Good morning. If you would open your Bibles and turn back to First Timothy, please. Our Lord Jesus Christ has called us into fellowship with him with an abundance of joy and love and that ultimate peace. And when we tell others of Christ, when we witness to them, we make these great truths known how glorious communion with our Savior can be. But this morning, we're going to look at another side of our Christian life, a little heavier side or edgier side, because the Christian life is also a warfare against that unholy trinity of the world, the flesh, and the devil. So this morning, we're going to look at 1 Timothy. We're going to look at the fight, the faith, and our feelings. 1 Timothy was written during Paul's fourth missionary journey. Timothy was caring for the church there in Ephesus. Timothy, as you remember, was not an apostle, but he was an apostolic representative delegated to carry out a special work. So read along with me at first Timothy 18, 19, and 20. Timothy, my son, I give you this instruction in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by following them, you may fight the good fight, holding on to faith and a good conscience. Some have rejected these and so have shipwrecked their faith. Among them are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan to be taught not to blaspheme." In verse 18, that word instruction there conveys a sense of very urgent obligation. In fact, it's a military word. Some of your translations have a charge. So Timothy is reminded that the ministry is not a matter to be trifled with, but an order from the commander in chief. So we're going to look at the fight fighting. Why does Paul use this military terminology? It's because the work of a Christian in some respects is exactly like that of a soldier. Being a soldier, a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ is hard work. It requires persistence, and it demands an immediate and wholehearted discipline. Now, are these the kind of things that come to mind automatically when we think of the duties as a Christian? When we think of our obligations as a church member? When we look at the language Paul uses here, We're forced to ask ourselves questions like, how active am I in the work of the Lord? How much effort do I put into the task of fighting in God's army against sin and Satan? Christians, like soldiers, need to be quick to respond to the orders issued by those who are over them. And the one over us here, coming through Paul, our sergeant, so to speak, gives us a command In verse five, that John has read for us in chapter one, to love, which comes from a pure heart. First Timothy one, five, the goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. So these instructions of Paul, which were in keeping with the prophecies once made about Timothy, were concerned with fighting. or so that by following them, Timothy could fight the good fight. These prophecies, whatever they were, are to be understood in the sense of predictions in some way granted to Paul concerning Timothy before his call to the ministry. So Paul is reminding Timothy here of the testimony he had obtained from the Spirit of God and that his ministry was approved by the Lord, and that he had been called by divine revelation before he had been even called by men into this office. This is why Paul now again takes up the theme which he began in verses three through five. Timothy was to launch a crusade against all wrong and dangerous teaching. And whatever these prophecies were that testify not only to the complete confidence that Paul had in Timothy, and that Timothy was God's choice as his successor. And they were also then an endorsement of that choice by the Christian community or the churches which Timothy was associated. So Paul continues this military language in the words, fight the good fight. As he urges his young lieutenant here to follow those prophecies confirming his calling, Timothy would be able to gain strength from the fact that his calling was from God. And because of this, Timothy ought to fight even more courageously. For what could give us greater confidence than to know that God has appointed us to do what we are doing? This confidence can become a great weapon for us. knowing that we are in the will of God and therefore cannot fail because being in the will of God, we cannot fail God. And we know God cannot fail, period. By the word fight, Paul states indirectly that we must maintain a battle. And this applies universally to all Christians, all believers, but especially to Christian leaders who are the standard bearers. It's as if Paul is saying to Timothy, you know, Timothy, you cannot fulfill this office without a battle. So remember that you're armed with God's own word to you, assuring you of the hope of victory. If you remember that God has called you to this very battle, God is our ultimate leader. And when it's his battle in his fight, it's going to be glorious and successful. There's going to be a fight. There's going to be a battle. But it will ultimately be good and not bad. Although it may not seem that way when we're in it. It didn't seem that way in that ultimate battle at the cross. Jesus died. It looked like a victory for Satan. It was a bad Friday. It was an awful Friday. It was a terrible Friday. And it wasn't until we realized and understood the redemption that was being accomplished through the cross, that we realized it was a good Friday. Verse 19 then gives us the faith and feelings. And that's still part of the fight. It's part of the pillars of the fight. Remember in Ephesians 6, starting at verse 10, Paul describes in detail the Christian's armor. And here he confines himself to two items of equipment, which embrace the fundamental