In the Word of God, to the second letter of John, verses 10 and 11. The second letter of John, verses 10 and 11. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him Godspeed. For he that biddeth him Godspeed is a partaker of his evil deeds. And my title for this evening's message is Biblical Separation. We will be primarily focusing on these verses this evening and dealing with this vital topic of biblical separation. But we begin, we don't begin in these verses, we begin in verse four. So I draw your attention to verse four. The Apostle John encouraging, with encouraging words concerning believers he knew walking in the faith. I rejoice greatly that I found of thy children walking in truth as we have received a commandment from the Father. So last week I dealt with, we began the study in the second letter of John, continuing from the first letter of John, and We still see some issues that were in the first letter and here again in the second letter. We see the same dangers, the Gnostic false teachers causing trouble in these churches, although it was an early form of Gnosticism. And here the Apostle in verse 4 is so thankful and so grateful for the fact that those whom he knows, this lady, whether this lady was an actual lady or whether John used the term symbolically to describe a church whom he knew very well and believed as whom he knew, whichever direction you go, the lessons remain the same, but his delight and joy in seeing believers growing in grace, walking in the truth. Well, this is a pattern and example for preachers and ministers in general. This should be the heart of gospel preachers and those who are standing in pulpits. This should be their great concern, just as a parent has a particular concern for their children and their well-being, and so many things to think about and have concern over. Well, it's also the same with ministers, with those who are charged by God to have flocks. They are to labour, they are to pray, and they are to have that anticipation and hope to see those whom they have care over grow in the faith. And these things should be so important to them, and they should delight in these things. When they see believers growing in grace and their love for the truth, well, this should excite ministers more than anything else. And this is certainly the case with the Apostle John. He has such a pastoral heart, even though he himself wasn't In a particular church, he oversaw, no doubt, a lot of churches in that region of Asia Minor. But he knew many believers intimately, and he names them. In the third letter of John, he names believers. So this was the heart of the Apostle John. It's very sad when you have ministers and they are indifferent to the spiritually dangerous things that can come into churches, spiritual dangers that can infiltrate into churches and cause so much damage. And if pastors aren't different to this, well, they should question their call to the ministry, because these things can really make such shipwreck, not only of believers' faith, they could really struggle in the faith as a result, they could lose instrumentality and so on, but even those who are not believers, it could really cause so much damage. And so the Apostle John, out of great love, has warnings in this letter. He rejoices to see them walking in the truth and growing in grace, but he continues in verses five and six. I'm gonna move swiftly through these verses, because I really want to get to the main theme in verses 10 and 11, which is such an important theme, but verses five and six. Now I beseech thee, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment unto thee, but that which we had from the beginning, that we love one another. And this is love, that we walk after his commandments, This is the commandment, that as ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it. This is so typical of John's exhortations concerning mutual love for fellow believers. This exhortation, we've seen it in the first letter, but also here again in the second letter, this exhortation for mutual love. But this mutual love of necessity must be grounded in the truth. This mutual love cannot exist without the foundation of the truth. It must be in that context. Genuine Christian love can only exist when there is the foundation of truth. And when the foundation of truth is compromised, well, it's no longer genuine Christian fellowship and Christian love. And this will be the Apostle John's reasoning here in these verses. And he goes on in verses seven and eight and nine and 10 to list out the warnings of what happens when the truth is compromised. So I'm moving swiftly through these verses, but for good reason. And we turn to verse seven. Here's the warning. If this mutual love is neglected and there's no love for the truth, things start going wrong. Verse seven. For many deceivers are entered into the world who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. These Gnostic teachers, they once were among you. We are told in the first letter of John that they were of us. They were in our congregations, but they were not truly saved because they left us and they went into the world. They're now in the world, but they have an appetite. They have an appetite for more followers. And there are some of these False teachers and deceivers, they are visiting churches. Now, the churches, generally speaking, I believe, many of them were house churches. They couldn't worship in the temple, and there was persecution, and so on, and we see this in the book of Acts, that many believers met in houses. And these false teachers were visiting, these were attempting to do so, and they came across as very friendly and genuine, and they were coming across as just fellow co-gospel workers and