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And man, 2 Timothy chapter number 2 is a very deep chapter. There's a lot of meat in this chapter. I mean, there's just a lot to talk about. But you'd expect that from a book like 2 Timothy where it's one preacher writing to another. It's Paul writing to his young protege in the ministry, Timothy. This is also the last epistle that Paul wrote because at the end of it he talks about how he knows that the time of his departure is at hand. He says, I fought a good fight. I finished my course. I've kept the faith. And in chapter 1, the thing that was just hammered over and over again was that Paul wanted Timothy not to change, not to go astray, not to water down the message, not to be ashamed of Paul and start distancing himself from Paul. Some of the things that popped up over and over again, as you recall, if you just glance down at chapter 1, for example, the word remembrance is used a lot. So in chapter 1 verse 5, when I call to remembrance, I'm sorry, that's not the one I was looking for, verse 6, wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God. So he's reminding him of things that he should already know. And he's basically telling him, don't change. Let me remind you. Let me put you in remembrance to stir up the gift of God. He says in verse 8, be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner. He says in verse 13, hold fast the form of sound words. Hang on to it. Don't let it go. He says in verse 14, that good thing which was committed unto thee, keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us. That's the contrast with verse 15, where he says, this thou knowest, that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me, of whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes. So all throughout chapter 1, he's trying to remind him of things that he already knows, trying to stir him up about things, and telling him, hold fast. Keep these things. Don't turn away. Don't change. Don't get watered down. Don't be ashamed of me. Don't be ashamed of Christ. Don't be ashamed of the Gospel. He basically wants Timothy to keep doing what he's been doing after he dies. I mean, picture it. Paul is about to die. He wants to make sure that there's somebody that he leaves behind that's going to pick up where he left off and do what he would have done if he were there. He's trying to pass this on to the next generation, and he doesn't want Timothy to drop that ball, because a lot of other people have already dropped the ball, so he's saying, please, Timothy, don't be another casualty. Don't be another shipwreck. Look at chapter 2, verse 1. Thou therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to teach others also. This fits that same theme of Paul being worried about the next generation, and that when he's gone, he wants to make sure that there are other preachers that are preaching the same stuff that he preached, and standing on the same things that he stood on, because he saw a lot of preachers that were failing, and so he admonishes them that in chapter 2, verse 2. Then it says in verse 3, thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. He's saying, don't get distracted or caught up in the cares of this world, the thorns in that parable that Jesus gave of the four different types of earth where the seed can fall, the parable of the sower. He talks about how the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word and it becometh unfruitful, and so he's exhorting Timothy not to let the thorns of life, those cares of this world, riches, pleasure, fun, distractions, that those things wouldn't come in and choke the word in his life that he would stop being fruitful. Don't get entangled with the affairs of this life. Make sure that you keep your eye on the mission to keep warring and being a good soldier of Jesus Christ. It's easy sometimes for us to get out of the battle, right, and just get tired of fighting, tired of the warfare, just, oh, I'm just sick of all the fighting. I'm sick of struggling. I'm sick of things being so hard. I just want to relax for a while. So it's pretty easy to just get into the affairs of this life, kind of get out of the fight and relax, and he's trying to make sure that Timothy realizes that he needs to keep fighting, stay in the battle, keep warring a good warfare. Then he used another illustration, if a man also strived for masteries, yet is he not crowned except he strived lawfully. This is a sporting illustration. So first he's saying, look, be a good soldier. Endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. Don't get entangled with the affairs of this life. Then he says, you know what else is that when people strive for masteries, they're not crowned unless they strive lawfully. This is an allusion to, for example, the Olympics, because, you know, even in the ancient times they had things like the Olympics, and what they would receive was not a medal or a trophy, but they would actually get a crown. They would be crowned when they won the Olympics in the olden days. So he's using that as an example, but he's saying, you know, you're not going to be crowned unless you strive lawfully, meaning that if you break the rules in that event, you're not going to win. You will lose. You'll be disqualified no matter how well you did, even if you were way ahead of the guy in second place. Once you're disqualified, you're disqualified when it's found that you've been doping or when it's found that you didn't run the whole track or you cut the corner or you violated the rules in some other way. You're only crowned if you strive lawfully. So what he's saying to Timothy is, you know, push hard, fight hard, battle hard, but make sure that you follow the rules. Make sure that you don't strive so hard to fight for the gospel of Jesus Christ and you just want to win so bad that you start cutting corners and breaking the rules. And this is what a lot of preachers will do where they really want the church to grow and they really want to get a lot of people saved and their hearts in the right place because they really want to reach the multitudes. They really want to reach thousands of people and they realize, hey, we're in a city of four million people and people are dying and going to hell. You've got to get them the gospel. And so that's a great goal. That's a great attitude. That's a great thought to have. But not if we're willing to cut corners and take shortcuts to try to reach everybody by not striving lawfully. What does that mean? By breaking God's laws, by breaking God's rules. And churches do this all the time. Even guys that are saved, even guys that are preaching the correct gospel where they say, look, it's just so important for us to reach people. We don't want to preach too hard about sin because then our attendance goes down. Or we don't want to throw out people for fornication or throw out people for drunkenness or throw out people for heresy because we just