Therefore, before God and the Lord Jesus Christ,
we shall judge the quick in the dead
at his appearing and his kingdom,
preach the word, be incident in season, out of season,
reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine.
The time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine,
but after their own lust,
shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears.
And they shall turn away their ears from the truth
and shall be turned unto fables.
Watch therefore in all things, endure afflictions,
do the work of an evangelist,
make full proof of thy ministry.
For I'm now ready to be offered
and the time of my departure is at hand.
I've fought a good fight.
I've finished my course.
I've kept the faith.
Henceforth there's laid up for me a crown of righteousness
which the Lord, the righteous judge,
shall give me at that day.
And not to me only, but unto all them,
also that love is appearing.
Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me,
for demons hath forsaken me,
have loved this present world,
and is departed unto Thessalonica,
Cretians to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia.
Only Luke is with me.
Take Mark, and bring him with thee,
for he is profitable to me for the ministry.
In Tychicus, I have sent to Ephesus,
the cloak that I left at Troas with Carpus,
when thou comest, bring with thee,
and the books, but especially the parchments.
Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil,
the Lord reward him according to his works,
of whom be thou aware also,
for he hath greatly withstood our words.
At my first answer, no man stood with me,
but all men forsook me.
I pray God that it may not be late to their charge.
And I was saying the Lord stood with me,
and strengthened me,
that by me the preaching might be fully known,
and that all the Gentiles might hear,
and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion.
And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work,
and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom,
to whom be glory for ever and ever.
Amen.
Salute Prisca and Aquila,
and the household of Onesiphorus,
Erastus abode at Corinth,
but Trophimus have I left at Melitum, sick.
Do thy diligence to come before winter.
Ubulus greeteth thee, and Pudens, and Linus, and Claudia,
and all the brethren.
The Lord Jesus Christ be with thy spirit,
grace be with you all, amen.
Let's pray dear Lord, God, just thank you for this time
we have to hear the preaching of the word.
Lord, just please bless this service.
Bless pastor, Lord, and fill him with your Holy Spirit,
and give him boldness as he preaches your word unto us.
Lord, we pray this all in Jesus' name, amen.
- Amen.
Okay, we're in 2 Timothy chapter four,
and here in 2 Timothy chapter four,
we have the Apostle Paul's last charge to Timothy,
and of course, we know that 2 Timothy,
the theme of this particular epistle
is for Timothy to endure hardship,
and specifically, when it comes to preaching
the word of God, preaching the gospel,
standing for truth, and standing with God's man,
you're gonna suffer some form of persecution,
you're gonna have some pushback from others,
and this is what the Apostle Paul
is encouraging Timothy to do, is to not be afraid.
He said, "God did not give us a spirit of fear,
"but of power, and love, and of a sound mind.
"We're to endure all things
"as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."
He says, "To be strong in the Lord
"and the power of his mind."
He's explained to Timothy,
"Hey, part of the ministry
"is that you will receive some pushback.
"You are gonna receive some persecution.
"Yea, all that will live Godly in Christ Jesus
"shall suffer persecution.
"It should be expected that this is what's gonna happen."
He specifically says in chapter two,
"Endure these things for the elect's sake."
There's others who are watching you.
You're to be an example to others.
And so in times of distress, in times of temptation,
when you wanna throw in the towel,
he's saying use the motive or the incentive
that other people are watching you.
You don't want other people to quit on the Lord.
You don't want people to stop going to church.
You don't want people to stop serving God because of you.
Therefore you should endure all things for the elect's sake.
In chapter three, he talks about the danger
of infiltrators, right?
These false prophets, those who have the form of Godliness,
but they deny the power they're of.
And we explained last week that these are individuals
who are reprobate concerning the faith.
Now as Janice and Jambres withstood Moses,
the Bible talks about, he uses those examples
of these reprobates.
And he specifically says that these,
referring to the reprobates, shall proceed no further.
In other words, they may be in a local congregation
for a period of time.
They may be there for a season.
Yeah, they may fly under the radar for a particular time,
but eventually, God exposes them, right?
Obviously, the danger of false prophets
is a legitimate danger.
It's a legitimate thing that happens
in local New Testament churches.
And no church can really avoid this.
It's going to happen.
And if you have false prophets infiltrating a church,
it's not a bad look on the church
if they get false prophets.
It's just a bad look if they don't do something about it
once they find out they're false prophets, right?
If they're not trying to remove them from the congregation,
throw them out of the church, get rid of them,
then at that point it becomes a problem.
But at the end of the day,
the Bible specifically tells us that grievous wolves
shall enter in and they're seeking to destroy the flock
and they don't want to spare the flock.
They want to deceive people
and disseminate heresy and false doctrine.
So we need to be aware of these things.
Well, in chapter four, he gives this last charge,
the last couple of charges,
and it's kind of like his conclusion of the letter.
And it seems to indicate the apostle Paul is ready to die.
Okay, chapter four talks about that.
And he seems to indicate like,
this is one of my last letters.
I'm being ready to be offered.
He's gonna die.
He's ready to go home to be with the Lord.
And so these are important words
that he's giving to Timothy as instruction.
Look at verse number one.
It says, "I charge thee, therefore before God
and the Lord Jesus Christ,
who shall judge the quick and the dead
at his appearing and his kingdom."
Now, I'll be honest with you.
Whenever I read 2 Timothy and I get to chapter four,
obviously I read it,
but I don't really pay attention to this verse
for whatever reason.
I typically hop next to the next verse
and just kind of talk about preaching the word.
But verse one is actually very important.
It's all important,
but it kind of sets us up to understand
the preceding verses.
When he says, "The Lord Jesus Christ,
you shall judge the quick and the dead."
Let's break that down a little bit
to see what he's referring to.
The quick, quick is simply another word
to describe that which is alive, right?
And the Bible says in Ephesians two,
"Ye hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses in sin."
In other words,
this is referring to someone who is saved, right?
The Bible typically refers to those who are saved
as being alive in Christ.
Because once you get saved,
your spirit is brought back to life.
It's regenerated, it's renewed.
That's what the Bible says in Titus chapter three, verse five.
The Holy Ghost comes and he renews, he regenerates,
he brings the spirit back to life
that was dead in trespasses in sin.
So when he says that he shall judge the quick,
he's referring to those who are saved.
And when he says the dead,
it's obviously referring to those who are not saved.
As I mentioned,
the Bible talks about those who are dead
in trespasses in sin.
It's not referring to those who are physically dead.
It's referring to those who are physically alive,
yet spiritually dead.
And just keep in mind that every person
who has not believed on the Lord Jesus Christ,
who the Bible, you know, we would call unsaved,
is an inaccurate way to categorize them
would be to be that they're dead, right?
They're dead in their trespasses in sin.
They don't have salvation.
And if they're not careful, if they die in that state,
they will go to hell according to the Bible, okay?
So when it says that the Lord Jesus Christ
will judge the quick and the dead,
it specifically says he's going to do it
at his appearing and his kingdom.
So this is referring to two events.
It's referring to the second coming of Jesus Christ,
which is the rapture.
And then it's referring to the establishment
of the millennial reign.
