Draw Wisdom and Strength from God’s Word

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Bobby Scott: Good evening. Let me first of all, bring greetings to you all from community of faith Bible Church in Southgate, and express my thanks to the committee that invited me to come. I do want to add a little bit more background to what Kevin just said in terms of, you know, the search for a local la preacher who would come and address us tonight. I when when when the search began, I was actually contacted and asked for some potential names for those who would speak at the conference and I specifically remembering the names that I gave, I mentioned, Dr. Paul, Felix is an amazing, exegetical, expository. Then I recall mentioning my co pastor, Anthony Cade, he’s a wonderful expository, in fact, one sermon that he preached that the Masters seminary chapel, the Vice President said, and I quote, that is the best sermon we’ve ever had at the Masters seminary chapel. I preset the master seminary chapel on several occasions. No one’s ever said that. So I remember giving those names. And then finally, when the formal like announcement for the conference came out, Paul Felix name wasn’t on the list. No, as pastor Anthony kid, but somehow my name was on there. And I specifically remember not giving them my name. But here I am. And I’m self conscious about complaining because I remember when Moses was complaining when God wanted to send them and I’m not an eloquent speaker, and this and that, and the other guy got really angry, and I don’t want got angry at me tonight. So I’m not going to complain anymore. But I’m very thankful for this opportunity, and thankful for my wife, who’s here and my co pastor and his wife, Sherry, but I do want to spend our time working through the word of God in Second Timothy, my assigned passages chapter three, and I invite you to turn there with me to Second Timothy chapter three, and I will read in my New American Standard verses 10 through 17. And when you there say amen. Okay. All right, let’s read. Now you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, persecutions, and suffering such as happened to me at Antioch, and at I conium, and that Lindstrom were persecutions I endured and out of them all the Lord rescued me, and did all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, but evil men, imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. You however, continue and the things you have learned and become convinced of knowing from whom you have learned them. And that from childhood, you have known the sacred writings, which are able to give you wisdom that leads to salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God, and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training and righteousness, so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work, we bought me as I pray. Father, Our song is our prayer, that you will speak to us through Your Word, just Spirit, Lord, open up our understanding and stir our hearts got to receive the truth is in this passage. And more than that, Father, we ask that we receive it with action, that we will be found faithful doing these things that you have charged us to do and these words, so bless us to be not only hearers of the word, but doers of it as well. So bless us in Christ’s name, I pray. Well, this is a powerful passage. But in order to really see it clearly, there is a proverbial elephant that blinds our view as Americans. And I think we need to take caution and make sure that we deal with the very almost American type of bias that will keep us from really benefiting from all that Paul is saying here and fully appreciate it so that we could rightly apply and then a word the proverbial elephant that staring right at us and this tax, it is fear is fear and the power of fear and have faith in Christ and Christ alone is the prescription to it Three years before Paul, or three years after this event happens, Paul writes this book to Timothy and 67 ad and but a 64 ad, the Great Fire of Rome took place. The Great Fire of Rome, some historians tell us burned for perhaps nine days, it destroyed 10 Out of the 14 provinces. In Rome, many were killed, and many, many more lost everything. And the rumor through Rome was that Nero himself had set the fire. It wasn’t true, but the rumor is stuck. And it was spreading. Looking for Escape Goat, Nero blamed the Christians. They were the ones who were not honoring the pagan gods of Rome. They were the ones who are calling Jesus Lord. And so Nero officially charged Christianity and made Christianity an illegal religion. And the persecution of the church officially starts here and 64 ad and, and hundreds of Christians were killed. Some were set as lamps and burned alive to light, Nero’s courtyard. Others were fed to lions, some were crucified, but the persecution as started and Paul now is a victim of that persecution. Many Christians in great fear we’re now abandoning the faith. Other Christians being influenced by Satan, we’re apostasy, sizing, the faith. And here at this great cost. Paul is writing this letter to his son in the faith to persevere in the face of this horrific persecution that have frightened many Christians away. Can I ask you a personal question? Have you ever been afraid? I mean, really afraid. I think of myself as a reluctant missionary on a couple of occasions, I’ve had the privilege of going to Africa and ministering to pastors. In the last occasion, I worked with my co pastor, and we went to Zimbabwe. And