back to indexBerean Community Church Wednesday Night Bible Study
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For those of you guys who are in the far back near the cafe, 00:05:48.760 |
Again, everyone, go ahead and take your seats at your tables. 00:06:04.400 |
Let's pray together to begin our worship set. 00:06:23.440 |
looking it over, observing, asking questions. 00:06:26.320 |
But also, we pray, God, that your spirit will illumine 00:06:29.720 |
and cause us to see powerful and wonderful things in your word. 00:06:43.160 |
that you would help us in our both heart and our mind, 00:06:47.520 |
God, that it would be washed by your word through your spirit. 00:06:50.680 |
And also, Father, as we study the passage this week, 00:06:54.720 |
God, sometimes it's difficult enough just to fight our flesh 00:07:00.080 |
And yet, we recognize there is a host of other distractions, 00:07:04.040 |
temptations, and pressures that come from outside of us, too. 00:07:07.720 |
So in all things, Father, help us to truly be alert, sober, 00:07:14.840 |
and lift up our song to you and praise and worship to your name. 00:07:33.240 |
There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's 00:08:34.480 |
The dying thief rejoiced to see that fountain in his day. 00:08:47.960 |
And there may I, though vile as he, wash all my sins away. 00:09:14.280 |
And there may I, though vile as he, wash all my sins away. 00:09:50.240 |
Till all the ransomed church of God be safe to sin no more. 00:10:16.200 |
Till all the ransomed church of God be safe to sin no more. 00:11:02.560 |
Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die. 00:11:32.000 |
Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die. 00:11:58.960 |
Redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die. 00:16:26.560 |
Okay, good evening again everybody. I just have two brief announcements for you 00:16:33.520 |
guys. You know just as a heads up again that this Sunday we have our members 00:16:38.040 |
meeting and just as a quick note number one if you're a member and you know that 00:16:42.520 |
you can't attend we do have a little absence form. Look it up on your email 00:16:47.200 |
and there'll be a couple links. Secondly because this Sunday is also the service 00:16:53.240 |
fair please note that we're gonna have all of our service booths situated out 00:16:58.000 |
in the courtyard and after the services they're gonna have handouts of 00:17:03.080 |
information that you can just pick up or otherwise like previously after the 00:17:07.520 |
membership meeting is done you can take time to visit with the reps from each 00:17:12.200 |
team. I recommend that even if let's say you're not looking to volunteer for 00:17:17.560 |
something immediately it's good just to be aware and informed about what's going 00:17:22.320 |
on. You're gonna have opportunities if you're a parent to talk to some of the 00:17:26.000 |
you know ministry leads etc etc so see it as a good opportunity to gain 00:17:31.640 |
information and awareness about what's going on at church okay. And then 00:17:35.560 |
secondly starting next week officially the cafe is going to be 00:17:41.480 |
open. Let's give them a big round okay. So the cafe ministry as you guys know 00:17:46.680 |
they've been doing such an amazing job on Sundays but from 530 to 645, 645 00:17:54.040 |
they're gonna do a cutoff. They'll have the cafe here open so that you can come 00:17:58.600 |
to your studies if you want to do meetups etc so 530 to 645 officially 00:18:04.080 |
starting next Wednesday okay. Alright everyone please have a great time with 01:01:58.300 |
All right, we're gonna get started in a minute. 01:02:12.460 |
If I can ask the people in the rooms to come back out. 01:03:52.520 |
We're not gonna be able to get into too much detail. 01:03:57.580 |
spend most of my time in the first three verses, 01:04:00.380 |
and then just an overview of verse four through 11, okay, 01:04:08.380 |
a little bit more difficult to understand, okay? 01:04:11.380 |
Let me pray for us, and then let's get started. 01:04:13.380 |
Heavenly Father, we ask that you would guide us and lead us, 01:04:29.380 |
I pray that all our judgments, all our thoughts, 01:04:32.380 |
all our emotions, our lives may be submitted to your word, 01:04:35.380 |
so if there is any misunderstandings or our flesh, 01:04:38.380 |
Lord God, that causes us to see things in a way, 01:04:44.380 |
help us, Lord God, to be guided by your word and your spirit. 01:04:59.380 |
Yeah, I didn't want you to see, so it doesn't matter. 01:05:05.380 |
Okay, so this week's text falls into three large categories. 01:05:11.380 |
I mean, you could have divided it into two, but you have... 01:07:33.380 |
The first three verses, basically, description of the false prophets. 01:07:48.380 |
And then, he concludes with an encouragement here, 01:07:52.380 |
"Then the Lord knows how to rescue the temptation." 01:07:56.380 |
So, the main point that he's trying to make here is it serves as an encouragement 01:08:00.380 |
to those who are righteous to persevere, to pay attention, 01:08:03.380 |
and it serves as a warning to those who are teaching false doctrines. 01:08:08.380 |
So, that's kind of like the breakdown that I'm going to be going through. 01:08:10.380 |
I'm going to spend most of my time in this section, 01:08:12.380 |
and then I'm going to pretty much hurry through that, 01:08:17.380 |