And the establishment of the millennial reign,
which we see in Revelation chapter 20,
is synonymous with what?
The judgment seat of Christ.
We often talk about the judgment seat of Christ,
where Christians will be judged according to their works,
not for salvation, but for a reward, right?
So that they can be receiving,
so they can receive crowns and authority
in the millennial reign, which by the way,
we see the apostle Paul talking about that
in verse number eight.
He says, "Henceforth, there is laid up for me
"a crown of righteousness."
So he's referring to that,
that reward that he's gonna receive at the kingdom,
the establishment of his kingdom.
So what we see here is that it's saying
that Jesus Christ is gonna judge the quick and the dead.
When does that happen?
Well, he obviously judges the dead,
those who are not saved at a second coming
because you have three and a half years of God's wrath
being poured down on this world, okay?
And what is he doing?
He's judging those who are dead
and their trespasses and sin
via the seven trumpets and seven vials of God's wrath, okay?
But he also judges the quick,
referring to those who are saved at his kingdom,
because when the millennial reign is established,
he judges those Christians at the judgment seat of Christ
to see if they produce wood hand stubble,
gold, silver, precious stones,
and then they shall receive a reward thereafter.
So that is the literal interpretation of this verse.
But the reason the apostle Paul is even mentioning this,
'cause like, why even bring this up?
Is he just trying to flex on us
with the information that he knows,
that what's gonna happen in the future?
Well, the main part of this verse
that I want you to notice is the fact
that it says that he shall judge, okay?
And that's important, why?
Because verse two says, preach the word,
be instant in season, out of season,
reprove, rebuke, and exhort
with all long suffering and doctrine.
So he's basically saying, you know,
Jesus Christ will judge,
therefore I charge you to judge as well.
And this is important, why?
Because we have such a weak culture of Christianity
that's always constantly being pushed out there
that we should not judge anybody, right?
Don't judge anybody, you shouldn't judge people,
you shouldn't judge, Jesus wouldn't judge.
Well, it sounds like here he is gonna judge,
the quick and the dead, right?
But not only that, God commands us to judge.
And look, folks, I get this all the time,
messages from people telling me,
hey, you shouldn't judge, Jesus said, judge not.
And what they're quoting is Matthew 7 verse number one,
but it's just like the first couple of words,
and then they just ignore everything else in that chapter.
Because the Bible instructs us to judge people,
where it forbids us to judge is when we're judging them
based upon sins that we ourselves are currently committing.
Why does he condemn that?
Well, because it's called hypocrisy, okay?
If I'm judging someone and telling them
not to drink alcohol all the while,
I'm an alcoholic, and I'm drinking beer,
I'm drinking whiskey, and I can't put the bottle down,
but I'm condemning others for doing so,
that's called hypocrisy.
That's called me trying to remove the moat
out of that person's eye all the while,
I have a beam in my own, you understand?
But the Bible specifically says in Matthew chapter seven
that when we remove the beam out of our eye,
we can see clearly to remove the moat
out of our brother's eye.
In other words, as long as you're not guilty
of the specific sin that you are judging,
you have every right to judge.
And you know, what would Christianity be without judging?
I mean, the way we get people saved in this world
is by judging them, telling them that they're
wrong on salvation, telling them that the wages of sin
is death, for all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God.
That's called judging.
But folks, even thereafter, God commands us to judge.
You know, we have 1 Corinthians chapter 2
that says that the spiritual judgeth all things, right?
The Bible talks about the fact that in 1 Corinthians chapter
number 6, it talks about the church
judging those that are within the local congregation.
It's important for us to judge.
And make no mistake about it.
Preaching is supposed to judge.
Why?
Because in order for people to learn,
they have to be told that they're wrong.
How can you grow in your knowledge of the Bible?
How can you change your conduct and your behavior
if you're not being told that you're wrong?
You know, to tell someone, well, you can't judge
is to say, well, I can't say that you're doing anything bad.
Because I don't want to hurt your feelings or anything
like that.
But that's not what the Bible teaches.
Jesus Christ judged.
The disciples judged.
God commands us to judge.
It's all over the Bible.
There's a book in the Bible called the Book of Judges,
where their responsibility was literally
to judge the nation of Israel.
And so don't buy into this lie that we as Christians
are not supposed to judge anybody.
We can't judge people.
Well, obviously there are certain stipulations to that.
If you're guilty of the same thing, yeah, don't judge.
You understand?
Here's a good example.
When you go to the gym, there's often these trainers
at this gym, right?
And they often like to judge others on how the right way is
to work out.
But these same people are not muscular.
They're out of shape.
They just don't look very visibly impressive.
So they're trying to get you to remove the moat out
of your eye all the while they have a beam in theirs.
That's not necessarily the best person
to judge that situation.
You have people in the comments section
trying to teach people who actually read the Bible what
the Bible actually says when they don't even read the Bible.
That's called having a beam in their own eye
trying to remove the moat that most of the time doesn't even
exist in the eye of the brother.
Point that I'm making here is the apostle Paul
is telling Timothy, hey, Jesus Christ will
judge the quick and the dead.
And I charge you to preach the word, which
is the equivalent to judging as well.
You need to make sure you judge.
And he kind of gives the elements here.
He says preach the word, be instant in season,
out of season, meaning preach the Bible when it's popular
and preach the Bible even when it's not.
Preach the Bible to Christians
when they like to hear certain topics,
but preach it even if they don't.
In other words, don't base what you preach
based upon the reaction of the congregation
or what it is that they want.
You just need to preach the entire counsel of God, okay?
In season, out of season.
And then he starts off with this.
He says reprove, rebuke.
That's a lot of negativity.
What does it mean to reprove or rebuke?
It means to essentially correct someone
and then correct someone very strongly, okay?
That's what it means to rebuke them.
So this shows us that preaching should be negative.
And in fact, in these particular elements of preaching,
we find more negativity than we find positivity, right?
'Cause he says reprove, rebuke
with all long suffering and doctrine.
So it's important that preaching
has an element of correction.
It has an element of rebuking, an element of negativity.
Why?
Because people respond well to that, okay?
But even if they didn't, you're still supposed to do it
as the Bible tells us to do it, okay?
He says reprove, rebuke, exhort
with all long-suffering and doctrine.
So we correct, we preach against, but we also build up.
That's what it means to exhort.
We encourage, right?
And then he says with all long-suffering and doctrine.
Now why does he finish off this command to preach
with this statement long-suffering and doctrine?
Well, what the apostle Paul is saying here
is that when you preach, you should be patient with people.
That's what it means to be long-suffering.
Why?
Because everyone is at a different spiritual level
in the local New Testament church, right?
Some are more mature than others.
Some don't catch the truth automatically.
Some are struggling.
Some struggle with their conduct, with their behavior,
with their way of thinking.
So we need to preach hard, but we also
have to expect that not everyone's going to be up to par,
so to speak, OK?
You can't expect someone to be fully
mature after one service or something like that.
Just get all the doctrines right off the bat.
Just learn the right kind of conduct right off the bat.
No, be long-suffering with people, OK?
Rip hard, preach hard, rebuke and correct them.
Tell them what the Bible has to say,
but be long-suffering as well.
