Excuse me, 2 Timothy chapter 4. 2 Timothy chapter number 4. We've been looking at fascinating lives of forgotten people. We've learned, the lesson that we've taken away is that a forgotten life doesn't necessarily mean that it wasn't a significant life. A forgotten life doesn't necessarily mean that it was not a significant life. And you're going to find that God has recorded the lives of the men and women of the Bible, the people of the Bible, for us to learn from. The Bible said, "...whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning." God wants us to examine their lives. He wants us to learn. Learn, first of all, about Him. How He works in the lives of people, His desires, His working in us. How He worked in their lives says a whole lot about how He works in mine and your life tonight. But then also, He teaches us about decisions, direction, lives that were lived, and there are examples that we're to follow and learn from, but at the same time, He's recorded lives that when we look at their life and examine their life, we find An example to be avoided at all cost. There's instances in which the significance of a particular person's life may not be found in what they did right as much as what they did wrong. Significance to you and me tonight. Some have left us examples to follow, others to avoid. Demas is such a man we're going to read about tonight. He's a man who loved the world. Look if you would please in 2 Timothy 4 and find verse number 9. Paul's writing to a young preacher by the name of Timothy. Paul is in prison. He said, Do thy diligence to come shortly, quickly unto me. Timothy, I need you. Look what he says in verse 10. Here's why. For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world. and is departed unto Thessalonica." Crescens to Galatia. Now Crescens was not one who had went away from the Lord. He was on missionary work. Titus unto Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Take Mark, bring John Mark, bring him with you for he's profitable to me for the ministry. But I key in on the man by the name of Demas. A man who loved the world. Do you know his name means popular? He wanted to be popular with the world and the Lord at the same time. And you know what I've found is you can't march to the world's tune and the Lord at the same time. You can't be in step with the world and in step with the Lord at the same time. Lockyer in his classic work, his All Series. If you know anything about Herbert Lockyer, he wrote a whole series of books, all the prayers of the Bible, all the doctrines of the Bible. It's called the All Series. He wrote a book called All the Men of the Bible, and he records all the different names of men in the Bible. It has one All the Women of the Bible. And in his book, All the Men of the Bible, he has a section on Demas. And here's what he said. He talked of Demas as the man who forsook his friend. Bible scholars tell us that when Paul wrote these words, he was in the Mamertine prison in Rome, a sunken dungeon oozing with slime. It was cold. It was damp. Paul had been imprisoned there. He would soon be beheaded on Nero's chopping block for the crime of preaching the gospel. He's writing to Timothy, urging him to quickly sail to Rome. In his mind, he remembers another young preacher by the name of Demas. He informs Timothy of the sad news, the tragic news that Demas has forsaken him. He's left the ministry. He's gone back out into the world and he's no longer living for God, no longer serving the Lord as he one time would. The only thing left to say about Demas was what might have been. He had joined the ranks of those that would be called backsliders. Those who go away from the Lord. All of us have known someone who used to love the Lord and live for the Lord and serve the Lord. Many times they served right along with you, shook their hand on a given Sunday. There were times that you stood side by side in the work of God, but for some reason or another, that like Demas, they have went away. You know, he's only mentioned three times in the Bible, Demas is. We're given three snapshots of his life that tell a sad story of failure. I want you to notice with me first of all that he was a man, first of all, we're going to see of the devotion that he had. Verse number 10 of 2 Timothy 4 gives us the impression that while there may be a present failure, there was also a past faithfulness in Demas' life. He was once with Paul, but now he has forsaken and he's deserted the aged apostle. But look over, if you would please, with me in the book of Philemon. It's going to be over about two blocks, two books to the right. And you're going to go by Titus, and then you're going to find Philemon, and you're going to find verse number 24. You say, preacher, what chapter? Verse 24. And he's going to mention it. It's amazing how Paul never forgets to mention, and I understand the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but at the same time we recognize that Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, doesn't forget his co-laborers. You know, I've said it many times that