This morning, we're going to continue on where we left off a few weeks ago in 2 Timothy. But before we start, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, we're grateful to be here once again this morning. Father, we gather weekly because we are those who have been redeemed by the blood of Christ. We come to celebrate that together, to look on all that Christ has done for us, and to say he has done great things for us, and mighty is his name. And so, Father, that's what we want to do this morning as we come to your room. We want to look at all the things that Christ has done for us. We want to look at the fact that we have been adopted as sons because of his blood, that our sins have been washed away, that we have been given an inheritance, and we have been pulled into a kingdom and called a people even when we're not a people. Father, we want to look at all those things and want to stand in awe. And Father, as we come to your Word, that's not all we want to happen. We want to see the glories of Christ, but we also want to have those glories affect us, to cause us to see how we ought to follow after Christ, to change our wills and our hearts to follow after him. So Father, as we turn to your word this morning, Father, that's my prayer, is that you would be opening our eyes to see the glories of Christ proclaimed in your word. Father, that you'd be working in our hearts, that as we see those glories, that our hearts would rejoice and stand in awe, that we would give him the worship that he deserves for those things. Father, I pray that you would work on our wills, that as we hear the words of Christ, that our will would be bent away from ourselves and towards his will. Father, we admit before you that we are not powerful enough to do those things on our own. Father, in fact, on our own, we would turn away from those things. So Father, we pray that your spirit would be in our midst this morning to be giving us the ability to see, to feel, and to respond rightly to your word. Father, I pray for myself especially as I come to preach your word. Father, I pray that your spirit would fill me and cause me to speak things that are only true and glorious of Christ, and things that are beneficial to those who are here listening. Father, our heart's desire is that Christ would be exalted in this time. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. So we've been in 2 Timothy for a little while now, and as we have gone through 2 Timothy, and this has been my summary statement, my kind of theme for the entire book is this. It's that 2 Timothy tells us that serving the gospel is going to be hard. but it's always worth it. Serving the gospel is gonna be hard, but it's always worth it. And so Paul's encouragement to Timothy is keep pressing into Christ. Don't give up when it's hard, don't walk away, keep pressing into Christ because serving the gospel is always worth it. Then we broke the book up into two main sections. We said there's kind of six master charges or commands in this book, exhortations to Timothy. We broke them up, there's six of them, and they kind of go in sets of three. In fact, as we see this morning, Paul really likes sets of three. We're gonna talk about sets of three more. But he says three sets of charges, and then another three sets of charges. And the first set of three, I'll look at Timothy and say, yes, you're weary with the task, but the gospel is gonna strengthen you. And so he looks at Timothy and says, be strong in the gospel. So we had several charges under that. The first one, he looked at Timothy and said, fanning to flame the gift of God that is in you. He said, remember what God has done for you and let that spur you on in the gospel. And then second, he said, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me as prisoner. And then third, we saw the master charge. I always think the third charge here is always gonna be in the master charge. So the third charge, the master charge of the first section was, If you need strength to keep going, the only place you're gonna find that strength is in the grace of God. And so he says, you then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus. But we finished that first section a little while ago. We've been in the second half of the book, which he's now gonna look at you and say, okay, you've found your strength. This is where your strength is. Now go out and be strong with the gospel, be a servant of the gospel. Once you've been strengthened, go out and feed the sheep, as Jesus might have told Peter. And so there's three exhortations, three charges under this as well. We've gone through the first one over the last several weeks that we're in 2 Timothy, and the first one was this, do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. And so that's where we've been. We did that for a couple weeks. We're ready to jump into the next section in 2 Timothy 3, which I've kind of split out into two things. And I've really wrestled with this. I was going to do this in two weeks, but I decided that these two parts go together so closely that splitting them up, sometimes we can miss the flow of the passage and miss the main point. So we're going to go through all of 2 Timothy 3 this morning, which means we're going to be bunking a little bit. So try to keep up. I'm going to go. But we're gonna see that we have another charge, and the fifth charge is gonna be this. First, do your best to present yourself as one approved, but then continue in what you have learned. Continue in what you have learned and faithfully believed. And so that's where we're gonna be this morning. And so if you wanna open your Bible, we will be in 2 Timothy 3, so feel free to open your Bible, read along with me, or if you want, I've got the text up here on the screen. So let's read 2 Timothy 3 together. 2 Timothy 3, 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 worrying 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. You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra, which persecutions I endured, yet from them all the Lord rescued me. Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and imposters will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete or competent, equipped for every good work. So as we go through chapter three this morning, this is gonna be my proposition, my main point for this passage this morning is Paul's gonna look at Timothy and say, your task is impossibly hard. Timothy, your task is impossibly hard and yet not impossible. Your task is impossibly hard and yet not impossible. You need a powerful weapon. So that's what Paul's gonna be trying to teach Timothy through chapter three. And I'm gonna split it up into three points this morning, and then we'll do a very brief application at the end. But our first point, Timothy's, or Paul's gonna look at Timothy and he's gonna say this. The enemy's weapons are strong. The enemy's weapons are strong. That is, the battle is beyond your strength. But then he's gonna follow that up. He's gonna say the enemy's weapons are strong, but the enemy's weapons are not ultimate. The enemy's weapons are not ultimate. The battle might be beyond your strength, but the battle is not going to be lost. So what's gonna connect those two? How do we get from the battle's beyond you, but the battle's not gonna be lost? Or his third point is gonna be this. You need to use the ultimate weapon. The battle is beyond your strength. You need to pick up a weapon, and scripture is gonna be your weapon for this war. So actually, we could go through and kind of list other, I actually went through and wrote like five different ways to write these points, and I got rid of some of them, but I couldn't get rid of all of them. So we could go through again and say, these are his three main points. He's gonna look at Timothy and say, if you're going to continue in your service, you need to correctly understand your situation. So that's gonna be the first one. And he's gonna say, the situation is, the enemy's weapons are strong. But when you correctly understand your situation, you don't need to be given to despair. Even though the enemy's weapons are strong, you're not going