Be patient with people and understand that people
grow at different rates.
And this is something that Timothy needs to know,
but you know what?
Something that you need to know as well, though, OK?
You know, when people come to our church, they're brand new,
and maybe they have some weird ideologies.
They use a different version of the Bible.
They have a different position on End Times Bible Prophecy.
Don't condemn them for it.
Teach them.
And if it takes them a while to get it, be patient with them.
Right?
We're not talking about major heresies or anything like that.
But let me just say this.
There's times when people come to our church
and they don't get salvation out of that either, right?
We're not going to label that person a heretic
if they don't get it the first time.
Maybe it requires a couple of times for them to come to get it.
Have the gospel preach to them a couple of times
before they actually get it.
This is what it means to be longsuffering, OK?
Like, oh, I don't know, man.
If you let someone like that in the church,
what's going to happen?
What are they going to do?
What do you think is going to happen?
They're just going to influence everyone in the church
to believe just like them.
It's not going to happen.
When we create an atmosphere of just solid Bible doctrine,
where people are educated in the scriptures,
you don't really have to worry about that stuff.
Now, obviously, we don't want someone to remain unsaved.
We don't want someone to remain ignorant of what the Bible
actually teaches regarding certain doctrines.
But we also need to make sure that we're longsuffering when
they just don't understand off the bat, OK?
So he says, reprove them, rebuke them, exhort them
with all longsuffering.
And then he says, and doctrine, meaning
that you not only need to correct them,
but you need to show them from the Bible
why it is that you're telling them that, right?
Doctrine is basically the teaching of God's word.
This is important.
So he says, preach the word against the end season,
out of season.
And then he gives the reason why this is important.
And it's important for you to catch this.
Look at verse number three.
Four, the time will come when they will not endorse sound doctrine.
But after their own lust, shall they heap to themselves
teachers having itching ears, and they shall turn away their ears
from the truth, and shall be turned into fables.
So listen to me.
The default setting of any Christian
who's not being given proper biblical preaching
is that they end up being deceived.
They end up not being able to endorse sound doctrine.
And they'll start looking for people who just tell them
what they want to hear.
That's like the default setting, unfortunately,
because that's what the flesh is.
So it's important for a church to give a proper biblical diet
to the church.
Why?
Because you need to develop the right appetite
for the right kind of preaching.
And sometimes people come to our church and are like, oh, man,
that pastor's kind of rude.
And he says certain words.
And he yells a lot.
Or he says this, that, and the other.
But here's the thing.
You just need to develop an appetite for it.
You may not like it right off the bat,
but you'll like it after a while.
And here's the thing.
Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's wrong.
It's wrong if what I'm saying doesn't match up
with the Bible, OK?
You'll like the volume.
Eventually, you'll like the volume.
Eventually, you'll like the rebuke.
Why?
Because we have to develop an appetite for it.
And hard preaching requires you to adapt to it.
And here's the thing.
If you don't adapt to it, then you're
going to adapt to fables.
People are going to be able to lie to you.
You're going to try to heap to yourselves teachers
having itching ears, just telling you what you want to hear,
not rebuking you, not reproving you, not correcting you,
not teaching doctrine.
And folks, this is why we have churches that literally
preach for like 20, 30 minutes.
You know why?
Because people can't endorse sound doctrine.
It's like too much, right?
Whereas in our church, an hour long sermon is a short sermon.
That's a short sermon.
I try my best to keep it in an hour.
But sometimes I go an hour and 20.
And when I go an hour and 20, sometimes people
come up to me like, man, that seems short.
Or if I do like an hour and 10, they're like, hey,
you're kind of short today.
I do an hour and 15, and it's just like, wow,
you kind of breezed through that, didn't you?
Like, what do you mean breezed?
It's an hour and 15 minutes and I preach.
But let me tell you this,
this is not the case in all churches.
In many churches, they cannot endure a lot of doctrine.
They tune out, they can't pay attention.
They are bored with the Bible.
They can't digest the hard truths of the word of God.
And this is because they're not digesting
on a regular basis, biblical preaching.
You need to be able to do it.
And again, it's something that you have to adapt to.
You need to develop an appetite for.
I've shared this multiple times in my sermons,
but I think it's a good illustration to explain this.
Before I got married, when I was very much interested
in my wife, I was really close friends with her brothers.
I'm not anymore because I already married her now.
No, I'm just kidding.
They're cool.
We get along sometimes.
They're cool.
But one in particular, his name is Tim.
And Tim and I, we were good friends.
We were friends from the start.
And once I got to church, him and I were really good friends.
But once I liked his sister, I just hung out with Tim just a little more.
I was just around him a lot more.
And we helped start a church plant.
And this was in Monterey Park.
And in Monterey Park, there's a lot of Asian stores,
a lot of Asian restaurants.
And he liked that stuff.
He ended up marrying a Chinese girl, actually.
And he would always buy me a boba milk tea.
He would get himself a boba milk tea,
and then he would get me a boba milk tea.
And I remember drinking it for the first time,
and I was like, this tastes like an ashtray.
This is disgusting.
Now, how many don't like boba milk tea?
OK, so most of you know what I'm talking about.
So I remember drinking this, and I'm like, this is so nasty.
But you know, he would get it for me every single week.
And you'd say, you would drink it?
Yeah, because I like the sister.
You know, I'm just like, thanks, Tim.
Just like, you know, drinking, I'm like, man, this guy keeps
getting me this.
And he would do this every single week, but I would never
tell him not to because I wanted to be cool with the
brother, OK?
But you know, after a couple of weeks or months or
something, after a while, I actually developed a taste for
it, and I actually liked it.
And after a while, I just started buying it on my own.
And then now I didn't necessarily need the motive of
like being nice to him or whatever, because I actually
like both of myself.
So now I've got it on my own.
What's the principle there?
You know, I adapted to it.
I developed an appetite for-- and to this day, I still
like it, believe it or not.
Crack boba, really good, right?
What's that, the king brulee?
Is that what it's called?
Top notch, OK?
And for those of you who are hating on it, you just
haven't had it enough, OK?
Maybe I should buy it for you every week, because you're not
going to say no.
And then you develop an appetite for it.
But you know, that's kind of how preaching is.
And you know, preaching is bitter.
Preaching is hard.
Preaching doesn't taste good right off the bat.
But after a while, you're just kind of like, you know, this
is good.
I actually like this, OK?
And so that's important.
So it's important for us to preach the Word of God,
to preach the entire Council of God,
because there's going to come a time
where people can't endure it.
And if you're not constantly giving the church just
a weekly dose of Bible preaching with all these elements
attached, you know, they're going
to end up going back to their default settings of just
wanting to hear fables, being lied to,
not being educated in the scriptures, and so forth.
He says, "They shall turn away their ears from the truth
and shall be turned unto fables."
Verse five says, "But watch thou in all things.
Endure afflictions.
Do the work of an evangelist.
Make full proof of thy ministry."
He's telling Timothy here, you need
to make sure that your ministry is well-balanced.
And the way you can have a well-balanced ministry is,
number one, you've got to preach the Bible.
Number two, you've got to be vigilant,
meaning don't be careless in your church.
