The Sick Love of Controversy

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | Good Monday, it's a big week for us in the podcast

00:00:07.240 | with two hot topics on the table.

00:00:09.760 | I'll put them back to back

00:00:10.680 | because they're related to one another.

00:00:12.760 | Both are very relevant for this season in church life

00:00:16.120 | where social media plays a large role in our culture,

00:00:20.240 | or at least it seems like it plays a large role

00:00:23.040 | in our culture.

00:00:24.280 | Thursday, we're gonna look at how to best speak

00:00:26.260 | of cultural sins or how to not speak of cultural sins.

00:00:30.880 | Paul tells us some things are so wicked,

00:00:33.880 | they are too shameful even to speak of.

00:00:36.580 | He says that in Ephesians 5, 12.

00:00:38.680 | So what cultural sins should we not even talk about?

00:00:42.640 | And what does Paul mean here in this text?

00:00:44.320 | And why does it matter for us today?

00:00:45.520 | That's next time on Thursday.

00:00:47.160 | But today we look at the sick love of controversy

00:00:50.180 | or the unhealthy craving for controversy

00:00:53.600 | as Paul calls it in 1 Timothy 6, 4.

00:00:56.700 | The question is from a podcast listener named Brett.

00:00:59.240 | Pastor John, hello, we live in an age of controversy

00:01:02.520 | and that controversy loving spirit

00:01:05.200 | has come into the church.

00:01:07.840 | The apostle Paul clearly warns us

00:01:10.080 | against people in the church who have a diseased

00:01:13.040 | or unhealthy craving for controversy

00:01:16.080 | and for quarrels about words,

00:01:18.560 | which produce envy, dissension, slander,

00:01:22.840 | evil suspicions and constant friction

00:01:25.160 | among people who are depraved in mind

00:01:27.480 | and deprived of the truth,

00:01:29.440 | imagining that godliness is a means of gain.

00:01:31.980 | That's 1 Timothy 6, verses four to five.

00:01:36.560 | I'm wondering if you can lay out principles

00:01:38.840 | for what this diseased craving for controversy looks like

00:01:43.000 | in the church today.

00:01:44.220 | - I'll try to do that in just a moment.

00:01:47.640 | I'm gonna lay out some principles

00:01:49.880 | to try to avoid what Paul's denouncing in these verses.

00:01:54.880 | But first, let me say a word about

00:01:58.240 | what Brett calls our age of controversy.

00:02:02.260 | He's right, of course,

00:02:06.280 | but we probably shouldn't forget

00:02:09.400 | that even in our own country,

00:02:12.560 | the bygone centuries have been just as,

00:02:17.640 | if not more given to vitriolic language in controversy.

00:02:22.640 | And the reason I say that is just

00:02:26.680 | 'cause it's on my front burner

00:02:28.480 | because I'm reading biographies.

00:02:30.920 | In the last, say, six months,

00:02:32.680 | I've read biographies of John Marshall,

00:02:35.440 | first Supreme Court Justice,

00:02:37.320 | Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Samuel Adams,

00:02:40.600 | and what you can't help but notice

00:02:43.680 | in these really detailed, excellent scholarly biographies

00:02:48.680 | is how outrageous the defamation of character was

00:02:54.080 | in the political writings of that time.

00:02:57.360 | I mean, the language is every bit as vitriolic and lewd

00:03:02.360 | as the language we might be appalled at today.

00:03:08.480 | So that's the first thing to say

00:03:10.260 | is that the age of controversy is not new.

00:03:15.260 | What gives this age, our present age,

00:03:18.560 | a new flavor is first how ubiquitous social media is

00:03:23.560 | so that we have immediate access

00:03:30.500 | to as much vitriol as we would like,

00:03:34.240 | and second, the excesses of sexual sin in our day

00:03:40.240 | are in American history unprecedented and outrageous,

00:03:45.200 | like so-called gay marriage and so-called transgenderism

00:03:50.200 | and so-called healthcare as we cut our babies in pieces.

00:03:56.280 | And the reason I put the term so-called

00:04:01.980 | in front of those phrases is because they don't really exist

00:04:07.760 | and we should not even dignify them as Christians

00:04:12.320 | with language that gives the impression they do exist.

00:04:17.600 | I get really worked up about this.

00:04:19.640 | Some of my good friends have caved on the language issue.

00:04:23.280 | There's no such thing as a marriage

00:04:27.920 | between two men or two women.

00:04:29.560 | It does not exist.

00:04:31.720 | There's no such thing as a man becoming a woman

00:04:34.840 | or a woman becoming a man.

00:04:36.320 | It does not happen.

00:04:38.880 | There's no such thing as healthcare,

00:04:42.320 | which consists in killing unborn children.

00:04:45.560 | Those are simply not realities.

00:04:49.240 | Naming them marriage, transgender, healthcare

00:04:53.520 | does not make them what they aren't.