to lose. So in the face of that, you don't need to despair. Instead, you need to pick up the right weapons. And so that's what we're going to go through this morning, and we'll follow it up with a few applications at the end. But we're going to dive in with this. The enemy's weapons are strong. The battle is beyond your strength. So he's gonna look at Timothy and say, Timothy, if you wanna continue on, you need to correctly understand the situation that you're in. So I'm not gonna go, well, I'm kinda gonna go verse by verse, but I'm kinda gonna go through this entire passage several times. And so I wanna pull out some truths out of this passage. And so as we look at this first one, I think there's four truths that this passage tries to teach us. The first one is this. Paul looks at Timothy and says, sin is going to continue to multiply. Sin is going to continue to multiply. So that's where we come in 2nd Timothy 3 verses 1 through 5. He starts out with this, but understand this. In fact, he looks at Timothy and says, you know what? You need to understand where you are. The reason he says that is, if you recall back a couple weeks ago, we finished up with how the elder teacher, Timothy, should teach his opponents, interact with his opponents. And he finished with this, you should have hope that maybe they're gonna come and repent. Maybe those who are opposing you might come to their senses and they might give up their opposition. But then he says, you have that hope, but understand this, that's not gonna be how it is most of the time. He says, you should always have that hope, they might come to their senses, they might come back, but understand this. And then he's gonna tell us what is the baseline of what Timothy's gonna experience as he continues in his ministry. He says, understand this, in the last days, there will come times of difficulty. Paul looks at Timothy and says, we're in the last days. The last thing has happened. Christ has come, he's ransomed his people, he's provided the propitiation. And so all the New Testament looks at the time of the church and says, these are the last days. And Paul says to Timothy, if you're in the last days, the Bible also tells us what the last days are gonna be like. It's gonna be full of times of difficulty. You don't have an easy task. It's not gonna be walking through roses as you try to serve Christ and serve the gospel. Then he tells them why. This is why. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy. We go through this list, and Paul gives this really long list of things that are sins. And I don't think the purpose of this list is necessarily to go through and say, well, we need to tear apart each of these words and understand sin. These are all really straightforward things that we understand. These are things that are opposed to the things of God, and they're marking people. But as we start to tear apart the list, what we can notice is actually this isn't a set of triplets. It's a little hard to see it in English unless you're really studying, but these are in sets of triplets. And I'll try to show you that, but we'll see another set of triplets later which might help you understand the triplets. But he starts with this. People will be lovers of self, lovers of money. And you just say, Matt, you just said these were triplets, and that was two things. That's important, actually. It starts with a list of two, and then the others are sent three together. But we're going to come back to this set of two and see that this is guiding us on this list. But he says he starts out with something like this, that people are going to be directed towards themselves instead of towards the things of God. In fact, that's where he's going to leave us at the end. Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. And that's going to be the end of that triplet. But we have people are going to be directed away from the things of God and towards themselves. They're going to be full of themselves. And if they're full of themselves, then we're going to see these sorts of attitudes engendered in them. They're going to be proud and arrogant and abusive. They're going to hold themselves above others. and be willing to attack others because they think that they are the most important. And as they do that, they're going to encourage others in that. They're going to encourage others to be disobedient to parents, to be ungrateful and unholy. Three words that in Paul's mind would go very closely together. Think of every time Paul thinks about the law, he goes back to them. being obedient to your parents and so on, holiness, and being disobedient to your parents are very closely in. The gratefulness, Paul says that they should make some return to their parents. He's used those three as going together. So those three are, okay, they're gonna be focused on self, so they're gonna hold themselves above others, and then they're gonna encourage others to do sort of the same. Then he just starts listing off words. He says, they're going to be heartless, unappeasable, slanderous. As they go about, they're going to injure others. Not only going to injure others, they're going to do so without self-control. They're going to be brutal. They don't love the good. In fact, they do so almost without any concern for others at all. They're treacherous. They're reckless. They're so focused on themselves. They're swollen with conceit that they don't even care about the harm that they do to others. He finishes with this, they'll be lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. So we've got these sets of triplets. I'm gonna come back to this in a second, but the first triplet is split from the beginning to the end to kind of make up this list. Paul says, this list is what sin is like. And he says, Timothy, people are going to be like this. Don't misunderstand. Sin is going to continue. When Christ came into the world and he ransomed his people, he hasn't come back with the final sword to eradicate sin, and that's going to keep going on. And he's going to finish with this. He kind of wraps up his triplicates, and he adds this last one at the end, having the appearance of godliness, but denying his power. Paul says, sin is going to be sin, and there's going to be hypocrisy. People are going to pretend to be in the church. and yet have all these attitudes and these sorts of actions going on in them. So Paul looks at Timothy and says, your task is going to be hard. Why? Because sin is going to continue to be sinful. Timothy, don't think that you have an easy task because sin has always been sin. and it's not going to change. Sin is going to continue to be sinful. And those are the sorts of attitudes and actions you're going to see, and you're going to see those in the world, but I'm going to pull this into the next point, but you're going to see those attitudes and actions in the church as well. So he says, your task isn't easy. Don't think that every time you speak, everyone's going to listen and follow after what you're saying, because these are the baseline attitudes that sin has incorporated into people. Sin will continue to multiply. It will continue to be sinful. But as we keep going on, I don't think that's all that Paul wants to tell Timothy. He says, sin is sinful. Don't think your task is going to be easy. But then he's going to say this. He's going to say, this is the general effects of sin. This is what people are like. But then he's going to take it and say, you know what? You're going to find that in the church. Hypocrisy will corrupt even the church. And so this is where those triplicates become important. We have all these sets of triples, and we have that first triple that's split from the front to the end. The lovers of money, the lovers of self, lovers of money, lovers of pleasure, rather than lovers of God. That kind of wraps up this list. It becomes a beginning and end to a very rhetorical list that Paul's writing. Paul's actually using a lot of rhetorical pattern as he's writing this chapter, and he makes this list, and he kind of gives a book, and it's the list. But then he adds one more thing at the end of the list that he spends a little