So, the first part of it, where it says, "False prophets arose among the people, 01:08:22.380 |
just as there will also be false teachers among you." 01:08:29.380 |
is whenever you see a list, it's good to kind of put them in order, 01:08:33.380 |
so that you can see them, like, line by line. 01:08:36.380 |
If you put it all in a paragraph form, sometimes it doesn't stand out the way it should. 01:08:40.380 |
So, whenever you see any kind of list of anything, 01:08:48.380 |
and sometimes you'll get better insight when you do that, okay? 01:08:52.380 |
He starts out by identifying false prophets and false teachers. 01:08:56.380 |
What's the difference between false prophets and false teachers? 01:09:12.380 |
most likely is referring to the Old Testament prophets, right? 01:09:16.380 |
Where they were declaring, say, "God told me this, I had a vision from God." 01:09:19.380 |
False teachers are basically interpreting, like, interpreting the Revelation. 01:09:24.380 |
So, in the Greek, these two words, again, there's a lot of, 01:09:28.380 |
if you have a good word study, I think I gave you a couple as an example. 01:09:34.380 |
If you have a good Bible program, it will save you so much time. 01:09:39.380 |
Instead of flipping through pages, all you have to do is push a, like, 01:09:42.380 |
if you had a Bible program, it says "false prophet," 01:09:44.380 |
and you just push a button, and then the Greek word would come out. 01:09:47.380 |
Even if you don't know the Greek, there would be English, you know, 01:09:52.380 |
and then it will give you the definition of that, word for word. 01:09:57.380 |
So, I would highly recommend, right, don't drink boba for a week, use that. 01:10:04.380 |
One Disneyland ticket could get you two, okay, two Bible programs maybe. 01:10:12.380 |
If you are, you're doing an inductive Bible study, 01:10:16.380 |
having a good Bible program would literally save you, like, hours. 01:10:21.380 |
Because you just click of a button, especially the word studies, right, 01:10:26.380 |
You just click of a button, and then boom, it will come out, right? 01:10:29.380 |
You'll be able to go much deeper, much faster if you did have it. 01:10:31.380 |
So, if you don't have it, I highly encourage you to get it. 01:10:34.380 |
The Greek words behind these two words is "pseudo-prophetas" and "pseudo-didaskala," 01:10:43.380 |
So, basically, they're false prophets, false teachers, 01:10:47.380 |
and then he goes into the description of who they are. 01:10:51.380 |
He says they will secretly introduce destructive heresies, first one, right? 01:11:02.380 |
Most likely, it's happening inside the church, right? 01:11:07.380 |
So, if it was obvious that they're coming, that you know who they are, 01:11:12.380 |
especially in our circles, right, you say, "Well, if they're teaching the health and wealth gospel, 01:11:19.380 |
or they're, you know, the pastor or whoever is asking for $320 million airplane 01:11:32.380 |
So, they're not that hard to identify when they're outside, right? 01:11:37.380 |
But they seek, it says that the dangerous ones are the ones who secretly introduce destructive heresy. 01:11:43.380 |
You know, this word "heresy," right, "hereticus" in the Greek, 01:11:49.380 |
there's a distinction between the two different type of words that describes false doctrine. 01:11:54.380 |
One is "schism," which means where we get the word "to separate," right? 01:12:00.380 |
This one, "heretic," the word itself literally means to have opinion, 01:12:06.380 |
to have your own opinion, the word "heretic." 01:12:09.380 |
So, the word "heretic" itself doesn't necessarily mean it's false. 01:12:13.380 |
But a destructive heresy is somebody who is within the church, right, 01:12:18.380 |
somebody who has doctrines that are off the wall, right, 01:12:22.380 |
that we're going to have to pray to Mary to get to Jesus, 01:12:24.380 |
or you're praying to, you know, Jesus was the brother of Satan. 01:12:28.380 |
Those type of things are not within the church. 01:12:30.380 |
Those are things pretty obvious outside the church. 01:12:32.380 |
Those are like you break off from those type of stuff. 01:12:35.380 |
He's warning about doctrines that seep into the church that seem like they're Christian, 01:12:43.380 |
And that's why it says it's destructive heresies that are secretly introduced, right? 01:12:47.380 |
It creeps into the church, and you have wrong thinking, wrong life, 01:12:51.380 |
and it is completely contrary to sound doctrine, but it creeps in because it sounds right, right? 01:12:58.380 |
That's what he's trying to really get them to pay attention to. 01:13:01.380 |
So the destructive stuff that comes into the church usually are not that obvious 01:13:08.380 |
if you're not really paying attention, right? 01:13:11.380 |
He said even denying the master who bought them. 01:13:15.380 |
So ultimately, all destructive heresies eventually lead to rebellion. 01:13:21.380 |
This word for master literally means a slave owner, right? 01:13:25.380 |
And he's saying that we've been delivered from one master now to serve the other master, 01:13:31.380 |
but a destructive heresy that's secretly introduced usually brings you away from submitting to the true God, 01:13:39.380 |
and you end up ultimately serving yourselves, right, 01:13:42.380 |
which is bringing upon them swift destruction upon themselves. 01:13:46.380 |