Zimbabwe has one of the worst dictators, and at the time, had one of the worst dictators in the world, Robert mugabi. And he had he had a law that foreigners could not take in public pictures, because he was afraid that negative x mosaics would be put out about Zimbabwe. And as we’re in our hotel, and I’m looking out the window and there was something going on like a concert or something outside of our hotel room and the pastor who we were working with. He’s a massive seminary grad, but he’s a native Zimbabwean, and he said, Hey, it’s a Christian concert. I’m like, Hey, can we go. So he takes us down to this Christian concert, and I don’t know what they’re saying i But, but I started to connect, I was connecting my African roots. And so I’m moving a little bit. I’m enjoying the music. And next thing I know, I’m getting tapped on the shoulder. And our friend said, Pray for me, that they’re arresting me. He’s getting arrested for taking a picture in public. So we began to walk back to make Schiff police station like a trailer. And I’m horrified that here it is, I’m like, Lord, see, I didn’t want to come to Zimbabwe. You made me come. And now we’re getting arrested as in Bob with one of the worst one of the worst dictators in the world. So he’s in there, and we’re praying like crazy. And then after a while, he came out. And he came out and he began to tell us what transpired, the guy asked him, What are y’all doing here? And he said, we’re working. We’re doing a pastors conference. And he said, Where can anybody go and how much does it cost? And he said, anybody coming is free. And he said, Can I come? And he gave me his Bible back as my game was carryback and release them. And as we’re walking back and I’m hearing Thomas, tell us all these things, but I told Thomas what I was thinking while he was in the prison, and when I told Thomas was this that that when they come out, I have a pocket full of money. And I’m gonna suggest there isn’t some fine that we can pay and I’m gonna give him all these American dollars to get by for Thomas from going to jail and us falling after him. I’m gonna pay him off what however much money we had, I’m gonna give it all Tom. And Thomas looked at me and said, Why would you do that?

Why wouldn’t I just be willing to suffer for Christ? And in that moment, I became the Incredible Shrinking Man. There’s something about us as Americans that we really fear, persecution and suffering. We have theologies explaining why the sufferings and pain will only be healthy and wealthy and fine. And this is an American phenomenon that we shipped all over the world because As you want to deny the elephant in the room that we will all suffer for Christ, if we’re faithful. And in this passage, as Paul is exhorting his, his son in the faith to endure faithfully, don’t don’t turn away. He’s pressing him to look fear and persecution in the faith, and to stand faithfully on the Word of God. And I want us to walk through these three extra rotations. And the first is found for us in verses 10 through 13. And I’m just going to call this first execution. Keep following Jesus as Lord, to keep following Jesus as Lord. The text tells us now, you followed in here Paul’s point is emphatic that you, Timothy, you follow closely, however, you Timothy asked me, you, Timothy, you followed an idea of followers stock and trade language, and the first century church for a disciple, a disciple, a follower of Christ. And even though Paul uses the language to follow me as he does here, the qualifier is always understood, for Paul to me, follow me as I follow Christ. And that’s true here that I decided was one who follows after Christ in a disciple of someone who has been born again, by by the grace of God. And they’ve been in a process of being transformed from one level of glory to the next. And it’s someone who’s been commissioned by the king himself, to go out and to make disciples. So here Timothy is a disciple, he’s a follower of Christ, born again, being transformed into Christ’s likeness, commission to go out and to make disciples and He has the greatest example on Earth. To do that he has Paul Ryan in front of him. The revered Paul that the greatness site with the great missionary of the ancient world, the great Christian thinker, he has Paul right there and and so what Paul does is he highlights what it is to really be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ and these verses and, and I’m going to highlight it in three different ways, as Timothy is following Paul, as he’s following Christ by highlights what that means. And he first highlights it by giving his example the following Christ is going to cost there’s a price to pay. And he says it in these verses when he says, But you followed my, my teaching and, and what a place to start. And a lot of the false teachers in this this context that had a pasta size and those who had in fear, turn away from Christ here Paulus, and you follow my teaching you you follow my doctrine that that you listen and you learned, and that the ways of God as I taught them, and, and right orthodoxy leads to orthopraxy, that there’s a way that you need to live. And Paul modelled that as well. That you listen to my teaching, you learn from my teaching, but also the text says that you follow my conduct, my way of living, that you follow that you obey that you submit it to it, you you mimicked it. And that’s the heart of what it means to be a Christian making disciples. We need to say, Follow me as I follow Christ. Look back with me