nobody climbs Mount Everest alone. There's always a team of people that helps get you there. Can I help us to understand? A church never gets where God wants it to go by one person alone. It takes a team of people to help us get there. It's together serving God. We are fellow laborers for the Lord. I can't accomplish what God has for me. You can't accomplish what God has for you. We can't accomplish what God has for our church unless we do it together. And you're going to find that Demas at one time with a group of men served Paul, and they served God together. Look what he says in verse 24. Demas. There he is. Lucas. He's talking about Dr. Luke. My fellow laborers. He's writing to his friend Philemon. He said, let me tell you about my team. He said, I want to tell you about those that are serving alongside with me. I'm thankful for them. They're a blessing in my life, and I just want to make mention of them. And here we find him as one of Paul's fellow laborers. along with Mark and Luke and Aristarchus and these servants of God. There was a time when Paul and Demas labored together for the Lord. He was sold out for God. He was a promising young preacher on fire for God, burning with a radiant love for the Lord Jesus. He was wanting to do more, and Paul had asked him to join his evangelistic team. serving Him together side by side. They no doubt preached together. Now while Paul was probably the main preacher, there was no doubt times that in other parts of a city or in the synagogue or whatever it might have been that no doubt Timothy or maybe Titus or Demas or one of the others would handle the Word of God. And they would go from city to city, place to place, and they would labor together preaching the Word of God, reaching. A lost and dying world. They did it arm in arm. They preached together. They planted together. You say, what do you mean by that? Did they garden? No, they were missionaries. They planted churches. Wherever Paul and his evangelistic team went, when you find them in the New Testament, they go into a town. They either had a revival or a riot, one or the other. But something was going to happen. And right there in the middle of it all was a man by the name of Demas. He labored right alongside of them, no doubt maybe baptizing converts, discipling new believers, helping ordain preachers and organizing churches. Somebody wrote Paul would plant and Demas would water. Paul would hold the nail and Demas would swing the hammer, or vice versa. Demas would hold the nail and Paul would swing the hammer. But together they planted churches all over the known world. They served together. They planted, they preached, and they prayed. Remember we met a man by the name of Epaphras last week, learned what it was to be a prayer warrior. No doubt that Demas was part of those prayer meetings. And nothing draws people together like praying. Do you know you can't pray for somebody and stay mad at them? Somewhere along the line you're going to fall in love with them. You just can't pray with somebody and like a magnet it not draw your and knit your hearts together. No doubt that they had shared prayer requests together. They had prayed for one another. They had prayed for new converts and new churches and areas of the world and the direction of where God would have them to go. And so they preached together and they planted together and they prayed together. You know what? I bet they were even persecuted together. Because whenever Paul faced persecution, do you know his team faced persecution too? 2 Corinthians 11, we won't turn there for the sake of time tonight. Verses 23-28 lists all the sufferings of the apostle Paul. how he was beaten and shipwrecked and went through trials and difficulty and hardship and perils and pressures and persecutions. And these people on that team, they went there with him. I wonder how many times that maybe they stared into the jaws of death together, maybe prayed for God to spare their lives from an angry mob or the constant threat and peril of traveling in the ancient world. And somebody said that both Paul and Demas had been singed by the fires of persecution. Demas was standing on the mountaintop of spiritual zeal, but then he's going to find himself falling into the valley of worldliness. Wonder how many times Paul had reminded them, Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed, lest he fall. Can I tell you, I don't care how on fire for God you might be. I don't care how in love with Jesus you and I might be. I don't care how deep we might be in the work of God. There's always the danger of spiritual failure in our lives. Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth. Boy, when we think we're there, it may be that we're on the verge of falling. How dangerous it is. There was a devotion that he had. No doubt he was a devoted man. Loved God with his life. But there's going to be a decision that he's going to make. Can I tell you, it wasn't long after Paul had written these words to Philemon, he's going to describe Luke as the blood physician. But no longer will he speak of Demas as a fellow laborer. I think it's in your notes, it's not in mine. I'm going to turn there, Colossians chapter 4 and verse number 14. This is the other snapshot. Remember I told you there were three? I believe Philemon was snapshot one. Here's snapshot two. There's something that's happened. Demas is not the same. This man of devotion is getting ready to make a tragic decision. Look what it says in verse number 14. He's mentioning his co-workers again. He said, Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas. No longer is it fellow laborer. No longer is it prayer warrior, preacher, servant of the Lord. It's none of those. It's just and Demas greets you. He's with us, but he's really not with us. He's no longer a fellow laborer. He's just Demas. Maybe Paul had sensed a change in him. Maybe he could see that his zeal had begun to wane. Maybe his enthusiasm for the things of God had begun to wax cold. I don't believe that happened overnight. I believe it took time. It's not that one day Demas was preaching and witnessing and praying and working and serving, and then the next day something snapped and he decides he's had enough. No, it doesn't happen that way. I've found that many times there's a cooling effect that takes place in the lives of Christians. It happens over a period of time. I want to give you a verse. Proverbs 14, 14. I don't know if it's in your notes. Just jot it down. The Bible said, The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways. Here's the point I want you to notice. The backslider in heart. This matter of going away from God. This matter of cooling in our love for the Lord Jesus. This matter of failure in the Christian life is a matter of the heart. It's a matter of the heart. That's where it takes place. Oh, I can be fervently serving on the outside, but my heart cooling on the inside. Every year we get a crop of freshman Bible college students. Every year we'll tell them that a Bible college is a wonderful place to grow cold on God. You say, preacher, why is that? I remember as a freshman in Bible college, I was told that. I've said in many a chapel where an orientation of students in other colleges, Bible colleges, and the president of that college or a preacher would remind them that Bible college is an easy place to fall away from God. We tell them every year here at Calvary Baptist Bible College that very same thing. You say, preacher, why is that? Because you see, you study the Bible. And the same thing's true maybe in your home school, in a Christian school. The Bible, if we're not careful, can become an academic discipline. It can just become another book that we study. You go to Bible college, every class centers around this book. You would think that with the Bible being front and center that it just draws you. But no, if you're not careful, you can become so accustomed opening the Bible and doing the work and going through the motions that it becomes like math and reading and history and science. It just becomes another academic responsibility. And I'm afraid if we're not careful, Christian, you and I have become so accustomed to our Bible and we read it, but sometimes it's just an academic or habitual matter that we take care of and we never really nourish our heart. Oh, that happens in the lives of preachers. I live with this book every day of my life. But if I'm not careful, all I do is go to the Bible to prepare messages, and I fail to prepare my heart, and my heart gets cold. Ralph Sexton Sr., he made this statement, I'll never forget it. He said you really don't have a person if you don't have their heart. The Lord no longer had Demas' heart. I'm going to ask you a question tonight. Does he have your heart? Before a person ever leaves the Father's house like the prodigal son for the world, their heart's already out there. The prodigal son was in the hog pen long before he ever went there. He was in the far country long before he ever left the father's house. It all happens in the heart. This one reminds me of the fellow who was proposing to his girlfriend. He said, now honey, I'm not wealthy like Jerome, but I love you. And you know, I don't have fine jewels and fancy clothes like Jerome does, but I want you to know I love you. That girl got to thinking for a moment. She said, honey, I love you too, but tell me more about Jerome. We're not careful. We'll get our eyes on the world. We'll look at its trinkets. We'll look at what it has to offer. and we'll turn our eyes away from the Lord Jesus. You remember we sing the song, turn your eyes upon Him, look full in His wonder, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace. But yet, wait a minute, wait a minute, do you realize that the converse, the opposite of that can be true as well? That we can begin looking at the world and all that it has to offer, all of its trinkets and all of its gadgets and all of its fun, and if we're not careful, we begin to gaze at it, It turns our eyes away. And guess what happens? The light of the Lord begins to grow strangely dim in our lives. Wow. How dangerous. I believe that's why the Lord