So if you notice, one of the things that I ask you to do is look for words that are repeated, right? 01:13:51.380 |
So this word destruction, right, destructive, destruction, or the word judgment. 01:13:59.380 |
Remember, if you go down the list, you probably, if you did this, you probably see, like, 01:14:03.380 |
those are the two words that gets repeated over and over again. 01:14:06.380 |
So throughout this whole text, the 11 verses, it's a warning against those who are bringing destruction into the church secretly, okay? 01:14:17.380 |
He said, this is going to be so effective, he said, many will follow their sensuality. 01:14:23.380 |
This word for sensuality in the English sounds like something sexual, and it could be, but it's a much broader term. 01:14:33.380 |
And so if you have other translations, you probably noticed that some of your translations says shameful, right? 01:14:39.380 |
Or some of your translations says destructive. 01:14:42.380 |
Or the King James basically says a way of perniciousness. 01:14:46.380 |
Any behavior that leads to, leads to destruction, judgment, right? 01:14:53.380 |
He says, but many will follow their sensuality. 01:14:57.380 |
It basically is describing somebody who's led by their flesh and not by the word, right? 01:15:02.380 |
Remember how we talked about that in Romans chapter 7 and 8, and then we talked about that in the book of Galatians, right? 01:15:09.380 |
Those who, those who, what, they invest in the flesh, they're going to bear fruit in the flesh. 01:15:15.380 |
Those who invest in the spirit will bear fruit in the spirit. 01:15:18.380 |
So some people who are following their flesh, whatever they desire, right? 01:15:23.380 |
And they're going to be following them, they're also going to be led into destruction. 01:15:28.380 |
Because of them, many, because of the way of, because of them, way of the truth is maligned, right? 01:15:35.380 |
So, so much of criticism in the church today, right? 01:15:39.380 |
So much, I'm not saying all of it, but so much of it is not against Christians, right? 01:15:46.380 |
And I'm not saying Christians haven't made their mistakes. 01:15:49.380 |
But so much of the criticism in the church are people who have the name of a Christian who are inside the church, right? 01:15:56.380 |
Pseudo-Christians who are being led by their flesh, but especially in our generation where the line has not been drawn for the most part, 01:16:05.380 |
because the churches have been working overtime to get everybody into the church no matter what, without any standards. 01:16:12.380 |
And so some of you guys may have thought when you came to our church, it's so weird to have membership, right? 01:16:19.380 |
Doesn't God welcome everybody? No matter what kind of sin you allow in your life, doesn't God welcome everybody? 01:16:24.380 |
Isn't it about grace? And then, so there's no, there has been no line between the church and the world. 01:16:29.380 |
So, so much of the criticism from outside the world comes not because Christians haven't been living a certain way, 01:16:37.380 |
it's because there's non-Christians inside the church. 01:16:39.380 |
So I'm not saying everybody who sins is a non-Christian, but inside the church, many, right? 01:16:46.380 |
Many have been following destructive thinking, right? 01:16:53.380 |
So we have to be careful that we're not quick to judge and say that guy's a Christian or that guy's not a Christian 01:16:59.380 |
because he's not doing this or he's not doing that. 01:17:01.380 |
But at the same time, if people are living by their flesh, they're denying the master, right? 01:17:09.380 |
And they're following false thinking, it ultimately leads to maligning of the church and his, his, his gospel, right? 01:17:17.380 |
And this is why God calls us to make sure that the church is holy. 01:17:22.380 |
The church has to be a place of grace, but it also has to be a place of holiness, and neither can never be compromised, right? 01:17:29.380 |
You cannot compromise holiness in order to be known as gracious, 01:17:33.380 |
and you cannot compromise graciousness because you want to be known to be holy. 01:17:41.380 |
So he says that because of this, the church will be maligned, and their greed, ultimately, is their own greed. 01:17:48.380 |
And the word greed isn't simply talking about money, it's covetousness. 01:17:52.380 |
Somebody who may not be greedy for money can be, can covet fame, honor, right? 01:18:05.380 |
They're not seeking to glorify God, they're seeking to glorify themselves in the name of God, 01:18:09.380 |
and they will exploit you, take advantage of you. 01:18:19.380 |
People who are living by their sensuality, right? 01:18:29.380 |
How do you get people who are living by their sensuality to follow false doctrine? 01:18:39.380 |
If I start preaching a gospel that allows you to be comfortable living in your sin, 01:18:53.380 |
So when you're under guilt, you have two options. 01:18:59.380 |
Either you repent of that guilt and come to Christ, 01:19:02.380 |
or you will change your doctrine so that you don't longer feel guilty. 01:19:08.380 |
So a false teacher will come in, and to do what? 01:19:18.380 |
So that you can continue to live in sin and still feel like, you know, everything's right. 01:19:23.380 |
So all you've done is you haven't dealt with the guilt. 01:19:25.380 |