to the book of Philippians Philippians chapter three, what is it we’re doing in terms of ministry, when when God radically saved someone and brings them into our church? What are we trying to do with those people that Paul, Paul says it here in Philippians, chapter three, verse 17, he says, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us, for many walk, of whom I often told you and now tell you even weeping, that there are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and His glory is their shame, and who set their mind on earthly things. That there is a broad way and there’s a narrow way in Paul says, follow my way follow my example. And that’s as to be true all Christians, we were telling people to follow us as we follow Christ. I remember when I was at UCLA, and I’m single and I’m discipling these guys and and I would just tell them to just follow my example, follow my path and when it comes to dating, follow my pattern. Follow my example as as I relate to this, my single sisters follow my example follow my pattern, because we need to hear but we need to see it as well, that something must show and tell in Christianity. As anyone following up to your example, are you telling people follow me as I follow Christ? mimic my marriage mimic my parenting, mimic my work ethic mimic what I do in my day. mimic and follow. So here’s Timothy follow up Paul’s example. And he followed his purpose as well to the Paul had a plan. He had an objective, he had a vision, he had an aim yet he had a goal and Jesus Christ gave it to him. And Paul didn’t deviate from that. It stated for us in chapter two, verses eight through 10. But the text says, Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, descended of David according to my gospel, for which I suffer hardship, even to imprisonment as a criminal, but the Word of God is not imprisoned. For this reason, I endure all things for the sake of those who are chosen, so that they also may obtained to this salvation which is in Christ Jesus, and with it, eternal life. Paul says, I am laboring, I’m enduring for the sake of those who are chosen, Paul saw as his mission given to him by the Lord, that it was the greatest search and rescue mission in the history of the whole world, that there were people who are lost, and God has saved Paul to God to save others. And Paul did not deviate from their call or their mission. Paul would even say in Acts 2024, but I do not consider my life of any account as dear to myself, so that I may finish my course. And then ministry, which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify solemnly of the gospel of the grace of God. There’s a story told a true story told of a great storm that was on the sea, and the Coast Guard received a distress signal. And the chief warrant officer was rallying together the the rest of the Coast Guard workers and they were going to get on a ship and go out to sea and try to find this ship and distress and it was a horrific stone. And so one of the junior officers cried out over the waves over the wind over the roaring sea, and he just cried out, but But Captain, we can’t go out. Because if we go out, we may never make it back. And the captain says, oh, no, no, we have to go out. But we don’t have to come back. That was passed on, that he’s on a search and rescue mission. There were people who were lost. Jesus had died to save centers, and Paul was willing to go, he was willing to, to lay down his life. Because that was his purpose. That was his aim. That was his drive, it wasn’t to get a bigger platform wasn’t to become a celebrity apostle, wasn’t to make a lot of money to get a bigger house or retire at 65. Paul’s mission was the mission that the king gave him. And his mission was to seek and save for loss. And that was his mission. And he was faithful to Texas, my faith, and this is his personal faith in God. And he’s telling him that you saw that you saw me trusting God, I didn’t shrink back you saw that. You saw my faith in God, you saw me trusting God. And you saw that and you saw my patients and negatively speaking patients is the idea that you’re not quick tempered positively is just that you respond and not react, you stay calm, and you recognize God’s sovereignty over circumstances, that he was patient. And then he says, You saw my love you You saw what motivated me? No, it wasn’t money. It wasn’t fame, it it wasn’t any of those things. That what motivated Paul was the love that Paul had known how great love that

he had received that God had poured out His love and Paul’s own heart and it spilled out in move Paul, to fulfill his mission to pursue others. And just read the New Testament is staggering how how Paul never forgot the great love that Christ has showed him. And it wasn’t like some type of a lake that Paul just dammed up and enjoyed it himself. It was like a river that kept flowing from God to pour out to others. And Paul was saying this of himself in comparison to other Christians. He says in first Corinthians 15 NIPER, I am the least of the apostles, not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. And a few years later, Paul sinks even a little bit lower, not just the least of all the apostles, it says in Ephesians, three eight, to me the very least of all the saints. This grace was given to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, that was given to me and then he says he was thinks a little bit Lord. I’m not just the least of the apostles. I’m not just the least of the saints. Paul says in first Corinthians 115 and 16 This is saying is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance. Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. And I am the worst of them all, that I’m the chief of sinners and that’s not hyperbole. I’ve got out of top 10, most one analyst Paul would have been at the top of the list. Paul would walk into a conference like this and drag me out of stone me in front of everybody. There was not a greater enemy of the church than the Apostle Paul earthly speaking. And Paul recognize that, and yet he was showing mercy. He never forgot that. Jesus personalizes that, that when we, if we think and recognize the gravity of our sinful heart, the gravity of our sinful ways, what we really did deserve from God, and we think about what we received, then that was their real love and own hearts. Jesus said, When they were unable to repay, he graciously forgave them. So which of them will love more he says, Which of them will love more and he added, he who was forgiven, more will love more, and Paul recognize how much he had been forgiven and he served his king in love. And then his endurance and like sandwiched in the middle of patients and endorses the love, that patience and endurance find themselves in the love chapter as well. Not only do we are our patient people, but Paul here my endures, said he, he endured all kinds of circumstances, all kinds of difficulties. He was he was steadfast, he endured, and the persecutions are literally that he was how he was treated and how he was abused, and it led to his sufferings. In Second Corinthians 11 outlines them Five times I received from the Jews 39 lashes, three times I was beaten with rods once I was stoned. And this happened in Antioch and I, conium and Alicia, that’s where Timothy first met Paul, Paul goes back to the very beginning and accept the 14th. On Paul’s first missionary journey, this persecution read Acts 14. So as he saw from the beginning, Paul’s persecutions, his sufferings, and he saw it all and by God’s grace, Timothy followed. So here Paul reminds Timothy of just the great persecution that he had undergone, but now they’re under Nero and the persecution of the saints in this first century. There are a lot of people who didn’t endure a lot of people who didn’t press forward. A lot of Christians who defected and in fear and now there’s a pastor sighs under the influence of Satan, but taught by Paul tells his son, Timothy and the faith, but you can’t. Timothy, you can’t. You just see my life, Timothy. We’ve gone a long way together, Timothy, you can’t stop and turn back Timothy. I know many in Asia have the fact that I know that. I know others have a pastor sighs Timothy, but Timothy, you can’t. And he’s pleading with his son in the faith. And this intimate relationship they have and Paul writes this, this letter as it were to Timothy in the face of grave persecution. Listen to what Paul says and let me go back and survey the book with us in chapter one. There is this fatherly son intimacy to Paul, thanks, God for Timothy and talks about tears and, and the closest of the relationship but Paul also says this, in verse 13, retain the standard of sounding words, that is a command, verse 14 Guard through the Holy Spirit who dwells in you the treasure, that is a command, he tells us in chapter two, verse one, to be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus, that is a command. He tells him to entrust these are faithful men in verse two, that is a command. He says, Suffer hardship, Timothy, and that is a command that says in verse eight, remember Jesus Christ, and that is a command of verse 14. Remind them Timothy, and that is a command to me that you cannot turn away. You cannot stop. There’s too much on the line. There’s too much at stake. Souls are at stake. This is not about you, you must press forward. There’s a cost to being a disciple. I try to tell my kids you can’t buy everything at the 99 cent store. There’s a price you have to pay. And Timothy was poor, faithfully pay it. And Now is your turn, Timothy. Now it’s your turn. Not only was there cost of Paul paid and Paul is showing him this cost of discipleship, but that’s just a cost for all of us. That’s what the text says. Look with me it verse 12. Indeed all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus. Well, what what what? Yeah, yeah, be persecuted. That’s this It’s almost like a promise that this this is going to happen if you desire to, to devote your life to God and, and to do what he wants you to do. And in this radical devotion to God, if you do that, then you will suffer. Jesus said it. Remember the word that I said to you a slave is no greater than his master. Truly, truly I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is the one who has sent greater than the one who sent them if they persecuted me, John 1520. And they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will keep your as also. So there’s just a price to pay, that all those who live godly, will be persecuted. There’s just something wrong. And everybody likes everything we say on Facebook and social media and Twitter, that when we speak the truth, even in love, and we’re confronting the sins of this broken fallen world, there’ll be some who their pride or rile up, and they’ll respond and negative ways. And the text says that, that that to be a disciple of Christ, you’ve got to push through that. And pause the show, showing, as it were, what it means to really follow after Jesus, Lord, that there’s persecution that we