00:04:55.920 | And these are just some of the kinds of sins

00:05:00.840 | that are rampant in our day,

00:05:02.640 | not to mention the love of money

00:05:05.000 | that has probably sent more people to hell

00:05:07.040 | than all the sexual sins combined

00:05:09.040 | and racial sins and nationalistic and ethnocentric sins

00:05:13.840 | and epidemics of the misuse of drugs

00:05:16.320 | and on and on and on for our age.

00:05:19.600 | So every local church,

00:05:22.360 | I am getting to the issue of controversy in the church.

00:05:26.120 | I'm getting there.

00:05:26.960 | Every local church needs to affirm its biblical stance

00:05:34.140 | over against these sins.

00:05:36.560 | For example, at our church, Bethlehem Baptist Church,

00:05:39.280 | the elders labored long and hard in recent years

00:05:43.760 | over two extended statements

00:05:48.720 | regarding race and regarding sexuality.

00:05:53.120 | And in my judgment,

00:05:54.760 | they produced two very helpful documents,

00:05:59.080 | which our church and our school,

00:06:01.240 | Bethlehem College and Seminary,

00:06:02.360 | happily embraced as where we stand.

00:06:05.840 | In other words, the leadership of the church

00:06:09.040 | shouldn't leave their people wondering,

00:06:12.360 | where does the church stand

00:06:14.120 | in regard to these controversial things in our day?

00:06:18.760 | But now comes the rub that Brett is talking about.

00:06:23.920 | Within our churches,

00:06:25.800 | even the clearest and the most forthright churches

00:06:29.680 | that have driven a stake in the ground,

00:06:31.920 | people have different dispositions and different instincts

00:06:36.680 | and different personalities,

00:06:38.680 | which incline them in different directions

00:06:41.880 | concerning how frequently and how fervently

00:06:46.520 | and how forcefully and how harshly and how crudely

00:06:51.520 | cultural issues should be talked about,

00:06:55.200 | should be foregrounded inside and outside the church.

00:06:59.480 | Some of these differences are quite manageable,

00:07:03.240 | and we just need to have forbearance and patience

00:07:06.920 | and forgiveness in order to get along

00:07:10.260 | with each other in love.

00:07:13.080 | But Paul, in these verses, in 1 Timothy 6,

00:07:17.840 | says there's a limit.

00:07:19.880 | There's a limit to how you talk about these things.

00:07:22.540 | There is a love of controversy that needs to be rebuked

00:07:27.920 | and, if necessary, removed.

00:07:29.960 | Here's what he says.

00:07:31.060 | This is 1 Timothy 6, 4 and 5.

00:07:34.200 | The person he's concerned about is, quote,

00:07:37.960 | "puffed up with conceit and understands nothing."

00:07:42.960 | He has an unhealthy, literally sick,

00:07:47.040 | he has a sick craving for controversy

00:07:50.680 | and for quarrels about words or word fights,

00:07:54.320 | which produce envy, strife, slander,

00:07:57.400 | evil suspicions or conjectures about other people,

00:08:00.540 | and constant friction among people

00:08:03.760 | who are depraved in mind and deprived of truth,

00:08:06.800 | imagining that godliness is a means of gain.

00:08:11.400 | Now, what I think will be useful as a diagnostic tool,

00:08:15.900 | first for ourselves, are we guilty of this?

00:08:19.960 | Lest we fall into this.

00:08:24.000 | And a diagnostic tool for others

00:08:27.000 | is to take these traits that he just described

00:08:30.240 | of this controversy-loving person

00:08:33.560 | and state the positive alternatives.

00:08:37.240 | And in that way, we can have something to pray toward

00:08:41.920 | as well as something to run away from,

00:08:44.520 | and we may be able to see the problems

00:08:47.520 | of others and ourselves more clearly.

00:08:50.840 | So let me do that just briefly.

00:08:53.600 | Seems to me there are six traits

00:08:58.240 | of this lover of controversy

00:09:00.400 | that we can name and strive to avoid.

00:09:02.500 | One, pride.

00:09:05.440 | He's puffed up with conceit, Paul says.

00:09:08.240 | The positive alternative, of course, is humility,

00:09:11.060 | or more specifically, a readiness to confess

00:09:15.240 | our limitations of knowledge

00:09:16.920 | and our willingness to go on learning.

00:09:20.800 | If a person comes off as cocky

00:09:23.680 | and acting like he has infallibility,

00:09:26.800 | never makes any mistakes,

00:09:28.440 | you know you're going to have a problem.

00:09:31.960 | We need to cultivate in the church

00:09:34.200 | the profound belief that a person can be rock solid,

00:09:39.200 | unwavering on matters of clear biblical truth

00:09:43.020 | and justice and purity while maintaining a humble demeanor.

00:09:49.560 | There are people, a lot of people, it seems today,

00:09:52.080 | who don't believe that.

00:09:53.240 | They think the only way to be a person of backbone

00:09:58.880 | is to be brash.

00:10:00.200 | I don't think that's true.

00:10:03.200 | Number two, the second trait

00:10:06.040 | of this lover of controversy is ignorance.

00:10:10.040 | Paul says he doesn't understand anything.