So there's only two ways to get under guilt, right? 01:19:30.380 |
Either you find justification in Christ by true repentance, 01:19:39.380 |
So in order to justify yourself without repenting, 01:19:43.380 |
you have to condemn whoever is causing you to feel guilty, right? 01:19:48.380 |
So there's only two ways to get out of guilt. 01:19:51.380 |
Justification by Christ through true repentance, 01:19:58.380 |
And so he says, in their greeting, covetousness, 01:20:02.380 |
they're going to come tickle your ears to exploit you with false words. 01:20:07.380 |
And that's why from the very get-go why we named ourselves Berean 01:20:14.380 |
that people are not using the Word of God to come to truth, right? 01:20:18.380 |
So we have a generation where we rely on catechism, 01:20:22.380 |
where we rely on tradition, we rely on our discipler, 01:20:26.380 |
we rely on whatever tradition that we came from, 01:20:30.380 |
And people are contested, "Why do you believe that?" 01:20:34.380 |
So it's not really you. You're relying on tradition, right? 01:20:42.380 |
Sometimes if you are faithful to the Word of God, 01:20:47.380 |
and that's exactly where you should be, right? 01:20:50.380 |
But when you are constantly concerned about staying with the group, 01:20:59.380 |
Because your desire to be accepted by the group that you're in 01:21:03.380 |
won't allow you to accept doctrines that will take you away from that, right? 01:21:16.380 |
to make sure that every thought you have, every behavior you have, 01:21:22.380 |
It's that their judgment is from long ago, is not idle, 01:21:25.380 |
meaning that God is not just sweeping it away. 01:21:28.380 |
It may seem like they're getting away with it, 01:21:35.380 |
but at the end of the day, it says God's hand is on them actively. 01:21:42.380 |
So these are all descriptions, not only of a false prophet or false teacher, 01:21:51.380 |
So anybody who's living continually based on his sensuality, 01:21:55.380 |
sensuality doesn't necessarily have to be something evil, right? 01:22:11.380 |
All of those things are open doors for satanic presence in your life 01:22:18.380 |
because these are things that God wants us to repent of and put behind us, 01:22:27.380 |
those things will cause you to accept certain doctrines and reject certain doctrines, right? 01:22:34.380 |
You emphasize certain things and de-emphasize certain things, 01:22:37.380 |
not based upon the Word of God, but based upon your own prejudice, 01:22:42.380 |
so these things are from God or these things are not from God. 01:22:45.380 |
That's why Jesus says the very first step of truly living is what? 01:22:57.380 |
but if you die because of Christ, you will really live. 01:23:01.380 |
So the beginning of true life is recognizing our own life needs to be put away, right? 01:23:09.380 |
In order for us to receive new life in Christ. 01:23:11.380 |
Otherwise, whatever it is that you are holding on to blinds you, right? 01:23:16.380 |
And you say, "Well, I don't think I'm blind." 01:23:18.380 |
Of course, if you're blind, you're not going to think you're blind 01:23:20.380 |
or else you wouldn't say you're not blind, right? 01:23:24.380 |
How do you recognize that? What's in your heart? 01:23:36.380 |
The second part where he gives us three examples. 01:23:39.380 |
I said two examples, but they're actually three, right? 01:23:42.380 |
First, he says the angels, and then he says the ancient world, 01:23:47.380 |
and then he says the city of Sodom and Gomorrah, okay? 01:23:57.380 |
The angels individually is as high as you can go, right? 01:24:02.380 |
So he says if God's not going to spare even an angel when they rebel, what is he saying? 01:24:09.380 |
The point is not look at the angels and study, like, how did they fall? 01:24:13.380 |
What is the point of this, what he's saying here? 01:24:17.380 |
If God didn't even spare angels, of course false prophets aren't going to be spared. 01:24:24.380 |
So judgment is going to be carried out without prejudice. 01:24:34.380 |
He's saying clearly, so that's why if you're in a large crowd and you feel safe 01:24:40.380 |
because a large number of people are thinking the same way, right, you should remember this verse, right? 01:24:48.380 |
There have been periods when everybody was wrong, where everybody is under judgment, right? 01:24:55.380 |
So it's kind of hard to imagine when the Bible says that the road to destruction is wide, right, 01:25:03.380 |
and the road to life is narrow and few would be found on it. 01:25:11.380 |
We don't know exactly how few, but we know that when Christ went to the cross, 01:25:17.380 |
majority of the people, even though he spent three years doing public ministry, 01:25:22.380 |
preaching the gospel, and everybody said he must be the Messiah, he raised Lazarus from the dead. 01:25:26.380 |
And when Jesus went to the cross, very few followed him, right? 01:25:31.380 |
Now, would that be, we don't know exactly what the number is, but that is still true today, right? 01:25:37.380 |
He said narrow is the gate that leads to eternal life and few will be found on it. 01:25:42.380 |
So he says the ancient world and then the city itself, Sodom and Gomorrah, right? 01:25:47.380 |
So you see kind of like that individually, the world, and then specifically the city. 01:25:53.380 |
So I think he highlights these for a reason, right? 01:25:56.380 |
