There are some hymns that take us deep into commitment, and that is certainly one of them. Would you open your Bible with me please to 2 Timothy, the third chapter. We hear a lot about the good old days, right? Someone has defined the good old days as when men rode chargers instead of marrying them. You may have to think about that. However you define the good old days, I'm not sure that the good old days were ever what they were said to have been.
The one thing is for sure, and that is that the good old days will never come again. Time passes on. It marches unhaltingly toward destiny, and the world around us marches onward too, and if I may say so, downward. I may be accused of pessimism, but I don't think that that's pessimistic to say is simply biblical. It's the nature of things in this sin-cursed environment in which we live to degenerate. Even the laws of physics testify to that.
In the end, the world system and its organization, its attitudes, its nature will be just like God said it would be. There are still a few of those billboards around that say so and so whether man on a local station said it would be like this. Remember seeing those? Well, sometimes he was right and sometimes he was wrong. One thing is absolute, and that is that when God says something is going to be, it's going to be.
As we go about serving the Lord, we are to do so with certain expectations, not probabilities but certainties, things that will be. In our study of 2 Timothy, in chapters 1 and 2, we study the theme about serving the Lord acceptably, and what that means for us as servants of Christ. Now in chapters 3 and 4, we're going to study the theme serving the Lord expectantly. As we go about serving Him, we can expect the world will oppose our efforts. That's one thing we can know for sure.
We can also expect that the Word will achieve its ends. We can know that. The third expectation that we can have in our service for Christ is that the Lord will reward His servants. That's not a maybe. That's a sure thing. Let's explore this theme, the first theme, in our text today in 2 Timothy 3, verses 1 through 15. And that is this, as we serve the Lord, we serve Him expectantly, knowing that the world will oppose our efforts.
The apostle writes, but realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness although they have denied its power, and avoid such men as these.
For 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. And just as Janys and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also opposed the truth, men of depraved mind rejected as regards the faith. But they will not make further progress, for their folly will be obvious to all, as also that of those two came to be.
But you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me at Antioch, Iconium, and Elystra. What persecutions I endured, and out of them all the Lord delivered me. And indeed all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.
You however continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Our service for the Lord Jesus Christ will be opposed by the society in which we live. Therefore, we should never be surprised by its intensity or overcome by its persistence.
Notice with me first the description of society that is found in our texts for today. The Apostle says, in the last days. That is an interesting phrase that is found elsewhere in the New Testament. That phrase refers to the whole of the age in which we now live. After all, if you look at the outline of human history, even 2,000 years could be called the last days. For thousands of years went before these 2,000 years of this age of grace.
The term is used in that way in Hebrews 1 and 2 where we are told that in these last days God has spoken to us by His Son in contrast to the former days when He spoke in bits and pieces through the prophets. In these last days, since the coming of Jesus Christ as the Savior and as the fullness of the revelation of the Father, since He came 2,000 years ago, the last days have been in progress and will be until He comes again.
But this phrase also has a more narrow meaning than that, and it seems to be used in that way here. It refers not just to the age as a whole, but to the conclusion of this age. What the Apostle calls in 1 Timothy 4.1 the latter times. So what the Apostle is going to say here applies not only to the 2,000 years of past history since Christ came, but it applies in particular, I think, to the days in which we live and of those days just before the Lord Jesus Christ comes again.
He says that in the last days difficult times will come. The word difficult means savage. It means grievous. It's been paraphrased as times hard to deal with, pressure-filled times. The word is used only one other time in the New Testament in Matthew 8.28. There it is used of violence and the violence of a man possessed by a demon. There's an interesting suggestion by that.
It is that the pressure, the trouble, the savageness of the last days will result from spectacular demonic action, and I believe that. We heard this morning a letter from a missionary family that we love and support, members of our church serving in Indonesia. Can you imagine being with them in that hut a few weeks ago as they mourned the passing of this one man?