need to have maximum attendance at all costs because we've got to reach all these people. I want to reach all these people, too, but I think in the long run we reach more people by keeping the church right. Our church has focused on purity from the beginning. And here we are 11 and a half years in. The first time that we threw somebody out of the church was in the first year of the church's existence. We just started, even when we're only running 12, we threw out a couple who was living together in fornication. And I didn't just throw them out without giving them a chance because they were new believers. And so I preached it from the pulpit, I talked to them, I explained to them the situation, and finally I just told them you can't come to our church because you're living in fornication. And 1 Corinthians 5 makes it crystal clear that if people are living in fornication and they're called a brother, that they should be cast out of the church. And that's pretty hard to do when you're only running 12 people, 15 people, 20 people, and you're casting out a couple of fornicators. In the flesh, you want to keep everybody around in those early days because you're trying to get the thing off the ground. And you could say, well, but we've got to help these. How are they going to grow if you're throwing them out? This is the human logic that denies scripture, 1 Corinthians 5, that tells you specifically to throw out people that are living in fornication. Yeah, but I mean, how are they going to get right with God if they're not even in church? Should we lean on your understanding or should we go with what the Bible says? And the thing is, I've talked to people whose child who was raised in a Christian home, who ought to know better, they've been raised with the Word of God, they've been saved for a decade, they know what they're doing, and they're out living in fornication. And they said, oh, I'm trying to get that person to go to church with me. And I said, well, you ought not try to get that person to go to church with you because that person should not even be welcome in any independent fundamental Baptist church because the Bible says that you're not allowed to go to the church if you're living in fornication. There's no other interpretation of 1 Corinthians 5. I mean, I don't, he's real clear about it. If somebody's called a brother and they're a fornicator, put away from among yourselves that wicked person. Don't even eat with that person. But you say, oh, but we've got to get them in church. It's going to help. No, you know what's going to help people more is when you throw them out of the church because it's a wake-up call. It's a swift kick in the pants that they need for fornicating. They need that. You know, having them here and just kind of ignoring their sin, turning a blind eye. And listen to me, all over America, even in independent fundamental Baptist churches, there are all kinds of couples classes and all kinds of Sunday school classes and all kinds of church get-togethers that are happening in the homes of people who are living together in fornication or they're just treated as normal members of the church, a man and a woman who live together but they're not married. What kind of a message does that send to the youth? What kind of a message does that send to children? Yeah, but we got to make it easy for people to come and to get right with, no. We have to do what the Bible says. Also, if we wanted to just get a bigger crowd, we could bring in a lot of really worldly and sensual music, right? And we could shorten the sermon down to 15 minutes, 20 minutes, keep it really bottom shelf, all milk, no meat. And then we could just have a lot of emotional music and a rock concert up here. And we could even just into the bargain, get some women up here in mini skirts to be the backup singers. People are going to like that, carnal people, worldly people, unsaved people or saved people who are just really into the flesh, they're going to love that. And yeah, you'll grow, you'll run 200, 300, 400, 500, churches all over Phoenix are proving that right now. With all the smoke and the purple lights and the sermonette that's 15 minutes long, that's just shallow as a Frisbee. But it's just, yeah, but look how many people we're reaching. No, no, no, actually, Faithful Word Baptist Church is reaching more people than any other church in this city. There I said it. Amen. It is. Period. That's just a fact. It's just the truth. Why? Is it because we decided that the only thing that matters is just getting to the finish line as fast as we can? And we'll compromise, we'll cheat, we'll steal, we'll break God's laws, whatever gets us there. Whatever gets us to reaching, no, no, we got the rule book and we studied it and we made sure that we weren't taking any illegal supplements. We were not doing any blood doping. We're not taking any hormones or steroids or any HGH or anything, you know, and we weren't taking stuff that's borderline and taking stuff that's illegal in some countries and not in others. No, no, no. We got the rule book. We figured out, okay, when we start running is when the gun fires and no sooner. And we're going to stay in our lane and we're going to do what the rules say and we're going to win fair and square. And God's not going to crown you when you're not striving lawfully. And that's why you're going to be more blessed in the long run by taking the hard line, preaching the whole Bible, not just getting overboard on evangelism to the point where you don't care about purity anymore and it's all about quantity and it's no longer about quality. It ought to be about, and listen, when you have quality, the quantity will come. But if you have quantity, there's no quality coming. Quantity produces quantity but quantity does not produce quality. So you got to get the cart behind the horse and understand that it's important that we strive in our Christian life lawfully, that we live a godly life, a clean life, a righteous life and that our church follows the rules laid down in scripture and doesn't just start doing whatever we want, whatever it takes to get to the finish line faster. It's a running race and a lot of these churches are hopping on a bicycle. Woo, look how fast we're growing. Look how fast we're going. They're riding around the running track on a bicycle. I mean some churches have a motorcycle. They're doing a wheelie down the field, look at us, we're doing great. God's just thinking, no, you're nobody, you're not even in the race, you're disqualified. So we need to make sure that we strive lawfully. This is one preacher telling another preacher, hey, I want you to strive. I want you to work hard. I want you to try to grow and try to reach people and try to do huge works but you better do it lawfully. Don't compromise to do it. He says the husbandman that laborerth must be first partaker of the fruits. Consider what I say and the Lord give the understanding in all things. Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel. Again, he's bringing up remember, remember. Now that's a pretty basic statement, isn't it? Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel. That's a pretty basic statement but what's he saying? Don't ever forget the fundamentals. Don't forget the basics. Nail these things down. Don't question the basics. Don't throw out the, you know, stay true to the fundamentals of the faith. Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel. Don't forget that. Well, that's so basic it's not even worth talking about. We got to talk about everything because nothing's too basic. Every sin has to be preached against all the time. Every doctrine needs to be reiterated all the time just to make sure that we stay on the right path and we don't end up like these other shipwrecks that we talked about in chapter one here, you know, people that had turned away from the apostle Paul because we know that if they're turned away from the apostle Paul, they're not right with God. He's the most anointed preacher at that time that God was using the most. So he says Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel wherein I suffer trouble as an evil doer, even into bonds, but the word of God is not bound. So he's saying my preaching, my gospel has gotten me into trouble and it's gotten me labeled as an evil doer, even though I'm doing right, even at the point where I've been put in prison, even into bonds. But he says the word of God's not bound though. So what he's saying is they can lock me up, but they can't lock up the gospel. They can't lock up the word. The truth is going to spread and the more they fight it, the more it spreads. In fact, all throughout the Bible, Exodus chapter one, the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew when they afflicted the church in the book of acts. It says the disciples were multiplied greatly in those days. Then the Bible says in verse number 10, therefore I endure all things for the elect sakes that they may also obtain the salvation, which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Now I want to kind of park it on this verse because this is a verse that some people struggle to understand and in fact, some people will misuse this verse to try to say that elect in the New Testament is referring to the Jews. It's pretty easy to prove from the Bible that the word elect in the New Testament is not the Jews, but that it's believers. It's pretty easy to prove that if you just look up all the mentions of elect. For example, in the books of the Thessalonians, both of them, he talks about them being elect and obviously they're not Jews. They're Greeks in Thessalonica and he says that they're elect and of course the famous verse in Romans chapter eight, who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justify it. Those who are justified, those who are saved are the elect, whether they be Jew or Gentile, whether they be bond or free. Colossians chapter three put on there for as the elect of God, bowels and mercies. In the context there, he's talking to people that are Scythians, Parthians. He lists a whole bunch of nationalities and says basically any of those people are the elect of God if they believe in Jesus Christ. Christ, there is neither Jew nor Gentile. There is neither bond nor free. You're all one in Christ Jesus. So I'm not going to go to all the mentions of elect we could and that's what you'd see is that it's clearly those that are saved. And even in the famous Olivet Discourse, Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 21, when it talks about the elect, it talks about the anti-Christ would be so convincing that he would deceive the very elect if it were possible, meaning that it's not possible for the elect to be deceived. Well, let me ask you this. Are the Jews deceived? All day long because they don't even believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God. So therefore, they're big time deceived. So what people will do though is they'll take this verse and they'll say, well, wait a minute. If the elect are the saved, they'll point at this verse, therefore I endure all things for the elect's sake that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. This is the case that they'll make. They'll say, well, these people, they obviously don't have salvation because they need to obtain salvation. So therefore, in their mind, the elect here must be the Jews. Now, think about how strange that would be for the Apostle Paul to be preaching in Chapter 1 all about how Timothy needs to keep preaching and here's a good preacher with a Greek name and here's some bad preachers with Greek names and I'm over here in Rome, Italy and I'm preaching the Gospel and you're preaching in Crete and Ephesus and these different places, Ephesus for Timothy, Crete for Titus, but some of these same ideas come up and he says, out of nowhere, by the way, everything I'm doing, I'm doing for the Jews. That'd be pretty weird. Wouldn't that be weird? Like therefore, I endure all things for the Jews' sake so that they can get saved. You'd be like, huh? What are you talking about? That doesn't make any sense, does it? That wouldn't jive with anything else that Paul's been writing in any of his epistles where he's clearly talking about preaching the Gospel to every creature. I mean, look, he was the Apostle who obeyed the command the most to go to all nations. He's the guy who's going to the Greeks way more than the original 11 disciples that were with Jesus Christ. So he wouldn't just pull this out of nowhere. There's nothing in the context about the Jews anywhere before, anywhere after. That would be really random. And so are we going to use that to negate all the other mentions of elect that talk about Gentile Christians being elect? But no, let's forget all that because of 2 Timothy 2.10 right here. This is the Jews. But I've heard that argument from a lot of people. Now what this verse is actually saying, which makes more sense with the context, actually I don't want to say it makes more sense because the other explanation makes zero sense to just all of a sudden say, well, everything I'm enduring, I'm doing it for the Jews. That doesn't make sense. But if he said this, therefore I endure all things for the elect's sake, if we're going to say that's people who believe on Christ, people that are actually saved, that they may also obtain the salvation, which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory, people would say, well, if they're saved, why do they need to obtain salvation? Here's what he's saying. Let me illustrate to you this way. What if I talked about how we're taking these trips where we drive three hours or five hours and we go to these Indian reservations and we spend money, we spend time, we put gas in the tank, we buy food, we spend time on planning it, we bring a lot of materials that we distribute. If I were to ask why do we do it, why do we go through all that trouble, why