all have to endure. Paul endured it, we all have to endure it. And then the text says, and it’s going to get worse as evil people grow more evil. And the persecution as it were, in his context, will get worse. Paul just says to Timothy in verse 13, but evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. That there are real evil people that we know the stories of Jeffrey Dahmer and mass murderers. And we know those stories but but we don’t always equate it in a spiritual in the spiritual world that we live in that there are some who literally are inspired by the evil one and Satan himself. The Bible says in Genesis 315, that I’m going to put enmity between you and a woman says that the the spirit through speaking through the serpent, that we know to be Satan, that God is gonna be enmity between you and the one that’s gonna be hatred, God gave Satan over to hatred. There’s no one who hates like him. He hates without measure. He hates me, and he hated any and those who heal us, they will fall in his hatred. And so Cain as a seed of Satan kills his brother Abel. And there’s been a war raging from Genesis 315, right on through the end of the age of Christ returns and crushes Satan, Ted. So there’s a war and you are hated if you’re a Christian. You can’t dies that war and Satan has emissaries, that people that he can use. Now they disguise themselves, they put on masks and discard disguises in a religious context, says that in second Corinthians chapter 11. But they’re emissaries of Satan. They’re doing what he does. And they hate, they hate us. So there are Christians being persecuted in this century digging holes in the Middle East getting in the holes, and they’re being executed in the holes that they stand in. As we speak. There are Christians who are being tortured. As we speak, there are Christians being thrown in prisons in different places around the world, and they’re being tortured and killed.

And they weren’t maths and art in this context. Some of them were masks that are being religious and, but but we have to see through that, that one of the great exports of America is our calls. We send out the J W to the whole world of Mormons to the whole world, the prosperity gospel to the whole world. And as they themselves are down there damning others into hell as well, too. And that’s evil. It’s one thing. It’s one thing to be, and in this in this context, an imposter, a charlatan someone who’s intentionally deceiving, and they’re being deceived themselves by the by Satan himself. And so they’re deceived, and they’re deceiving others. And it’s one thing to go out and misrepresent our friend or misrepresent someone and say, they said such and such and they didn’t say that. But that’s hurtful. When you when you find that people are misrepresenting you and saying, Bobby said all these things and or you said all these things, you didn’t say that that’s hurtful. To do it intentionally is worse. But to go out and line God’s name, and the name of religion, to go on, tell people like give me your $100 and you will get well and you don’t have to see a doctor and they die. That’s evil. There’s a it’s one thing to misrepresent a person but to intentionally misrepresent God and its context there’s, there’s a morality to misrepresenting people there’s a morality to saying that someone said XYZ and they didn’t. There’s a morality that’s broken as violating this evil, when false teachers and and imposters God is a God it says such a such a such such when he has not we all ought to Hate false teachers. Jesus was a friend of sinners, sinners of every stripe came to Jesus, prostitute, tax collector, whoever they may be. But when Jesus spoke of the Pharisees, there was special language that he used whitewashed tombs with dead men’s bones inside the special language that Paul uses, he calls them dogs and Philippians. There’s something nice about American Christianity that we need to recognize that we’re in a war. And we have enemies and they know, they know that we don’t always want to go there and recognize the evil that they’re walking in. But we hear Paul is saying that, in these last days in this period between Christ and return, that the imposters will get worse, the Jeffrey Dahmer started office, he murdered this key picked up a guy and hit a guy in a hat in his apartment and murdered him. And then it wasn’t until years later that he murdered someone else again. And then he started doing unspeakable things. And at the end, before he’s caught his murdering someone every single day, you know what it takes for evil to flourish for good people to do nothing at all, just for saying nothing and do nothing. And Paul here is telling Timothy that there is no it’s gonna get worse. And we have a ministry that we have to, we have the following Christ, we need to be willing to pay a price and recognize that we have evil opponents, evil opponents. But then verse 11, and I skipped it intentionally it says this, look, they’re with me, the end of verse 11 says, but out of them all, the Lord rescued me. All the persecutions, all they had didn’t do or the cause that he’s paying faithfully and following Christ, He says the Lord, deliberately out of all of them, he rescued me out of all of them. That that one of the most repeated commands in the Bible is Fear not, it’s fair enough for I’m with you. It says that in Joshua, let me read your verse and Joshua, and I love it. It says in Joshua, one, five, no man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life, just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave or fill you or forsake you only be strong and courageous, and God will give him success and fall in and all of his ways. And here in this text, and Second Timothy, chapter three, Paul knows that Timothy has seen that how how God faithfully delivered and rescued Paul, and He will be with us. He will deliver us the antidote to our fears. trust in Christ, that he’s with you. The giants in the land, were really big. That’s true. But God was bigger. The cities were well fortified and had great weapons, but God had just destroyed Pharaoh’s army. And yet, the new generation, the generation leaving the Exodus, they didn’t trust their God was with them, and God would fight for them and deliver them. And so for us, if we’re going to faithfully follow Christ, and these Perlis last days, if we’re going to do that, and we’re going to be faithful and follow the Lord Jesus Christ, then we have to do it with faith, trusting our King. There’s a mission He’s called us to and we can’t turn back there’s a second exhortation. And these, these verses, verse, verses 14 and 15. Not only do we have to keep following Jesus as Lord, but we have to keep persevering. I’ll say it this way, in the holy Word, we have to keep persevering and God’s Holy Word and says in verse 14, you however, continue, you are however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of that here what where everyone else is defecting, and apostasy sizing. But you Timothy, you have to continue in the things that you have learned, and Paul motivates him, but two different ways. He wants to motivate him by by calling him to remember that he was a steward and and who it is who’s entrusted this legacy to him. He says, You however, continue on the things you have learned and become convinced of knowing for whom you have learned them. That his mother, Lois in his grandmother units that they had from the from his childhood that read the Bible to him. And not only that on Paul’s missionary journey, and acts 14, Paul perhaps led Timothy to the Lord. And so Paul had invested in him as his mother had invested in him and his grandmother had invested in him, and there have been others in his church who had invested in him and there was a legacy that Timothy now has this trust and is a stewardship of this truth that has been entrusted to him. So the question is, can you just stop Timothy, how can you just stop your grandmother taught you these things and your mother taught you these things and you know of their faithful character, you know, of the efficacy of the truth that they taught you that It was a real they had transformed lives that you you know that it was true. How can you just stop? Timothy you can’t. That you have to persevere and the word because you’re a steward of it now, it’s been passed along to you can I? Can I just ask this who’s invested in you? Who taught you the word? Remember this Sunday school teacher, or your pastor, your your parents? And here are so many defecting and apostasy sizing? What what excuse? Can you pause? What What would I tell my wife after 25 years of being in the ministry? It just got too hard honey. Just just all the all the negative criticism on social media, I just couldn’t take it anymore. What would I tell my mentors? Well, what would I tell Daffy Grisanti and Dr. Alex Montoya and Dr. Paul Felix and Dr. Lawson, Laverne and Dr. John McCarthy. What do I tell all those who who invested in and poured the Word of God into me? That it just got too hard that that hill was just too high. The valley was too diva. I just couldn’t do it anymore. But when did we ever do any of these things alone, that God by His grace is made us disciples were saved by grace, He transforms our lives and that work that he began us to heal completed, that we didn’t begin this thing by the flesh, and we don’t continue it in the flesh that God graciously and there was some Paulus, exhorting Timothy, you have to persevere. You have to endure you, you have to keep pressing forward, Timothy, in that word, and then the motivation that he gives him secondly is not only that, because of the legacy and the stewardship that he received. And in verse 15, it says, And that from childhood, you have known the sacred writings, which are able to give the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus, that you know, Faith comes by hearing and hearing the Word of God because you heard the gospel and the power of God, through the gospel saved you, Timothy, that you know that the word of God saves, you know that the word of God convicted you that you are a sinner, you know that they convinced you that Jesus was Lord and Savior that he really died and paid the price for says that he really rose and he really grasped righteousness as a gift of His grace, you know that personally, Timothy. So the charge here and the motivation here is from the persevere, knowing that the Word of God is the power of God, to salvation. Power, tell us in Romans 10, verses 11 through 15. For the scripture says, Whoever believes in him will not be disappointed. For there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile for the same Lord as Lord of all abounding and riches for all who call on him. Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? Our they believe in Him, whom they have not heard? How would they hear without a preacher? And how will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written? How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things? Are your feet beautiful?