The angels, when they sinned, was cast into hell. 01:26:00.380 |
So I'm not going to go into every part of this. 01:26:02.380 |
The word hell here is not Gehenna, is not Sheol. 01:26:07.380 |
The Sheol is the Hebrew word that we typically think of hell, and then the New Testament word is Gehenna, right? 01:26:14.380 |
But this word here for hell is only used here. 01:26:18.380 |
And I'm not going to spell it out because I can't read it. 01:26:24.380 |
Okay, well, let me spell it out for you, okay? 01:26:26.380 |
It's not going to mean anything, but taratao. 01:26:34.380 |
This is the only place in the New Testament where this word is used, right? 01:26:38.380 |
So I'm not going to go back, go into the history. 01:26:41.380 |
Maybe some of you guys read it in your, I don't know. 01:26:45.380 |
You're not supposed to look at your commentary, but if you did, you may have read it that this was a Greek mythological word. 01:26:52.380 |
It was more of a cultural word, kind of like today if I said, you know, like if I said something and I said, "Oh, you know, you're going to end up in purgatory." 01:27:00.380 |
Right? And if I say that, it's like, does he actually believe in purgatory? 01:27:05.380 |
Right? Is he actually saying that he believes in purgatory? 01:27:09.380 |
No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that you're going to be punished. 01:27:12.380 |
But maybe the cultural word that everybody understands what purgatory means, punishment for your sins, right? 01:27:18.380 |
So we don't know exactly what it means, but when you say he was cast into hell, if you were doing this study carefully, 01:27:27.380 |
what's a question that you would have come up with this? 01:28:02.380 |
Okay. No is good, but you could have followed that up, right? 01:28:14.380 |
I'm going to say one third fell. I'm going to ask you a third. I don't think they're in hell. 01:28:29.380 |
Satan's the god of this world. He has demons. Right. When Jesus was walking on earth, what did the demons say? 01:28:35.380 |
Why have you come before your time? Right? To torture us. Right? 01:28:40.380 |
To send us to hell. So demons were walking around at that time. Right? 01:28:46.380 |
So this couldn't be referring to all demons, right? All fallen angels who have been sent to hell. 01:28:52.380 |
So this is something a lot more specific than that. Right? 01:28:56.380 |
So we don't know. We don't know exactly what it is. There's a lot of guesses. 01:29:01.380 |
Some believe that this is in reference to Genesis chapter 6, Jude 4, 5, 6, 7, or 8. 01:29:08.380 |
I don't know if you guys read that passage, but if you looked up cross references, my guess is Genesis 6 and Jude probably 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 came out. 01:29:17.380 |
In fact, I'm going to read Jude 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8, and then you'll see the parallel between this passage and that passage. 01:29:23.380 |
But my goal today is not to get too deep into this. It's just to kind of explain why you're doing inductive Bible study. 01:29:29.380 |
You should be asking these questions. Okay? Today, because of time, we're not going to get too much into it. Right? 01:29:35.380 |
The ancient world, he said, Noah preached the preacher of righteousness. Is there a record of Noah preaching? 01:29:43.380 |
Do you remember? No, there's no record of like Noah's public street preaching, telling everybody get in the boat. 01:29:53.380 |
You know what I mean? Or you're going to die. There's no record of that. Right? 01:29:57.380 |
They mock him. Right? God says to go in, lock up. He locks up. Rain comes. Destruction comes. The end. Right? 01:30:05.380 |
But he's described as a preacher of righteousness. Preacher doesn't necessarily mean he is opening his mouth and preaching. 01:30:12.380 |
His very presence was a witness of God's righteousness and holiness in his generation. 01:30:18.380 |
But they call him the preacher of righteousness because of his life. Right? 01:30:22.380 |
Obviously, there is a need for the physical preaching, the words being proclaimed. 01:30:30.380 |
But sometimes when there isn't preaching in life, the preaching with words is nullified. Right? 01:30:38.380 |
If your life doesn't represent the gospel that you want to preach, they're not going to take the gospel seriously. 01:30:45.380 |
Sometimes your life is much more powerful than any word you can speak. Right? 01:30:51.380 |
Powerful meaning that it causes people to think and open up their heart, especially in our generation. 01:30:57.380 |
Because there is a, there is a, already a prejudice toward the church. Right? 01:31:06.380 |
Hypocrites. Right? You say one thing and you live another. 01:31:10.380 |
And so you have all these prejudices against the church or a lot of people who used to go to church who fell out. 01:31:15.380 |
So we don't have a neutral culture that we're living in. Right? 01:31:20.380 |
Either they're Christian or they have a positive view, some of them, because of their experience with other Christians, 01:31:25.380 |
or many of them, as you probably know, have negative experiences in the church. Right? 01:31:30.380 |
So in that context, there needs to be preaching of righteousness by our life. Right? 01:31:35.380 |
In order that we can preach with our mouth. Here it says, he condemns Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, having the example. Right? 01:31:44.380 |