Make sure you are aware of dangers,
heretical dangers, the danger of false prophets,
the danger of different trends
that come through churches in Christianity.
We need to be vigilant about these things, right?
And not be ignorant about them.
And he says, and you also have to endure afflictions.
So aside from preaching the Bible,
being watchful, just handle hardness, okay?
'Cause the ministry can be hard.
And then he says there, do the work of an evangelist.
Another way of saying this
is you need to go and preach the gospel.
Make sure that the church has an atmosphere
of getting people saved, going out there and evangelizing.
This is how you can make full proof of your ministry.
This is a well-balanced ministry.
Then he says in verse six,
for I am now ready to be offered
and the time of my departure is at hand.
This is referring to the fact that most would agree
that he's referring to the fact that he's gonna die, okay?
And he's ready to die.
And he says, I have fought a good fight.
I have finished my course.
I have kept the faith.
Now, verse seven is something
that all of us need to strive for, right?
To fight a good fight, to finish our course
and to keep the faith.
And like I mentioned this morning, you know, with Aaron,
I don't know if Aaron could really have said that
at the end of his life, right?
He messed up.
He did a lot of bad stuff towards the end of his life,
and he's remembered for more wrong
than he is remembered for good.
And you know what?
This kind of shows us that the Christian life is a fight.
And if you're not willing to fight, then stay home.
Don't do anything.
Because you know what?
We do have to fight the devil.
We do have to fight the world.
We have to fight our flesh.
We have to fight infiltrators.
We have to fight people who are attacking us.
That's just part of the Christian life, right?
This is why he starts off in chapter two talking
about being a good soldier of Jesus Christ.
A good soldier is one that fights.
It fights for the souls of men.
It fights for the right type of doctrine.
It fights on all fronts of the Christian life
to preserve the ministry, to preserve the right doctrine.
He says, I fought a good fight.
I have finished my course.
I have kept the faith.
Now, folks, let me just remind you
that it's important for you to finish your own course, right?
Obviously, we want to look at others.
And others can be a blessing to us.
Using the example of others can be a blessing to us.
But if someone else doesn't finish their course,
it doesn't mean you can't finish your course.
Don't base whether you stay in church
or not off of what someone else is doing.
Now, obviously, this message is not for the leader.
It's not for the person enduring affliction.
Because earlier, he just said, endure all things
for the elect's sake.
But for the recipient, the message to that person
is, hey, finish your course.
You know, we should have the goal to be in this thing
for decades on end and to just die serving God.
That should be your goal.
You should picture yourself dying serving the Lord.
You should picture yourself old, unless you're already old.
You should picture yourself--
oh, I'm not going to look at anybody.
Brother Rick always says, just look at me.
So I'm just going to look at your brother, OK?
Every time after service, he's like,
you know you could just look at me, right?
He can endure sound doctrine.
You've got to picture yourself at the end of your life having
served the Lord, fought a good fight,
win souls to Christ, having read the Bible,
and just kind of at the end of your life saying,
you know, I've done all that I can do.
And you know, I would love to have this attitude of,
I'm ready to be offered.
The time of my departure is at hand.
I'm just ready to go home with the people of the Lord.
And you may think to yourself like, oh, yeah, I mean,
I think that's pretty easy, and it's not necessarily.
It is a challenge.
And you know, I remember years ago at a former church
plant that I helped start, there's
a man there who-- I want to say he was about 55,
maybe between 55 and 65.
And he had been serving the Lord for many years.
But you know, he made some really bad decisions
earlier in his life that affected his health drastically.
And you know, he ended up having this disease,
and he was dying.
And this guy was a fervent soul winner.
He went to church, loved the Lord, he loved to preach.
He was a great guy, and I remember being at his deathbed.
And it was hard for him to even speak at the end of his life.
And I remember going to him and saying like, "Is there anything you want to tell me before
I say goodbye?"
You know what I mean?
Because I was there basically to say goodbye to him.
And then anytime he would talk, he'd just take really deep breaths and just say one
word and two words and then three words, and then he'd just be too tired.
But the last thing he told me was this, "I wish I would have done more."
That was the last thing he said to me.
I think to myself, "Man, this guy served God."
And yet on his deathbed, he's telling me he wished he would have done more.
And obviously, from the outside, I looked at him and thought to myself, "You did a lot."
But maybe he knew something that I didn't.
Maybe he felt like I could have done more and I didn't do more.
Because all of us have a different range of potential, right?
All of us are capable of doing more than others or whatever it may be.
Obviously he felt like he could have done more.
His potential was far greater, but for whatever reason, he didn't.
And you know what?
I don't want that to be me on my deathbed.
I don't want to look at myself at the end of my life and think to myself, "Man, I could
have done more."
I want to have the confidence of the apostle Paul and say, "You know what?
I left it all on the table.
I left my health on the table.
I left my resources on the table.
I left everything on the table, all of my talents and my gifts.
I put it all out there to serve the Lord and I'm ready to be offered."
And you know, it's easy to say this when things are going well.
It's harder to say this when you're actually going through a tough time, when you're going
through a difficult time where you want to quit.
And you know, you may think to yourself, "I don't want to quit.
I'm good to go."
Yeah, but you're not there yet though.
You don't really know what that's like, you know.
You probably haven't experienced anything really hard, okay.
And you know, and by the way, when I say hard, I don't mean like stubbing your toe or something
like that, right?
Like, "Oh man, I have it so hard, I have an ingrown toe now, and I just got to go soul
in it."
You know, you're kind of weak if that's you, okay.
You know, I'm talking about like hardness that affects the soul, right?
Hardness that affects the mind.
Hardness that affects the heart.
Hardness that, you know, attacks the walk with God.
Hardness that makes it hard to pray.
These are the hardships that I'm referring to.
Things that could potentially take you out of the Christian life, okay.
We need to endure those things, those endure afflictions.
We need to fight the good fight, finish our course and keep the faith.
And obviously when he says keep the faith, it's just referring to like living the Christian
life to the very end.
Well, because the apostle Paul had, you know, he knew that he was finishing well.
He says in verse eight, henceforth, there is later for me a crown of righteousness,
which the Lord, the righteous judge shall give to me at that day and not to be only,
but unto all them that love his appearing.
And I believe what he's referring to is the fact that he's going to receive a crown that
Jesus Christ distributes to believers who serve God to the very end.
Or as Revelation chapter two puts it, those who are faithful unto death.
Now people often interpret that to mean faithful unto death, like faithful until someone kills
me for my faith, which yeah, that could be referring to that.
But I think it's also just referring to those who are faithful until the day that you die,
whether you're killed or not.
So here's a great incentive for you to make it to the very end.
You know, Jesus has a crown of righteousness for you.
All you have to do is endure to the very end.
Okay.
You're like, man, I'm still young.
I got decades on it.
Well, you don't know if you have decades on it.
Number one, because life is but a vapor.
Okay.
So just because you're 20 doesn't mean you're going to make it until 80.
This might be your last decade.
I'm not trying to scare you, but no, actually no, I am trying to scare you, because life
is but a vapor.
So that should motivate you to just serve God as much as you possibly can right now.