When you come to work, are those the beautiful feet carrying like sweet gospel of grace? The good news that Jesus says, and your family or your feet beautiful in your neighborhood or your feet? Beautiful? Are you? Are you the one who brings knowing that God saves, knowing that his word is true? Knowing that faith comes by hearing and hearing the Word of God? Do you do that? And hear Paul is pressing Timothy because of the persecution because of fear. Because those were defects that he’s pressing his his son in the faith, but you know, you know that the word of God leads to salvation, you know, that, you know, who taught you. So you have to persevere, Timothy, you have to persevere in the Word. And then finally, the last exploitation in our passages this not only we need to keep following Jesus as Lord and keep persevering and God’s Holy Word as sacred, as holy, as set apart as distinct is different. If the ground was holy, when Moses was there in the presence of God, how much more his word that a sacred is holy that that that this book is not like any other book. And the reason being is this last point is that we have to keep ministering the last. The last charge that Paul gives Timothy and these verses are the last exhortation I’m going to draw this this keep ministering and I don’t know what preposition to use, and when to use all keep ministering from the word or by the word or in the word or according to the word just make your ministry Bibles send it from beginning to middle to the end. The stay in the word, Timothy. And here’s why, because it is God breathed. It gives three reasons the Bible literally is breathe out from God. And that makes every scripture, every sentence, every paragraph, every chapter, every book, it makes everything in the Bible, at the end of the day, God’s word. And here, Paul is not so concerned about the mechanism of how Peter explains all that. Paul describes the nature of the finished product of the original autographs. This is God’s writings. These are God’s words, Timothy. So your ministry has to be Bible centered. It has to be grounded in the Word of God, because the Bible is what God says about everything. And then in Psalm 19, it tells us the Old Testament is there for the Word of God, all of it. The psalmist says in Psalm 19, the law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul. The testimony of the Lord is sure making wise the simple the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart, the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes of fear of the Lord is clean and doing forever. The judgments of the Lord are true, they’re righteous all together, they’re more desirable, then go yes, then much fine go sweeter also than honey, and the drippings of the honeycomb, more Overbye than your servant is worn and in keeping them there is great reward because it’s the word of God. Not just the Old Testament, as Paul is writing the New Testament, it says in first Corinthians 1437. If anyone thinks he is a prophet, or a spiritual, let him recognize that the things which I write to you are the Lord’s commandment. The Paul knew is, as God was, through the Holy Spirit, supernaturally working through him that he wasn’t a spark, but the words were the words were breathed out from God, Old Testament, and the New Testament, that’s all from God, you know, says God is not dead. God is not silent. He is not mute, he is not deaf. He’s not blind, that the God is declaring to all sinners everywhere to repent, and he’s doing that through His Word. So God is speaking and He speaks through His Word. We hear the Bible, we’re hearing the Word of God. And then Paul was saying, not only do we have to make a minister totality by ministry, centered around the word of God, because it’s God breathed, but also because it is useful. That’s what the text says. So All Scripture is inspired by God and all scripture is profitable, that is profitable, it is divinely empowered to be useful. This efficacious without limit that God’s Word does. We’ll call this everything that he wants it to accomplish. It will never return to Him, boy, that God’s word is used for what God intends for to do, it will absolutely do. And it’s profitable for teaching. That the only way we can think God’s thoughts after him is from the Word of God that the whole of our mind has to be renewed. And we’ve got to know how to think right and the Bible tells us how to think right, is profitable for reproof, that is for a correcting era for rebuking those who are in error for confronting false teachers, the word