The scripture reading this morning is from the Gospel of Luke. It's chapter 5. Luke chapter 5. If you'd like to follow along as I read the first 11 verses. Luke chapter 5. And I suppose that maybe the central part of this account of Jesus and his disciples is in verse 8, which we will be considering more closely in a few moments. Luke chapter 5, beginning in verse 1. On one occasion, while the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret. And he saw two boats by the lake, but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon's, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat. When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch. And Simon answered, Master, we toiled all night and took nothing. But at your word, I will let down the nets. When they had done this, they enclosed a large number of fish, and their nets were breaking. They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both the boats. So they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, He fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken. And so also were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, Do not be afraid. From now on you will be catching men. When they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him. That is the word of God and it is another remarkable display of Christ, the Son of God, God then incarnate. Let's ask the Lord's blessing then on the ministry of his word. Father, we now come to your word and We do so desiring to hear your truth, desiring to respond to your word in genuine faith. We pray, Father, that you would enable us to see you more clearly, to know you then more intimately, and to know ourselves as well, and thereby to understand the great grace that you've shown us in your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we pray this in Christ's name, amen. You're familiar with, no doubt, the sixth chapter of the book of Isaiah that begins this way. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up. The train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim, each had six wings, with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called. The house was filled with smoke. And I said, woe is me, for I am lost. I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. It is similar to what Peter must have felt in the passage we just read, when seeing the deity of the Lord right before his eyes, he declared this before Jesus, when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees saying, depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. There are many ways in which man, the sinner, minimizes sin. And it's not just something that is characteristic of unregenerate people, of pagan people, of people who don't even profess to believe in Christ. But even we as God's people, as Christians, This is a sin that we battle against, a tendency that we battle against as well, and that is to minimize sin. We don't see sin for the terrible evil that it really is. And this causes all kinds of problems in our lives. If I remember right, R.C. Sproul has a sermon called, on this very topic, called Cosmic Treason. that sin is cosmic treason. We'll have to listen to that in the Sunday school hour pretty soon. Cosmic, cosmic treason. Cosmic means something characterized by greatness. Sin is a great treason. greatness in extent and intensity or comprehensiveness. It is a great and intense comprehensive treason against the Lord. But we tend to minimize it. That means we tend to see sin as something that's not so serious as it is. And we see this minimization of sin in many ways exemplified around us. For example, think of the biblical doctrine of eternity in hell for the person who departs this life. without Christ, eternity in hell. And if we're honest with ourselves, we'll recognize that there's at least been times where we've seen this as a bit of an overkill by God. You know, we operate on, hey, wait a minute, the punishment is supposed to fit the crime. And then eternity in hell. I mean, that's a punishment that seems to be divine overkill. It's not something that fits the crime. Well, the problem is we don't understand the crime. We don't understand the severity of sin. So we call hell cruel and unusual punishment. There are many accounts in the Old Testament of God striking down the wicked. Think of Aaron's sons, Hophni and Phineas, right? All they did was tweak things a little bit. In the tabernacle there was something called this strange fire, and God gave them fire. And that was the end of it. And we look at that and say, You know, come on, it wasn't that big of a deal. Well, apparently it was. Apparently there's something wrong with our understanding of God. Think of the flood. God wasn't really that bad that God was a wipe out almost everybody. You have God ordering Israel to wipe out Canaanite cities and kill everyone there. And then there's this one example that we talked about in the first hour, that J.C. Ryle points to in his book, Bible Stories for Children, the Two Bears. And that, by the way, First story on the two bears based on 2 Kings 2 is attached to your sermon handout. Those