Ultimately, Sodom and Gomorrah served as an example. Example to who? 01:31:53.380 |
That when a society falls that deep into sin, God's judgment comes. 01:31:58.380 |
People are saying that we are either there or getting there real quick. Right? 01:32:04.380 |
As much as we are concerned about the state of, state of the world. Right? Right now. 01:32:10.380 |
Like just the crazy things that are coming out right now. Right? Especially in California. 01:32:15.380 |
I recently found out that they passed a law that young, I don't know how young, is it, correct me if you guys know, 01:32:24.380 |
like five, six, seven, eight, I forget how young, but pretty young, that if they want to get a sex change, 01:32:29.380 |
they can get one without the parent's consent. Right? 01:32:33.380 |
And I heard, and I don't know if this passed yet, but I heard that if a parent refused to give sex change to a child, 01:32:40.380 |
they can actually come, child services can come and take away your children. 01:32:45.380 |
There's crazy stuff going on right now. Right? 01:32:49.380 |
And I've only mentioned one. If we kept on studying, I mean, this is where the time that we're living. 01:32:55.380 |
I don't know if we're that far from Sodom and Gomorrah. Right? 01:32:59.380 |
Maybe, maybe even beyond Sodom and Gomorrah, you know? 01:33:04.380 |
So he says, this is serving as an example. We are living in a culture. 01:33:08.380 |
But here it says, he says, he knows how to rescue a lot. He was oppressed by sensual conduct on principled men. 01:33:16.380 |
Right? And then he says he was, his soul was tormented because of their lawless deeds. 01:33:24.380 |
If we're living in the kind of culture that we're living in now, and our soul is not tormented by what we see, 01:33:33.380 |
or we don't feel a sense of oppression and darkness around us, something's off. 01:33:42.380 |
For us to hear that, to know that, that these are things that are actually happening, and it just doesn't bother us at all. 01:33:55.380 |
So he says that Sodom, that Lot was a righteous man, and because he was a righteous man, 01:34:02.380 |
he felt the oppression of the darkness around him, and he was tormented. 01:34:08.380 |
Now, why is this important? Right? Because we need to pray. 01:34:14.380 |
And I know that right now, because of this evil in our culture, that there is a lot of movements, 01:34:21.380 |
and a lot of things that are going on, the how do we combat this, that we need to have more people in office. 01:34:26.380 |
All of these things are true, but I believe the very first thing that he calls us to do is to pray. Right? 01:34:34.380 |
If you're tormented, first thing that we do shouldn't be marching. Right? 01:34:40.380 |
If you're tormented by what's going on around us, the first thing that we should do is not simply to try to change legislation, 01:34:46.380 |
although all of those things are important and essential, the first thing that has to happen is to pray. 01:34:51.380 |
Call people to pray. Right? To pray, to fast. Right? 01:34:58.380 |
Because this is not something that we can do simply by getting organized, simply by talking louder, 01:35:09.380 |
And so, again, I just want to highlight that as he is mentioning all of these things, 01:35:14.380 |
that all of these things are here as an example, that before anything else, he said we need to come before God and pray. Right? 01:35:28.380 |
He said, "And the end conclusion is, the Lord knows how to rescue godly from temptation, 01:35:33.380 |
to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, especially those who indulge in the flesh and its corrupt desires." Right? 01:35:45.380 |
How many people are struggling with routinely going to porn? Right? 01:35:56.380 |
I know this is an issue. I know this is a problem in every generation. I also know this is a problem in our church. Right? 01:36:04.380 |
Because we live in this generation, the temptation is on your phone. 01:36:10.380 |
If you just excuse that and say, "We all struggle. It's so hard." Right? 01:36:19.380 |
You are allowing yourself to continue down that path. Right? 01:36:25.380 |
Your comfort, your ease is more important than your relationship with God. Right? 01:36:35.380 |
This is something that if you continue to indulge in your flesh and your corrupt desires, there has to be a sense of urgency in our life. 01:36:44.380 |
That beyond anything else that you're pursuing or you're concerned about, this has to be dealt with. Right? 01:36:51.380 |
And it's not just about feeling guilty. Right? 01:36:55.380 |
Because worldly sorrow, all it does is lead to condemnation. 01:37:00.380 |
Godly sorrow leads to repentance and bears fruit. 01:37:03.380 |
So in order to bear true fruit, we have to figure out how do I overcome this. 01:37:09.380 |
But the worst thing to do as you are indulging in the flesh to excuse this. Right? 01:37:15.380 |
Because basically what you're saying is God is okay with this. 01:37:23.380 |
Because I guarantee you if you are living continually in this, Satan is already influencing your thoughts. Right? 01:37:34.380 |
What you love, hate, how you listen to sermons, how you do Bible study, fellowship, your pursuits, desires, what makes you happy, what makes you sad. 01:37:44.380 |
All of it is being influenced by this, even if you don't recognize it. Right? 01:37:50.380 |