00:10:13.000 | Now, I take that to mean that when our heart is infected

00:10:18.420 | with this sickness of the love of controversy

00:10:21.620 | and with pride, even the facts that we get right

00:10:26.220 | will be skewed in a damaging direction

00:10:30.080 | so that it can be said,

00:10:31.380 | we really don't understand anything.

00:10:33.800 | We don't get anything right.

00:10:35.440 | We turn everything in a harmful direction.

00:10:38.900 | Third, Paul says this person has a kind of sickness,

00:10:43.060 | the ESV translate unhealthy,

00:10:45.780 | craving for controversy and word fights.

00:10:48.020 | There are people who have a morbid need to fight,

00:10:53.020 | a need to fight in order to feel significant,

00:11:00.900 | to feel justified, to feel safe.

00:11:03.260 | We need discernment to recognize this kind of person.

00:11:08.320 | One way is to test whether there is as much praising

00:11:13.420 | and thanking and rejoicing

00:11:16.100 | as there is criticizing and complaining.

00:11:20.660 | Does the person love to see the beauties of God

00:11:25.380 | and Christ and salvation and heaven

00:11:28.560 | and speak of them with joy and marveling?

00:11:32.220 | Or does his need for a fight hinder all of that?

00:11:38.520 | If so, he's not well.

00:11:41.420 | He's just not spiritually well.

00:11:43.780 | He needs help.

00:11:45.540 | Fourth, this person stirs up envy.

00:11:49.440 | This can happen in different ways,

00:11:52.060 | but one way is that lovers of controversy

00:11:55.960 | like to show off their verbal prowess,

00:12:00.540 | clever put downs, shrewd analyses

00:12:03.720 | of other person's stupidity,

00:12:06.580 | ready wit, and a nimble use of culturally hip allusions.

00:12:11.580 | All of this, with a view to showing off,

00:12:15.300 | tends to make other immature people wish they could do that.

00:12:20.140 | That's called envy.

00:12:21.180 | Fifth, this controversy-loving person

00:12:25.780 | is careless with the truth.

00:12:27.740 | Paul says he uses slander, evil suspicions or conjectures.

00:12:33.860 | This usually means he's ready to believe evil of others

00:12:38.100 | with very little evidence.

00:12:40.740 | His anger at a viewpoint, which may be totally justified,

00:12:45.740 | causes a bias that is so strong it ceases to need truth,

00:12:51.540 | but only needs to show the insanity of the viewpoint.

00:12:56.420 | In the process, holding one right position

00:13:02.220 | can easily be used to justify saying other things

00:13:06.020 | that are not true.

00:13:07.480 | We need to love the truth

00:13:10.060 | through and through with great earnestness.

00:13:13.140 | And then finally, sixth,

00:13:15.260 | Paul says that this lover of controversy

00:13:18.740 | imagines that godliness is a means of gain.

00:13:23.120 | In other words, deep down, he loves money,

00:13:27.840 | which Paul says later is the root of all evil.

00:13:32.300 | Which I take to mean the heart that values this world,

00:13:37.300 | what money can buy, over Christ,

00:13:41.420 | is the kind of heart from which all evils come.

00:13:46.420 | It is.

00:13:48.420 | Money is just the lever that such a heart pulls

00:13:53.420 | in order to get what they really want,

00:13:56.100 | which is not supremely Christ.

00:13:59.300 | So I think if we mainly seek to be the opposite

00:14:04.300 | of this lover of controversy, in these six ways,

00:14:09.120 | we will probably be in a good position

00:14:12.060 | both to recognize the error when we see it

00:14:15.660 | and in a good position to avoid it ourselves.

00:14:20.060 | - Yeah, amen.

00:14:20.900 | Is there as much praising and thanking and rejoicing

00:14:24.720 | as there is criticizing and complaining?

00:14:27.020 | Such a great litmus test on our tongues.

00:14:30.260 | And this reminds me of Ephesians chapter five, verse four,

00:14:32.660 | a text that we have talked about many times on this podcast.

00:14:35.220 | Paul wants us to clean up the crudeness of our tongues

00:14:39.480 | with thanksgiving.

00:14:40.580 | Thank you, Pastor John.

00:14:42.460 | And thank you for joining us today.

00:14:44.280 | If you want to ask Pastor John, email us your question

00:14:47.740 | by going to our online home at askpastorjohn.com.

00:14:50.920 | Well, speaking of a culture of sin

00:14:54.740 | and speaking of Ephesians five,

00:14:56.980 | specifically in verse 12,

00:14:58.340 | Paul tells us that there are some things in this world

00:15:00.940 | that are so wicked, so shameful,

00:15:04.740 | that we Christians shouldn't even speak about them.

00:15:07.560 | So what cultural sins are so shameful,

00:15:10.540 | we are not even to talk about them?

00:15:13.520 | That's next time.

00:15:15.060 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke.

00:15:16.380 | We'll see you back here on Thursday.

00:15:18.140 | (upbeat music)

00:15:20.720 | (upbeat music)

00:15:23.300 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

The Sick Love of Controversy

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