So we are continuing this morning in our series in 2 Timothy, guarding the gospel. And we come to 2 Timothy chapter 3, verses 1 to 9. It can be found on page 996 in the Pew Bible. So you please turn with me to 2 Timothy chapter 3. This is verses one to nine. Hear now the eternal living word of God. But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, Brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness but denying its power. Avoid such people, for among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions. Always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth Just as Janice and Jambres opposed Moses So these men also opposed the truth men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith But they will not get very far for their folly will be plain to all as was that of those two men So there's a video of a church service in Florida that has gone viral. It's gained a lot of attention. Less than a month ago, a pastor of this church invited a drag queen, a man dressed like a woman, to come to the front of the service and deliver the children's sermon and to then take a role in the Eucharist. The pastor wrote in a Facebook post describing this man who was dressed as a woman as an angel in heels, appearing to shepherds in the fields of the night shift, telling them that good news had arrived on their doorstep. But it actually gets worse. The man who was dressed in drag was also a candidate as ordination for a pastor in his denomination. And this man has a video where he stated some of his beliefs in the form of a poem. In it he said, the Bible is nothing. He goes on to say, God must be nothing. Religion must be nothing. It is all nothing until we wield it into something. And so in our series through 2 Timothy, Paul has been encouraging Timothy, exhorting him to stay focused and firm in this task of guarding the gospel. And now, starting in chapter 2, Paul's changed his focus to false teachers that were influencing the church there in Ephesus. This is where Timothy was the pastor. And he charged Timothy to distinguish himself from these false teachers by reminding the people of the gospel of Jesus Christ, by charging the people not to quarrel. And he wanted Timothy to continue to rightly handle the word of truth, teaching the whole of the gospel. And then in our last passage, Paul painted the picture of two types of teachers in the church. The honorable vessel. Those who teach the true gospel and pursue godly living fleeing from sinful desires like Paul himself Timothy and so on Then there are dishonorable vessels false teachers and he compares their teaching to an infectious disease and said it spreads like gangrene and Those teachers are quarrelsome. They speak irreverent babble. They're upsetting the faith of some in the church and Now, what is happening in that church in Florida is a more extreme example of a much bigger problem in the church. There are people teaching all kinds of falsehoods in the church. And these people claim to represent Jesus Christ. They claim to represent the gospel. But before we get into what Paul has to say about that, I want to remind you what Paul said to Timothy in the passage right before this. Speaking to Timothy, specifically about his dealings with false teachers, in chapter two, verse 24, he says, and the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. And so when we consider the false teachers of our day, even though their behavior and what they're teaching is an abomination to God, were to be kind to them, patiently enduring the evil that they're doing. We are to correct them, but to do so with gentleness. Because if we show them the love of Christ, Paul says, God may perhaps grant them repentance, leading to a knowledge of the truth. And they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil after being captured by him to do his will. And so this clearly applies to the false teachers in our day that we're talking about. They clearly have been snared by the devil. But we are to treat them and correct them with the gentleness and love of Christ. And so with that in mind, we come to our passage this morning, chapter three. And here Paul gives Timothy some details about the false teachers. And so for us, we see in this passage three truths to remember about false teachers. First is that they love themselves, but they don't love God. Second, they pretend to be Christian. And the third is they won't succeed. Now, Paul has just said that God may grant some of these false teachers repentance, that some of them may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil. But he begins our passage today in verse 1, but understand this. that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. And so Paul's creating this contrast with what he just said. Although God may grant some of them repentance, this is not always going to be the case. He wants Timothy and all of us to understand that some, if not many, of these false teachers will remain false teachers. They're not all going to repent. And these false teachers will create times of difficulty, times of confusion and stress in the church. Now I want to note when Paul says last days, it's easy to think that he's referring to some time in the future, maybe even the distant future that applies to the days immediately preceding the return of Christ. But that's not the way this phrase last days is used in the Bible, and it really doesn't fit the context of our passage. Throughout the New Testament, The phrase last days is used to represent the new age that was promised in the Old Testament. And this begins with the arrival of Jesus Christ. And so with the coming of Jesus, the old age has started to pass away and the last days have arrived. We see an example of this