So again, for the sake of time, I'm going to move on. Right? 01:37:55.380 |
But this is not something that a Christian could just excuse because you are actively heading down the wrong path. Right? 01:38:05.380 |
And the Spirit of God cannot, right, guide you if you are constantly grieving the Holy Spirit in this. Okay? 01:38:14.380 |
They despise authority. Usually somebody who's indulging in the flesh, they despise authority because they don't want to hear it. Right? 01:38:22.380 |
Because typically it's the authority that's going to come and say, "Hey, maybe that's wrong." 01:38:26.380 |
You're headed down the wrong path. So you end up despising authority. Right? 01:38:31.380 |
Because people who are not authority are not going to be challenging you. Right? 01:38:36.380 |
The Word of God is not going to come to you. But whoever's bringing the Word of God to you, you don't want to listen. 01:38:42.380 |
They're daring. This means bold. Right? Audacious. 01:38:46.380 |
Meaning, in your sin, right, eventually you're going to despise authority because you don't want to hear it anymore. 01:38:53.380 |
And then you're eventually going to become bold. Right? 01:38:57.380 |
You say, "Oh, why? Why are they doing this? This is so judgmental. You guys are so legalistic." 01:39:01.380 |
And then you double down on living that. Right? 01:39:06.380 |
Self-willed. Another word for this is self-centered. 01:39:13.380 |
Meaning, you don't care how to fix other people. You don't care if the Word of God is being maligned. 01:39:23.380 |
So, self-willed. You see the progression here? Somebody who indulges in the flesh, despises authority, becomes bold, 01:39:29.380 |
and he lives his life self-centered. As long as I'm okay, it's okay. Right? 01:39:35.380 |
They do not tremble when they revile even angelic majesties. In other words, there's no fear. 01:39:43.380 |
Even though your soul should be tormented by the sins around you, 01:39:48.380 |
even though there's sin that has crept in and you've allowed it, there's no sense of fear. 01:39:54.380 |
No sense of urgency. Right? Because your heart has become calloused. 01:40:00.380 |
He says, "Whereas even angels are greater in mind power, do not bring reviling judgment against them before the Lord." 01:40:06.380 |
And again, I'm not going to go too deep into this. I would suggest that you go and read Jude 4 and on 01:40:13.380 |
because it's a reflection of this. But at the end of the day, the application of this is 01:40:18.380 |
there's a spiritual battle going on, and there is no sensitivity to their spiritual battle. Right? 01:40:26.380 |
So we're not fighting against flesh and blood, but against principalities and power in high places. Right? 01:40:32.380 |
And that's why he says to put on the full armor of God, and then he says, "Pray, pray, pray, pray, pray, pray, pray," 01:40:38.380 |
at the end. Pray above all of this. Right? So either if you are continuing to live in sin, 01:40:46.380 |
that you are, you don't have faith and you're just faking it, right? Or your heart's become so callous. 01:40:54.380 |
Right? And you're embracing, "I like this. I don't like this. This is judgmental. This is not," you know. 01:40:59.380 |
And then you've just kind of like created your own little God that is not consistent with what the Bible teaches. 01:41:05.380 |
Right? And so he says he's warning them. Again, there's one theme in this whole text. Right? 01:41:13.380 |
God never sweeps sin under the rug. He never sweeps sin under the rug. 01:41:21.380 |
Because when God says it's going to be clean, it's going to be truly clean. Not appearance of cleanliness, 01:41:27.380 |
but real cleanliness. Right? But the way he does that is through grace. Right? 01:41:34.380 |
The way he brings us to righteousness is through grace. He says that God will forgive you. 01:41:40.380 |
No matter how deep, no matter how vile, no matter how difficult, he says, 01:41:45.380 |
"If you are willing to fight against it, God will forgive you." Right? 01:41:51.380 |
He's not saying like, "Get right or get out." He said, "No, you need to get right. That's why you need to come to Christ 01:41:59.380 |
and admit it and bring it out. Confess it. Find forgiveness. Find accountability. Find true fellowship." 01:42:06.380 |
Right? And so by the grace of God that we are led to holiness. Right? 01:42:13.380 |
Otherwise, we are all susceptible to all kinds of heresies coming in. 01:42:20.380 |
And usually the heresy that destroys us the most are not the obvious ones. 01:42:26.380 |
Jesus is not God. He was never resurrected from Christ. It's not those heresies. 01:42:31.380 |
It's usually the heresies like, "Oh, we're going to be gospel-centered. 01:42:36.380 |
So therefore, every imperative is legalism or moral teaching." 01:42:41.380 |
Well, that sounds great, but it's not biblical because that's not how the Bible teaches it. Right? 01:42:50.380 |
Social justice. Doesn't Jesus want us to care for the poor? Isn't that pure religion? Right? 01:42:58.380 |
And then you can, "It's not just the gospel. We got Jesus. God sent us here so that we can flip the world upside down, 01:43:06.380 |
you know, and take care of poverty and racial injustice." 01:43:11.380 |
He said, "Oh, doesn't that sound biblical?" He said, "No, God called us to preach the gospel. 01:43:18.380 |
And if we preach the gospel, people's souls are saved. 01:43:23.380 |