aspects of doctrine and then practice. Faith and a good conscience. Conscience being that felt testimony of our own mind. Now it's not for a lack of a better word that I'm calling a good conscience our feelings because I could come up with a lot of better words than that, but none of them started with an F. So I had to use that But notice three times, faith and good conscience are joined together by Paul in this letter. We read the first time in verse 5, a good conscience and sincere faith. Here, holding on to the faith and a good conscience. And then in chapter 3, verse 9, that faith with a clear conscience. So he shows the inseparable connection here between faith in our morality, faith in our behavior. And Paul appears to epitomize here the spiritual side of our armor. Faith in a good conscience means it's not enough to proclaim the faith with our lips. We must practice it in our daily lives. It's been said of a very hypocritical pastor that he was such a good preacher, he should never get out of the pulpit, but that he was such a poor Christian, he should never get into the pulpit. That's faith in a bad conscience. There was a lot of faith being preached from the pulpit, but there was no good conscience living out of the pulpit. He was a hypocrite. It's hypocrisy. The Greek word for conscience can literally mean joint knowledge. And it came to be used of the facility to distinguish in our minds between right and wrong. And the right operation of this facility was given special prominence in Paul's theology. If you turn back to Romans chapter 2, verse 15, Romans 2, 15, Paul was talking about the Gentiles who did not have the law of Moses, but they did By nature, things required of the law. And then in verse 15, he says, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness and their thoughts now accusing or now even defending them. So they're being accused by their conscience or defended by their conscience. So a good conscience is important to a good warfare and a good ministry. You need a good conscience for a good fight. A good conscience is that inner voice which warns us, hey, somebody may be watching us. Somebody may be looking at what we're doing, but we're going to do the will of God anyway. It's like when Martin Luther said, here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. A good conscience is the result of a pure life. Like Paul, Timothy was to maintain a blameless conscience. John MacArthur says a conscience is a God-given device in every human mind that reacts to that person's behavior. It either accuses or excuses. It produces feelings of well-being, peace, contentment, and calm when behavior is good. When behavior is evil, It activates guilt, shame, remorse, fear, doubt, insecurity, and despair. So its purpose is to warn a person that they're sinning. And what a blessing to have such a warning device. It is to the soul what pain is to our physical body. Pain warns us that something is threatening our body's well-being. When we put our hand on a hot stove, We jerk it back because we feel that pain. Well, the guilt warns us that something is threatening the well-being of our soul. Its purpose is to warn a person of the fact that they're sinning. Paul encourages us all to realize that the faith of the gospel is something worth fighting for. How vital is it then, when we have many today that are perverting the truth of the gospel, to have such a great concern to ensure that the purity of the word of God is upheld. None of us should ever let go of any teaching of the Bible. Faith denotes sound doctrine, that purest truth of the Bible. Who Jesus Christ is, what he did, and how he did it. Faith must be accompanied by a good conscience. Because for one thing, the punishment of a bad conscience is turning aside from the path of obedience. Those who do not serve God with a sincere and perfect heart, but start giving a loose rein to evil and wicked ideas, even though at first they may have that solid understanding, be on that solid ground, they wind up losing it altogether. So there's a stern warning to us here. We know that the treasure of a solid doctrine is invaluable. And there's nothing that we ought to dread more than to have it taken from us. Paul informs us there's only one way to keep it safe, and that's to secure it by the locks and bars of a good conscience. Sound doctrine must be believed and acted upon. It's not mere head knowledge. So again, what does Paul mean when he speaks about our consciences? He is talking about that which lies within each of us It tells us what is right, what is wrong, and how to tell the difference between the two. Obviously, we cannot do this on our own. It's something that is spirit empowered. When Paul said that Timothy should be armed with a good conscience, he meant that he must be sensitive to God's voice. Right beliefs must show themselves in right behavior. This is a good conscience. Every believer should hold on to the faith and a good conscience because he's seeking to live a life that is holy, godly, and honoring to the Lord in every way. And a genuine fear of God gives strength to persevere to do just this. Now, we also know it's possible to sin against the conscience, and it becomes defiled. Repeated sinning hardens the conscience so that it becomes seared like scar tissue. Look in 1 Timothy 4, verse 2. This is what Paul is talking about. He's talking about wrong doctrine and he says, such teachings come through hypocritical liars whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron. Your conscience can become so seared that good becomes evil and evil becomes good. And professed Christians who make shipwreck of their faith do so by sinning against their own consciences. Bad doctrine