Because you may not even have 10 years.
You may not even have five years.
May I say you may not even have the end of this year.
Okay.
But here's the thing.
Let's say we did have 40 years left or whatever it may be.
You know, what will keep us on the straight and narrow path of serving God and enduring
afflictions is looking at that shiny crown that Jesus Christ has waited for us.
He's going to honor us with at the judgment seat of Christ.
And look, you know, for young people, like, ah, you know, it's so far down, you know,
down the path or whatever.
Yeah.
But the older you get, the more you realize how close you are, you know, I turned 40 this
past year and I'm just like, oh, man, in 10 years, I'm going to be 50, you know, 20 or
60.
Like, oh, man, you know, I'm nearing the end kind of, you know, I don't know how long
I have in this earth.
I would hope that the Lord would just preserve me until I'm just really old and just, you
know, wrinkly and just barely able to move.
And I'm just like, just preaching.
My very last time I was just dying of a heart attack or something preaching.
But I don't know if that's the case.
I just know that I want to endure until the end, whatever my end shall be, whenever my
end shall be.
So he's going to give it not only to him, but also to all those who love his appearing.
He says in verse nine, "Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me, for Demas hath forsaken
me, having loved this present world, and is departed unto Thessalonica, Cretians to Galatia,
Titus unto Dalmatia."
Now this is a very sad verse, is it not?
And it's contrasting the apostle Paul's ability to finish strong with Demas' inability to
finish at all.
Because we see here that he's like, "I fought a good fight, I finished a course, I've kept
the faith.
By the way, Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world."
And this is indicating that Demas backslid.
He couldn't endure the Christian life.
He couldn't endure the ministry.
So he loved the world and he went into the world.
And you know what?
Demas was probably saved.
He's in heaven today.
But man, he's in the Bible now, too, though.
Like forever.
Like he's a byword and a proverb.
He's not going to name their kid Demas.
He's not going to name their baby Demas.
Demas is a reproachful name.
No, no Christian, unless you're some non-denominator who just doesn't know the Bible at all.
No one's going to be like, you know, let's call him Demas, you know.
That's not a thing.
Why?
Because he's a byword and a proverb of someone who not only forsook Paul, but also forsook
the Lord Jesus Christ by going out into the world, having loved this present world.
And we obviously know the Bible says love not the world, not the things that are in
the world.
If any man loved the world, listen to this, the love of the Father is not in him.
This is saying that a person who has an affection for the world, who gets out of church, who
goes into the world, can't necessarily say that they love God, they don't have the love
of God in them.
Why?
Because the things of this world are not of God.
God constantly wants us to combat the world, to be against the world, not to commit spiritual
adultery with the world, as Demas has done, did.
He says, having loved this present world, and he says that he departed into Thessalonica,
Cretians went to Galatia, Titus to Domitia.
We don't necessarily know what he's implying here, because he's almost saying it in context
of Demus forsaking Paul, but it could just mean that these people went their separate
ways.
We know for sure, Demus backslid, but Cretians to Galatia, we can't necessarily say for
sure that's what happened with him.
It would almost imply it, because it's in the context of Demus forsaking Paul, but he
could have just gone to the churches of Galatia, just serving there.
And Titus, of course, to Domitia, we don't know exactly what that means.
We do know that Titus was originally where?
He was on the island of Crete, helping to ordain elders in every city.
But now at the end, we see him going to Domitia.
We don't necessarily know why.
And then he says, "Only Luke is with me.
Take Mark and bring him with thee, for he is profitable to me for the ministry."
So he says that Luke is with him, meaning that it's kind of sad, you know, at the end
of his life, the apostle Paul only had a couple of people with him.
You know, Luke is the only one who's actually abiding with him.
He's still his friend.
He's still fellowshipping with him.
And then the good news is that he's saying, "By the way, take Mark and bring him with
you."
And the reason that's very interesting is because in the book of Acts, you know, the
apostle Paul doesn't like Mark.
He thinks he's a weakling.
He quit on him on his first missionary journey, if you remember that story.
But then later on, it seems as though Mark kind of redeemed himself, okay?
And the principle that we can learn there is this.
You can redeem yourself if you messed up earlier in life, right?
Maybe you did something.
Maybe you're involved in sin.
Maybe you weren't necessarily up to par spiritually speaking.
Well be like Mark and be profitable later on, right?
Now you can be profitable.
And look, we have plenty of stories of people who maybe left church for a season, they back
slid, they got away from the Lord, but now they're profitable.
Now they're back in the house of God, they're serving the Lord.
This should be the goal for anybody who gets out of church is like, man, I just need to
get back on track, get back into church and start serving God.
He says in Tychicus have I sent to Ephesus the cloak that I left at Troas with carpets
when thou comest bring with thee and the books, but especially the parchment.
So let me make a couple of comments regarding the books and the parchments.
Okay.
Now a lot of churches that I've heard of in fundamental Baptist circles and just churches
in general will use this as a text verse to say that the apostle Paul studied other books
outside of the Bible.
Okay.
And I remember hearing this in Bible college and a bunch of different churches talking
about, yeah, you know, it's possible that the apostle Paul studied other works.
He did tell, you know, Timothy to bring the books.
Okay.
But I don't believe that for one second.
I don't believe, you know, Paul is studying Plato and, you know, all of these, you know,
Greek philosophers or whatever is out there.
Why?
Because he has the word of God.
Okay.
And he just got finished telling Timothy, give attendance to reading, to exhortation,
to doctrine.
And he's not talking about reading Plato.
He's talking about reading the word of God.
How is he going to instruct Timothy to study, to show himself, to prove himself to God,
and work with him in the need not to be ashamed, all the while he's studying some secular books
to learn more Bible or something?
It just doesn't make sense.
Okay.
He said, "What are the books?
How about the Old Testament?"
You know, it's crazy.
People, they see books and they're like, "Oh, it has to be secular books."
Why can't it be the Bible?
Is it because that's what you do?
Because instead of reading the Bible, you study books outside of the Bible.
You are more interested in philosophies and things that are outside of the Bible rather
than the Bible.
Folks, the Apostle Paul is studying the Word of God, okay?
And he says books.
He's probably referring to Old Testament scriptures.
You're like, "Yeah, but it says parchments, too."
Well, parchments is simply referring to animal skin that people use to write on.
So obviously, the Apostle Paul is writing letters.
We obviously know that 2 Timothy is possibly the last epistle that he wrote.
But that's not to say that he's not writing letters to other churches that is not inspired
by God.
You understand?
So he's telling Timothy, "Hey, bring the books," the Old Testament, because he literally
just got finished telling Timothy, "Hey, make sure you're rightly dividing the Word
of Truth."
So he's obviously leading by example.
That's why he's telling him, "Bring the books."
And then he says, "Bring the parchments, as well," because he needs to get some writing
done.
That's all that it means.
And I'm just telling you right now, a lot of people will use this verse to justify reading
secular books so they can get some deeper knowledge of the Bible.
Folks, if you want deeper knowledge of the Bible, just read the Bible.
All you need is the Word of God.
And let me just say this, I'm not against reading secular books, either.
I'm not against reading self-help books.
I actually like self-help books.
