Look at verse number 15 and 16 of 2 Peter 2. Now, Peter is speaking to these false teachers and he says, which have, the which they're referring to these false teachers he's been talking about, which have forsaken the way of truth and are going astray. And he develops that on that, following the way of Balaam, the son of Bosar, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but was rebuked for his iniquity, the dumb ass, speaking with a man's voice, forbade the madness of the prophet. And so he says they went astray. They said they forsaken the right way, gone astray. And then he explains how, what it means that they went astray, is they followed the way of Balaam. And so what I want to get to in Lord Will and Next Sunday Night is the way of Balaam. I want to talk about the way of Balaam. But tonight I want to look at these statements he makes leading up to that subject. So let's pray and ask the Lord to help us learn something, get something out of this tonight. Father, we thank You for a good day. And Lord, just a blessing, this evening's service has been a joy. And Lord, before we come to the Lord's Supper, Lord's Table, I pray that You'd just open our hearts to the Word of God. And You'd help us be grounded and sure and unmovable in our faith and our stand on the Old Bible. I ask that You would fill me with Your Holy Spirit. I pray that You would take my body as I yielded anew and presented anew, and use it as a tool to communicate the truths in these verses right here. So have Your way is my prayer. Help us to be receptive and open to Your will. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen. I tell you, Peter is powerfully exposing the corruption of these false teachers. Peter here in 2 Peter chapter 2, and then what we're studying in Sunday school on Sunday mornings in the auditorium class, Jude. These two fellas are absolutely taken it to the false teachers. And they're warning the churches, they're exposing them, and both of them, and a lot of this I've said a number of times, and I hope you take and look at it. Read Jude, it's just 20 some verses. Read 2 Peter here. They're almost verbatim the same. Obviously, Peter and Jude were in communication, I think. and dealing with this issue that was of great concern to the churches of the day and is still a concern to our churches of our day. And he's absolutely powerfully exposing them and using strong language as he continues on. He's exposing their false doctrine. We've talked about that. They're bringing in false teaching. But he goes beyond that and he's addressing the individuals themselves and what kind of people they are. Their doctrine was corrupt. And listen, there is corrupt doctrine. Not everything that calls itself Christian is Christian. You understand that, right? Now to be very honest with you, Baptists never did pay much attention to what the Pope has to say. But when he comes out and says all religions lead to God, he's dead wrong. That's heresy. Which 99% of the statements that come off his lips is heresy. But there is such a thing as false doctrine that if believed and followed, will lead people to hell, to be very honest with you. And Peter's warning that. He said, do not let that in your church. Do not let this false teaching get into your teaching ministries of your church and the preaching of your church and guard the church from these assaults, these doctrinal assaults on the church. But then he's going beyond that, as I said, and he's exposing their corruption, not just their doctrine, but their corruption of them personally. And he's talking about what kind of people they are that are bringing this false doctrine into the church. They are corrupt men, personally, in their lifestyle and in their morals. We saw that a little bit earlier. He said, in fact, if you would, just look there, we preached on this already, but verse 14 is a classic illustration of what I'm trying to say. Having eyes full of adultery that cannot cease from sin. Would you agree with me? That's debauchery. That's corruption. Beguiling unstable souls. Hearts they have exercised with covetous practices. Cursed children. Good heavens. He's exposing more than just their doctrine. He's exposing their character. And in verse 15 and 16, he makes two statements about their character, about what kind of people these people are. Now, I want to just say a word or two about character. We talk about doctrine, the importance of doctrine. But I want to tell you, character is important. You don't hear that word a whole lot anymore. There was a day, and I know everything's politicized today, so I hesitate, but there was a day when politicians talked about character, about men and women of character. What we used to call them was statesmen. It was men and women in office that had some convictions about them, had some morals, some integrity, some character about them, and they didn't go with the wind. They weren't out for what was most popular. They were for what was right. And if they got voted in, they got voted in. If they didn't, they didn't. But they were standing on the truth and on what is right. That's character. And there used to be talk, there used to talk in the political realm of character. You don't even hear the, and by the way, in the education system, they would talk and teach and educate about character. Now, I don't know what goes on today. I see what's in the news and scares the daylights out of me. What's happening in our education system. But there's character needed in our education system. And you don't hear, I guess, I don't hear much about it being talked about in our education, all levels. Used to be talked about in churches. About character, integrity, honesty. Standing and doing what's right, regardless whether it's popular or not. Now the big catchphrase is, is we need to connect with the community. We need to be relative to what's going on in the community. Listen, if truth is relative, we stand for the truth. If truth is relative in the community, we stand for the truth. If the community doesn't consider truth relative, we still stand for the truth. Character, character, character. These men that Peter is exposing are lacking in character. And he's exposing it. I did a