itinerant preachers. Here are our services, we're available. And this is how they came across, so friendly, so courteous, but they blaspheme Christ because they deny that he came in the flesh. So the exhortation and the warnings continue in verse eight as a result of this. Look to yourselves that we lose not those things which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward. Be watchful, examine yourself, examine the atmosphere of the church, be on your guard. Be jealous for the truth. And that's so important. Have a jealous devotion to the truth. Be committed to it. Protect the faith. Protect your own faith. In Revelation 3, verse 11, we read the following. Christ's words, behold, I come quickly. Hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. There's always an attempt for the truth to be compromised, to be attacked in some shape or form, and we must ever be on our guard and be watchful as a result of this. Treasure these things above all else. If I don't treasure the truth more than anything else in life, well, I can loosen my grip on the truth. And as a result, I could lose so much. If I'm a true believer, I will not lose my salvation, but I can experience other troubles in my walk. with the Lord. As a result, I could lose my instrumentality. The spirit can be grieved. If a church allows compromise, and we'll explain these things as I go on to verses 10 and 11, but if churches allow compromise, even subtle compromise, to enter among them, then, well, years later, Those who truly love the Lord could be leaving the congregation in tears because they're forced to, because there's now a takeover, and these people have won the hearts of the majority. That often happens, and it's so sad when it does happen. It's so subtle, it can come in so subtly. Well, verse nine, whosoever transgresseth, the apostle Paul really, I mean, I beg your pardon, the apostle John makes it clear and reminds them You need to really look out, you really need to know who these people are. They transgress, and they abide not in the doctrine of Christ. You ought to know the doctrines. They abide not in the doctrine of Christ. You can make that plural, the doctrines of Christ, penal substitution, and justification by faith, and these other precious doctrines. And hath not God, he that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. So remember that these people who offer their services to you, who want to have fellowship with you, and you know where they stand on these issues, They come across as fellow workers, but they're not fellow workers. They're not co-workers with you in the gospel. These are not minor differences. No, these men are denying the humanity of Christ. They're denying the very gospel. Don't give them any foot room. Don't call them to preach or to labor with you in the gospel. And then we reach the climax in verses 10 and 11. And I really wanna stay in these verses this evening, because it's such a vital topic. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine, the doctrine of Christ, which composes of the doctrines of our faith, receive him not into your house, neither bid him but God speed. For he that biddeth him God speed is a partaker of his evil deeds. So we remain on these verses and this crucial topic of biblical separation. Whether the Apostle John is addressing this lady who is using her house as the gathering of the church, or whether it's a church gathering in a house, he's warning them. these men are visiting house churches and they're offering their services as authentic preachers and Christians have that, because they're saved, they have this natural kindness and tendency to be hospitable and to welcome itinerant preachers in. This is what we should do. There's this exhortation in the third letter. Those who are genuine gospel workers, well, be hospitable to them. Help them along their way, support them. But watch out for these particular individuals and know where they stand. Don't give them hospitality. Don't even greet them. It's so serious, the warning of John, and for good reason. Don't give these deceivers hospitality. Don't invite them to your meetings to speak. They are not co-workers. They are enemies of the cross of Christ. And the Apostle John and others who were fellow workers in the gospel, they may have reasoned in the following way. Be on your watch and remember our dear brother Paul. At this particular time, Paul was already dead. He had gone to be with the Lord. Remember our dear beloved Paul, how he wrote also that we mustn't be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. and because they deny the things that they deny, they are truly unbelievers, and we cannot be unequally yoked with them in gospel work. So this is what these Gnostic teachers were doing, visiting different house churches, and they came across as so courteous and friendly. Well, what about today? Someone may say, I don't see the harm of helping or supporting Other churches which are different from us, not hugely different, they call themselves evangelical. They call themselves Bible-believing. Yes, their worship is quite different. Their worship is contemporary. I'll get to that point later. and they may use the NIV and things of this kind, but I've heard that preacher, and he says good things, this preacher. He says that Christ is the only Savior, and he says that God demonstrated His love by sending Christ to die on the cross. I've heard him say these good things. Yes, but friends, It's so important to understand this, that often false doctrine can often be detected not by what the preacher says, but what the preacher does not say. And this has been a personal experience of mine. When I was a young Christian and going to a certain church and I had this anxiety