do we go through all that hassle, then an answer that I would give is, hey, we do it for the people who get saved. Think about that wording. We do it for the people who get saved. You know, we did a soul winning marathon one time and it was just in the worst town for soul winning ever. We had like, this is in the early days of our church, like 2008, we had like 27 soul winners out all day and we had one person saved. So it was kind of a frustrating day. But the guy's name was John. I still remember it. And so we jokingly on the way home kept saying, we did it for John. We went for John, you know. It was all for John. It was worth it for John. You know, we were just kind of joking around. But obviously there's truth in that. We did it for John, amen. That's an achievement. Getting somebody to heaven. You know, I mean, that's what it's all about. But if I said, hey, why do we endure the persecution? Why do I preach hard? Why do I, you know, suffer affliction and why do I push myself or work hard or why do you get up early or stay up late or why do you take a trip all the way to Albuquerque just to go soul winning in Albuquerque, you know, six and a half hours away. Hey, we do it for the elect's sake that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. What are we saying? We're doing it for the people who are going to get saved. Because God already knows who's going to get saved before they get saved. Now this is not Calvinism where God decides who gets saved and who doesn't. But their elect, which means what? What does elect mean? Chosen. Elect is a synonym of chosen. They are elect according to the foreknowledge of God. So basically we go to some town in a faraway place and there are people in that town who are going to get saved. We don't know who they are. The Lord knows who they are. Obviously from the foundation of the world, God already knew who's going to get saved and who's not going to get saved. So who do we do it for? We do it for the people who don't get saved. Not me. If I was going to go somewhere and nobody was going to get saved, there would still be profit in that because yeah, we still preach. God gets the glory. We obeyed. God will reward us. But honestly, it's not enough to get me to go that far, friend. I want to see some people get saved. If I just knew going in, if somehow Brother Garrett and I, as we're planning these trips and everything, if we were to just get foreknowledge, Garrett, right? If we just knew there's a certain town where if we go there and do a soul winning marathon, nobody's going to get saved. Are you going or are we skipping it? I'm skipping it because it's like, why drive all that way if nobody's going to get saved? Now if we don't know that and we go there and we work and nobody gets saved, we're going to still get rewards because we worked and God's still going to bless us for our efforts and at least God's glorified by people at least hearing a clear presentation of the Gospel even if they reject it. It makes him receive glory. But who are we doing it for? Are we doing it for the guy that slams the door? No. We're doing it for the elect's sake. They may also obtain salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. And here's the thing. This verse actually debunks a Calvinist attitude because if those people were going to get saved anyway whether we go or not, then we wouldn't have to go for their sake. That they may obtain salvation. See what I'm saying? We need to go so that they can get saved and the reason they're elect is because they're going to get saved because we're going to go. So it's not really that hard to wrap your mind around the wording there I don't think because I think that we use a real similar wording when we say, hey, you know why we're going to that town to go soul winning or you know why we're going soul winning up at FWBC North or this is why we're going soul winning in Chandler or Gilbert or wherever the soul winning time. Hey, you know why we're going to that soul winning time? We're doing it for the people who are going to get saved. That's what's being said. He does it for the ones that get saved. Why? Because he wants those people to get saved and he knows that he has to go and preach and suffer in order to make that happen. So I think it's pretty easy to understand once you just go into it knowing what elect means instead of trying to force an unnatural meaning of elect to be, oh, the Jews. The Jews aren't God's chosen people, friend. They are not chosen for anything except to split hell wide open. They've been chosen for hell, okay? Because you know what? You're not saved. And if you're not saved, you're not elect for anything except to burn in hell. And so to sit there and say that, oh, yeah, the elect are the Jews. They're God's chosen. Wrong. Wrong. If you don't have Jesus, you have nothing. We're in the New Testament, not in the Old Testament. So that's very clear that they are not the elect. It's saved Christians that are the elect. Verse number 11, it's a faithful saying. For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him. If we suffer, we shall also reign with him. If we deny him, he also will deny us. If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful, he cannot deny himself of these things put them in remembrance and on and on. So let's stop and look at this little section here because this all kind of goes together. It says in verse 11, if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him. If we suffer, we shall also reign with him. If we deny him, he also will deny us. If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful, he cannot deny himself. Let's slow down and look at this because this is a passage that also can be tough for people to understand. What's the context, first of all? The context is in chapter 1, he's already telling him, endure afflictions. Don't get watered down. Don't back off. Don't be ashamed of my chain. Be willing to go to prison. Be willing to suffer for the cause of Christ. That's what chapter 1 was about. That's what chapter 2 is still about. He says endure hardness. Endure afflictions. I endure all things for the elect's sake. Hey, I'm in bonds. I'm suffering even under bonds. So I'm enduring all things in verse 10, and then verse 11 he says, it's a faithful saying, for if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him. If we suffer, we shall also reign with him. What's he talking about? Suffering for the cause of Christ. So the whole purpose of what he's saying is he's trying to get Timothy to be willing to go through persecution, to endure afflictions, to suffer for the cause of Christ. That's what he's trying to get across to him. So he says to him that if we suffer, we shall also reign with him. So he's trying to get him to be willing to suffer because of the rewards that he's going to get. That's how he's trying to motivate him. Because just earlier, what did he say? You'll be crowned if you strive lawfully. That's