bit more time on. He says, this is what sin is like. Sin causes people to be directed towards themselves, not towards God, not towards others, but caring about themselves, and then all these sorts of characteristics, attitudes, and actions erupt from them. But Timothy, this is the one that I'm most concerned about when I look at you. There's gonna be those sinful attitudes and actions, but they're gonna have the appearance of godliness, even though they're denying its power. He looks at it and said, that's the characteristics of sin. And Timothy, you shouldn't be surprised to find the characteristics of sin in this world, but there's gonna be people in the church, even people that might appear to be godly, at least we'll put quotes in that, maybe are very good at convincing others that they're godly, and yet those attitudes and actions are found in them as well. They claim godliness, they even can convince others that they're godly. but they aren't really loving God, they're loving self, and these sorts of actions are going, attitudes and actions are underneath the surface. He says, Timothy, you're going to find this in the church as well, and there it's almost going to be more insidious, because it's going to look like there's godly people but behind people's backs are going to be like this. Hypocrisy is going to be a problem. And so he says, Timothy, sin is going to continue to be sinful, but here's a bigger issue. Sin is going to try to masquerade as Godliness. So this is going to be a problem, Timothy, and that's why you're going to have such challenge in continuing your ministry. But then we pick up there, he says, this is maybe the thing I'm most concerned about, and so he's gonna expand on that. He's gonna say, they have the appearance of godliness, but they deny its power. Why is that a problem for you, Timothy? Well, he says, there are those among them, among those who are having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power, there are those among them who creep into households, and they capture weak women. He says, these women are burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, and they're always learning and never able to arrive at the knowledge of the truth. I will say in chapter three, there's a lot of really interesting things that are a little hard to understand exactly what Timothy, I'm sorry, what Paul is telling Timothy about, because we don't have the reference. We don't understand what Paul's looking at and saying, these are the types of people that I'm talking about, Timothy. But if we take a step back, We can say, well, there's people who have the appearance of godliness and yet deny its power, and they're running through the church. They're found in your church, they're able to convince others that they're godly, even though what's at their core is really all these things of sin. And when they do so, they're able to convince those who are weak. Paul calls them weak women. I'm not sure if it was mainly women that these people were actually convincing, or if that's just Paul's way of saying, those who are weak and don't understand in the church are gonna be convinced by them. And they're gonna follow after them and think, hey, that's somebody who I really admire, that's somebody who I like, and I'm gonna follow after what they're saying. even though at their core they're following after something that's completely ungodly. And so he says they capture weak women. The reason that these women, these people are weak, is that they're burdened by sins and various passions. They have seen the truth, and yet they haven't let the truth completely free them from their bondage to sin. They still have a bondage, and so they see what they think is good in this world, and they run after that. And so they're always learning. They might come and listen to you, but they're never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. So what Paul's saying, if we take a step back, is something like, those who have the appearance of godliness are going to be running around the church, and people are going to follow after them. And that's going to be a problem, because now you've got people following after this ungodliness that's masquerading as godliness. And Timothy, that makes your task ten times harder. So not only is sin going to masquerade as godliness, but that hypocrisy is going to corrupt the church. These men, they're within your midst, and yet they're opposing the truth. These men are in your midst, and they claim to be godly, and many might think they are because of how they hold themselves, and yet they're still corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. Timothy, that's gonna be the root problem here. is that there's gonna be those in your church that are like this, and people are gonna follow after people like that. He's gonna talk in chapter four about people having itching ears and wanting to follow after what they hear, what they like to hear, and that's what Paul's talking about here, is saying, Timothy, they're gonna follow after those who have the appearance of godliness but deny its power, who claim that they're godly but let these sort of attitudes and actions well up in their hearts so that they treat others that way. Hypocrisy is gonna corrupt even the church. So Paul to Timothy, he says, your task is hard because sin is gonna multiply and hypocrisy will corrupt even the church. Then he's gonna, we're gonna skip over a few things that we're gonna come back to, but he doesn't hold, he doesn't pull back on this. He says, not only is hypocrisy gonna invade your church, but here, let me make you a promise, Timothy. This is a fun promise to go through in the Bible. He says that sin's prevalence means you are sure to suffer. Look at sin. Sin is still sinful. Sin is found in your church. There are those who claim to be godly and yet are filled with these sorts of things. And because of that, sin's prevalence means that you are gonna be sure to suffer. So we'll skip forward a few verses and to verse 12. Paul says this, he says, indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. So he says, you know what, Timothy? Here's a bedrock promise. All, everyone, not accepting anyone, who wants to live a godly life, and that's the emphasis there, all who are godly, all who are not actually like this, who aren't those who are lovers of self and lovers of money and proud and arrogant and abusive and disobedient to parents, ungrateful and unholy, all those sorts of people who have been changed by the work of the Spirit are going to be persecuted. Paul writes it as an absolute promise. Timothy, there's no way to escape this. This is your task. You're going to be persecuted because you aren't partaking in what the world is partaking in. And Timothy, you're not gonna be able to escape that by hiding in the church, because when you come into the church, guess what? You're gonna find all those things as well, and people that are even trying to pull an opposite wave from you because that's what's in their core. So he says, Timothy, don't think that sin is gonna go away. Sin's prevalence means you're going to suffer, that's a promise. Timothy, don't think otherwise. And then finally, Paul says, that's where we are now. Understand this, you're in the last days, and it will be times of difficulty. But don't think that if you wait it out long enough, it's going to get better. In fact, Paul says, you're going to suffer if you're a godly person. And guess what? As time goes on, it's going to get worse. So we come, we just did verse 12. Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. And he says this, the other people, those who are like 2 Timothy 3, 1 through 5, evil people and imposters, another reason I think Paul's looking at people in the church and saying, there are people in your church like this because they're imposters, they're evil people. What are they gonna do? They're gonna go from bad to worse. Timothy, this isn't a temporary problem that you just have to wait out for a little bit and things are gonna get better in a little while. This is gonna be a continual problem, even a worsening problem. This is the pattern that we see across all the New Testament, that the birth pangs, as we wait for Christ to return, are gonna get stronger. Things are going to get worse. And Paul says, that's a promise, Timothy. It's going to get worse. If you think it's hard now, just wait a while. It's going to get even harder. And this is what they're going to be like. They're going to go around deceiving and being deceived. You're going to have these people come into your church. They're imposters. They look as though they have a form of godliness, but really they deny its power. And they're going to go and deceive others. And that's what you're fighting against. And it's going to look like you're constantly losing. You're the one who's being persecuted. And they look strong. They're going to be deceiving and being deceived. They're going to be stronger and stronger in their wickedness. They're going to go from bad to worst. And so Paul is going to say this, he says, sin isn't going away. The world isn't going to get better. It's going to get worse. That's what Paul wants after Tinnitus. He says, understand this. This is the sort of situation in which you're doing ministry. He says, it's a bad situation, it's full of sin, that sin is corrupted even the people in the church, and those people in the church are gonna be deceiving others in the church, and that's gonna lead to your persecution for sure, I promise Timothy, and it's gonna get worse and worse as time goes on. Now this is kind of a side note, this isn't the main point of my sermon, but this is one reason why I could never be a post-millennialist or somebody that thinks that the church is gonna take over the world and put everything in order before Christ comes. Because Paul seems to say that, Timothy, it's not going to get better. It's going to get worse. The one who's going to set things back in order is when Christ comes. But that's a side note. But those are the things that Paul tells Timothy. Timothy, sin is going to continue to multiply. It's going to continue to be sinful. That hasn't gone away. And that hypocrisy is going to infect even the church, and that's going to create hardship and heartache and persecution for you. In fact, sin prevalence means that you are going to suffer in the church. And here, let me tell you, Timothy, things aren't gonna get better, they're going to get worse. So his conclusion is, this is what you're up against. You're not gonna be able to win this war. You don't have anything in you that's going to be able to defeat the sin that is corrupting the world and corrupting even people in your church. This battle is beyond you. And he's saying, understand this. He tells Timothy, stop and think about this. Make sure you've got this rooted in your mind. It sounds really depressing, but Paul says, understand this, because if you don't understand this, if you imagine that your task is gonna be easy, that's gonna be a sure pathway to discouragement and burnout. And so Paul tells Timothy, make sure you understand where you are, the battle that you're in, and that this battle is well beyond your power. This is where you're going to find yourself ministering. And if you thought that it was going to be easy, you're always going to come in and be discouraged over and over and over again. So that's his first point that I want to look through as we go through 2 Timothy 3, but that's not the only point Paul makes. He wants them to understand that your task isn't easy. The battle is beyond your power. The enemy's weapons are strong, but the enemy's weapons aren't ultimate. The enemy's weapons are strong, but the enemy's weapons aren't ultimate. The battle might be beyond your power, but the battle is not going to be lost. And we're gonna say, understand what situation you're in, but don't despair over that. The enemy's weapons are not ultimate. And so I wanna go back through 2 Timothy 3 and see some other points that we can pull out. Paul looks and says, sin's gonna continue to multiply and hypocrisy is going to corrupt even the church. But Paul says the hypocrites aren't gonna win. They might look powerful for a while, but they're finally going to be exposed. He doesn't say when. He doesn't say that it's going to be soon. It might not even be within Timmy's lifetime. But Paul says this, they're not going to get very far. I'm skipping ahead of myself. So let's look at that. We came to 2 Timothy 3, 5 through 9. He gave that list, that triplicates list of these are what sin is like in the world. And then he said, and guess what, Timothy, you're going to find that in the church. And you're going to find that in people that actually are able to hold sway in the church and direct people after them. This is bad. That's going to make your job hard. But he's going to say something at the end. He says, these men are opposing the faith. They're corrupt in mind and disqualified regarding the faith, but they will not get very far, for their folly will become plain to all. They might look like they're holding sway in the church right now, they might be able to get some to follow after them, they might convince some that they're godly, they have the appearance of godliness even though they're denying its power, but they're not gonna get very far. Paul is pretty sure about that. He says they're not gonna win. They might look powerful now, but they're not gonna win. And why is Paul so sure that these people that have led astray people in your church and caused them to follow after them, why is he sure they're not gonna win? Well, it's this. He says, this has happened before. Janus and Jambres opposed Moses. And we ought to throw up a flag and say, who in the world are Janus and Jambres? And as we go through the Old Testament, turns out Janus and Jambres aren't anywhere in the Old Testament near Lycaon. What is Paul talking about? But we could look at those who opposed Moses, and it turns out Janus and Jambres were Hebrew oral tradition about what the names of the magicians that opposed Moses in Exodus 7, 8, and 9. And so we read a large portion of the plagues this morning, and we heard that there were these magicians, these servants of Pharaoh that sometimes could go and replicate the plagues. And so we come through, and he says, think about what happened to Janice and Jambres. And then realize, those who oppose God's order aren't gonna get very far. They might look powerful for a while, and they might hold sway, but they're not gonna get very far, because Janice and Jambres, they look strong, but they failed in the end. So let's look at Janice and Jambres, or the magicians that oppose Moses. In the first plague, it looked like those magicians were strong. Moses comes and raises the stuff of God, and turns the Nile River to blood, and you have to think that all the Egyptians are like, huh? We got something different going on here. But then it says the magicians of Egypt did the same by their secret arts. That probably was a pretty discouraging moment for Moses. God said I was gonna take a staff and I was gonna do wonders in his name. And guess what? Those magicians, we don't know how they did it and I'm not gonna dive into that much. The point is the magicians were able to do it as well. Moses probably was very discouraged and it says because the magicians did it, Pharaoh's heart remained hardened. People continued to go after that because it looked like they had power. It looked like they spoke for God as well. And that continued happening. It wasn't a one-time occurrence. We come several plagues later, the magicians appear again, and it says, but the magicians did the same again by their secret arts and made frogs come out in the land of Egypt. And again, Moses is probably like, well, God, I'm doing your wonders. I'm lifting my staff. I'm saying what you're saying, telling me to say to the Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. And the magicians are able to do exactly what I'm doing. And probably Moses was a little bit discouraged, like, this isn't going exactly how I imagined it might go. But that didn't last forever. There was a period in which the magicians were able to replicate. But then we come, I think this is the fourth plague. We