in Acts chapter two. On the day of Pentecost, the apostle Peter quotes the prophet Joel and he says, and in the last days it shall be God declares that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh. So he's clearly talking about after Jesus ascended and the Holy Spirit comes upon God's people. He's talking about the whole age of the church. Another example is in the opening two verses of the book of Hebrews. The author wrote, long ago, at many times, and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son. And so Paul's use of this term is the same as the other places in the New Testament. where it means the time between the first coming of Christ and the second coming of Christ. It's referring to the age of the church. And so Paul was writing about not only the time that Timothy found himself in that moment, but the time that we find ourselves in this moment. It applies to the whole of church history, and which this will continue until Christ returns. So during this time, during these last days, Paul's saying that the church will find among its teachers some false teachers, some who will not repent, and they will cause times of difficulty. And so this is the universal condition of the church of Jesus Christ. This is what Timothy is going through. This is what the church in the United States is going through right now as well. The church has seasons of great stress and difficulty, and they're caused by false teachers. Paul begins to tell us why these false teachers will cause great difficulty. Starting in verse 2 he says, Lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness but denying its power. So Paul gives a long list of attributes that describe these false teachers that not only plague the church in Ephesus, but continue to plague the church throughout church history, including today. And so Paul bookends this list with things that these false teachers love. The first is that they are lovers of self, lovers of money. And then it ends with they are lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. And so this is our first truth about the false teachers in the church. They love themselves, but they don't love God. The list of attributes shows us that they have an inverted love compared to what Christians have in a Christian our hearts have been replaced. God has changed us We no longer solely love ourselves The Holy Spirit brings us to spiritual life so that we can then love God the gospel taking root in someone's heart, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is what enables us to love God. So while for all of us there is this struggle that continues between our love of God and our love of ourselves, and it will continue as long as we're in this life, we do have that struggle. For the false teachers, there's no struggle. They just love themselves. Their love of themselves reigns supreme in their heart. There's no room for the love of God. They haven't been converted. The gospel hasn't changed them. And so this is a key distinction between a false teacher and a true servant of the Lord. That is conversion. Has the person been transformed by the gospel? A man who comes to the front of a sanctuary in the midst of a worship service of the living and true God, dressed in a wig and a sequined dress and high heels to deliver the children's sermon, is only loving himself. He's making a mockery of the worship of God. He's not loving God at all. And that behavior is really an outgrowth of the bigger problem. Both his theology and his behavior show a man that has not been changed by the gospel. Therefore, his desire to be a teacher in the church comes from something else, most likely his love for himself. When God is replaced by a love of self, all sorts of vices inevitably come from this. And so this list, it really points us to a primary issue. That is, do they love themselves or do they clearly love the Lord? And so let's briefly look at this list that Paul gives us. Paul says that there are lovers of money as well. That would just be an extension of the love of themselves. Money, in and of itself, is not bad. It's a useful tool. But the greed that can take place in someone's heart is evil. It's actually in Paul's first letter to Timothy, referring to these false teachers, that he famously wrote, the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. The false teachers are also proud, arrogant. They think of themselves instead of God and they do so in a prideful way and they also speak about themselves in a prideful way. The word arrogant actually can be translated as boastful. They boast in themselves rather than boasting in the Lord. As Paul puts it, boasting in the cross. They're abusive, disobedient to their parents. They're ungrateful and unholy. Ungrateful for all the blessings and gifts God has given them, they're unholy in their lifestyle. It says they're heartless and unappeasable. They lack affection. They don't have a love, not only for God, but for God's people. And unappeasable actually means unforgiving. They lack interest in forgiving others and reconciling wrongs. And all of this is clearly contrast to the ways of God, the ways of God's people. And he also says, slanderous, without self-control, and it just goes on. They're brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit. At the conclusion of the list, they are lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. And that really summarizes who they are. But then Paul says something important about them in verse five, that they're having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. It's amazing that these people that Paul's been describing, godlessness, selfishness, they have malice and so many bad attributes, would have the appearance of godliness. What