little study, got thinking about that concept of having character. And I found this fascinating. The word itself, the word character, the very root word it comes from, if you're going to go down to its most basic level meaning, it means this. An engraved imprint. like you would engrave. We were hiking yesterday around the falls and we went down this little fall way in the back there and somewhere down in there and there was some rocks where somebody had taken some rocks or something and had scratched into the rocks. They had engraved into those rocks some initials. There was one said D.L. Hearts K.L. I don't know what that meant but D.L. You guys don't get it? Never mind. It looked fresh. It looked like somebody had just put it there. But that's the word character. The word character means to be in great, and this is the idea behind where the word came from. This is the idea behind it. It is where truth What is right is indelibly engraved into the heart and soul of an individual. In other words, a person with character, it is engraved. It's engraved on their heart and soul, doing right. We all understand we have sinful nature, right? Anybody found that to be true? We have a sinful nature. We battle it every day. How many people had to battle and deal with your sinful nature today? Yeah, it's every day. It's all the time. It's there. We have a sinful nature, a fallen nature, but we can still, in spite of that, we can still have godly character. You follow what I'm saying? Character. To engrave or imprint on the heart and soul. These traits that are engraved into my heart and soul make me the person that I am. I do what I do because I am what I am. You follow what I'm saying? A little animal that's going around barking, the barking doesn't make that animal a dog. The fact that he's a dog is what makes him bark. You see where I'm going with this? It's our character. If a person is a liar, then that person, their character is flawed in the area of honesty. You follow what I'm saying? If a person has eyes full of adultery, as he describes there in verse 14, That means their character is flawed in the area of purity. Character. It's the moral, somebody put it this way, it's the moral structure of what I am. Character, character. Now, character versus reputation. A reputation, at least most people's concept of reputation, is what people believe me to be, right? A reputation is what people think I am. A reputation is my appearance. What others think I am, what others believe me to be, how I appear to be, that's my reputation. These false prophets were coming into the church under the guise of a good reputation. If you would, notice there back in verse number 1, he says, but there were false prophets. And I keep coming back to this verse in our messages, but it sets the tone for the whole chapter. But there were false prophets among the people, the Old Testament Israel, even as there shall be false teachers among you who privily shall bring in damnable heresies. They're not coming in open. They're not coming in honest. They're not coming in transparent. They're coming in privily. They have this reputation. Oh, yeah, he's a good guy. Oh, she's wonderful. And that's their reputation, but it's not their character. Reputation is what people think I am. Character is what I actually am. Reputation is what people believe me to be. My reputation is the image I portray when I'm in public, when I'm around others. But my character is what I am when no one else is watching. I think I may be mistaken on this. I think it was Bob Jones Sr. said, your character is revealed by what you do when no one knows you're doing it. If there's things we could do and we were certain that no one would ever know and there never be consequences, I wonder how much sinful things we would indulge in if we were convinced nobody would ever know and that there would never be any public consequences. My character says, I'm going to do right whether anybody knows about it or not. I'm going to do right regardless of what the consequences are. I'm going to do right. And these fellows did not have character. They had the reputation, but they did not have character. They were coming in privily. They were operating on their reputation, what they appeared to be, and not their character. Now, we come to our text, verse 15 and 16, and he makes two statements about these false teachers. Number one, he says, they've forsaken the right way. And then number two, they followed the way of Balaam. Now, following the way of Balaam, we're going to look at that in a future message, Lord willing. And tonight, I want to look at this just briefly. They have forsaken the right way and are gone astray. These men lacking in character, their doctrine was corrupt, their morals were corrupt, they were corrupt personally. And they have forsaken the right way. The word forsaken there, I got study in it, it means this, to depart away from. It means to abandon. To walk away from it. Here's the right way. And that right way has the idea of the, it kind of refers back to when Jesus says, straight is the gate and narrow is the way. That's kind of what Peter's referring to there, I think. Here's the right way. This is the straight way. This is the way of the Lord. This is the Bible way. This is the Jesus way. This is the right way. And they forsaken it. They've walked away from it. They've abandoned it. They have departed from it. They've forsaken the right way. Then he goes on and he kind of restates and he says, which have forsaken the right way and are gone astray. That word gone astray is an interesting word. It means to wander from the truth. And it has kind of dual implications on that phrase, they have gone astray. It means to wander from the truth, but it also has this idea, to lead someone away from the truth. In other words, here's the right way, here's the Bible way, this is the godly way, the way of character, godly, biblical character, that's the right way. They've forsaken that and they've gone astray and not only have they themselves wandered from it, they've taken the hand of someone else and are bringing them along with them away. Get the picture? And Peter's saying, that's what these characters are. That's what