usually starts with conduct, even with secret sin. John Calvin says, all the heirs that have existed in the Christian church from the beginning proceed from this source, that in some person's ambition and in others covetousness, extinguish the true fear of God. A bad conscience is therefore the mother of all heresies. That's a pretty impressive statement by Calvin, that a bad conscience is the mother of all heresies. So if we know what is right and godly, we must do what is right and godly. Or where do you think we're going to end up? In the next clause, Paul says, some have rejected these. And again, this is a strong verb implying a violent and deliberate rejection. And again, since some have rejected these, Paul is talking to more than just Timothy. He's talking to every one of us. These here in the context are those false teachers, those who are teaching heresy, those failing to pursue practical godliness. The false teachers have no desire to maintain a pure conscience. They have little interest in living for holiness. Bad theology has its roots in bad morals. Those who teach error do so in order to substitute a system that accommodates their sin. Now, Paul introduces here a nautical image, a shipwreck. And it's possible that Paul is thinking of our conscience as that stabilizing factor that, when rejected, renders the ship unstable. Those who ignore their conscience are going to continue to make a shipwreck of their faith, as some of these early Christians have done. And the metaphor taken from a shipwreck is highly appropriate, for it suggests that if we want to arrive safely at the harbor, we have to be guided by a good conscience. Otherwise, there's that danger of a shipwreck. There's that danger that our faith is going to be sunk by a bad conscience, just like a whirlpool in a stormy sea. And when you think about it, what is human life and what is its whole course other than a navigation? On the one hand, we're travelers in this world. As scripture tells us, we're aliens and strangers in the world. And on the other hand, there's that frailty in us, which is more fluid than water and all that surrounds us, like water, It flows about us on all sides, and that every and any minute, winds, storms, and squalls can arise. Let us therefore learn then that if our life is but a kind of navigation on the water, that we are at the same time exposed to many winds and many storms. And if that be so, what's going to become of us if we're not in a good boat with a good rudder, our conscience, and a good captain, the Lord Jesus Christ? Verse 20 gives us Hymenaeus and Alexander. They are cited as examples of shipwrecked believers. Hymenaeus is again mentioned in 2 Timothy chapter 2, but the details available are insufficient to conclude exactly who Alexander is. But whoever these men were, their case called for strong disciplinary action. And it's described in the figurative words handed over to Satan. Now, what does handed over to Satan mean? We think about the Old Testament, we know that Job was handed over to Satan. Satan implied that God's children just serve him out of selfish motives because of the benefits he gives them. So to prove the falseness of that accusation, God turned Job over to Satan. And Job, among other reasons, was delivered to Satan to learn to glorify God, to give God honor. And we see there that a true child of God can be delivered to Satan so God receives greater glory. The Lord Christ was also handed over to Satan for a time to be tempted in the wilderness. Paul was sent a messenger of Satan, a thorn in the flesh, to torment him. The reasons which we find in 2 Corinthians chapter 12. The same expression is used in 1 Corinthians 5, verse 5, dealing with sexual morality. It says, a man has his father's wife. And it seems to be there that Paul interprets, or we can interpret that as implying some type of excommunication. That Paul means that they are to be put out of the church into Satan's providence into the non-Christian world. But whatever Hymenaeus and Alexander have done, they've certainly turned their back on God's word and requirements for holy living. In 2 Timothy 2.18, it says that Hymenaeus had wondered from the truth and that the resurrection had already taken place. So the apostle declares that all who have departed from the Lord's ways have made shipwreck of their faith. And the concluding clause there, to be taught not to blasphemy, again, clearly shows that the purpose of this handing over to Satan had a remedial motivation behind it, and it was not merely for punishment. However stringent the process of handing one over to Satan, the motive was mercy. So whenever church discipline departs from the mercy idea, then that stringent, harsh handing over only serves as a barrier to progress. Doesn't mean we should do away with church discipline, as many have done in this day. Of course, some are handed over to Satan not for positive purposes, but for judgment. Think of Saul, first king of Israel, and Judas Iscariot. So we need to ask ourselves this morning, what are we doing What steps are we taking to avoid making shipwreck of our faith and our lives? None of us should be so proud to think that we can't fail, we can't fall. We can. When we shipwreck our faith, we wreck our usefulness, our virtue, our testimony, our sanctification. And how do we do it? By believing error. by not holding on to the faith, not fighting to hold on to the faith. Cornerstone Church here is in a constant battle with the forces of evil. There are false prophets and false teachers, as well as false Christs. Satan is the originator of all these false doctrines, for scripture tells us that he is a liar from the beginning. So it's not enough that we preach and learn