And when their souls are saved, saved souls deal with prejudice. 01:43:28.380 |
Saved souls care for the poor. Saved souls, right, will fight for social injustice. 01:43:36.380 |
But our primary call is to preach the gospel." Right? 01:43:41.380 |
And a lot of times the false things that come in, it causes us to say, "Well, it's the gospel. 01:43:45.380 |
Yes, it's the gospel, but it's not just the gospel. It's the gospel and this. It's gospel and that." 01:43:51.380 |
And so when we begin to kind of, you know, turn left or to the right, it's because it seems right. Right? 01:43:58.380 |
It seems right, but it's not. And the only way to be able to discern that is to pay very close attention to the Word of God. 01:44:08.380 |
Right? Test everything. Test if what I just said is true. Right? 01:44:13.380 |
That's why the Bereans were considered more noble in character than the Thessalonians, 01:44:17.380 |
because they tested to see if everything Paul was saying was true. 01:44:20.380 |
They put the Word of God at the highest standard. 01:44:24.380 |
Not people, not their own prejudice, not their denomination, not their church, not their leaders, but the Word of God. 01:44:31.380 |
Okay? All right. So let me give you the discussion questions for today. 01:44:39.380 |
What are some false doctrines that you've seen propagated within the Christian circle? 01:44:43.380 |
How were you able to identify them as being false? Right? 01:44:46.380 |
Worst thing to say is, "I don't agree." Why? "I just don't think it's fair." Right? 01:44:54.380 |
That's the worst way to come to a conclusion, because your sense of fairness is from a fallen point of view. Right? 01:45:02.380 |
Okay. Let me not go off tangent. Okay. I got things to say, but I'm going to hold myself back. Okay. 01:45:11.380 |
If you notice it, if you like something or don't like something, how did you come to that conclusion? Okay? 01:45:18.380 |
Number two, have you had any major doctrinal shifts as a result of carefully studying the Bible? 01:45:22.380 |
What were they, if any? Right? It doesn't have to be recent. It could be many years ago. 01:45:27.380 |
Like, you had a paradigm shift because – not because a sermon that you heard, not because you were a part of a community, 01:45:34.380 |
but you were looking at the Word of God, and the Word of God caused you to think differently. Right? 01:45:39.380 |
Number three, should Christians be fearful of God's judgment? 01:45:42.380 |
We are called to fear God, and yet in 1 John 4:18 it says that love casts out fear. 01:45:47.380 |
How do you reconcile these two thoughts? Right? Clearly the Bible says both. Right? 01:45:54.380 |
How do you reconcile these two things? You understand the question, right? 01:45:57.380 |
And then four, how does the reality of spiritual world affect the way you live your life? Right? 01:46:03.380 |
If you believe God is real, you believe angels are real. If you believe angels are real, you believe the devil is real, and the demons are real. 01:46:12.380 |
If you believe heaven is real, you believe hell is real. Right? 01:46:16.380 |
How does the belief in the reality of the spiritual world affect you? 01:46:26.380 |
When I first became a Christian, I lived in terror because I was saved in a charismatic circle, and they attributed everything to the devil. Right? 01:46:35.380 |
The music is devil, the movies are the devil, you know, and I had a hard time waking up in the middle of the night because I was afraid I was going to meet the devil. 01:46:48.380 |
And later on, I realized that my fear was more based upon my prejudice of what I thought the devil was. 01:46:56.380 |
And then the more confidence I had in the Spirit of God in me, it started to slowly drive out fear. Right? 01:47:03.380 |
But how does the reality of the spiritual world, the demonic world, the angelic world, does it cause just fear or indifference? 01:47:12.380 |
Right? It just doesn't seem real, so it doesn't really affect you. 01:47:17.380 |
Or soberness. That's why, again, let me just say something real quick, okay? 01:47:23.380 |
That's why these scary movies are not good for your soul. 01:47:31.380 |
This is a… The reason why it's not good for your soul is because it desensitizes you to the demonic world. 01:47:39.380 |
And so, because you're entertained by it, you know, it no longer seems real. 01:47:52.380 |
Why are you here every Wednesday studying a bunch of stuff that has no effect on you? 01:47:57.380 |
What are you doing? Every Wednesday, what a waste of time. Right? 01:48:00.380 |
Every penny that you spend, you could have had several Teslas. Right? 01:48:08.380 |
Why are you going to weird places around the world to share the gospel? Right? 01:48:13.380 |
It's because you believe it, right? You believe it. Right? 01:48:17.380 |
But if you become desensitized to the spiritual world, yeah, it affects how you view your spiritual life. Right? 01:48:27.380 |
So, I don't know how many of you guys are going to listen. Right? 01:48:32.380 |
But personally, like, I don't think it's good for your soul. Right? 01:48:40.380 |
All right, let me pray for us, and then I'll get you in your groups. 01:48:45.380 |
Heavenly Father, I pray for your blessing upon the small group time. 01:48:48.380 |
May it be fruitful and practical that all our discussion would not end in theory, but in application, Lord God, of what you convict us.