of God is useful for that. For correction, not only pointing out was wrong, but setting it right showing what is right and for training, and righteousness, it trains us and right ethical behavior, so that we can live like our King, and it’s broken, broken, fallen world that we can be lying and we can be solved, we can live right? We can live out there, by God’s grace, not perfection, but with progress and progression. We can live out the Kings ethic for us. In Matthew chapter five, through chapter seven, the power of the king is broken out that the Holy Spirit and through His word and, and we can live in a way that progressively shows that the king is with us, that the king is with us, that He set us free, that we can do that. And then third, and finally, as we look at this last exhortation that ministries have to be centered around the Bible. It’s got to be beginning, middle and end. And not only because it is God breathed and because it’s useful, but also because the Bible is God’s intended means to equip the man of God to do the work of God. So Paul says the that, that it does all this instruction that is doing all this rebuking is doing all these things so that there’s a purpose to the ministry of the Word of God so that the man of God and and here in First Timothy 611, the man of God or the Old Testament context of man of God, it really is here in a technical sense this the set apart special To spokesperson for God that it makes him adequate, thoroughly adequate, thoroughly equipped, thoroughly prepared to do the work of God that the Bible does that. It makes him thoroughly equipped to do every good work everything God calls him to do. It prepares him for that. And in turn, what does he do? according to Ephesians, chapter four, the man of God equips the saints of God to do the work of ministry. And so there’s a circle here to the man of God is equipped by the Bible. He takes the Bible equip the saints of God, so that at the end of the day, the saints of God can do the work of God, so that we can go out and do those deeds that God has saved us for He’s made us his masterpieces, saying this by grace through faith, so that we can do these works that he set apart for us from the beginning of the ages Ephesians 210. And so there’s work that the king wants us to do. And these last days, there’s, there’s something he wants us to do. And the Word of God is the means that equips us to do that. When you read through history, and you read through the Bible there, epics and seasons where everything just changed to sci fi as a book and, and Israel changed. As a Cairo reads the book and things changed, the Reformers go back to the book and, and things change. That that we’re living in a time where there’s some parallel division almost, and we have a real enemy. And enemies aren’t across political aisles. There aren’t the opposite gender. They’re not the opposite ethnicity, that we have a real enemy. The Bible says that we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against powers and principalities. And we’re wrestling, we’re in a war from Genesis 315, to this present, now we’re in a war. And we will always be in a war to like King comes back and he has emissaries that he uses. But but but the weapons of our warfare is spiritual. It’s gotta be the Bible. How do you fight in the spiritual war? You need spiritual tools? How do you win a battle that you don’t fight that we have to fight and we fight with the sort of the Word of God, we have to persevere, the darker the age gets, the greater the persecution gets, the more some are in fear of defecting, and is seen as inspiring others to pasta sighs. But for the believer, the fall of Christ, we have to follow our heart after Jesus as Lord, we have to persevere in the holy word of the Bible. We have to keep ministering according to the Word and we can’t fail and we can’t quit and we can’t turn back. We have to trust that king who fights our battles for us, and all that he will desire to do. saints of God my brothers and sisters, he will accomplish. And we will stand as Paul says at the end of verse 11, and the low will rescue us from all of it. But don’t shrink back and fear. Press four by trusting your king. Follow faithfully after him, persevere in the Bible, and minister to coordinate his word. And He will bless us. Amen. Let me pray. Father, thank You for our time together tonight. Thank you for this conference it there’s much we need to think about because there’s much that needs to be done to grant us grace Lord to be faithful, in Christ’s name I pray.