To Suit Their Own Passions

2 Timothy 4:1-5 ESV

“I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.”

But Having Itching Ears

The time has come indeed when not just people, but many people who profess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior of their lives are not enduring sound teaching, but they are rejecting it. They don’t want to hear the truth, but they want to hear the lies, for the lies coddle them in their sins, and the lies make them feel good about themselves even when they are habitually and deliberately sinning against the Lord Jesus. For they want to continue in their sinful practices, but they also want the hope of heaven when they die.

So, they surround themselves with teachers who will tell them what their itching ears want to hear. For they will tell them things like, “All you have to do is pray this prayer and now all your sins are forgiven and heaven is guaranteed you when you die and nothing can take it away from you, no matter how you live your life.” And they call that “God’s grace.” And they will tell them that God can’t even see when they sin anymore and that when he looks at them all he sees is Jesus, even if they are steeped in sin.

And they will call the true gospel – the one taught by Jesus and by his NT apostles – they will call that “works salvation.” And they will either lead the people to believe or they will tell them directly that they do not have to repent (turn from their sins), and they don’t have to obey the Lord, and they are not required to do any works at all, not even though Ephesians 2:10 says, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”

For you know how, in the political world, it appears that anything that contradicts the “official narrative” is called a “conspiracy theory,” even if it is the truth, or especially if it is the truth? The parallel to that in the “Christian” world and culture of today is that if anyone is speaking the truth of the gospel, in biblical context, they are tagged as “works salvation people.” And what they are teaching is tagged as “works salvation.” And the people are being programmed to disregard it automatically then, even if it is true.

Oh, and then the BIG THING right now appears to be that everything must be positive, happy-happy, feel-good, and uplifting, even spoken to those who are living in deliberate and habitual sin. For it is all about not offending people these days, even if you are offending them with the truth. For they regard the truth as negative, for it is all about not being negative these days. But, in reality, it is the lies which are negative and the truth is positive, because it is the truth which saves lives, not the lies.

So, today they have kind of romanticized the gospel of Jesus Christ and made it like a romantic love story of two people falling in love with each other with all those initial mushy-gushy whirlwind feelings. But that is based in feelings, not in truth. Now part of it is the truth, but it is a deliberate half-truth they are teaching, which then makes it a lie. And it is all so focused on what Jesus does for us, but not on what is required of us in love response to him because of what he did for us.

And so it is well sought after and well liked because it doesn’t make anyone feel bad. It doesn’t make anyone feel guilty for their sins. And it doesn’t require that they forsake their sins, but it focuses on God’s grace in forgiving us our sins so that when we die we get to be with Jesus for eternity. And so it shares all these promises of God but absent of to whom the promises apply, and absent of the stipulations and the conditions for the promises to be realized. And so a lot of people are claiming promises not theirs.

Be Sober-Minded

So, Paul, realizing these things were coming, and that some of them were already on the scene, to a certain degree, he gave Timothy particular instructions, which can also be applied to all of us who believe in Jesus Christ. For we are all to proclaim (preach, herald) the excellencies of God who called us out of darkness into his wonderful light (1 Peter 2:9). We are all to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth and those who make disciples of Christ of people of all nations.

And not one of us is to be ashamed of our Lord and of his gospel, or else when he returns one day he will be ashamed of us. And this isn’t just about sharing the gospel, but this is also about us encouraging, exhorting, urging, and provoking one another to leave our lives of sin behind us and to follow Jesus in obedience to his commands, and to live godly and holy lives, for the glory of God, and for us to do the works which God prepared in advance that we should walk in them (see Ephesians 2:10 and Titus 2:11-14).

[Matt 5:13-16; Matt 28:18-20; Jn 4:31-38; Jn 13:13-17; Jn 14:12; Acts 1:8; Acts 2:14-18; Acts 26:18; Rom 10:14-15; Rom 12:1-8; Rom 15:14; 1 Co 12:1-31; 1 Co 14:1-5; Eph 4:1-16; Eph 5:17-27; Php 2:1-8; Col 3:16; Heb 3:13; Heb 10:23-25; 1 Pet 2:9,21; 1 Jn 2:6]  

And as Christians, it isn’t that some of us are called to “the ministry” and that some of us are not. We are all called to the ministry of the gospel of Christ and to helping one another to grow in our walks of faith in Jesus Christ and to not fall back into sin. We are all called to be the Lord’s witnesses and to love the people of this world and our fellow Christians. We are all called to minister God’s love and grace to other people and to be engaged in meeting other people’s legitimate needs.

God did not place us on this earth and save us from our sins so that we could go on living in sin and for self, doing what we want to do, living for the passions of the flesh, and not living for him and for his gospel in walks of obedience and in holy living. We are not here just to have fun and to entertain and to be entertained. We are to be serious-minded people whose lives are surrendered to Jesus Christ who are speaking the truth of the gospel, and who are exposing the lies and who are suffering because of it.

[Matt 5:10-12; Matt 10:16-25; Matt 24:9-14; Lu 6:22-23; Lu 21:12-19; Jn 15:1-21; Jn 16:33; Jn 17:14; Ac 14:22; Rom 5:3-5; Phil 3:7-11; 1 Pet 1:6-7; 1 Pet 4:12-17; 2 Tim 3:12; 1 Thess 3:1-5; Jas 1:2-4; 2 Co 1:3-11; Heb 12:3-12; 1 Jn 3:13; Rev 6:9-11; Rev 7:9-17; Rev 11:1-3; Rev 12:17; Rev 13:1-18; Rev 14:1-13]

Oh, to Be Like Thee, Blessed Redeemer 

Lyrics by Thomas O. Chisholm, 1897

Music by W. J. Kirkpatrick, 1897

Oh, to be like Thee! blessèd Redeemer,

This is my constant longing and prayer;

Gladly I’ll forfeit all of earth’s treasures,

Jesus, Thy perfect likeness to wear.

Oh, to be like Thee! full of compassion,

Loving, forgiving, tender and kind,

Helping the helpless, cheering the fainting,

Seeking the wandering sinner to find.

O to be like Thee! lowly in spirit,

Holy and harmless, patient and brave;

Meekly enduring cruel reproaches,

Willing to suffer others to save.

O to be like Thee! while I am pleading,

Pour out Thy Spirit, fill with Thy love;

Make me a temple meet for Thy dwelling,

Fit me for life and Heaven above.

Oh, to be like Thee! Oh, to be like Thee,

Blessèd Redeemer, pure as Thou art;

Come in Thy sweetness, come in Thy fullness;

Stamp Thine own image deep on my heart.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrYhiK2nQBg 

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