listening online, I'll try to remember to put it on the sermon audio PDF. But if I don't, you can buy that book, The Two Bears by J.C. Ryle on Amazon. But here it is, 2 Kings, right? He, that is Elisha, went up from there to Bethel. And while he was going up on the way, some small boys came out of the city jeered at him saying go up you baldhead go up you baldhead and he turned around when he saw them he cursed them in the name of the Lord. And two she bears came out of the woods and tore 42 of the boys. So here it is, a biblical story for children. And yet, wouldn't you say that most parents, most even professing Christian parents today, well, you know, that's one of those parts of the Bible that is inappropriate for children to hear. J.C. Rowe would differ from that. I think God would too, he puts it in his word. And he said, well, it's very appropriate. And yet you would get all, remember, maybe you've been in a church in years past where, I mean, I can remember this when I was a teenager in my college years, the church that I went to, they had the pastor every Sunday before the main sermon, he would have this sermonette for children. You ever seen that happen in the worship? So the children would all come forward and come up and then they would go off to children's church after that. What do you suppose would happen if in most churches today, if you're gonna have the little sermonette for the children and the children come up and the pastor goes down and says, now children, I wanna tell you, about Elisha and the two bears. There is no doubt in my mind there'd be people screaming and yelling, you can't tell the children that. Well, I think that I would agree with J.C. Ryle that this in fact is something that children should be given attention to. Ryle for instance says, As he's giving this account, he says, there's three principles here. I'll just give you the first one that he notes. He says, children, God takes notice of what you do. God is watching you. And when you obey him, he's pleased. But when you sin and you disobey him, He is not pleased. God takes notice of you. Can you remember as a kid, any time when you as a kid, I'm thinking of from my own experience, maybe when you were six, seven years old, something like that, you could probably do it earlier than that, when you actually mocked a godly person, or you sat in church, and mocked the pastor maybe under your breath. A kid doesn't have to be very old before they can do that sort of a thing. I did it. Here's the grace of God. God could have wiped me out when I was six years old. He didn't do it, but that's only his grace. But why would people object to that? Why would they object to children being taught and warned? You know, we get the idea that parents and adults, come on, they're just kids. It's not so serious. Well, sin is always serious. Sin is a fatal soul disease then, you see. But this is just another example of how we tend to minimize sin. God doesn't, and God's word doesn't do it either. In this present life, If most likely, in fact, I would say this with certainty, in this present life, we probably will never fully grasp the sinfulness of sin. And I don't know that we could, and maybe some of that is the grace of God not showing us just how sinful our sin is, though he certainly shows us plenty when he convicts us then of our sin. But at the same time, it's not possible for us in this life to fully grasp the holiness of God. But it is important that we see more clearly as we grow in Christ, more of God's holiness. Because the more we understand what it means that God is holy, the more clearly we will see how sinful sin is, you see. I mean, think about it. You just look at that account in 2 Kings. Okay, these kids came out and they mocked Elijah. But if we really grasp the holiness of God and what it is for a creature to mock God by mocking then his servant, we wouldn't wonder at all that God wiped them out, even though they were children. Think about it in your own life, minimizing sin. Do you ever dismiss sin as being something that's rather comical? Have there ever been times in your life when you made a joke about sin and kind of sloughed it off and it was kind of funny and, you know, it's just one little sin. So you see, we minimize it, we dismiss it. We even say, you know, in a sense, what was the greatest sin? Besides perhaps that of Lucifer when he Revealed against God, but what is perhaps the greatest sin? The greatest sin, historically, was when the first man and woman took a bite of fruit. And yet, people will think about that and they will mock it. They will mock God's word. Are you kidding me? plunge the entire race into the condemnation of God and the whole universe under the curse of God? What kind of a God would pronounce death and a curse upon the entire creation just because they ate some fruit that they weren't supposed to? Right? I mean, at the most, that's misdemeanor theft. That's all that is, but you see it, you see the point. We dismiss sin because we don't grasp the holiness of God. Think of Satan's original sin, Lucifer perhaps, when he was the, it's thought to be