said we can't serve two masters. There's no way you can love two masters. You can't do it. The Greeks, they said, had a game when a man would get on the back of two horses and he would ride them and have his foot, his leg on the top of both saddles and he would have hold of the reins and those two horses going around the track and he would ride them as far as he could. But he always knew eventually those two horses would split off in different directions. He would have to make a decision which horse he was going to ride. And can I tell you, you can't have your foot, and I can't have my foot, one foot in the world's saddle, and one foot in the Lord's saddle, and expect to continue to go on. No, somewhere along the line, we've got to make a decision which saddle we're going to ride in. Demas had a decision to make. He needed to decide which horse he was going to ride. And the pull of the world was getting harder and harder to resist, and he made the wrong decision. You know, the more we say yes to the world, the easier it becomes to say no to God. I thought about tonight. I looked out here tonight, and I was so blessed. I mean, we're right here, dead in the middle of summer, and we've got a wonderful, wonderful attendance tonight on Wednesday night. You're here. Bless my heart. I just thought about it. I said, Lord, look at all the people that's come tonight to honor You. I thought about how just a part of who's here tonight are elevated and then life groups, people all over our property being ministered to tonight. How thankful I am for that. Do you know there used to be people that sit right here on a Wednesday night? They did. They served right here. We begin to let down in our devotional life and then we'll begin to let down in our worship life. And usually the first thing that will begin to slip will be a Sunday night or a Wednesday night. And then before you know it, we sort of let our Sunday school or our life group attendance go. And then before you know it, it's just Sunday morning at 10.30. And then it's not long until that sort of hit and miss. And then it's not long until you find yourself out. It just doesn't take much. I found that the more we say yes to the world, the easier it is to say no to God. The very opposite is true. The more I say yes to God, the easier it is to say no to the world. The world has so many ways of drawing our allegiance, pulling our love. That's what it seeks to do. It seeks to cool our love for Jesus. You see, very quickly tonight, I want to bring the message to a close. There was a devotion that he had. He was a devoted man. He was a god? Nobody could have looked down the corridor of time and saw Demas away from God. No, he was serving, he was fervent, he was faithful, he was involved, he was doing, he was there. And then he made a decision. And then thirdly, there's the devastation that he faced. You know what? We're not told that Demas came to a tragic end. We're not told that. We're not told that some kind of tragedy happened in his life. We're not told that. He just sort of falls off the pages of the Word of God. He's just no longer there. Oh, I believe he's in heaven. He made a decision, but wait a minute, it's forever inscribed in the pages of the Word of God for over 2,000 years. Here's been the shame. I go back to II Timothy 4 verse 10. For Demas, I need you to come, Timothy. I need you to come quickly. Get here as quick as you can. For Demas hath forsaken me. Watch this next phrase. Having loved this present world. Could you imagine having your name written in the Word of God and that said about you. I couldn't imagine that. But yet it can happen. There's more than one preacher like me that's no longer doing what God called them to do. They've experienced failure in their lives. Let me just quickly give you the final fill in your blanks and give you these thoughts, okay? I think that we've already been challenged tonight, haven't we? He loved the world. Preacher, what do you mean by the world? We're not talking about the trees and the birds and all that. He's not talking about the world of men because Jesus loved the world of men and died for it. He's talking about a world system. You hear this word a lot, kosmos. It's an orderly arrangement, a system. Get our English word cosmetics from that lady putting her face in order. God put the cosmos, the universe in order. But yet here it stands for more than just the solar system and the sun, moon, stars, planets, galaxies, all of that. No, it's more than that. Here's what God said in I John 2.15, Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. It's not wrong if you love photography. It's not wrong if you love to paint, or to draw, or to hunt, or to fish, or to yard sale, or to go to Hobby Lobby. I just don't have to love it. That's not what he's talking about. It's where I love this world more than I love God. The world is society. Here's what it is. It's society that's not only apart from God, but in opposition to God. That's what it is. It's in opposition to God. That means they're in opposition to what God's doing. Here's what