And there were others around in that filth who were weeping and wailing, talking to the dead man's spirit, and then watching as people who were seated on this side of the room were carried to this side of the room by demons? Did you hear them say that in the letter? That's what they said they observed. The people didn't walk from one side to the other. They were carried by demonic forces. You say, well, that only happens in pagan lands.
Listen, I believe that we are going to see more and more overt demonic activity right here. Indeed, a young man who attended our church, I'm not sure he's continuing to attend, but he attended some, was delivered of demons about three weeks ago by one of the pastor teachers in our small churches who's had experience doing that on the mission field.
So whether it's overt in that sense of personal possession or only behind the scenes, I am convinced that in these last days it's going to get more and more difficult because demons are going to become more and more active. They are going to put the pressure on. Now notice that he describes our society socially in verses two through four by listing 18 characteristics of people in the last days. We might summarize it as degenerate. That would be the one word that would summarize all of these.
Let's just look down the list. Lovers of self. Now as you go down the list, think, does this describe the world in which I live today? Lovers of self. Have you ever seen a time when people were so concerned about self-realization, self-actualization, self-fulfillment, self-this, self-that? Lovers of money, materialism, boastful. The word means empty pretenders. In other words, people will pretend to be something or to be able to do something they can't really do.
Arrogant, that is conceited, proud. Revilers, blasphemers, not just against God but against people. Disobedient to parents. Children have always struggled with disobedience because that is the sin nature of man. But in the last days it's going to become more pronounced. Why? Because I think it's going to be encouraged in the society around us. Ungrateful, unholy. Nothing will be held sacred anymore in the last days.
I mean, even something as mundane as our language is abused and given, words are given double meanings and so on. You can't speak to a young man or young woman on the college campus except by being very careful because the language you use may have double meanings to them. There's nothing that's set apart and kept sacred or holy or untouchable. Nothing is dragged down to the gutter, even the very words we use. Unloving. Specifically, it means no family love.
In the last days there will not even be that natural kind of affection that God built into His creation between parents and children. Perhaps the abuse that seems to be growing in our own society right now would be an example of this. Ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable. That means people will be unwilling to compromise.
Whether it's between management and labor or two individuals involved in a lawsuit, there will be no desire to compromise because my side is right and come whatever may, even the destruction of this company or the destruction of our relationship, I will not compromise. I will not be reconciled. Malicious gossips. The word here is diabolos. Do you see any word in there? Diabolos. It's the Greek word for devil.
You know there's no one who is so mostly conformed to the image of the devil as a gossip because his very name means that. One who gossips about other people. Gossip, malicious gossip. We've prominent in the last days. Without self-control. Brutal. People will be like animals. Haters of good. Treacherous. Betrayers. No sense of loyalty. Reckless. Conceited. That is puffed up. Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.
In other words, even the worship that goes to God is going to be devoted to pleasure. That will be the big thing to seek. During this last holiday weekend of the summer as we call it, where even some of God's people. Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. That is the description of our society socially. And what the apostle says here is only going to increase and intensify as the age comes to its climax. Now there's a description also here of our society spiritually beginning in verse 5.
If degenerate would describe our society socially, apostate would describe it spiritually. He speaks generally. He says he introduces the idea in verse 4, but he goes on in verse 5 to say, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power. You and I are both form and we are power or life, personality. Our form is our body, but the power or the life principle or the personality of us is inside, it's invisible.
When that leaves the body we die and the body is left behind and it decays. That is a picture of what's going to happen to Christianity or Christendom may I call it in the last days. It will have a body. It will have a form. It will have an organization, but it will deny the power, the life of it. That is there will be no spirit of God moving through it. There will be no force to it that's of God because it's only a shell. It's only a form. It's only an outward appearance.
That is apostate Christianity. There's no place for God in it. Just as our bodies decay and we bury them out of sight when loved ones die because even though we love them we can't bear to look upon the corruption that takes place. So it is my friend with the organization of Christendom in the last days. Being without life it will corrupt. It will decay. It will become a foul stench in the nostrils of God.