talking about rewards. Rewards in the future kingdom of authority and so forth at the judgment seat of Christ. So he says, if we suffer, we shall also reign with him. Has everybody got that? We suffer for Christ. We're going to be rewarded. He's going to give us great power and authority. He's going to say to one, be over ten cities. Be over one city. Be over five cities. Okay. Then he says, if we deny him, he also will deny us. Now in order to help us understand what's meant here by if we deny him, he'll also deny us. That's what Jesus said in Matthew 10. Keep your finger. Let's go to Matthew 10. Because Matthew 10 says pretty much the exact same thing, but it says it a little longer so you get a little more detail of what it means when it says, if we deny him, he also will deny us. Now what's the context? If we suffer, we're going to reign with him. So here's the thing. Denying him is the opposite of suffering with him. Why? Because what do you suffer for? You suffer for openly preaching the word of God. You avoid suffering by doing what? Denying him. Because why did Peter deny Christ? He didn't want to be persecuted. He didn't want to be arrested. I mean, Jesus is on trial. Jesus gets beaten, whipped, spit on. He's arrested in the middle of the night. He went through all that. And Peter's standing afar off, following afar off, warms himself at the fire. And they say, hey, you were with him also. Oh, I know not the man. How did he deny Christ? By saying, I don't know him. I know not what thou sayest. I know not the man. So Peter denied the Lord. What's his motive? He's what? He's afraid. Okay, what did Paul tell Timothy in chapter one? God's not given us the spirit of fear. Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me as prisoner, but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel. So how do you avoid the persecution? How do you avoid the affliction? By being ashamed and denying the Lord instead of standing strong on the word of God and on the gospel and on Jesus. Everybody understand? So that it all fits, right? It all makes sense. Look at Matthew 10, verse 32, and we'll get a little more detail here. Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. Is that what Peter did? No, Peter did the opposite, right? Whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven. So Peter denied the Lord. What's the opposite of denying the Lord in this passage? Confessing him, right? Okay. So we want to understand what the word deny means. Here he's saying, confess me before men, I'll confess you before my Father which is in heaven. Deny me before men and I'll deny you before my Father which is in heaven. Let's go back to 2 Timothy chapter 2 with that insight. So that's exactly what he says when he says if we deny him, he'll also deny us. Now some people would misuse this passage to try to teach that you could lose your salvation. Who's had somebody bring that up to you with that goal to try to say, hey, you can lose your salvation? Because hey, if we deny him, he'll also deny us. But that's why he follows it up in verse 13 with a verse showing you why you can't lose your salvation because otherwise verse 13 would be kind of random because I can understand why verse 11 fits in with the subject. I can understand why verse 12 fits in with the subject of standing for the truth and being persecuted versus denying the truth, being ashamed and avoiding persecution. That's what we're talking about. But then all of a sudden there's this kind of random statement in verse 13. If we believe not, who said anything about not believing? We're talking about whether you're going to preach right, Timothy, right? Whether you're going to preach right and boldly proclaim the truth. But all of a sudden now it's like, well, if we believe not, yet he abideth faithful, he cannot deny himself. What's that verse doing there? I believe what that verse is doing there is to make sure we don't misunderstand verse 12 because obviously God knew that people could take verse 12 and try to twist it to say you could lose your salvation. And what they're meaning by that is that if he denies you, they're going to say, well, that means that you're not saved. That's what they're saying, right? If we deny him, he'll deny us. They're saying that deny us means you're not saved. You lost your salvation. But what the Bible explains in verse 13 is that if we lost our salvation, that wouldn't be him denying us. That would be him denying himself, okay? And don't let this go over your head. Let me explain it to you clearly. Look at verse 13. Let's look at verse 13 carefully. It says if we believe not, now who's the we? Well, it's the same if we suffer, if we be dead with him. It's Paul talking to Timothy. It's preachers. It's us. It's me and you. It's Paul and Timothy. He's saying if we believe not, yet, meaning in spite of that, he abides faithful. Why does he abide faithful? Even if we believe not. Even if we have what? A lack of faith or we have a lot of doubt, right? And we lack faith, we doubt as believers. He says yet, in spite of that, he abideth faithful. Why? Because he can't deny himself. Okay. Keep your finger here. Let's go to Hebrews 10. It's just a couple pages to the right in your Bible. It's very close. Go to Hebrews 10. Let's get a little more insight into what it means when it says that he abides faithful. What does it mean when it says God's faithful? Look at Hebrews chapter 10 and look at verse number 23. It says let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering. What's wavering? Doubting. And it says let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering for he is faithful that promised. He's faithful that promised. Go back to 2 Timothy 2. So what it means to be faithful is that you're going to do what you said you're going to do. If you made a promise, if you're faithful to that promise, what's that mean? You're going to keep your promise. So the Bible says don't doubt because God is faithful. He's going to do what he promised. He's faithful that promised. Hold fast the profession of your faith without wavering. So what the Bible is saying here in 2 Timothy 2.13, if we believe not, yet he abideth faithful, meaning he can't break his own promise. He's not going to deny himself. He's going to abide faithful. He's going to do what he promised to do. The Bible says this is the promise that he promised us, even eternal life. The Bible says in hope of eternal life which God that cannot lie promised before the world began. So just as God cannot deny himself, God cannot lie and what he has promised he will do. He promised us eternal life. Now think about it. If the one thing we have to do to be saved is to believe on Christ, right? All the way, you know, whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life. Then if anything, if anything would make you lose your salvation, it'd be what? Believing not, doubting, lacking faith, losing faith or whatever. But here's the thing. What he's saying is