John Wesley said back in the 1700s, 1750s. He said, the world is anything that cools my love for Jesus. Anything that I get so caught up in, so passionate about, that I don't love Jesus the way I used to love Him. That's what he's talking about. the things that are in it. He goes on to say in that same verse, if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Here's what he's saying, to the extent that I love the world is how much I lack in my love for God. That's what he's saying. You can't love them both equally. And God demands to be preeminent in our lives. The love of the world had moved into Demas' heart and it moved the love of God out. Can I help us understand that? A backslider is not just a Christian that maybe is living in immorality or maybe involved in drunkenness or gambling or falling into some terrible sin. It's much deeper than that. We can go to church, we can come to church, we can sing in the choir, teach in the Sunday school, preach in the pulpits, and yet be cold and backslidden in our heart. It's not a location. It's not. It's a direction away from God. Not only did he love the world, he left the work. That word forsaken means to leave down in. It has the idea of a man in a pit with no way out, and you leave him down in that pit. And Paul, here he's in the Mamertine prison in Rome, and you're going to find that we would say it like this, that Demas let Paul down. But he didn't just let Paul down. He let himself down. He let other members of the team down. But most of all, he let the Lord down. Do you know that word forsaken is the very same word that Jesus used on the cross when He said, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? It means to utterly abandon. The Father literally abandoned His Son to die on the cross. And Demas turned his back. He abandoned the work of God. He abandoned the Lord. He abandoned the service of God. He abandoned the servant of God by the name of Paul. When you and I begin to cool in our love and our affection for the Lord, and we go away from God, can I tell you, it doesn't just affect us. It doesn't just affect our family. It affects the entire body of Christ. Our church, we're members one of another. You see, the Bible said if one member of the body suffers, the rest of it suffers too. You say, how do you know that? Well, go home and hit your finger with a hammer and then give me a call. I believe it hurts all through, doesn't it? All the way down. Can I help you to understand? Every person that's a part of the body of Calvary Baptist Church is vitally important not only to the mission, but the welfare. and the health of our ministry. When one person gets cold, it affects another person. It affects everybody. Because you're not serving. You're not sharing your giftedness. You're not provoking or stirring those around you to love and good works. We're not interested in other people. We're not making a difference in the lives of others. We're not serving the Lord. We suffer. We do. And let me just say that you think, well, nobody's going to miss me. But yet, you know, whether you ever receive a phone call or a card in the mail or a note or somebody letting you know, oh, you're missed because we grow together, and your giftedness helps me grow, and my giftedness helps you grow, and we need each other. And let me give you this last point and I'm done. He lost his witness. I wonder how many people Demas could have reached how to remain faithful. I wonder what could have been in his life. You know, leading a small college, and we have a very small college, but yet it's been an impactful college. We've got servants of the Lord all over the world. We've got church planters out of Calvary Baptist Bible College all over America that's planted churches. It's made a difference. I'm thankful. You don't have to run thousands to make a difference. Sometimes great impact can be made in the lives of just a half dozen or maybe a couple dozen people where great impact can be made through their lives. I always look back at students who have come through our college. And they started the race and then they quit. And they went on to something else. And I've often wondered what could have been. What could have been? People I've pastored, I've watched their family come into our church and began to watch them blossom and grow and then something happens. I mean, you would have thought it. But then something happens and they made a decision and they began to drift away from God. And then before you know it, they're gone. And I always look back and think about what could have been with their family. I wonder what God would have done with their children. I wonder how God would have used their lives. I wonder what impact they could have made. You see, Demas will always be remembered for what could have been, not what was. That's Paul. That's Timothy. That's Titus. That's Luke. That's Mark. But Demas was what could have been. Don't let the epitaph of your life be what could have been. Don't be like Demas and love the world. Let's just stay in love with Jesus. Amen? Let's bow our heads tonight.