Having described what's going to happen generally to apostate Christianity he goes on more specifically to talk about its leaders whom he calls false teachers, people who are guilty themselves of apostasy. Now I'm using that term and it's an important one to define because sometimes it's misused. In fact it's helpful if we get three terms straight. One is the term heresy. The word heresy means division. It refers to a division over doctrine or over some issue. Another word is the word error.
It refers to a mistake or an incorrect understanding of some doctrine. Now listen, one can be in the faith, be a true believer and be a heretic, be a divisive person. One can be in the faith and be in error, but one cannot be in the faith and be an apostate. The word apostate means to fall away from.
An apostate is one who professed to believe, who professed to be a Christian, who was under that umbrella so to speak and then fell away from it, proving that he was never a possessor of the real thing. He is one who has fallen away from the truth, Peter tells us in 2 Peter 2.1, that there are two specific doctrines to watch.
One is the deity of Jesus Christ and the other is the sufficiency of His blood shed for our sins because those are the two doctrines that apostates will inevitably deny in some fashion. One who is an apostate will not accept the fact that Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of the Father come in flesh. In some way that doctrine will be denied.
And secondly, an apostate will deny the sufficiency of the blood shed on Calvary for our sins and added to the work of Christ will be human effort of some sort. Something we must do to gain salvation or eternal life or nirvana or whatever they want to say comes. Apostates profess at one point and then fall away. And there are many of them. Indeed, they are like a swarm of flies over the decaying carcass of this age. Notice how the apostates are described here in our text.
They are described as using methods which deceive people, especially those who are impulsive and easily changeable, those who flit from one place to the next, those who are gullible and vulnerable. The apostle seems to be thinking of a specific situation in Ephesus and thus he mentions in verse 6 the weak women weighed down with sins and led by various impulses. Paul is not attacking women at this point.
He is talking to Timothy, I think, about something specific and Timothy would have recognized immediately what Paul had in mind. Believe me, women are not the only ones who are gullible and vulnerable. We all are, apart from the truth that God has given to us in His Word. Apostates feed on people like that to deceive them. It says that they emphasize learning in verse 7, always learning. Now there is nothing wrong with learning, as that learning leads one to the truth.
But notice what happens with the apostates, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth, of the faith that God has given to us. They never are able to recognize the truth. They just keep learning and they go off in some direction and tangent. He says furthermore that they not only cannot recognize the truth, but they oppose the truth in verse 8, just like the magicians in the court of Pharaoh opposed Moses.
Publicly claiming superiority over it, they lead people into increasing error away from God and not to the truth. By the way, those two magicians named here also use supernatural means to try to persuade that what they were teaching was true. Don't ever fall for the idea that just because a miracle seems to have happened, that therefore what is said must be of God. Because just as in Moses' day, still today miracle workers are a broader group than just those from God.
The devil's got his people out there too. And one of the ways they deceive is by performing signs. This happened. It must be of God. Else how would this be? And the result is that they deceive and lead impulsive people into some new truth. Always watch out for the guy that comes down the road with some new truth that no one's ever thought of before. So I was driving Pastor Wiersby home for dinner a couple of weeks ago. I said, boy, I really appreciate your message this morning.
He said, oh, that's fine. He just kind of showed the compliment aside as he usually does. And then he said, your people didn't hear anything new. I said, well, maybe not, but they appreciated it and I did too. And he says, always be careful of the person that comes with something new. He says, if somebody gets in your pulpit and gives some new thing, you've invited the wrong person to your pulpit. Of course, I've heard that from him before and I've heard it from others before as well.
Watch out for the person who's got that new idea, that new concept, that new revelation. No one's ever thought of this before. He says furthermore about these apostates that they're depraved or corrupted in mind. They're reprobate with regards to the truth, the faith. The word rejected is a very strong word. It means that these people who have professed and then fallen away have fallen beyond the point of being able to be saved. They are rejected by God. They are reprobate by God.