the highest created being of God. Think of what he did, he and the angels that went against him, that went with him. Here he is, there was no one higher than that anointed cherub. He's there present in the very presence of God himself as fully grasping the holiness of God as any creature could. and he rebels against God because he wants to be God. Well, that is the enormity of sin. Paul reminds us, don't be deceived. God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man sows that he shall also reap. God isn't mocked. Consider another example that we hear all the time, I think, around us of sin, not being so sinful, and God's word on the subject being, you know, it's a cosmic exaggeration. It's not that bad. People will say, now wait a minute here. You Christians, are you telling me that I'm supposed to believe? that good moral people who work hard and they help others are going to hell just because they don't believe in Christ. Yes, that is exactly what we're saying because in fact, there are no ultimately good moral people. There is none righteous, no not one. Don't be naive about this. Many, many, many professing Christians embrace a brand of universalism that says most so-called moral people will surely arrive in heaven. They believe that, for example, every Sunday when they happen to go to church, right, they're sitting, maybe there can be a huge crowd, maybe it's a really big church, you know, there might be a thousand people there or more or something like that. They really believe that the vast majority of the people in that place are surely going to arrive in heaven, that somehow Christ will overlook their sin and save them because, you know, after all, they were pretty good. I've really appreciated R.C. Sproul, you know, in his later years. You listen to his sermons in his later years, and you can see how often, as he had a privilege of preaching to big crowds of people like that, and he would come out and say, even if it's a conference of pastors, and he would come out and say, you know, when Jesus says, there are few that are saved, I can only conclude that many of you are not born again, and you're that far from hell right at this very moment." And he would challenge everyone in that, because if you read up, by the way, speaking of R.C. Sproul, on Ligonier's regular surveys that they do, you'll find that I don't know whether it's a majority. It's certainly approaching about half of professing evangelicals, people who profess to believe the gospel, who profess to be that the Bible is the word of God, believe this stuff. They believe that most people in the end will be saved. They believe other things too, that God changes and so on. But there's this kind of universalism. But what does the Bible say? What does God say? Whoever believes in Him, Christ, is not condemned. But whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. So that good moral person that you might know who rejects Christ, who doesn't believe the gospel, who doesn't believe the Bible is the word of God, is condemned, and justly so, is under the condemnation of God. Hebrews 12, see that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven. That is the the Word of God. Essentially, people like this, like these professing Christians I've been describing, really what they do, if you get right down to it with them, what they're saying is, don't bother me with the Word of God. I know what I know, and I believe what I believe. And this is what I believe about God. And they will always minimize sin, and they will also minimize the holiness of God, you see. Well, let's think about this subject then, the sinfulness of sin. The Bible defines sin, This way, 1 John 3, everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness. And here it is, sin is lawlessness. You see, the law is the expression, the verbal expression of who God is, right? That's what the law is. Sin, therefore, is godlessness. It is lawlessness. It is this rebellion against God. In the shorter catechism, we have this, what is sin? What is sin? The answer is, sin is any want, that means lack. Sin is any lack of conformity to or transgression, violation of the law of God. In any way that I do not conform, even the slightest way, conform to the law of God, and remember the law is spiritual, right? I have to obey it from my heart. To any extent that I do not conform to that, I am sinning. That's why under the law there's nothing but condemnation. If you're trying to make yourself righteous before God by being a moral good person, it's not going to work. Here's some more about the sinfulness of sin. This is from our confession of faith. Every sin, both original that we're born with, and actual, that we practice, being a transgression of the righteous law of God, and contrary then to God, does in its own nature bring guilt upon the sinner. Now listen to these words, this is harsh, right? Listen, whereby, this guilt, whereby he, the sinner, is bound over to the wrath of God and curse of the law, and so made subject to death with all miseries, spiritual, temporal, in this life, and eternal. Now people, you know, people