come to Exodus 8, verse 18. Eventually, the magicians, they ran out of steam. By verse 18, it says, the magicians tried by their secret arts to produce gnats, but they could not. The magicians who had been able to replicate the plagues of God Almighty, all of a sudden ran out of power, and they said, uh-oh, I'm not sure why they could create frogs and not gnats, that's pretty confusing to me, other than the fact that the magicians looked like they were powerful for a while, and then they ran out of power, because they looked like they could speak for God, but they really weren't. And so the ministers are like, oh, we've heard now. So they couldn't be like, hey, buddy, we got to have a talk. This is the finger of God. We thought that we could keep doing this. But it turns out what Moses is doing it and what we're doing is really different things for a while. It could look like the same thing. And we're pulling in opposite directions, but both speaking for God. But actually, we think that Moses might be the one that's speaking for God. Unfortunately, Pharaoh isn't very easily convinced, so Pharaoh starts with a still heart and he goes, you know what, you guys did this for a while, I think that I'm gonna go with my own way. But eventually, we get to plague number six. And in Plague No. 6 in Exodus 9, it says, Now the boils went out over the land. Not only were the magicians not able to replicate that plague, but eventually all the magicians could not even stand before Moses because of the boils. So the boils came upon the magicians and upon all the Egyptians. So we went from the magicians look powerful and they oppose Moses and they convince Pharaoh to keep going that way away from the command of God. But the magicians look powerful for a while, but then they went like that. They didn't get very far. They held sway for a while, but they didn't win. So Paul comes back and he says, Timothy, you've got people in your church like that. You've got people who can convince others that they're godly, but their heart is full. of these sorts of attitudes and actions that are full of sin, and they're convincing others to follow after them. And for a while, they might look strong, they might look like those magicians in Egypt, which were able to replicate God's power. He says, you know, those magicians didn't get very far. Timothy, I've read this story before. I know how the story ends. You're in the middle of the story. I don't know how far you are into that they're gonna look powerful, but I can tell you at some point, they're going to go like that. They're going to fall off the cliff and not be able to convince others that they're godly anymore. So his summary is this. They might look strong, but guess what, Timothy? When they look strong, remember Janice and Jambres, they didn't win. they might look strong, they won't win. On the other hand, you can look at those who look powerful now, hypocrites who are invading the church and are convincing people to follow after them, seem like they have power now, but think about, they're not gonna have power forever. On the other hand, look at another group of people. Timothy, you have other examples of what it looks like to lead a godly life. So we come to 2 Timothy 3, verse 10. Paul looks at Timothy, he's been talking about these men who come into the church, sway the church after them, who look like they're godly, they're able to convince others that they're godly and they hold themselves up as the godly ones in the church and are convincing others to follow after them. He says, that's what they're like, Timothy. You, however, he says, you're gonna have a different pattern, Timothy, don't be like them. You, however, have followed." He says, you're following something different. You're not following the pathway that those evil men are, those evil men and imposters are. Instead, you're following, what are you following? You're following my teaching, my conduct, and my aim in life. Timothy, you've been my protege, my trainee. I've trained you how to do these things, and I've sent you out. Now I've sent you out probably to Ephesus. You're working in Ephesus." He says, that's what you've been following after. And this is where we start to get those lists that are triplicates again. So we get triplicates, my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love. My steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings. Actually, if it was hard to see the triplicates in the first list, I think it's easier to see the triplicates in this list. My persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and Lystra. He's using those rhetorical techniques. Again, he's not trying to give an exhaustive list or say, you know what, we need to dig into each of these words because each of these words is infinitely important. I think we can learn a lot from looking at those words, but he's making this pattern. He's saying, here's the triplicate pattern of the people devoted to sin. And you've got this other pattern. Look at my life, my conduct, my faith, my patience, my love. Look at my steadfastness, my persecutions, my sufferings, which happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra. So we've got this triplicates. He says, Timothy, you followed a different pathway. You followed the pathway that's focused on the teachings that I handed down to you in the way that I lived out my life. And that's produced a different set of attitudes in you. Faith, patience, and love. And you've seen that faith, patience, and love doesn't always lead to easy ends. I had to be steadfast. I was persecuted. I suffered. And those sufferings happened all over the place, at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra. So we have a set of triplicates, but he says a set of triplicates, and then he puts one at the end. Which persecutions I endured, yet from them all the Lord rescued me. And that's what he wants to do. Again, we have a list of triplets and a conclusion, and that's what Paul wants to draw out of that list. He says, it's opposite of the list that I gave you before. Those people look like they're powerful in the hold and swing of the church right now, and it looks like you're being persecuted, and Timothy, that's gonna be somewhat discouraging. But remember this, you've seen patterns that have gone before, patterns that had a different pathway in life, led to different things that look like it led to persecution and suffering in this world. But at the end, what you saw, Timothy, was that the grace of God sustained me through all of those things. The grace of God met me there. The Lord rescued me every time that I was persecuted and helped me keep going on. So he says, you can look at those that look strong now, but realize they're about to fall. You can look at those who look weak now, but realize they have God on their side, and God's grace is sustaining them. So he's saying something like this. You're following good examples of God's grace. You're not following after the path of the evil kingdom of impostors. You're following after good examples of God's grace. So the hypocrites aren't gonna win, and you have great examples of those who have followed after the true things of Christ, who have put Christ first, and therefore have run into persecution and sufferings, and yet were as able to endure because the Lord met them there. And he's gonna look at suffering and say, Timothy, you're gonna suffer as well. In fact, I can make you that promise. All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. So we come back to that. He says that promise, but actually when we start to read the other things that Paul's saying, in 2 Timothy 3, that is a promise. He looks at Timothy and says, this is what you ought to expect. But there's a lot of hope in that promise. Because Paul says, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. And here's the thing, when you get persecuted, and it's because of your godly life, so this isn't just because anything bad happens to you, but when you can look at your godly life and say, people are persecuting me, and it's because I'm following after Christ, That's a testament to your godly life. Your persecution, it