinners. Remember the, the law is like a light that comes on, it does confront, it shows us we need a Savior, and on and on we could go. Ah, this same movement’s where they began with all the drama and the lights and the special effects in church, not all of it bad, but soon it becomes the main thing and the Gospel and the preaching of the word and sound doctrine becomes secondary.

Um, boy, there are so many of them I’m skipping over. Lately there’s what’s called the missional movement. Ah, now that’s blended in with the, um, social justice movement and it’s a concept of getting out there in the world and meeting needs and meeting people where they are. Basically it’s a concept where the Gospel’s important but meeting the human needs of mankind is important, it’s kind of a dualism, kind of an equality, and that’s where the error is. Anytime you allow that add-on to become more important than the Gospel, more important than essential doctrine, then it soon is no longer just a movement, for you its become a monument. It’s staying there. Folks, I’m not just blowing smoke this morning. I can take you to church after church after church after church after church after church that has a mild, soft, if not totally unbiblical Gospel message but they’re doing great works in the community.

Friend, what good does it do if you feed everybody, if you meet everybody’s social need and their soul goes straight to hell? This is why Paul tells Timothy, “Be vigilant. Be careful about these things.” These things can have some good to cause our attention or call our attention to some, ah, needs in our communities etc., but in all of these is the deadly poison that if we keep embracing the new technique, the new clever approach, the new niche, it can become the center and the Gospel and the scripturally based structures and means to do church work are diminished.

Colossians 2:8 reminds us as Paul again writing to a church says, ” See to it,” as a matter of fact, that’s a hard charging command there, “See to it,” Paul’s saying. “I command you, whatever you do, make sure this happens in your church.” Paul, what do you want to make us sure about? Make sure “that no one takes you captive through philosophy,” the thinking of the day of what’s important versus the doctrines I gave you, that’s what Paul’s saying. They’ll take you captive. They’ll, they’ll, they’ll capture. Do you know why it’s so easy to be taken captive by these movements? It’s because they really appeal to the emotions. It feels good to help men physically. It feels good to help the disadvantaged and we’re for that, of course. It takes spiritual discernment to do that but never lose being Gospel-centered.

That’s why he charges the church at Colossae, “See to it according to the tradition of men.” What does he mean the tradition of men? He means these are things that natural men think of all the time. Spiritual men think differently. Natural men always think along these lines and “the elementary principles of the world,” and notice that last line, “rather than according to Christ.” It means it’s in contrast, it conflicts with the calls of Jesus Christ.

And one of the real temptations of these movements is that, quite honestly, you can jump on these movements and make a lot of big stuff happen in two or three years and it feels good and looks good because the numbers are good and that’s easier than the long, hard, cross-bearing work of lashing ourselves to sound teaching and scripturally mandated methods, trusting God to build his church. That’s hard. Humanly speaking that’s hard and one of the things that we have to remind ourselves, and that’s why I think Paul ends this section by saying, “Timothy, anything else that’s contrary to sound doctrine, be aware of it, be on your alert about it,” is that false teaching seldom begins as false teaching. Did you hear that? False teaching seldom starts as false teaching. It’s just a thought. It’s just a notion. It’s just an idea that we ought to consider. Then it develops and develops and develops. Over time, the extrabiblical teaching that comes in, again, becomes the center and it diminishes what really matters and what we’re really to stand on.

I don’t know about you, but this spring I have determined to declare war on fire ants. I don’t like them. I don’t like anything about them. Now in my impetuous style, in the past when I would run upon a fire ant mound, I’d grab whatever strong chemical I could get my hands on and I would baptize them in it. I appreciate you not reporting that to the EPA, alright? And I guarantee you, it killed a bunch of them but lo and behold I would do that and five or eight days later there’d be three more 10 feet away and I realized these guys right here, now there’s something going on down in that den or mound I don’t know anything about. They’re tough.

So I began to read and study. I like researching stuff because it’s me against the ants, and I read an article by Clemson University scientists and the Clemson, now this, I can understand common knowledge now but that was just the article I read, but the Clemson University scientist said what they discovered is that the fire ant queen has a taster or tasters, plural, that actually the worker ants bring in the food and she will watch them eat it and if they get sick or act strange or die, she will refuse to eat it. So if you give them a quick acting poison, the fire ant workers just run in there and fall over dead and she says, “I’m not touching that stuff.” And she just keeps having fire ant babies or however she does it and they just keep building new mounds. So what the scientists have discovered is you take tiny tiny tiny granules of soybean meal or something like that, and you put an even tinier amount of poison in there so the fire ants over literally weeks, you scatter it everywhere, they slowly bring it in, slowly bring it in, slowly, and they’re eating it and she says, “Well, they look okay.” She starts eating it and it takes several weeks and pretty soon, boom, they’re all dead.

That’s the way these movements do it. “It’s not that big a deal. Brother Jeff, you know, he’s a stickler about everything.” No, I’ve been watching things for a while and a little bit more comes in, a little more accommodation, a little bit more of a new niche, a little bit more and pretty soon it kills out the queen of the church, Jesus and his Gospel, and it may take a generation or two, but I’m telling you, it happens over and over and over again in church history. We as pastors, we as, and you men aren’t off the hook, your elders biblically are more responsible than you but you’re responsible for your families, we have to be vigilant to not let the tiny poisons of movements, again they may have some good in them, but if we keep embracing stuff that’s beyond Scripture as “the way to do it,” it won’t be long until you have a majority of people that say, “That’s the main thing,” instead of the Gospel and preaching sin and righteousness and the judgment to come.

Real quick and I’m done. Ephesians 4:14, “As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about,” notice, “by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming.” Paul says, “I don’t want my,” now I’ve talked about, ah, the Ephesus church, we’ve talked about the church at Colossae, now we have the church at, ah, Ephesus again and he said, “Don’t be carried around and tossed around by all this stuff that comes through.” 2 Timothy 3:6-7, “For among them,” he’s talking about false teachers with false teaching, “among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” He says these ladies are weak spiritually, they’ve got sin in their lives and they are so prone to chase this movement and that movement and this movement and that movement. 2 Peter 3:16, “as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.” It’s a distorting of God’s doctrine. It looks good, it looks wise, and by the way, are you listening to me? Are you? I want you to sit up straight and I want you to hear about what I’m about to say: some of these movements seem innocent but they’re going to lead to destruction to the ones embracing it and promoting it and to many under their charge. This is serious business. 2 Timothy 4:3, Paul writing to Timothy in his second letter says, “For the time will come when they,” those listening to you, “will not endure sound doctrine,” they won’t have the discipline to hear sound teaching, they’ll want something new, “but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires.” And like the fire ant poison, it comes in slowly, slowly, slowly until it does its work and kills out what matters.

Now there’s only two kinds of churches, there are those who are in the fight and are constantly reforming to be pure and genuine in doctrine, you’re never perfect, you just keep repenting and keep reforming, then there are those who are lazy, somewhat indifferent, and waiting for the next thing to keep it going and they’re killing out what matters. This is a 2,000 year old book and it speaks right where we are today. False teaching in every age. I don’t know about you, but by God’s grace I’m staying in the fight. Not to be against everything, but to be cautious and careful to not let anything supplant the Gospel of Jesus Christ and his church.

Look, your salvation and my salvation requires the Gospel plus nothing. Not the Gospel plus demographic information from the community. Not the Gospel plus social action. Not the Gospel plus missional strategy. The Gospel plus nothing. That’s what gets men’s souls into heaven.