for a while, I was troubled and I couldn't put my finger on it until later on I understood. So a preacher may say, have evangelical language and mention certain truths of the gospel, but he may miss out vital chunks. He may never discuss certain things which are crucial to salvation. He may tell you that God demonstrated his love by sending his son to die on the cross, but he will never mention things like guilt, that we're guilty sinners, and Christ had to die in our place and be judged in our place. They will never mention things like the fact that we're guilty, and we're guilty, and God the Father poured out his wrath upon his son. Language like this will never be used in many churches. And if that's the case, if the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ is not articulated, is never articulated, Well then probably that denomination and that minister probably most likely deny the doctrine of penal substitution. It's a watered down gospel, it's not genuine. And other doctrines they deny. Well how did this happen? How did these strong Calvinistic churches which were strong in the past, they were Calvinistic, and now they've turned into these wishy-washy, compromised churches, which deny so much of the gospel. How on earth did this happen? And there were many churches like this. There were strong Calvinistic bastions of truth, and now they're compromised, wishy-washy, indoctrined. What happened? Well, we can trace, you know, we can trace it back to some very dangerous movements. For example, higher criticism, which came from the continent, particularly from German scholars, and this kind of liberal teaching came into this country In the mid to late 19th century, Charles Spurgeon had to contend with these issues. This liberal teaching, higher criticism, is, in a nutshell, it's an attack on the Bible, on the credibility of the Bible. And really, no stone is left unturned. Everything is attacked. The authors, are the authors genuine? The deity of Christ? Everything that is torn to shreds with this higher criticism. And it came into the Bible seminaries, it came into the colleges, at that time and it filtered through into the churches as ministers were trained in these colleges and seminaries and institutions and this is what happened. But then there's another dangerous movement which came about, which is particularly relevant to our teaching of biblical separation, which rose in the late 1940s, and that is the new evangelical and ecumenical movement. And that was very dangerous also, where these pioneers of this new way of thinking repudiated the idea of biblical separation. They hated this doctrine of the fact that we must separate from error. And the new attitude that many evangelical people, that the mindset they had was this, is that, well, we have so many battles to fight. There are so many battles that we as ministers and churches, there's so many outside battles. There's atheism, there's secularism, there's false religion. And what are we doing squabbling with each other about these things in church? We need to unite together and put an affront and fight the enemy outside. This was the reasoning. We shouldn't be fighting with each other. We should look over these minor doctrinal differences and unite together and reach the world for Christ. This was the attitude of this new evangelical or new ecumenical movement. Well, who would be under the umbrella of this new movement, which took place in the late 1940s? And it's grown astronomically since then, but who would be included? Well, pretty much every Tom, Dick, and Harry who professes the name of Christ. That's the benchmark. All you need to do is just profess that Jesus is Lord and you're pretty much ticked in, you're in. You can be Catholic, Anglican, charismatic, Pentecostal, and many other liberal denominations, you're welcomed in. And we can all unite together to reach the world for Christ. Well, what if there was a local ecumenical alliance in our city? What if we got a letter or we got a phone call from churches saying, come, join this movement of churches in this city and we'll all reach, we can come together and we can reach the people of Chichester with the gospel? Well, would we take this into consideration? Couldn't we reach many more souls for Christ? Besides, some of these churches, I know for a fact that some of these churches have hundreds of people attending them. So we could reach the gospel with so many people. So many of these people are not saved. But this passage reveals the fatal flaw of that pragmatic thinking in verse 11. For he that biddeth him God's speed is a partaker of his evil deeds. I can't justify helping, assisting, supporting, joining any organization, denomination, or church which undermines or compromises the truth in any shape or form. When these churches do so, if I do this, I'm supporting them. I'm supporting that church which is flooded with worldliness. I'm supporting that church which denies penal substitution. It's not an opportunity for the gospel, it's a pollution of the gospel. That's what it is. I'm polluting the gospel by joining hands with these people, with those who deny so many critical truths. And maybe those who don't deny them in theology, but that they deny them in practice by what's happening in their churches, terrible things happening in their churches, with worldliness flooding in. Well, this passage of scripture, among many others, forbids us to do this, to support, unite, or join ourselves. Well, even with other sound churches, we're not actually to make this ecclesiastical joint with other churches. We can assist and help each other in a loose way and have loose friendship and support other sound churches, like-minded churches, but certainly not other ones