that even if you did that, he would still abide faithful even if you did doubt. Now I don't think a saved person is going to just fully stop believing in Christ because the Holy Spirit lives inside them. They've been enlightened. Their eyes have been opened. But it is possible for Christians to have serious doubts. Look at John the Baptist. He doubted whether Christ was even the Messiah. So what the Bible is doing here is in chapter 2 verse 12, he says if we deny him, he also will deny us. But just to make sure we understand that deny us doesn't mean that we're not saved, he says if we believe not, yet he abides faithful. Even in spite of that, he would be faithful to his promise. Why? Because he can't deny himself. So if we were to lose our salvation, that wouldn't be God denying us. You know what that would be? That would be God denying himself. And God can't deny himself. He has to abide faithful. He must keep his promise or he's not even God because God can't lie. So God will keep his promise. There's nothing we could ever do to lose our salvation because he said I give unto them eternal life, they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. We're sealed under the day of redemption. So now it makes sense why verse 13 is there. Because it's to make sure we don't misunderstand verse 12. So what does verse 12 mean? If it's not talking about losing your salvation, because of course we can't lose our salvation, we have eternal life, what does it mean when it says he also will deny us? Okay. Well let's stop and think what does the word deny mean? Now the word deny is used a few different ways in the New Testament. Sometimes it's used with an object. Like for example I could say I'm denying my children a second cookie. And in that sense denying would be to withhold something from them, right? Like for example if I said, you know, Jesus told us to deny self and take up our cross and fall. What did he say? Strain self, to withhold things from our self. Deny self and follow him, right? That's one meaning of deny. Another meaning of deny would be like what Peter did. Saying that we don't even know Christ, right? And that's what's being used in this context here when it says if we deny him, he'll also deny us. Because Peter gave us an example of what that looks like when you say I know not the man. So this is saying you're not a Christian or saying that you don't believe something in the Bible or saying that you don't stand for the Bible. But another meaning of deny also is found in Acts chapter 3 when Peter's preaching and he says to the Jews, you denied the Holy One. You denied Christ in the presence of Pontius Pilate when he was determined to let him go. You denied him. Now what did they say? Did they say we don't know him? No. What they said when they denied Christ was basically he wasn't their king. Because Pilate said hey, should I crucify your king? What did they do? They denied him. And they said what? We have no king but Caesar. So they denied him saying he is not the king of the Jews. He is not the Messiah. He is not the Christ. He is not the son of God. They denied him. Is everybody following? Does everybody understand? So if we deny him, he'll also deny us. If we confess him before men, he'll confess us before his father which is in heaven. If we deny him before men, he'll deny us also in the presence of his father which is in heaven. So what does that look like? Well, think about this. Let's say I confess him before men. Let's say I'm just boldly proclaiming the Gospel. I'm showing no fear. I'm taking a stand for the things of God. I'm preaching right. Then the son, Jesus, is going to say to the father up in heaven, he's going to confess me before his father. He's going to say, hey, father, Steven Anderson is down there and he is boldly standing for the truth. He's doing what? He's confessing me before the father as putting in a good word for me. Why? So that I can be blessed, so that I can be rewarded, so I can get answers to prayer. Right? And now, or let's say I am ashamed of the Gospel, I'm ashamed of the truth, then what's he going to do? He's going to deny me to the father. Basically, it's going to be the exact opposite of confessing me. It's going to be to say that which is negative about me. To say that I'm not what I'm supposed to be. I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be. I'm not who I say I am. He's going to say, hey, Steven Anderson is down there. He's a coward. He's ashamed of the Gospel. He's afraid of persecution. He's not doing what's right. And what's going to be the result if Jesus denies me like that before the father? What's going to be the result? Chastisement, loss of blessings now, loss of rewards later. You understand? So we're not talking about salvation. We're talking about being blessed or being withheld from blessings. Because Jesus is our advocate with the father. So stop and think about this. Satan is called what? The accuser of the brethren. Well, accuser is a prosecutor. These are legal terms. An advocate is another word for a lawyer. So our advocate with the father is Jesus. Jesus is our defense attorney in heaven. He's our advocate with the father. If any man sin, we have an advocate with the father. So Jesus is going to go to bat for us. He's going to step in and advocate for us to the father. What's the devil going to do? The devil is going to accuse us to the father like he accused Job. So let me ask you this. Do you want Jesus advocating for you, confessing your name, bringing your name up positively, saying, hey, Steven Anderson is doing a great job, or whatever your name is, is doing a great job, and you get that good word put in, or do you want Jesus, basically the devil saying, hey, look at Steven Anderson, he's a coward. Look at Steven Anderson. And do you want Jesus to say, yeah, pretty much. And you're like, what in the world? This is supposed to be my defense attorney. But he's like, well, you're not standing for me. I'm not going to stand for you. See what I'm saying? So you can still be saved, and you can still be ashamed of the cause of Christ. Look, the Bible says that if any man provideth not for his own, especially for those of his own house, he's denied the faith and is worse than an infidel. Denied the faith. Now, look, there are plenty of saved Christians who are going to heaven, but they don't provide for their family. They don't go to work. The Bible says they've denied the faith. So it doesn't mean that they're going to go to hell. It doesn't mean they're going to lose their salvation. But what it does mean is that if they're denying the faith, God's not going to bless that. And if we deny the very Christ himself and deny his word and deny what the Bible says, even though we know it's the truth, well, then he's going to deny us. But just to make sure we don't understand, look, even if we believe not, he abideth faithful, because he can't deny himself. Can he deny us? Oh, yeah, he can deny us, but can he