I think they're great.
I think they help in a lot of ways.
And obviously, whenever there's something in a self-help book that contradicts the Word
of God, I just ignore it, you know?
It's just like, all right, that's worthless.
Now, I will say this that, you know, if you haven't really read the Bible, you probably
shouldn't read books outside the Bible to improve yourself.
Read the Bible first.
You need a good foundation of the Word of God, you know, before you start delving into
other books that can persuade you to have a different philosophy than that which is
found in the Word of God.
So, you know, read the Bible a couple of times, get grounded, get some biblical convictions
about yourself, and then start going into other books or whatever, you know.
And I'm not talking about Harry Potter or anything.
You shouldn't be reading Harry Potter because it's just gay.
But the point that I'm making here is that this isn't referring to some codice of some,
you know, Greek philosopher, some Roman philosopher.
I don't believe that's what it's talking about.
I think he's just saying, bring the Bible with you.
And he said, why didn't he say the Bible?
Well, because the Bible wasn't necessarily put together and canonized into one book as
of yet.
I mean, the New Testament is still being written at this point.
The last book of the Bible was potentially written around 95 AD before the first century.
And so up until then in that first century, that's when you have all the New Testament
books being written and they're on scrolls.
Are they placed in the code of seas?
It's possible.
We don't know for sure.
We know that basically a church would get a letter, an epistle from Paul, from Peter,
from John, and they wouldn't necessarily enshrine it.
What would they do?
They would copy it.
They would preach from it.
They would read from it.
People would memorize it, and then they would send it off to Colossi to go read as well.
So the churches are circulating the scriptures to become familiarized with doctrine so that
they're not deceived by some fraudulent, pseudepigraphal writing, you understand?
They're becoming familiar with it.
So you go to the church at Ephesus, and what do you have?
You have just scrolls of these letters.
Even though the New Testament was not finished in its canonization, so to speak, let's say
they just had the epistles of Paul, and they didn't have the gospels yet, well it doesn't
matter because whatever they had at that point, they knew was the word of God.
So they're receiving the scriptures.
They are understanding this is the word of God.
They're not wondering, "Hey, is this God's word or what?
We need some church council in the third century to tell us what's the Bible, what's not."
They already knew it.
As soon as they got their letter, they're like, "This is God's word."
And so when someone else sent them a letter claiming to be the apostle Paul, right, and
they said, "This is from the apostle Paul to the church at Thessalonica," they're like,
"Okay, let's see what it says here.
Oh, this teaches a preacher of rapture, not Bible, right?
This teaches purgatory.
That's weird.
Not in the Bible.
This is a fraudulent document."
Why?
Because they already have scriptures, and the scriptures are not going to contradict
one another.
This is why we don't esteem the apocryphal readings.
"Oh, Protestants removed the apocrypha from the Bible.
They should have kept it in there."
Why?
Because it teaches purgatory.
We're not going to keep it in there because it teaches heretical teachings that don't
match up with the Bible.
So that's how you determine what is the Bible and what's not.
Who are you?
Who gave you the authority to determine what was God's Word and what wasn't?
God did.
The Holy Spirit.
And you know what?
Common sense.
Hey, look, obviously you need to be saved to be able to determine what is God's Word
and what isn't because we know the voice of the shepherd.
Just tell you something, there's a lot of stuff in the apocryphal readings that you
just need common sense for.
To just say, this just sounds, Harry Potter is better than this.
Star Wars is way better than this, you know?
There's more biblical principles found in those writings than you'll find in the apocryphal.
The reason Catholics and everyone else fight against, you know, Protestants, which we're
not even Protestants, but they label us as Protestants, the reason they would even attack
Protestants for removing these is because of the fact that they're not saved.
In Unsafe People, the Bible says that the natural man receiveth not the things of the
Spirit of God.
So they can't really tell the difference between what's taught in the Apocrypha and what is
actually the Word of God.
They don't know the difference because they're blind.
That's what the Bible says.
I don't even know how I got off on that, but you know, this is very important, folks.
Knowing how the New Testament was compiled is very important.
Oh, you know, give me an example in the first century of a church that knew they had the
scriptures right here.
Why do you need something, a historical document outside of the Bible to prove what the Bible
already says, right?
Well, something outside of the Bible.
Why am I going to appeal to an inferior authority, right, to lend veracity to the final authority?
It makes no sense.
Just go to the Bible.
The Bible is enough.
The Bible has already laid the guidelines, stipulations, and the parameters that believers
would use in order to determine whether something was the word of God or not.
And so, you know, we don't need the Apocrypha.
We don't need the Book of Enoch.
And if someone reads the Book of Enoch and they're just like, oh yeah, this is God's
word, you're probably not saved because it has so many, like, horrendous, absurd teachings
on there.
It's just mind blowing if someone would accept it to be the word of God.
Okay.
So anyways, he says, bring the books, especially the parchments.
Look at verse 14.
What was I talking about?
Does anybody remember how I got off on that?
What?
Books and parchments.
But what was I talking about?
How did I get off on the New Testament thing?
Does anybody know?
Huh?
Bible college.
What about it?
Bible college is bad.
Don't do it.
I don't remember.
95 A.D. was probably the last book, you know, the last time a book was written.
And so, you know, as you progressively get to that, Christians, it's not like, you know,
"Oh, here we are in the 100, you know, 100 A.D. and we still don't know what the Bible
is."
Because that's not what they want you to think.
They want you to think that you're in 200 A.D., right?
And Christians are just like, "You know, I just don't know what's the Bible.
I really don't know."
Not really recognizing that they've already accepted what is the Word of God and what
isn't, when the letter was given to them.
They didn't have the Word of God.
Okay.
Then if the Bible says, "Study to show thyself, and prove unto God, a workman that need not
to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth," how can they obey that if they didn't
have the Bible?
If the Bible says, "All scripture is given by inspiration of God.
It's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, instruction, and righteousness,
that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works," how can he
do that if he didn't even have the Bible?
If the Bible says, "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God," how can that
happen if they didn't have the Bible?
If he's literally instructing the church, "Hey, give attendance to reading to exhortation
to doctrine," Paul, when he's talking, we don't have the Bible?
How can they fulfill that if they didn't have the Bible?
Do you see how absurd that argument is?
It's crazy, because over and over again, look folks, how about the fact that he tells Timothy
that the pastors are worthy of double honor who labor in the word and doctrine?
Well, I guess no pastors in the first century, if he got any double honor, because they didn't
have the Bible.
There are so many commandments in regards to the Bible that tell us, oh, I guess they
did have the Bible because if they did not have a canonization as of yet, then guess
what?
Those commandments couldn't be obeyed.
And again, I'm not saying that by the time first Timothy's written, oh, they have the
entire canonization, but hold on a second, whatever they do have, they already know is
the word of God.
Then, and the more letters come in, okay, this is the word of God.
And by the time you get to the book of revelation, he's saying, don't let anybody add to this
or take away from this, it's like, oh, this is the end.
And after that, it's just like, we don't need any more.
But then the Roman Catholic Church wants to say, no, we gave you the Bible.
Right?
Don't you hear that all the time?
We gave you the Bible.