will, they will reject that. And when I say they, I'm talking about people that claim to be Christians. This thing is all over the place. They'll say, no way, come on, the wrath of God? cursed by God, miseries and death, temporal and eternal. People just rail against those kinds of doctrines. It is impossible that the churches today, for the most part, For the most part, it is impossible that these biblical doctrines on the holiness of God and the sinfulness of sin are being faithfully proclaimed and preached and taught in those places. It's impossible because people, they will revile against that. I guarantee people would walk, they will walk away from something like that and say, and just say, that is so judgmental, that is harsh. The God that I serve is love. Well, yeah, the idol that you serve might be different, but it's not the living and true God. Well, why do they rail against this condemnation, this wrath of God and curse of the law? It's because they refuse to believe the sinfulness of sin, and they refuse to think about and get a clearer picture of the holiness of God. Sin is not seen as serious. because God is not seen as being holy. How serious is sin? James 1. But each person is tempted when he's lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire, when it has conceived, gives birth to sin, and sin, when it's fully grown, brings forth death. That's how serious sin is. It is fatal, eternally fatal. Listen to Ralph Benning in this old book, I think it's in like the Puritan paperback series, you know, from the old days. And he wrote a book called The Sinfulness of Sin. Listen to what he says. The sinfulness of sin, not only appears from, that is, we see the sinfulness of sin, not only in this, but we see it in this, it's contrary to God. Indeed, it is contrariness and enmity being an enemy, hostile itself. Carnal men, sinners, unregenerate people, are called by these kinds of names in scripture, the enemies of God. But sin itself, the carnal mind, is called the enemy itself. Accordingly, it and its acts are expressed by names of enmity and acts of hostility. So here's the description of sin and sinners walking contrary to God, rebelling against God. rising up against him as an enemy, striving and contending with God, despising God. It makes men, he says, haters of God. These are the names given in scripture. Haters of God, resistors of God, fighters against God, even blasphemers of God, and in short, truly atheists who say there is no God. Sin goes about Here it is, sin goes about to un-God, God, and is by some of the ancients called decedium, God murder, or God killing. And lo and behold, what does sin do when God comes into this world? Kills them, right? That's what it is. He says to Satan, you were a murderer from the beginning. Sin is utterly sinful for several reasons. Here's one. Sin is utterly sinful because it grows. And what it grows toward is not a harvest of life, but of eternal death. I'm gonna give you an illustration here. about my plumbing woes. Some of you have heard of this already. But when I was writing this sermon, I thought, you know, this is the perfect illustration. So two weeks ago, I'm just happily at work out in the garage. Verla comes in with a cloud over her. And she says, I have some news, and it isn't good. Oh, joy, right? You hear somebody say something like that, it's like, oh, and I thought, oh man, somebody must have died. It was worse than that. Not really, but it seemed like it. She said, there's water dripping out of the circuit breaker panel on our house. You don't want water in your electricity. So the investigation began. Now, we're going to get to the sinfulness of sin. I'll show you how this is an illustration here. And it's not because I was saying bad words while I'm crawling around under the house. The circuit breaker panel in our house is on a shared wall, so that right behind it is the compartment where the water heater is. So initially, it's like, let's look at the water heater. Must have been, you know, they've got these pressure relief valves on them that'll spew out some steam and stuff, relieve pressure. And I looked at it, sure enough, the water relief valve is covered with mineral deposit all over it. Verla and I put that in about 10, 12 years ago and figured this thing's got to just be replaced. That must have been it. And it shot some steam out and came up through here. And so we replaced the water heater. It wasn't easy to do, but we replaced it, $650. And you think, there, the problem solved. But somehow in the back of your mind, you know, it's not going to be that easy, right? So no, it didn't. Sure enough, more water condensation. When you start to live in denial, because there's more water condensation in the circuit breaker panel, you think, well, it must be residual. It's just there from before. I'll wipe it off, but no, you know, it keeps coming. So, it's time to pull out the X-Acto knife and start carving up the sheetrock to find where it is. So inside, you know, above, everything's dry above the circuit breaker box. Cut the one below. Insulation is wet. The two-by-four framing is