I want to emphasize that he is not talking here about one who is a true believer. One who is a true believer cannot, by the very nature of things, be an apostate. He's talking about a pretender who has fallen away. He has fallen away without hope. In verse 13, he tells us that these things are going to get worse and worse. Evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse. The word impostors is interesting.
It refers to people in the ancient days who would give incantations and they would do these spells by shrieking and howling. That was part of their thing. It came to be used then of those who were magicians and used sleight of hand, tricksters. That's what the apostle calls apostates. They are charlatans. But he encourages us by saying in verse 9 that these people will have a limit to their progress. Eventually, their folly will be made known to everyone. They will be exposed.
I want to say some things that I think are important or else I wouldn't be saying them. Not everyone here is going to appreciate what I'm going to say. We are living today in the midst of unprecedented apostasy. I believe it's only going to get worse as the age comes to a close. We are seeing today an increasing falling away from the revelation of God given in this book and in His Son, Jesus Christ.
I believe that it's going to be intensified by several events that are going to take place probably in the next five years. I want to emphasize that what I'm about to share is my opinion. I am not speaking ex cathedra like the pope does. This is not revelation I'm giving, but I'm going to give you my opinion. Obviously I think I'm right or I wouldn't be saying it.
I believe one of the events that's going to happen in the next five years that's going to hasten the apostasy is the collapse of the Charismatic Movement. I know that may offend some of you, but I believe that the collapse of most of the Charismatic Movement, which is impending, is going to disillusion so many people that they will completely reject what they have heard and will go in the other direction to error.
I believe that coupled with that is going to come the collapse of many of the fundamentalist empires that are being built, at least in our country today too. Maybe they are out there on a shoestring or less. I believe that we are facing difficult economic times in the near future. That plus some other things will cause the collapse of some of the empires that are so well known and spouted across our country today. That too is going to cause a retreat toward apostasy and disillusionment.
I think thirdly that we are going to see an aggressive rebound of liberalism, both politically and religiously. We have been writing a crest of conservatism that began perhaps in the early 70s politically. I don't know what the next election is going to bring, but my hunch is that it is going to start the pendulum moving back in the other direction toward liberal politics, being in control instead of reacting.
At the same time that that happens, as often happens, there is going to be an upsurge of liberal theology. There are some people who think that religious liberals are dead. They are not. They have been caught off guard the last few years, but they are not dead. When some of these things that I have talked about begin to collapse, they are going to seize the opportunity of the moment to rise up.
I believe one of the things they are going to do is to embrace a new theology that just now is beginning to come out of the shadows in the guise of what is called the New Age Movement. Time Magazine this last week had an article on New Age Music, which is a part of that. The theology of the New Age Movement is basically unitarian. God is whatever you say God is. After all, all roads lead to God, and their special emphasis is that man himself is his own God and can become God.
I believe that that is going to become the new thing, the new fad that will sweep across this country theologically in the near future. The result of that, that all that I have talked about, is going to be a reaction to people like you and me. Whatever our politics, whether liberal or conservative, we are definitely on the conservative end theologically. We are going to begin hearing things like, if you believe that your religion is the only way to God, that is too narrow for the American way.
For we are a pluralistic society, and there is not room for your kind of narrow thinking in our society. I am convinced that once our society realizes that we say that Jehovah God is the only true God, that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation, once they understand we say that and we mean it, we really believe that there is going to be a reaction to it that will involve persecution.
It may get to the point of becoming a governmental kind of persecution, so that we will be told that we cannot continue to operate as churches and believe those kinds of outdated ideas. You say, well that seems pretty far-fetched to me. Maybe it is. Maybe these are only the nightmares of one preacher, but I think they are more than that. I believe that we are living in the midst of unprecedented apostasy, but it has only begun folks. It has only begun.