Then why don't you obey it?
Then why do you teach so many things that are contrary to the Bible?
And why is your entire religion based off of contradicting the word of God?
All right.
Let me get off that for a minute.
Look at verse 14.
So the apostle Paul starts kind of going on a rant here, just like I did.
And he says in verse 14, Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil.
The Lord reward him according to his works.
Now, this is a very important verse.
And the reason for that is because the apostle Paul is hoping that God punishes Alexander
the coppersmith.
Now, a lot of Christians have a problem with that.
They're like, Oh, you shouldn't say that.
You know, you shouldn't, you shouldn't be like hoping that God punished the Lord reward
him according to his works.
He's saying like, I hope God punishes him and rewards him and gives him a recompense
for the evil that he's done.
Now people will say, well, this is different though, cause Alexander wasn't saved.
We don't know that though.
There's no indication whether he's saved or not.
There's absolutely no indication.
The only indication that we have is that he did much evil to the apostle Paul.
But let me just remind you, Christians can do much evil to other Christians.
That's a legitimate thing.
Now obviously, you know, there's the biblical teaching that we're to bless our enemies,
blessing curse not, right?
Meaning that if someone wrongs you, your default setting should be to bless your enemies.
However, okay, however, the Bible also teaches us that there are Christians who are excommunicated
from a church that need to be punished by God.
That's literally what the Bible teaches.
Like people who are excommunicated for heresy, they're communicated for railing, they're
communicated for any of the sins that we see in first Corinthians chapter five.
According to the Bible, you know, the Bible says that he gives them over to Satan for
the destruction of the flesh.
That means that a church has the authority to remove an individual from a local congregation
and give them to Satan so that Satan destroys that person in hopes that that person will
repent.
And let me just say this, you know, obviously, again, the default setting should be to pray
for our enemies, to bless our enemies, bless and curse not.
But the caveat there is that if you have people who are literally trying to stop you from
preaching the Bible, they're trying to discredit the message from a church, that person needs
to be punished.
Because at that point, you're seeking to hinder the gospel, you're seeking to hinder the Word
of God, the work that a church is doing.
That person should be punished.
And look, I've said it before, and I'll say it again, just so people understand, okay?
Because I'm talking about impregatory prayers, yes.
Pregatory means cursings, right?
To implicate means to curse, you understand?
That's a biblical teaching.
But here's the thing, you know, and people are like, well, can you know, is that right
to do?
Well, if I pray an impregatory prayer towards someone and God doesn't punish them, I guess
he's in the clear.
But if I pray an impregatory prayer towards someone and something does happen to them,
guess what?
That means it was God's will for that person to be punished.
Now let's just say, for example, that Alexander here in 2 Timothy chapter 4 is the same Alexander
from 1 Timothy chapter 1.
Do you guys remember that Alexander?
Go to 1 Timothy chapter 1, 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 20.
It says, "Of whom is Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I've delivered unto Satan, that they
may learn not to blaspheme."
So let's just pretend for a minute that the Alexander, the coppersmith in 2 Timothy 4,
is the same Alexander here in 1 Timothy chapter 1.
That would possibly indicate that he is a believer.
And based upon the statement made by the apostle Paul in 1 Timothy chapter 1, Alexander was
excommunicated, because when he says, "Whom I've delivered unto Satan for the destruction
of the flesh," this is referring to church discipline, according to 1 Corinthians chapter
5 and 1 Corinthians chapter 3, understand?
So let's just say Alexander here was a Christian, he was excommunicated for heresy, well then
it's definitely justifiable to pray that God will punish him in order for him to repent.
So when he says, "Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil, the Lord reward him according
to his works," this is justifiable if it is that person.
But here's another reason why it would be justified.
Look at verse 15, "Of whom be thou aware also," go back to second Timothy four, second
Timothy four, 15, "Of whom be thou aware also, for he hath greatly withstood our words."
You know what that means?
It means he's trying to hinder the message of God, okay?
He's trying to hinder the gospel in some form or another.
He's trying to hinder the word of God from preaching the word, from the apostle Paul
from preaching the word of God.
He's withstanding, he's fighting against the word of God, and that's extremely evil, okay?
It's one thing to not like a preacher.
It's one thing to not like a messenger to just go somewhere else.
It's another thing to make it your agenda to try to destroy that church, right?
It's one thing to make article after article after article, even though no one reads any
of them, to just try to destroy a church.
You say, "Are you worried when people write articles?"
No, it's first of all free publicity, amen.
But number two, you could do nothing against us.
No weapon foreign against me shall prosper.
And if you fight against us, you're fighting against God.
Now I can literally point to various examples in the lifespan of our church where people
have literally fought against us as a church, fought against me, tried to hinder the work
of God, tried to hinder the gospel.
Many of them have died.
Many of them are currently dying.
I'm talking about there's a guy who literally sued our church, sued yours truly, sued me
for defamation because I preached against him, and now he has some sort of flesh-eating
virus and he's only been given a couple months to live.
Coincidence?
I think not.
The Lord is rewarding him according to his works.
You're trying to destroy a church, trying to hinder the work of God, trying to hinder
people getting saved, trying to discredit a man of God and the work of God and the word
of the Lord.
God's going to punish you for it.
You know, you know, you should, you know, don't give, you know, you should leave it
in God's hands.
I am.
I'm not taking vengeance.
I'm not taking vengeance into my own hands.
I'm not taking matters into my own hands.
I'm not out there hunting someone down.
Vengeance does belong into the Lord.
He will repay.
That's what the Bible says, right?
So I'm just asking God to do it.
I'm just saying, Lord, punish that person.
You say, well, is that really the best way to go about it?
Yes.
And I'm going to explain why.
Number one, if a person is attacking us and they're saved, if they get punished, hopefully
they repent, right?
If they're like, well, that was stupid, I'm not going to do that anymore.
Or two, let's say they don't repent and God destroys their lives.
It makes other people afraid to do what that person did and say, you know what?
I was going to talk crap about that pastor, but I'm not anymore.
I was going to try to attack that church, but I'm not anymore.
Why?
Because they died.
You don't want a flesh eating virus now, do you?
I'm not joking, folks.
This is legitimate things that have happened in our church.
Okay.
You know, the guy who was literally stopping us from preaching the gospel in Ohio a couple
years back, and then literally, I'm talking about just shutting us down, you know, you
know, just say no manner of even causing the people at the hotel where we're having these
conferences to kick us out, making all types of slanderous videos about us, just hindering
us, just a thorn in our flesh.
Two months later, murdered, and people were like, "You did it!"
Like, I didn't do anything.
I just prayed, preached the word of God, and I prayed, and God just did it.
You think that's a coincidence?
I don't think it's a coincidence.
That's what happens when you mess with the house of God!
And look, I don't think it's because I'm just like some godly person.
I think it's because it's God's house.
And I think it's because I'm preaching the Bible, and God doesn't like it when you try
to hinder the message of God.
And let me just say this, one of the greatest punishments, and you listen to me because
your enemies will experience this, one of the greatest punishments that a person gets
for withstanding the word of God, listen to me, is this, delusions.
Pay attention back there.