might seem hard in the moment, but that persecution and suffering is actually a testament to you that you're following after the things of Christ. So Timothy, far from being discouraged by that suffering, be encouraged by that suffering. Rejoice in suffering, as Paul might say other places. This isn't easy, Timothy. There's a promise, you're going to suffer. But rejoice in that because you know the people who suffer, it's those who try to live a godly life. in Christ Jesus. And so Paul looks at Tim and he says, you're going to be persecuted, but persecution should give you confidence that you are following after Christ. So he's looked back, he says, they look strong, but they're going to fall. We look weak, but God sustains us. And your suffering is a testament to your faith. And then he's going to finish the chapter and say, you know what? All that aside, we have something that's gonna defeat them every day. They might look strong, but we have a better weapon. So we're gonna come to 2 Timothy 3, 16 through 17. This is how Paul finishes up the chapter. Paul looks at Timothy and he says, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for correction, and for training in righteousness that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. So, so far in 2 Timothy chapter 3, we haven't been talking about scripture, but starting at about verse 14, all of a sudden, Paul turns to the scripture. We're going to look at that in a few minutes. But this is where he ends. He starts with, this is what sin's like. This is what the examples that you're following after are like. They look strong, we look weak, but we're sustained by God. And then he ends with scripture. He says, this is where this line of reasoning needs to point you, is that all scripture is breathed out by God. Now, the scripture that Paul's talking about most explicitly here is the Old Testament scriptures, because right now, Paul is literally writing the New Testament scriptures. So Paul's looking back at the Old Testament. And I'm not gonna give a derivation for all the reasons why we would accept New Testament scriptures to be wrapped into this as well, but we can go to lots of different passages, which would say the writings of Paul and Peter that are collected together would then also be wrapped into that. And so Paul looks at Timothy and says, in the face of all this, when they look strong, when we look weak and we have to wait for God to rescue us in those situations, this is what you have. You have scripture. You have the word of God. You have that which was breathed out by God. And that scripture is profitable. He said it's useful. That's the weapon you've been given. That's the tool that you've been given. Those who are evil people and imposters are using other tools and they're seeming to sway and convince the church, but God gave you a very powerful tool. Scripture being breathed out by God himself. And it's useful, it's profitable for teaching, for reproof and correction, and for training in righteousness. It's useful, it's gonna be, you can't stand against all those things, the corruption of sin, but the scriptures can. The scriptures are gonna be what gives you the power to teach, the power to correct, the power to train up in righteousness. And this is gonna be the end result. The man of God is gonna be competent or complete. The word there at the end is a hard to translate word, and I think in different translations you're gonna see that translated quite a few different ways, is everything you need to know when you have scripture. the scriptures that were breathed out by God, it is useful. And when you have that, you have everything that you need. In fact, you will be equipped for every good work. In the face of those who are opposing you, in the face of those who are hypocrites and corrupting the church, you have a weapon that is more powerful. It's scripture, that which was breathed out by God himself. This is where one of the places where we get the concept of inspiration of scripture, When we read the Bible, we're reading the very words of God because Scripture itself testifies that these are the very words of God. And Paul says, you gotta believe that, you gotta found your life on that and say, Scripture being breathed out by God is everything that I need to keep going. So I've used this illustration of weapons. We actually don't see any mention of weapons in 2 Timothy 3. We just kind of get this passage that I think fits really well into that battle of the two opposing forces. But we see other places where scripture is held up literally as the sword, as the weapon of our war. And it's exactly what Paul's talking about right now. Paul's saying, as he says in Ephesians 6, our struggle is not against flesh and blood. It's not against evil people. It's against the sin that is corrupting them and has found its place in them. So our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. In Ephesians, he's gonna go through a whole list of things. that we're gonna use to wage war against them. But he ends in verse 17 with this. These are the last two. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. Paul says over and over again, take that sword. The scriptures are your weapon. When you need to go into battle, that battle's beyond you, but the scriptures have the power that you need to go fight that war. Or the author of Hebrews, which was either Paul or somebody very closely associated with Paul, also would say this, Hebrews 4.12, the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. So as we come to 2 Timothy 3, 16 through 17, Paul ends here because he looks at Timothy and says, your enemy seems very powerful, and you seem really weak sometimes. Now, in your weakness, God is sustaining you. The Lord will rescue you from every trial, because he rescued me from every trial. But, Timothy, don't despair, because you have a weapon that is stronger than anything that they have. You have access to the weapon that's going to win this war. You're not gonna win the war, Timothy, but scripture will. Scripture is going to be what gives you the power to teach, to correct, to train up in righteousness. The scripture that's going to make you competent, complete, give you everything that you need so that you can go out and do every good work, even in the face of evil people and imposters. So Paul tells Timothy, it's not going to be an easy road, but here's four promises to go on. The hypocrites won't win. You've seen examples who have gone before who have rested in God's grace and have been rescued. Your suffering is really a testament to your faith. And Timothy, you have a weapon that's better than anything that they can wield. So his conclusion is, the enemy is strong. Don't think it's easy, because that's going to lead you to discouragement and despair, but that's not what I want. The enemy's strength does not mean that you should despair. Instead, it means you should go look for the right weapons. You should say, the battle is beyond me. I can't do this in my power. I'm going to need to find something stronger than I am to go win this war. And so that's gonna be Paul's exhortation to Timothy. We're gonna finally get to that exhortation here at the end of chapter three. Paul's gonna tell Timothy, so what do you need to do? You need to take off that ultimate weapon. The scripture is the only thing that's gonna sustain you in this fight. And so I wanna make three observations. These are all gonna come out of the last verses in verses 14 through 17. Paul looks at Timothy and says, you need to use the ultimate weapon. Scripture is gonna be your weapon for this war. So he's gonna look at Timothy and he's gonna remind Timothy of the power of God's word. He's gonna say God's word is powerful. He's gonna say it in three ways. First, he's gonna look at Timothy and say, guess what, Timothy, if you look back at your own life, you've seen how powerful God's word is because God's word brought you to Christ. So we start in verse 14. He's looked at the evil people and imposters, they're going from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But then he says, Timothy, I have better hopes for you. But as for