it means is that they're not only professing religion, they're not only saying they believe, but they're spreading it, they're promoting it. They are teachers in the church. It's one thing for these men to attend the church and sit in the pew, but it's another to be in the pulpit, to be a teacher, spreading their lies and deceptions. And so while their lifestyle clearly shows someone who hasn't been changed by the power of God, they're still the ones teaching the church. And so the second truth about the false teachers we see in this passage is they pretend to be Christian. And this is something that has always been a problem in the church. False teachers claiming to be Christian, using biblical language, but they're teaching something different than the gospel. They're twisting it and distorting it. Jesus speaks of this in what we had in our responsive reading from Matthew 7. It was in the Sermon on the Mount. He said, beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but are inwardly, inwardly are ravenous. They're in sheep's clothing, means they appear to be Christian. They seem like they're sheep. of the great shepherd. But they're actually something else altogether. Inwardly, they're ravenous wolves. And so Jesus tells us how we can recognize them. He says, you will recognize them by their fruit. And this is similar to what Paul's been saying. These men give the appearance of godliness. They talk the talk. They use biblical lingo. They come in sheep's clothing. But their fruit is rotten. You can recognize them by their bad fruit. Paul gave us a long list of the fruit of these men, and it's clearly not the fruit of the spirit. It's actually the fruit of the flesh, the fruit of the sinful nature of mankind who have not been brought to spiritual life. And so there's bad fruit in their lives. Clearly their behavior is unbecoming of someone who's in Christ. But there's also the fruit of their ministry. They may have the appearance of godliness. They may be in a physical church building, saying things from the Bible in a pulpit, using Christian language. But Paul says they are denying its power. There's a power that comes through the word of God rightly handled. As Paul puts it in Romans, the gospel is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes. When a man chosen by God filled with the Holy Spirit is preaching the true gospel and the word of God, the power of God is unleashed. And God reveals and works his power through his gospel. And so those who pursue godliness in their lives are tools for God to do this. The more we see in this country liberal theology taking hold in a church, that is, theology that denies the truth of God, that denies who Jesus Christ is, the more the church is on that path, they are on the path to death. Mainline Protestant denominations, they continue to teach this watered-down, godless theology, and they've been losing all of their members because they lack the power of God. Church growth, true church growth, people being saved comes through the Word of God rightly and truly taught. And so a church that lacks the gospel is a church that lacks the truth of God's Word in its preaching and teaching, lacks the power of God. People aren't saved by someone claiming the Bible is nothing or God is nothing until we make it something. That's exalting the power of man, not the power of God. And so this kind of teaching is completely devoid of God. But the gospel of Jesus Christ, the word of God, has the full weight of the power of God with them. And Paul tells Timothy to avoid such people. He's not telling him to avoid sinners in general. Rather, what he's saying is that unrepentant false teachers should be excommunicated until they repent. Paul then gives an example of the ministry of these false teachers, starting in verse six. He says, for among them, are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. So the ministry of these teachers was to creep in the household and capture weak women. The households he's referring to probably are house churches where these men would sneak in and teach their falsehoods. And creeped in, it says they were sneaking in, they were doing it in secret. And the people who believed them were described as weak women. It actually literally translated as little women. And so he's not speaking about all women clearly, just the specific women that became disciples of these false teachers. And that they were weak or little suggests that they were immature, childish women. And Paul then describes these women first as burdened by sin and led astray by various impulses. So these women were first morally weak, living sinful lives in contrast to godly ones. And the false teachers probably preyed upon their feelings of guilt. And they were also always learning and never able to arrive at the knowledge of the truth. And what we see is that they were gullible. Their always learning means they would listen to anyone, but they never came to a knowledge of the truth, which means they never came to a saving understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel never took root in their heart and brought about a relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ. The only type of disciple who would follow an unsaved, ungodly teacher are those who are unsaved themselves. If they were to come to a realization of the gospel, they would reject these false teachers. And so that's an example of the ministry and the disciples of these false teachers. But then Paul gives an illustration about them in verse eight. He says, just as Janus and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also opposed the truth. Men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. And so what this is referring to is in Exodus, chapter 