One of the strongest things that God will punish a person with, I'm telling you right
now, is strong delusions, meaning they'll start losing their minds.
That's a fact, meaning that God will just send paranoia in a person's mind, just worried
about it, just scared.
This is like, "Oh man, they're out to get me."
And that's a legitimate thing, like God literally says like, "I send them strong delusions."
And you know what, if you've been online as of recently, you've seen people being given
over to strong delusions, where it's just like, this person is absolutely losing their
minds, and you know what, that's part of their punishment, part of their punishment.
Because you know, if you've never been delusional, you don't know what that's like.
I've never been delusional, but if you've never been delusional, you don't know what
that's like.
But it's probably a very scary thing to experience.
Why?
Because you know, you start fleeing even though no one's chasing you, can't sleep, worried.
The Bible literally says that God puts fear in their hearts, where literally the shaking
of a leaf will cause them to just lose their minds.
They'll think that it's just people who are out to get them.
These are the delusions.
"Oh man, they're going to kill me.
Oh man, someone's going to do something to me.
Something's going to happen to me."
And it's just, we're just here.
We're just serving God.
About to go eat, laugh, fellowship, be with our families, and they're just scared half
to death.
Why?
Because God sends them strong delusions, my friends.
This is a legitimate thing.
That is a punishment from God.
I would not doubt it beyond any ... Shout out of a doubt that Alexander got something
like that.
Because if he's withstanding the words of the apostle Paul, he hindered him in some
way where he's stopping the word of God, I guarantee you God punished that guy hard.
And I don't think it's because of the apostle Paul.
I think it's because of the word of God that was being preached.
Because God does not take it lightly when you try to hinder the message of God.
Because look folks, let's just say for example, I'll use Miss Kelly as an example.
Let's say Miss Kelly just hates my guts.
No, crazy.
She just hates my ... And then she just doesn't agree with anything that I'm saying.
And she's just like, "I hate Pastor Mejia and he's a jerk and he's wrong and he always
preaches against feminism and all this stuff and he always uses me as an illustration of
discernment and all this stuff."
And then she leaves.
You know the normal thing for her to do is just go to a different church and just forget
about Pastor Mejia.
Like if I was such a plague on her heart and mind, wouldn't you think that the reasonable
thing to do would be for her to just go somewhere else and never think about me again?
Right?
Like I don't ever want to go to that church ever again.
But it would be weird though if she left our church, but then her entire life is centered
around attacking our church.
Just thinking about our church, slandering our church.
It's like if you hate me so much, why do you think about me all the time?
Why do I live rent free in your mind?
I'll tell you why.
Because God is punishing Miss Kelly as an illustration.
He would be punishing her by giving her that strong delusion.
Right?
Part of the punishment.
And so it's very much justifiable for us to pray in precatory prayers towards other Christians.
Yes, you can clip this if you want, especially if they've been excommunicated from a church.
And especially if they're trying to stop the word of God from being preached.
Because it's a grievous sin in God's eyes.
And again, we don't take matters into our own hands.
We're not vigilantes.
We do what Jesus Christ told us to do in Luke chapter 18 to pray these in precatory
prayers.
He says, "Of whom thou beware also, for he hath greatly withstood our words."
And my first answer, verse 16, "No man stood with me, but all men forsook me."
I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge.
So he has the balance here.
He's saying, "Hey, punish Alexander, but people who didn't want to back me up, father forgive
them for they know not what they do."
That's what he's saying, right?
So obviously, he knows what he's doing here.
He knows what he's talking about.
He's like, "Don't punish these people because they're just kind of spiritual children that
don't know what they're talking about.
They're being persuaded.
They're listening to these attackers and these infiltrators, but Alexander, may you punish
Alexander severely because he knows what he's doing.
Now withstanding the Lord stood with me and strengthened me that by me the preaching might
be fully known and that all the Gentiles might hear and I was delivered out of the mouth
of the lion.
And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work and will preserve me unto his heavenly
kingdom to whom be glory forever and ever.
Amen."
So what is this telling us?
The ever device the enemies of Paul constructed against him, it just fell apart, didn't even
work.
Didn't work.
The devices of the enemies came to naught.
Any plan they had to take the Apostle Paul down, never worked.
I mean, remember those guys who fasted?
They're like, "We're going to fast until we can kill the Apostle Paul."
Well, Apostle Paul, like, so did you guys die?
Because they were like, "We're going to fast until we get the Apostle Paul."
It just never happened.
And let me say this, there's people out there that conspire against us.
That's a legitimate thing.
There's people who create these wicked devices in their minds of what they want to do to
us.
What they want to do to me, what they want to do to our church.
And you know, good thing we can't, we don't have a glimpse of what that is.
Because it's probably like, "Whoa, you guys are crazy."
But you know, at the end of the day, it just never happens.
It never comes to pass.
And you know what?
If you don't want it to come to pass, stay right with God.
Stay right with the Lord.
Keep serving God.
Be pleasing unto the Lord.
But it's true that God brings the devices of the workers of iniquity to naught and never
comes to pass.
And you know what?
I'm going to experience this.
We're going to experience this as the years go by.
But even within recent years, I saw this where it seemed as though like, oh man, you know,
we're going to lose this battle.
In times past, we came out winning and the opposition came out losing.
The devices came to naught.
They weren't able to succeed.
Our church is still here.
It's still serving God.
It's still preaching.
It's still getting a bunch of people saved.
A lot of people are coming to church, visiting the church.
The church is successful.
It's prospering.
It's doing great.
It's showing us that the Lord is standing with us.
Okay?
So here's your weekly reminder to pray in Purgatory prayers, amen?
I'll finish there because the last couple of verses is just the Apostle Paul giving
shout outs to a lot of the laborers and the Lord.
Point being here is that he finishes off his letter to Timothy.
And what's the theme?
The theme is this.
Timothy, endure hardness, okay?
Alexander withstood me.
He might try to withstand you too.
You're going to experience a lot of these trials and tribulations, but just know this.
The Lord delivered me out of them all.
And why is he telling Timothy that?
Because he's telling him, God's going to deliver you too.
Make full proof of thy ministry, keep serving God, keep preaching the word, keep doing what
you're supposed to be doing, and God will be with you.
You know what?
It doesn't matter how bad it can get in the coming days or in the coming weeks or months
or years, at the end of the day, God will deliver us as long as we keep serving Him.
As long as we make full proof of the ministry, amen?
In the word, we are being vigilant, we are enduring afflictions, and we're doing the
work of an evangelist.
Amen.
Let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for your word.
Thank you for this epistle to Timothy, and what an encouragement it is, Lord.
I pray that you'd help us to exercise faith in the Word of God in these particular areas,
Lord.
There's a lot of wicked people out there, a lot of evil people that have been given
over to strong delusions.
And I pray that you would not only bring their devices to naught, may you severely punish
them so they can get right with you, Lord.
And if they choose not to get right, may you punish them so that others may fear to follow
them in the same path.
And I pray that you bless us as we're going away.
Thank you so much for all the salvations that we saw in January, all the baptisms that we've
seen, the growth of the church, Lord, may you continue to be honored and glorified in
all that we do.
In Jesus name, we pray.
Amen.