you, you aren't like that. Don't deceive and be deceived. Don't go down that pathway with them. Don't meet the weapons of the enemy with weapons of the enemy, because you're going to lose. You don't have power to win that fight. As for you, what should you do? You should continue in what you have learned. Paul says, Timothy, you started out with all the weapons that you knew, continuing what you've learned, what you firmly believed in, knowing from whom you learned it. Paul's talking about himself. He's talking about his mother, about his grandmother. He's saying, Timothy, remember, we brought you these truths. But ultimately, he doesn't. He says, know from whom you learned it. But he steps back from that and says, you know what? Your trust really shouldn't be ultimately in us, although that might give you a temporary hope in saying this is trustworthy. But he says, this is really what you need to trust in and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings. Paul says, Timothy, you've had the scriptures ever since you were young. Paul looks at Timothy and says, actually, Timothy, you've been blessed. From a very young age, your grandmother and your mother taught you the scriptures, and so you've been acquainted with the sacred writings. You know them inside and out, and you know that they were able to make you wise for salvation in Christ Jesus. He says, Timothy, look back. You know that you don't have the power to win this war, which is why you've been discouraged, why you're about to despair, why you might be tempted to give up. But he says, if you look back, you know where the power is. Scriptures are powerful enough to bring you to Christ. The scriptures were powerful enough to bring you to where you are now. Look back, they've been powerful in the past. But then he's gonna continue on. He says, God's word brought you to Christ. He's gonna also say, if it brought you to Christ, then it's gonna be able to preserve you in Christ or sustain you in Christ. So we're gonna come down to verse 17. We just thought about that. He said, you know what? You've known scriptures from your childhood and they were able to make you wise for salvation in Christ Jesus. They were powerful enough for that. So Timothy realized they weren't powerful enough, and they're going to keep being powerful enough. If you keep holding on to Scripture, you're going to be complete or competent. You're going to have everything that you need. You will be equipped for every good. Timothy, if the Scriptures were good enough to bring you to Christ, they're good enough to keep you in Christ. They're good enough to give you everything that you need. Look back at the power of the Scripture and look forward and believe that Scripture is powerful enough. The Scriptures are powerful enough to bring you to Christ. They're powerful enough to sustain you in Christ. But then he's gonna look and say, Timothy, the Scriptures were good enough for you. They were good enough for you in the past. They'll be good enough for you in the future. But you are in a war. You are in a war, and so guess what, Timothy, if the scriptures were good enough to bring you to Christ and sustain you in Christ, this is what's gonna win that war for you, Timothy. It's God's word that will transform those who are in Christ. And that's where he goes to in the center there. He says, you have been acquainted with the sacred writings. You know that they were able to make you wise for salvation in Christ Jesus. You know what? All scripture is breathed out by God, and it is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness. Timothy, evil people are gonna be like this. They're lovers of stuff, they're lovers of money, they're proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unpeaceable, and so on. You got nothing to fight that. In fact, if you look in yourself, you're going to find those things kind of warming the rain in your soul as well. You can't do anything, but you have a weapon sitting close by that is profitable to do something about those sorts of attitudes. That's going to give you the power to be able to teach in the face of those who are running away from Christ. It's going to be able to give you power to reprove, to say, thus saith the Lord, you are not going in the right way, to correct, to say that isn't right, and to train them up in righteousness and not for the things of sin. Timothy, this is your weapon, it's the only thing that you're gonna be able to wield to win this war. So the scriptures were powerful enough to bring you to Christ, they're powerful enough to sustain you in Christ, and they're powerful enough to complete your task. And that's the point of 2 Timothy 3. We could miss that point as we go through 2 Timothy 3 and get really tied up in some of the list, but this is the point Paul's trying to make. Timothy, the task is hard, So what do you need to do? Rest your trust in the inspired word of God and make that your only foundation. If you're gonna be a teacher, then you better be teaching the word of God. If you're gonna reprove, you better be bringing the word of God. If you're gonna correct, it better be based on the word of God. If you're gonna train up in righteousness, it better be out of the word of God. Many people think, wow, this guy really likes the word of God and he uses it all the time. And if you're gonna teach, and you teach based on something else, or approve based on something else, or correct based on something else, or train up in something else, then you've missed the point, and you've really joined those who are just leading the church astray. And so Paul says this. He says, God's word brought you to Christ, Timothy. It's gonna sustain you in Christ, and it's good enough to win the war for you. It will transform those who are in Christ. So use that weapon. Make scripture your weapon, nothing else. Nothing else is going to avail you right now. Make scripture your weapon. If you relied on yourself or thought the task was going to be easy, then you're going to lead into discouragement and despair. But if you use scripture to fight this battle, then you won't despair. In fact, you'll win. It might not be fast, and not might be even within this life, but you'll just keep going. And at the end, you can be confident that you will win. Evil people and imposters will go from bad to worse, but Timothy, you've got a weapon that's going to win this war. So as we finish, I just want to make some really brief application, because really that's the application. Paul wrote the application at the end of this chapter. And so the application that I'm going to say is, well, Paul's writing to Timothy, okay? Pastor, teacher, elder, maybe an apostolic representative. It's a little hard to define exactly what Timothy was. but obviously a pattern for how pastors, teachers, elders in the church should be. But I wanna step back and say, what does this mean for everyone? And I think that truth is true for everyone in the church. All of life should be based on the scripture. So when Paul looks at Timothy and he says, all scripture is breathed out by God. All scripture is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness. He says that all scripture is gonna be what the man of God needs to be complete or competent. It's going to be what makes him able to be ready for every good work. He's talking to Timothy, but he's really talking to everybody and saying, Timothy, this is the weapon that you're going to need to use, but this is the thing that everyone is going to need to use to base their life. Everyone needs to say all scripture is breathed out by God and it's what's profitable. All scripture is breathed out by God. So I think the application that we come to when we come to this passage is to look and say, you know what? The world is a bad place. The world is a bad place full of all sorts of sin that is going to corrupt the world and even the church. And so what do we do in the face of that? Do we run in and try to be culture warriors and try to, by saying no, that's gonna lead to losing battles over and over again? It should drive us to the word of God and say, my only hope is to base my life on the inspired