wet. And at the very bottom of that section, right below it, in the base plate two-by-four, there's about a, oh, I don't know, close to a two-inch hole that's drilled. And all the wires are coming from the circuit breakers and going down under the house and off to the various circuits. Well, Verla put her ear down there, and she said, I hear water. I hear water. And so, well, and it was kind of steamy, so the hot water heater, the holes here, obviously it's a hole in the hot water pipe down below, which it turns out. So, you have to crawl under the house and go in there and it's dark and there's some water down there. It's not a fun place to be, but I could see it dripping up through there. And you have to understand, so this is a manufactured home. And I don't know who thought of this, but in manufactured homes, they do all the plumbing, you know, all the frameworks open and everything, do all the plumbing at the factory. Then they cover it up with insulation, and then they cover the insulation with what's called a belly wrap, this black, tough material stuff that holds the insulation up. Point being, you can't see the pipes. And they're not easy to access. You've got to pull all of that stuff down. It's hard to get to. And so I did that under the house and pulled it away and found the leak. But when I saw it below, you can't access. You can't get to it. It's always in these hard places. So I had to go back out, crawl under the porch, pull skirting off the house, get in there. Verla came down there to back me up. And you can just feel in there these little pinhole streams of water coming out. And it was hot, so it was a hot water line. But when I got my hand on the other side, right where the leak was, I felt something else. Rats. They'd been chewing on the line. That's why there was a hole in it. Rats. Pretty common thing, as it turns out. At any rate, it was a battle. Cut the bad section out, got a splice put in there. We thought, okay, problem solved. But I knew that I had to go back under there to pull all the wet insulation out. because it won't dry, and it will rot the wood floor joists of your house. I mean, rats can literally destroy a building. And so you've got to get that out. So I'm down there crawling around, and there's drips. And while pulling the insulation down, I found out there were six more leaks. The rats had chewed through the water line seven places where they had done that. And I had to pull it all out and then scoot in under it and put splices in. And so what's all that got to do with the sinfulness of sin? Sin is like a rat. It destroys. it does it in the darkness. We had no idea this is going on. I was talking to my neighbor about it and telling him what's going on and he said, oh yeah, the guy right there on the other side of me, he had to have his whole house re-plumbed last year because the rats chewed it up, you know. And I told him, Well, if you need some help, we can take a look under your house. And he said, yeah, probably don't even want to go there. But think about this. The rat as a illustration of sin, it works in the darkness. How long has that been going on? I don't know. Unseen, it's hidden, it's multiplying. It's growing. What's the solution? You've got to kill it. You've got to kill that rat. No mercy at all. So now there's rat traps, there's poison pellets. I've got it all over down there. And I'm going to keep a close eye on what's going on. Do you not know, Paul says in Romans, do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you're slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness. Sin is a rat. It's a plague. It kills and it destroys. Just like James said, you let it go. and just let it have its way, and it is a soul killer. It has to be killed. The old biblical word for killing it, putting it to death is mortifying, okay? John Owen wrote a book, The Mortification of Sin. Mortifying, listen to it. This is out of the King James, Colossians 3.5. Mortify, therefore, your members which are upon the earth, fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil, that's always have trouble with this word, cupasence, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Mortify it, kill it, Romans 8. For if you live after the flesh, according to the flesh, you will die. But if you through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, You shall live. Let not sin reign in your mortal body to make you obey its passions. Kill it. Think of other examples of rats and death. The Black Plague, the bubonic plague, wouldn't it kill a third of the population, something like that? In Europe back in the Middle Ages, how was it caused? Rats. Rats, fleas on rats. Sin is utterly sinful because it's a black death, but it's on the soul. It's infinitely more dangerous than the bubonic plague. And nobody survives it if it is left to go. It kills the soul, and it kills for eternity. And now I put some poison pellets down there and some other things, but how are you gonna kill this rat called sin? It is only by Christ. There's no other way. You can go to the feed store or wherever, the co-op, and you'll find just all kinds