these yardbirds are. They've gone astray. It means to wander or lead into error. Now, there's two things about that. One is, I notice, it's not a sudden departure. That going astray, the emphasis in the definitions I found, the emphasis was on the wandering part. In other words, it's not just a sudden, all right, nope, I'm not going this way. I'm done with the Bible. I'm going this way. It wasn't that way at all. It wasn't real big and dramatic and announcements and banners. It wasn't any of that. It was to wander. In other words, to slowly drift away from it. And then to have someone else. and come and take them and slowly lead them away. If a false teacher came into Mountlake Independent Baptist Church and they announced right off the bat, we're not believing the Bible, we're forsaking the Bible, we're forsaking the gospel, we're forsaking biblical Christianity, we're going another direction, I'd like to believe not one person in our church would follow them. I'd like to believe that. That's not how they operate. They'll come in and say, oh yeah, we're just like you. Privilege. They believe the same thing. And then. They just slowly take a step. Well, you know, I believe it. I believe that book, sure. But you know, some of those things in there, I wonder if it's just something a little different. Follow what I'm saying? Then just, oh, well, that's not that important. And oh, that's just a little insignificant. Oh, that's a minor thing. Oh, and next thing you know, you're getting farther and farther away. You follow what I'm trying to say, what Peter's saying here? They've wandered from it. They've drifted from it. It's not bland, and it's not big and open. It's just a slow moving, slow moving away, away, away. Next thing you look back, and what you got, you don't even recognize as Christianity. And look around us, and I'm not trying to be judgmental of other churches. God knows I got my hands full with this crowd. And we're not better than anybody else. We understand that. But you look around, some denominations, some churches that years ago stood solid on the Old Book, and stood solid on preaching the Gospel, and stood solid on what is right and wrong. And it just boggles my mind I even need to say this, stood solid on what marriage is. And all of a sudden, okay, we're doing a 180. We're not going that way. It never happens that way. It's always just a little change here, a little change there. And sometimes people ask, they do, they say, what's the big hang up on the old King James? I'll tell you, we start changing our Bible, a whole lot more is going to start changing. What's the big deal about the music? I tell you, we start changing our music, a whole lot more is going to start changing. I've been in this long enough to know that when they start changing the Bible and changing the music, it's eventually going to be, the whole thing's going to be different. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've seen it. Now I'm not opposed to change. I'm not opposed to change, but I am resistant to it. And by that I mean this, if you're going to convince me to change on something, you're going to have to convince me it lines up with that book. Right? And so, he said, boy, you guys are, I had one guy tell me, you guys are awfully strict out there. I said, man, we're not near as strict as I'd like to be, but we just want to do right. And I'm committed by God's grace and with his help, I hope you know my heart. I don't want to drift from the Bible way. I don't want this church to drift from the Bible way. God have mercy, let Leatherman would be the pastor that leads Mountlake Interpentine Baptist Church away from the old King James Bible. By God's grace, that ain't going to happen. And we're not going to drift from the gospel, preaching the gospel, and emphasis on missions, and doing right, and holding biblical standards. I don't want to drift from any of that. And that's how these guys worked. They come in on their reputation. They look good. Oh, one of us. And then they just slowly question this and challenge that and alter this. They work their way into a position here. Then they start changing that and wanting to put the pressure on to move over here. And five, 10, 15, 20 years goes by. Next thing you know, you're out here in left field. And so Peter's warned them. They followed. He says they have forsaken the right way and are gone astray. They're leading others, drifting others. And that's how Christians go astray. That's how churches go astray. And that's how Christians go astray. I've seen it. I'm telling you. And some of y'all have been around. God bless. I'm not judging anybody. We all stand before the Lord on our own. Amen? Everybody has to answer for themselves. But as pastor you observe. I've seen people come in here, all involved, soul winning, faithful, even got positions. And then slowly they miss a little here and they miss a little there. And this changes and that changes. And then they're gone. And then they're gone. I'm telling you, there's a reason we emphasize spending time every day reading your Bible and praying. It's an anchor. Drop that anchor and put it deep in the Word of God, and it keeps me from drifting. It's a reason we don't have just one Sunday morning service a week. We have Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. We've got activities going on during the week. We have Bible Institute. We have all this stuff going on. Why? Because we don't want to drift. We need that constant, constant time. And that's how Christians go astray, just slowly drift, slowly drift. Start listening to something, it's not right, don't line up with the Bible way. Start doing this, start doing that, changing that personally in my own personal life, and start drifting, start drifting, start drifting. And he says that's what these guys have done. So one, when he makes this statement, they've forsaken the right way and are going astray, He's pointing out it happened slowly. They drifted. They just moved over a little bit, little bit, little bit. But there's something else he's saying here. When he uses that word forsaken, they were not, and I've said this before and he's bringing it out again, they were not ignorant of