word of God. I need to decide what I'm gonna do based on what scripture says. And emphatically, nothing else. We should say, scripture is what's breathed out by God. Scripture is what's authoritative. Scripture is what is profitable. Scripture is everything that we need. So, we aren't gonna base our lives on our feelings. We're not gonna say, well, this is the thing that feels right to me, so I'm gonna go after that. We're not even gonna base it off of our conscience. Paul says, I'm not the judge. None of you are the judges either. We have to base it off the word of God, not your feelings, not your conscience, not what other people might say, not what the world thinks. We have to base our lives off the word of God. and say all scripture is breathed out by God. I believe that, and I'm gonna use it to pattern my life after. So when the word of God says this, I'm going to say that's true, that's what it means. And so if we're gonna base our life on scripture, basing our life on scripture requires at least three things. We could talk about probably more, but just this morning, three things that I see as we go through 2 Timothy. If we're gonna base our life on Scripture, we need to have confidence in God's Word. Paul looks at Timothy and he says, all Scripture is breathed out by God. He says, Timothy, there's your confidence. You're not using some book written 2,000 years ago or 4,000 years ago or some random collection of writings from desert nomads, which is how many that are outside the church would characterize the Bible. He says, no, Timothy, That might have been the origin and the story of how God gave us the Bible, but Timothy, what you have in your hand is the very words of God. All scriptures breathed out by God have confidence in it. Believe in it, know that it's true and that it's powerful. So you need to have confidence in God's word, but then also you need to have knowledge of God's word. If we're gonna say all scripture is breathed out by God and it's profitable, it's profitable for teaching, for approval, for correction, for training in righteousness, and it's all that I'm gonna need to walk through the Christian life, then I better know what it says. And so we're gonna need to have confidence in Scripture, but also knowledge of God's Word. And so we should first say, I need to understand that God's Word is truly God's Word, and then I'm gonna need to know God's Word, which implies that we're gonna have to spend time in God's Word. We're gonna have to spend rich time studying what does God's Word say? And if I might say, not even just mere devotional time, like I read a little passage and think about it just kind of in relation to what I feel about that, but actually studying of God's Word and say, This is what God's Word says, and I'm gonna base my life off of this. It's a call to know the Scriptures, to have confidence in the Scriptures, to know the Scriptures. And then finally, if we're gonna have confidence in God's Word, knowledge in God's Word, then finally, we're gonna have to say, if we're gonna base our life off of God's Word, we need to apply God's Word. Go out and do what it says. And so as we read this passage, we hear that there's a war in the battles beyond us. Let us say, Scripture's the only thing we can hope in. This scripture is breathed out by God. I need to know what it says. This is what scripture says. I've studied it. I know what it says. And therefore, I'm going to go do that in the face of whatever the world is going to tell me to do. I think that's true for all Christians. But I do want to come back and say this is written to Timothy. a pastor, teacher, elder, apostolic representative, apprentice, and saying, that's true for everyone in the church, then it has to be doubly true for elders and teachers, for those who would stand up and represent God's word to his people. They need to be founded on the word of God. They need to have confidence that this is what God says. We have to have knowledge of this is what God said in his word, not merely coming and saying, well, I think, or I feel, or I am going to tell you that this is something I can't find in scripture, but I'm pretty sure it's right. If we're going to come and say we're going to lead God's people, then we need to know what God's word said. We have to have confidence in it and take it and apply it, because it's the only thing that's profitable. It's the only thing that's profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness. So if we go back to our outline, I got those three things out because I think that's actually what Paul's saying in his entire second section here. When he got to his first charge in the second section, he said, do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. He told Timothy, guess what, Timothy? If you're gonna go serve your people, you need to be able to rightly handle the word of truth. know it inside and out because if you go into situations and start basing how you are teaching or how you're approving or how you're correcting based on what's in your mind or what you feel and you don't know what the word of God says, then you're gonna be in great danger. Then he says, charge number five, continue in what you have learned. You know the word, so use the word. You know the Word, so use the Word. And then this is going to spring us into next week. I said we need to have confidence in the Word, so we're going to use it. We need to know the Word, but then we need to apply the Word, which is going to be where we're going to head next week. Paul's going to take that and say, here's your weapon. All Scripture is breathed out by God. It's possible for teaching, for proof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, fully equipped for every good work. And then in 4.1, he's going to say, preach the Word. If that's your weapon, take it and go use it. So that's a preview for next week, but we get those three ideas. Timothy, know the word. Timothy, use the word. Timothy, preach the word. So, as we close our application, we have to base our lives off of the word of God, to have confidence in its inspiration. It is from Christ, it is God's very word. We have to know what it says, and then we have to go apply it to our lives. So kids, what is the basis for the Christian life? And I'd say this, the inspired word of God is the foundation of every aspect of the Christian life. There's nothing else that we can base our lives off of. The inspired Word of God has to be the foundation of every aspect of the Christian life. If you don't make it that way, you're going to find yourself in that first list of people. And correspondingly, what then is the only weapon an elder should wield? The answer is going to be this. The inspired Word of God is the only weapon that will push back the darkness. Father, we're grateful for the words that you gave Paul to give to Timothy. Father, we look at our world and we see darkness around us. Father, we look at our world and we can feel the truth of what Paul was saying, that evil people and imposters will go from bad to worse. Father, we can see the effects of sin causing our world to crumble around us. And Father, that would be cause for despair, except for what you have given us in your Word. Father, we're grateful that you reminded Timothy of that and pointed him back and said, in the face of that, take up the sword of the Spirit. Father, I pray that you would work that into our hearts. Father, give us a renewed fervor for finding out what the Word of God says, and confidence in what it says, so that we would be able to apply that Word to our lives. Father, that that would be what holds back the darkness, so that we aren't swept away with it. Father, that will be good for us. That will be our preservation. That's what you've given us to preserve us in Christ. But Father, that will also be a glory to Christ because it will show that this passing power does not belong to us, but it belongs to you. So Father, I pray that you would exalt your word here in our midst this morning, that you would exalt your word in our hearts as we go out from this place and cause us to run after your word all the more. In Christ's name we pray.