of shelves of rodent killer, all kinds of brands, rodent killer and traps. When it comes to killing sin, mortifying sin, there's only one product, and that is Christ. Without him, if you're not born again, all that's going to happen when you in your own strength and by works of the law, so if we're trying to kill the rat, the rat's going to get stronger. Because, well listen to it, 1st Corinthians 15, the sting of death is sin, but the power of sin is the law. See, anybody that's trying to, okay, I won't covet anymore, I'm going to covet all the more. Paul describes that in Roman 7. It won't work. Now this sin, like rats under your house in the darkness, is easy to dismiss, out of sight, out of mind. I don't have to think about it. And don't tell me about it. Don't tell me that I'm a sinner, you see. They've been duped. They choose to ignore it and ignore the only remedy. The sinfulness of sin, as we began, is often minimized and therefore ignored. I don't want to look under my house. I don't want to look at sin in me, because repentance is painful. And besides, the world has lots of pleasures. I don't want to think about this unpleasant stuff, you see. And yet, if we don't follow Christ as his spirit leads us, if his spirit's not within us, we will never succeed. in putting sin then to death. The sinner who rejects Christ, who refuses to confess his sin and pray, God, be merciful to me, a sinner, is like a person whose home is rat infested, being destroyed by those rats, and so you tell him about it, and he says, I don't wanna think about it. I don't wanna think about that. You see, that kind of a person, And we were all once this way. We don't want to examine ourselves. We don't want the light of Christ shining then upon us. We don't like to pray prayers like this, Psalm 139. Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. See if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Now you have to admit, That kind of a prayer, even as a Christian, is a little bit scary, right? I mean, it's a little bit scary because as a Christian, I know that there's plenty of sin still in me. And that if I genuinely pray that prayer and ask God to search me, You know, get inside of me and do a thorough search and examination and if there are any wicked ways in me, show me and lead me to repentance and so on. And that's often, I could say always, a painful process. What might he find? You know, the sinner, One thing that will bring his fangs out more than anything else is to have his sins exposed. That's why the wicked hated Christ, right? He's the light of the world. The sinner doesn't want his sin exposed. When the Lord shines his light on us and dispels the darkness, it's blinding and even frightening. And that brings us back to Peter, in Luke 5, Lord depart from me, I can't stand your holiness, I'm a sinful man. Well, He's on his way to getting straightened out there at that point, because he understands the holiness. This is God. Only God could do what I just saw. And here I am, a sinful man. And again, Isaiah, woe is me. I'm lost. I'm a man of unclean lips. And I've seen the Lord. I mean, if you've ever read C.S. Lewis's book, The Great Divorce, can't remember all the details, but there's this guy who, and he's got this lizard on his shoulder, right? I think a lizard or something like that. And this thing does not want to leave. It does not want to leave at all. And it represents his sin. I think it was the sin of lust. And it represents his sin. And here, the angel, I think it was, is talking to the guy and saying, do you want to be rid of it? Do you want to? And he's kind of hem-hawing around. But that's what sin is, the sinfulness of sin. What's it take? It takes God by his spirit through his word, searching us out. Well, it takes this, Hebrews 4. The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword. piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. No creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account. See, so thoroughly, what's the word that oncologist uses that you don't want to hear if you go to them? If you've got cancer, it's- Malignant. Yeah, malignant. I'm sorry, but your cancer has metastasized. Is that how you say it? It means it's spread. Sin has metastasized in our being so that it is even in the, whatever this means, the division of soul and spirit in our joints and marrow, in the thoughts and intentions of the heart. That's how thoroughly infected the sinner is. We call it total depravity. Now God here in his word is telling us, I'll search you out. By my spirit, I'll take your word, my word, and it's going to function like a living and active two-edged sword. And we're going to go in and examine the innermost parts of your being and show you what is really there. And then I'm going to lead you in repentance and faith and lead you in the good and right way. Most people don't want that to happen. And the moment that that sword, the moment that they sense that sword is getting in there and revealing their sin, they're gone. They're gone, unless the Lord is doing a regenerating work. Listen to 2 Timothy 4, and I want to remind