We are going to see hellish days come upon us in the Western culture. Others have already experienced this, but we are going to see it come upon us. We need to be ready for it. As we serve the Lord, we need to expect that the world is going to oppose us, and not by slapping our wrists. How do we prepare for it? The apostle gives us some direction here, and that is the second part of our text. I am going to close very quickly.
He gives us direction to saints, and it is this, follow after the apostolic example. Notice he says that in verse 10, you followed my teaching and so on. He also outlines several important areas of life, and he says, look, Timothy, things are going to get tough. If you are going to stand, you are going to have to follow my example. Secondly, he tells him in verse 14, continue in your convictions. Let me ask you a question. Do you have any convictions? What are you willing to die for?
That tests your convictions. We are living in a day when there are very few Christians with convictions. I am sad to say. Frankly, if someone were to come up to me and say, look, Carl, I didn't like what you said about what you expect in the future, and you either recant of those opinions or I am going to shoot you, you know what I would do? I would recant on the spot. Because I am not about to die for some opinion that I have.
But on the other hand, if someone comes up to me and says, look, your teaching that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation is outmoded, it's not wanted, and if you expect to continue in ministry and have a church, you are going to have to update your message a little bit. Now we are getting serious. Because now we are dealing with conviction. I want you to know that it could very well come to that point in the near future in our nation.
Therefore, we need this charge from Paul to Timothy to be our own. Continue in your convictions. Why? Because of the trustworthiness of those who told you. In Timothy's case, it was his mother and grandmother and Paul himself. I can't go on without pointing this out. Paul Timothy was a little boy. In his childhood, as was customary in the Jewish home, he was taught the truth of God's revelation from the Old Testament Scriptures. Do you know how to make your life count for the most?
Do you know how to really get the return on the investment of your energy, your gifts, your talents? I will tell you how to do it. Go teach a Sunday school class. Because there you are teaching a child who is going to grow up and affect the next generation beyond your own. Work in a wanna. Instruct your children. Spend time with the little ones. Teaching them the truth. Oh, I know.
There is this idea, well, I don't want to force anything on my kids and when they grow up they can make up their own minds. Baloney. That's garbage. That is of Satan. God expects us to train up our children in the way they should go when they are young. Timothy was taught as a young man. Paul says, look Timothy, don't put away your convictions because you know who taught them to you.
And because, he says to him, and even more importantly, what you believe is derived from scriptures, the sacred writings, and they finally have brought you salvation. They've changed your life, Timothy. Do not forsake your convictions. Continue in them. And then as a word of encouragement, in his direction as saints, the apostle says this, look, be assured of the Lord's deliverance. Tough times are going to come. But notice what he says to Timothy here about his own experience.
He says in verse 11, what persecutions I endured. And remember he was even stoned, put to death, and was raised from the dead. He says, out of them all the Lord delivered me. You see his encouragement there? He says, Timothy, tough times are ahead. But listen, the Lord's with you. He hasn't forsaken you, and he is going to deliver you out of those tough times to come. However sharp the opposition may be, it's already defeated, ultimately, because Jesus has prevailed.
My friend, as you and I serve the Lord, we better not be naive. We better recognize that we're serving the Lord in terrible times, and it's going to get worse. And we must not allow that to deter us. And yet, if I may say so gently, there are some of us today who are facing tough times and we're ready to quit. How are you going to stand it five years from now, my friend, when it's really tough? Now is the time we better be getting our strength together. We better be laying the foundation.
We better be building our courage. This is not the time to quit. This is the time to redouble our efforts, to rededicate every part of us, as the song sang before we began to preach this morning, to give it to the Lord so that our lives can count in the tough times ahead and we can stick with our service for Jesus Christ. It may be that you're really discouraged and you feel heavy in your burden because of some things in your life.
Maybe you are facing some hellish times yourself, tomorrow or this week. May I remind you the Lord is with you, if you're one of His. And just as He delivered Paul, He's able to deliver you. And so come to Him with that burden. Come to Him with those fears that are very real that you have. And let Him bring deliverance from them all. Let's pray together.