which compromise the truth in this way. Well, I wish the battle ended there, but it doesn't. The battle doesn't end there, because today Satan is using a very insidious and subtle method to cause good reformed churches to fall, even without this outward ecumenical tie or bond. Satan is using something else, without this outward ecumenical union. And this, This method that Satan is using will churches, reformed churches, will end up going down this ecumenical pathway, this outward ecumenical pathway. And what is this method? Infiltration. What means of infiltration? Well, bringing in worldliness. And one of the ways in which he does this is he changes the worship. It starts in a very subtle way. Don't bring in the drum kits straight away. Don't bring in the bass guitars. Don't bring in these things. Don't catch them off. They will awaken to the danger. No, what you should do is change the hymn book. So that includes modern songs as well as traditional. Have the traditional hymns in there as well, but have the modern hymns as well. Have those and don't go too extreme. Don't go too extreme, not yet. Use what I call bridge hymns. and these transitional hymns, which are sound in theology. Some of these hymns are sound in theology, but they're written by contemporary artists, and they will tell you, I've listened to what they say, they will tell you, we normally don't write and compose hymns like this. Normally our songs are very edgy, repetitive and fun. But the reason why we've composed these particular hymns, which are rich in theology, is to win over conservative churches. That's why they're writing these hymns. It's downright deceptive. And yes, there are these theologically sound modern songs. And a believer may come up to a preacher and say, but preacher, the words of this hymn are so good, and it's rich in theology. How deep the Father's love for us in Christ alone. And have you read these Hymns? Yes, I've read them. I've read the hymns. And yes, they are theologically sound, but if you realize who wrote these hymns, and what this man's views are, and how ecumenical he is, this particular individual has no problems performing a worship conference in front of the Pope. He has no problem with that. He has no problem joining hands with Catholics, and in fact he's very eager, the man who wrote these hymns. And he wrote these particular hymns with the idea of beguiling conservative reformed churches and bringing them over to this great ecumenical heresy. This is the idea. Yes, the hymn in and of itself may seem innocent, but it's not, friends. It's actually very, very dangerous. And plus, this particular individual, this contemporary artist, he has crazy charismatic and new age mystic views, and these theologically sound songs often with a soft rock background, well, they're actually far more dangerous than the blatantly worldly hymns. They're far more dangerous because I already know some reformed churches who are going down this road. I'm not gonna mention them, but there are already reformed churches who have had these hymn books, who have these hymns in them, and really, in 15, 20 years' time, they will be as these other churches are. It's a slippery slope. There's that transition. And the goal is to be united with Rome, with the Roman Catholic Church, where we're all worshipping the same songs, we're all worshipping with the same style. So what's stopping us from joining hands and coming together in a united cause to reach the gospel for Christ? It's dangerous. Reformed churches are introducing these hymns, not many, but I know of some, and it's very sad. Whether they realise it or not, they have already begun the ecumenical journey. I will never dream of associating this church with this particular movement or that particular movement, but if you've got this hymn book and these hymns, and you know these authors and where they stand, if you have them in your church, well, things are going to change whether you like it or not. And this is what happens. It'll only be a matter of time when that outward ecumenical movement will be made with the church, because the spiritual union was made many years before, when I decided to defile the worship of the church and borrow these hymns, which although they may be theologically sound, but the source is compromised. The source of these hymns is seriously compromised. A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit. So these things are so important to understand. These people who compose these hymns, they deny the gospel. They are so off the rails. So this is the warning of these verses in verses 10 and 11. If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine. Receive him not into your house, neither bid him Godspeed, for he that biddeth him Godspeed is a partaker of his evil deeds. If I embrace these hymns, I may not want to have outward ties with these people, but if I embrace these hymns, if I embrace the worship, then that support has begun. I'm supporting, I'm encouraging this. I'm a partaker of the evil deeds, the principle applies. So we must be so careful. The enemy of souls is attacking churches on many fronts, not just one particular area, so we must be on our guard. Yes, not to be careful concerning the ecumenical movement, but also the subtle strategy of Satan. Satan can see that some churches, yes, they're very spiritually discerned, so I'll try another method. I'll try to go in through the back door and introduce these theologically sound hymns. There aren't many. but there's some of them and by these means will creep in and pollute the church. So may the Lord help us to have that firm stand on the truth and earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the saints. May God help us in these things. Amen.