the truth. They were walking away from the truth. It was adrift, it was wandering, but on the part of these false teachers, it was deliberate. Now sometimes people wander and drift and get out of the will of God and get away from the Lord because of negligence or not being careful. It's probably the majority of your church folk drift simply because they're negligent, they're not careful. That's not the case with these guys. They weren't just negligent. One day they were just being lazy in their walk with God and their understanding of the Word of God. No, no, no. They knew exactly the way. The right way. They knew exactly what the Bible way was. And they're saying, we reject it. I'm leaving that. Now they just walk away and announce it. They come a little bit, a little bit, a little bit. We've had some missionaries, and I think Dale and I might have been talking about this recently, but we've had some missionaries over the year, and we've had several hundred we've supported over the years, maybe numerous, five, six hundred maybe over the years that we've supported for a period of time. And we've had a few, very, very small percentage that were on the field or whatever, and they made a decision to change their position. I'm thinking of two in particular, on the field, and they wrote back to the mission board, they wrote to the churches, and said, we are changing our position, we're going into contemporary, and we're going with other versions, and we're going that way. Now, I respect their honesty. I respect them being open, if that's their decision, that's between them and God, and whether we support that or not, that's between us and God, and we didn't, we dropped them. In an appropriate way, an ethical way, but we didn't continue to support that. Now that's one thing, that's not what these guys are doing. They're maintaining the guys, the reputation that we are just what you are, but they're not. They're drifting, they're drifting, they're drifting. They're forsaking. It's a deliberate strategy. They had an agenda and they chose the method of implementing that agenda by using deception. and leading other people astray. That is why Peter and Jude are going ballistic on these guys. Now you read it. You sit down and read 2 Peter 2. You read through Jude. They're going ballistic on them. They're going back to Old Testament, giving illustrations of what God's going to do, how God judges this, and He's describing them in graphic powerful terms of how corrupt they are. But why? Because they're deliberate and they're deceptive in leading astray, leading astray, leading astray. I want to end with this. If you would, go to Hebrews chapter number two. And I think Paul, to be honest with you, was the penman of Hebrews, I think. Now he's warning the folks he's writing to in Hebrews, and he's kind of touching on these same lines. Now I'd like to believe, and I don't think, I sincerely do not believe there's anyone in our church that is deliberately trying to turn us away from our position. I don't want to believe that. I don't think that's the case. But we drift sometimes as individuals. How many people here ever found yourself in a situation, you look back and you said, how in the world did I get myself in this position? I didn't make the decision to be over here. Man, I'm far from God, I'm backslidden. How did I get over here? And it was just a drift, just a drift, just a drift. And then, by the way, that's why we have revival meetings. to yank us back where we need to be. Get us back over there. And so, I believe Paul, under the inspiration of God, is warning us. Look at verse 1 of chapter 2 of Hebrews. Therefore, now look at the terms he uses here, the words he uses. We ought to give them more, what? Earnest heed. What does he mean by that? Earnest heed. Man, earnest. Urgent. Sincere. I mean, we're applying. We're applying ourselves. We're putting effort. We're putting energy. We're putting our mind to this. We are making sure this does not happen. We ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, the Bible truths, biblical doctrines. Why? Look at the last phrase. Lest at any time we should let them what? Slip. That word slip, you could write in the margin of your Bible, has the idea, drift away. It's a nautical term. It means to drift away. Just kind of drift, the current's taking along. Next thing you know, it's a mile out in the ocean, and it wasn't tied up on the dock, and it just drifted out there. And he said we ought to take more earnest heed. Here's what I want to leave with us, and I'm preaching to myself as much as anybody. Let's take earnest heed that we don't drift away from God's will for our lives. Let's stay close to the Lord. Amen? I mean, don't just say, oh yeah, amen. No, apply ourselves. Give earnest heed. I am going to make sure that I stay true to this book. How many people want the preacher to apply himself to make sure this church don't drift from the Word of God? Amen. And how many preachers here want the church to apply themselves and make sure this church don't drift. Amen. It's all of us. We're a body. And we keep ourselves close to the Lord. And in doing so, we keep the church close to the Lord. Amen? Now next week, Lord willing, we'll find out about Balaam. I tell you, he's a bird, that guy. Let's pray. Father in heaven, I pray now that you would keep us close. I've prayed for years, Lord, that you keep me on a short leash. Lord, I don't want to wander. Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it. Lord, keep me on that short leash. Keep us close. Close to Your Word. Close to the truth. Give us character, Lord. Develop it in our hearts and souls. Integrity, so that we can stay true. Heads bowed, eyes closed. How many would say, preacher, God spoke to my heart tonight? God did. Spoke to my heart. God bless you. Hands all around. As we go to Lord's Supper, maybe an old altar would be a good place to do some business with God. Say, God, I want to get back on track. I want to stop this drift and get back. Maybe there's some other areas God dealt with your heart that you need to do business with God with tonight. Now's the time to do it. Father, bless our invitation we ask in Jesus name. Amen. Let's stand together.