sound doctrine and to proclaim the gospel, We must also defend the faith by exposing lies and opposing the doctrines of demons. If you go back to first Timothy chapter four, we looked at first to look at first one, first Timothy four, one. The spirit clearly says that in later times, some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Through the spiritual disciplines, and I'm talking about the spiritual disciplines here that directly involve the word of God, preaching, praying, reading the Bible, studying the Bible, meditating over the Bible, you will be able to understand and explain the true gospel from all the false ones out there. We must preach to win the loss to Christ, but also preach to grow believers so they can defend the faith against false doctrine. It's a constant battle to fight the good fight, to defend the faith, all with a good conscience, that feeling of knowing you are right and in the will of God, that feeling which is the result of the Spirit of God working in us, working in your heart, working in your mind for God's glory. How will you fight the good fight. How will you be able to defend the faith to oppose those false doctrines? Well, it's the same way you find your own calling. What is your calling? They're sitting out there today. What is God calling you to do? You're not going to find it in any modern or ancient prophecies made about you like Timothy did. And if you think you have, then you're probably already shipwrecked. In this first part of the letter, Paul tells Timothy he must care for the church at Ephesus by winning the loss, teaching to save, defending the faith. How are you going to do that? It's through those spiritual disciplines. Although not on the same level as Timothy, you are called to do the same thing today. All of you sitting out there today have gifts of evangelism. gifts of teaching, gifts of apologetics. Are you using them? Or maybe a better question is when are you going to start using them? Make a plan now. Tell a non-believer, make a plan to tell a non-believer about the saving power of Christ. Tell a Christian what you last learned in the Bible. Tell a Mormon or an atheist why he's wrong or a charismatic or a Lutheran why they're mostly wrong. No. That's different. That's attacking. That's not defending the faith. You have gifts, but are you using them? Like all Christians, Timothy was called to an unceasing spiritual warfare. We hear about the war in Iraq every day. The soldiers who have died defending their country, we hear a body count every week. Also those who are wounded and maimed from the suicide bombers. But do you ever translate that horror and carnage into the spiritual war you're in right now? That fight demands equipped, trained, and devoted soldiers. Are you a soldier for the Lord? May the Lord open your eyes like he did for the servant of God. When John read this morning from 2 Kings chapter 6, that Elisha prayed, O Lord, open his eyes so he may see. Then the Lord opened the eyes of the servant, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. He saw part of God's army in that spiritual realm. What of our weapons? They're spiritual weapons, but especially that sword of the Spirit, that word of God. Let me again mention those spiritual disciplines involving God's word. Do you sit under the preaching of the word like you're doing this morning? Do you pray over the word? Do you read the word? Do you study the word? And do you meditate over the word? That's your weapon. That will give you a good conscience, a good faith and a good fight in the battle. Paul sums up these verses here with another verse or two. Turn with me to 2nd Timothy, chapter 4, 2nd Timothy 4, verses 7 and 8. Verse 7, I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day. And not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing." Do you long for Christ's appearing? Do you take seriously the command from your Commander-in-Chief? This command is given so that you will fight the good fight, hold on to the faith and a good conscience. Are you fighting and holding on? Are you in the process of shipwrecking your faith? Now, maybe this morning you have no faith in Jesus Christ to shipwreck. In that case, you were born entombed at the bottom of the ocean in a shipwreck. You just don't know it yet. And in that case, you have a different command to follow. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. Repent and believe the good news. Stop doubting and believe. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. For the rest of you, Bible up. Put on the armor of God. Fight the good fight. Hold on to the faith in a good conscience. Let's pray. Father, we thank you again for the way you empower us, that you have given us the very spirit of your son, that you have given us oneness with Christ, that you have given us gifts and blessings that are too numerous to count. that you have given us everything we need, that you have called us to do, that you have given us riches beyond measure, seeding us with Christ in the heavenly places. Lord, you are a giving and generous God. Help us, Father, to be faithful with all that you have given us today, to especially have us fight the battle that you have called us into, that we would not take it for granted that we would not let our minds grow weak and fall prey to all the false teachings out there. Lord, that we would study ourselves, make ourselves workmen is approved your good word and know what it says and be able to defend it and tell others. Thank you, Father, for your glorious, glorious goodness and the glory that we will have one day when we see Christ come again. that we would look for that glorious appearing. We thank you and praise you in Christ's name. Amen.