you that when Paul wrote these verses, he is not talking to pagans. He's not talking about pagans. He's talking about people who profess to be Christians, people who are in the visible church. Here's what he says. I charge you, Timothy, in the presence of God and of Christ, and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word, Be ready in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching. Why? Why is this necessary? Well, here's the reason. For the time is coming, and we're in it, when people will not endure sound teaching. Who are the people? They're professing Christians. They're the ones he's preaching to. The time's gonna come when people will not endure sound teaching, but they have 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. Why won't they endure sound doctrine? Because they don't want the rats of sin exposed. They don't want their sinfulness before God. If anyone chooses to permit the rats of sin to continue to work unmolested by the Spirit of God in their heart and mind, that utter sinfulness of sin will inevitably kill that soul. And such a person will most certainly depart this life one day and end in hell. Now I need to tweak that statement a little bit. They're already dead, right? We are born into this world dead in sin. But if we choose to permit that sin to continue to work unmolested by the Spirit of God, rejecting Christ, I will depart this life, and I won't be in a better place. I will be in hell. People go to the doctor for physical ailments, but they won't go to Christ for the healing of their soul. He's the great physician. You know, his cure rate is 100%. Whenever somebody comes to him, whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Whoever you call on the name of the Lord, Lord, be merciful to me, the sinner. But if you don't do that, then the disease called sin also has a 100% rate, a fatality rate. 100%, 100%, 100%. Listen to these words by Arthur Pink, A.W. Pink. You can get most all, even all of his books free on Kindle. And he's a good one to read about and know about. He's commenting on that Hebrews 4, 12 verse about the word of God being living and active and so forth. Listen to what he says. The word of God now exposes his innermost being. Having eyes to see, the sinner discovers for the first time what a vile, depraved, and hell-deserving creature he is. Though in the mercy of God, he may have been preserved from much outward wickedness, so he's not as evil in practice as he could have been, in his unregenerate days, and so he passed among his fellow humans as an exemplary character. What a fine good moral person. He now perceives that really there dwells no good thing in him, that every thought and intent of his desperately wicked heart had all of his life been contrary to the requirements and claims of a holy God. The Word has searched him out and discovered him to himself. He sees himself now a lost, ruined, undone sinner. This is always the first conscious effect of the new birth. For one who is still dead in trespasses and sins has no realization of his awful condition before God, and he doesn't want to know it. Before passing on, Pink says, let us earnestly press upon the reader, or the listener, that's you, what has just been before us and ask, has the word of God pierced you? Has it penetrated as no word from man ever has into your innermost being? Has it ever exposed the workings of your wicked heart? Has it detected to you the sink of iniquity that dwells within? Make no mistake about it, dear friend, the thrice holy God of Scripture requires truth in the inward parts. If the word of God has searched you out, then you cried with Isaiah, woe is me, for I am undone. And with Job, I abhor myself. And with the publican, God, be merciful to me, the sinner. But if you're a stranger to these experiences, if you know nothing of these things, no matter what your profession of religion or performances, no matter how highly you may think of yourself, or other Christian think of you, God says, you are still dead in your sin. And that is the utter sinfulness of sin that if we're to be saved, we must come to terms with. Father, we thank you for the truth of your word and pray that you would take that sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and do that searching work in every single one of us. Father, I pray that there not be one person here today or listening who ends this life dead in their sins and enters into an eternity in hell. Those that don't know you, Father, we pray that you would do your good, though painful work of revealing those gnawing rats of sin that work in the darkness and would take us to hell. all the more sad because we have such a great Savior that you've given to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. And thereby, it is not something that has to happen. It is not that anyone needs to go to hell. but that we have this Savior. The remedy is there. We pray, Father, that you would, by your Spirit, work such a work in the sinner's heart that they would finally reach out for that remedy and believe in Christ. And we pray this all in Christ's name, amen.