deny himself? Well, guess why we're going to heaven? For sure, no matter what, because he can't deny himself. It's not because he can't deny us, because he sure can deny us, but he can't deny himself. So anyway, I want to spend a little time on that, because it is kind of a complicated subject there. But once you compare scripture with scripture and understand what deny means and what faith full means, it all makes sense, and compare it with Matthew 10. So it says that these things put them in remembrance, verse 14, charging them before the Lord, that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the heroes. He's saying there's a lot of striving or argument about words that has no benefit, it has no profit. Like right now, the argument that I just gave you, that's a profitable argument, because we want to make sure that we know the gospel, that we're saved and that we can't lose our salvation. And that's something that you could use out soul-winning if somebody comes at you and says, hey, you can lose your salvation, because if we deny him, he'll deny us. You can say, wait a minute, that's not saying he'll send us to hell, that's just saying he will deny us, we're going to lose rewards, we're going to lose blessings. Even if we believe not, he abideth faithful. He can't deny himself. But there are a lot of arguments and strives about words that have no profit, meaning that they don't help us grow, they don't edify us, they don't make us a better Christian, and it's what I like to call navel-gazing, navel-gazing, spoon-bending, kind of just people sitting around and having dumb discussions and dumb arguments, and it's out there. People just, they sit around, they talk about dumb things that don't matter. We should worry more about what's revealed in the Bible than the things that are not revealed in the Bible, of just asking all these questions about things that the Bible doesn't address. If the Bible doesn't talk about it, let's just not worry about it. Isn't there enough in here to talk about that matters? But there are a lot of just strivings and arguments of things that don't matter. And they have no profit, they're vain. Vain means what? They're a waste of time. So don't just argue about things that don't matter. Argue about things that do matter, but don't strive about words to no profit. Study to show thyself approved unto God so that you can win every debate and argue better than anyone. No, no, no. So that you can be a workman that need not to be ashamed. The goal in having knowledge and the goal in having the right doctrine is that you can do the right work for the Lord, not just so that you can wow everyone with your knowledge and just debate and argue and bicker and strive for no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers. Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth, but shun profane and vain babblings. And look, I've been in church my entire life and I've heard a lot of just vain babblings. People are just talking about just dumb things and dumb questions and just, it's just like, no, that doesn't matter. The Bible doesn't even cover that. Why are you arguing about that or why does that change anything? Whether it's X, Y, or Z. And their word will eat is that the canker, I already talked about this on Sunday, of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus, who concerning the truth of earth saying that the resurrection is past already and overthrow the faith of some. Nevertheless, the foundation of God stand as sure having this seal, the Lord knoweth them that are his, and let everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity. But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth, and some to honor and some to dishonor. If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified and meet for the master's use and prepared unto every good work. What's he saying? There are some people that we need to purge ourselves from. Even people that are saved. Even in the household of God. Even people that God knows that are his. If they're a vessel unto dishonor. If they're a subversive person who talks a lot of vain and profane babbling and a lot of just false doctrine and stupidity and worthlessness. The Bible says there are some people that we should purge ourselves from so that we can be a better servant of God. We want to just hang out with everybody who claims the name of Christ. Some people can drag us down and be a bad influence. If we purge ourselves from those kind of people, we'll be better off. Let's hurry up because I'm out of time. Flee also youthful lusts. So he's really worried about Timothy. He's like, look, I don't want you to go off the deep end doctrinally. I don't want you to get scared of persecution and get watered down and cowardly. And I certainly don't want you to go into youthful lusts and go out and commit adultery or whatever. Follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart. And look, again, this comes up for the third time in the chapter, but foolish and unlearned questions avoid. Does it say answer every foolish and unlearned question? No. He says foolish and unlearned questions avoid knowing that they do gender strife, meaning they give birth to strife. They conceive strife. So people ask dumb, foolish, ridiculous questions, and then it creates all this strife and debate. And pretty soon we're all arguing about stuff that doesn't even matter, that has no profit to anyone. It's completely meaningless. Now look, doctrines of the faith do matter. You don't want to become like the non-denom type where just, oh, forget doctrine, man. Let's all just sing Kumbaya together. No. Obviously, salvation by faith matters, the Trinity matters, eternal security of the believer matters, heaven and hell and those doctrines matter. Those things matter. But there are a lot of just stupid and unlearned questions that don't matter. I don't even want to name them all because they're so stupid. I feel dumber when they roll off my lips some of the dumb questions that are out there. Unlearned questions. When somebody comes to me and asks me a question that just shows that they're dumb and shows that they don't know the Bible and they're not asking to learn something but they want to strive or argue, I just don't even answer that email because I don't have to answer every question that's put ... Or I've had people ask me a question and I just say, you know what? That's a dumb question. I'm not going to answer that. That's a foolish question. The Bible says, answer not a fool according to his folly. The Bible says, avoid foolish questions. That's dumb. I don't want to answer that. I don't care to answer that. And he says, they gender strives and the servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient and meekness instructing those that oppose themselves if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth and that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil who are taken captive by him at his