7. There's an account where Moses is going before Pharaoh for the first time. and Aaron is with him. And Aaron's commanded to throw his staff on the ground and it became a snake. And so then Pharaoh summons sorcerers and magicians himself and they come and they throw their staffs on the ground and they become snakes. But then Aaron's snake swallows their snakes whole. And so the names of these sorcerers are not mentioned actually in the Old Testament account. But Jewish tradition says that two of those men, the magicians from Pharaoh's court, were named Janus and Jambres. And Paul is saying, just as those men opposed Moses, who is a true servant of the Lord, they therefore oppose God himself. And these false teachers in Ephesus who are opposing Paul and Timothy, who are true servants of the Lord, are also opposing God himself. And just as God was with Moses and Aaron, defeating the magicians, he will be with Timothy, defeating the false teachers. And then Paul concludes in verse nine, but they will not get very far, for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men. Just as the men who opposed Moses didn't get very far, these false teachers won't get very far. And that really applies to all false teachers. And that brings us to our third truth here about false teachers in the church. They won't succeed. We don't need to overreact to what's going on, to these heretics, opponents of the truth. Even when it's right in our face, even if it's absurd, their rotten fruit will become plain to all. because they don't preach the true gospel of Jesus Christ and the word of God. They lack the power of God in what they're doing. They're opposing God. And so just as Timothy lived in these last days between the first and second coming of Christ, we still live in those days. There are difficult and dangerous, stressful times in the church, but God is sovereign over all times. And there are those in the church that live wicked lives, that teach heretical falsehoods about God and Jesus Christ. They love themselves. They don't love God. They pretend to be Christians, but they will be exposed. They lack the power of God and they will ultimately fail. The Lord knows who are His. He's not deceived. They may be successful for a short while, but it won't last. There may be places where it seems like the lies are winning, when you see what has happened to once great seminaries, once great denominations in the kingdom of God that have fallen completely to falsehoods and lies. But they won't last. Their folly will be plain to everyone. And once this age comes to an end, when Jesus finally returns as promised, he will bring about the consummation of all things in final judgment and salvation. And our future hope in his return is guaranteed. We don't need to be afraid that the church of Jesus Christ will fail. We don't need to worry about these ridiculous, godless, false teachers that they'll win out. They may have their time, where their false teachings will spread like a disease, but when Christ returns, all his enemies will be judged. And that includes anyone who opposes the truth about Jesus Christ. Unless they repent, they will face him in judgment. And those who love Christ, those who love the truth of the gospel, our salvation will be complete. We'll be in our future resurrected bodies in glory, in the new heavens and the new earth with Jesus Christ for eternity. So your job as a faithful servant of the Lord is to continue to pursue godliness in your life, continue to flee sinfulness, be kind to everyone, patiently enduring evil, loving even your enemies, being gentle to those who oppose you, And we do this knowing that no matter what happens in this world, Jesus will return and make all things right. We have a hope that unbelievers, heretics, anyone who hasn't been transformed by the gospel doesn't have. A future hope of guaranteed glory promised by God upon the return of his son. So don't be swayed in your faithfulness to the Lord. Don't be swayed in your faithfulness to the word of God and his gospel. While there are many heretics and false teachers loving themselves more than they love God, you will love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. While the false teachers who appear to be Christian, living godless lives, lacking the power of God, you in your house, you will serve the Lord. And you have the power of God and the power of his gospel with you. The Holy Spirit indwelling to empower your life and your work for the kingdom. And we do all this knowing that the mission of God to call a people to himself, to change our hearts and to bring about the redemption of all of creation will not fail. So let us take heart knowing that the truth is on our side. Therefore, God is on our side. And so no matter how much we might suffer now, no matter how bleak it may look on this side of heaven, no matter how blatant and obscene the false teachers become, one day we will be with God in all His glory for the rest of eternity. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we come before You knowing that You are a great and sovereign God. While there are times of difficulty, there are always seasons of those who oppose us that oppose you, that make a mockery of you. We will stay strong in your word. We will hold fast to the gospel of Jesus Christ. We will continue to do your work in this world. Lord, send us your spirit that we may remain faithful in suffering that we become more godly each day, pursuing you and pursuing holiness, fleeing from sinfulness, that we may be a light in this world, that we may show with our lives what is possible with a people that are transformed by the power of God. And we pray all of this in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, amen.