will. Okay. So what does this mean? We're not to strive or to be gentle. What's he saying? That means that if I go out soul winning and somebody wants to argue with me, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to walk away. I'm going to avoid that and walk away. If somebody just wants to argue and debate with me, I'm just going to walk away. See, what I'm supposed to do as a servant of the Lord is to meekly instruct people. And if people will not let me meekly instruct them, then I'm just going to move on. Because some people you can't meekly instruct them because they won't listen. So that's where it comes into play, a man that is in heretic after the first and second admonition, reject. And some people, you know these guys that were thrown out of our church for denying the Trinity and that's exactly what they did. I don't care what they're trying to lie and say now that we just have a different view of the Trinity that's just not the Trinity. It's just one is Pentecostalism but we're going to call it the Trinity now or something. These people who were cast out for denying the Trinity, you know they desired to discuss this doctrine with me and I told them I'm not going to discuss this doctrine with you because the Trinity is not up for debate. I will teach you the Trinity but I'm not going to sit for hours and listen to your Pentecostal crap. Okay because I'm, and look, I'm not, and by the way, I'm not going to do a debate either. You know there are preachers who travel all over the world and do hundreds of debates. I've never done a debate and I'm certainly not going to debate the Trinity. Why not? Okay you're not going to win or something, no, no, no. I'm not going to debate the Trinity because the Trinity is not up for debate. The Trinity is so crystal clear in scripture that it's not even something to be questioned or debated. It's something to be taught to someone. See I'm not going to strive and argue. Look the questions that they ask when they question the Trinity are stupid questions. They're dumb. Well who, I mean how many people are sitting on that throne? I mean that's just a stupid question. The Bible is crystal clear that the Father is up in heaven and that Jesus Christ is seated at his right hand. If that's not enough for you, that the Father is in heaven and Christ is seated at his right hand, advocating for us, confessing us or denying us before his Father which is in heaven, if you're going to say, yeah but I mean there's only one throne so it's like where is he sitting? That's a dumb question. All of their objections to the Trinity are dumb. All of them are foolish and so I'm not going to sit here and debate with them. That's why I just told them, you're a heretic and you've been admonished repeatedly, tons of preaching on the Trinity, tons of sermons and they, after the first, second, third, fourth, fifth admonition, if they're not ready to get on board with the right doctrine of the Trinity, they just need to be rejected at that point because I'm not going to sit there and strive with people and I'm not going to strive with them out soul winning. I'm not going to strive with people that, you know, people come up to me after the sermons and they want to challenge my preaching and that's fine and they tell me, hey, here's where you're wrong and then I tell them, well no, here's what I believe in the Bible, this is why I said what I said, here's my evidence and they're like, well no, but I still think you're wrong. Then I just say to them like, okay, well go ahead and think that then, you're entitled to your opinion. But I'm not just going to sit there and argue with people and argue and strive because it's always best to avoid that if we can and look, if you go out soul winning and you argue with a lot of people, you're probably not getting a lot of people saved and if you go out soul winning and you actually teach people and meekly instruct people, you're probably getting a lot of people saved. But after the first and second admonition, heretics need to be rejected. If these people came to me and said, Pastor Anderson, teach me what the Trinity is, teach me what the Bible teaches about the Trinity, show me what the Bible says, then frankly I would just say, well, I already preached it. Here's the three sermons, download them and listen to them. Or I would just begin to preach those sermons to them from the Bible. But I'm not going to sit there and argue with somebody over the deity of Christ. I'm not going to argue over those things. I'm not just going to sit there and argue. I've had people come here and want to argue with me about whether salvation is by faith or by works. That's an unprofitable argument. I'm going to teach the truth and people have the option to either believe it or not believe it. Debates are a bad way to learn. They just create a lot of confusion, a lot of strife. It makes a lot more sense to just listen to a sound Bible teacher teach the Bible. Because you know what a debate is? One person's right, one person's wrong. That means half of what you're listening to is lies. You're just listening to half lies and half truth. I want to listen to all truth. So as soon as I know somebody's a liar, I don't need to listen to them. I want to listen to the truth. I don't like to argue with people. I don't like to debate people. Because I'd rather teach people that are teachable. That want to learn. If people don't want to learn, then they should just move on. And that's what the Bible is saying here. It says foolish and unlearned questions avoid. Knowing that they do. He didn't say answer all foolish and unlearned questions. He said avoid them. And then he said they gender strives and the servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient in meekness, instructing those that oppose themselves. If God peradventure will give them repentance, the acknowledging of the truth and so forth. So let me give you a tip on being gentle about soul winning. How can you be gentle about soul winning? Here's a good way to do it. Only talk to people who want to listen. You know what I mean? Because then it's real easy to be gentle. But you know when you start getting angry and losing your temper and getting rude and yelling at people at soul winning is when you're talking to people that you should have already walked away from. Because don't cast your pearls before swine. Don't give that which is holy unto the dogs. When we go out soul winning, we're giving everyone an opportunity to hear the gospel. And if somebody says, hey, I'm not interested. I don't want to hear the gospel. I don't want to hear what you have to say. Then you know what? See you later. Have a great day. No, you need to listen. Or if they just want to argue and fuss and fight about every point, Romans 3.23, they're already arguing with you, move on. And gently go to the door that's going to let you gently and meekly instruct in the Word of God. Let's bow your heads and have a word of prayer.