1Timothy 4 -- What is the apostasy?

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1 The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Let’s discuss what these demons teach. First, they will negate the necessity of faith in Jesus to be saved. As long as you do what you think is good then that is OK. Second they will undermine the faith in one God and Father. Since God is the God of all then “all Gods” are referring to this God. This is a direct contradiction to the word of the Lord that He is the way, the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father but by Him. They will deny specific commands and laws in the Bible like capital punishment. This is arrogant and opens the door for anyone to treat God’s word in a way that you can pick and choose what you will receive and what you will reject. They will teach people to commit fornication. They will teach ecumenism as a way to short circuit preaching the gospel. On the surface ecumenism sounds good, the oneness of all Christians. But when someone denies the faith once for all delivered to the saints, that is not something you can tolerate. So what they are really teaching when they say “ecumenism” is to tolerate that woman Jezebel who calls herself a prophetess and teaches my servants to worship idols and commit fornication. That is what these teachings are doing. Also, instead of referring to preaching the gospel as preaching the gospel they call it “proselytizing” and condemn it as unfriendly. This is a big deal, you must not share the gospel with atheists, you must respect the “freedom of religion” of every person. So preaching the gospel is now “disrespectful” of someone’s freedom not to believe. Along these lines they teach you to worship in silence, just like Paul said, they worship dumb idols that make you dumb. They will teach there is no hell, that Islam and Judaism and Christianity all worship the same God. Again, blurring the lines of the gospel in an attempt to deceive the elect. They will undermine the faith by referring to certain passages in the Bible as “magic” and “God is not a magician”. They will confuse and distort what the Lord did on the cross. Jesus bore our judgement for sin on the cross. He didn’t commit sin, but He bore the full judgement for the sin that we have committed. In that way He has paid the full price for our redemption. But they will distort that and say Jesus became a sinner for us, it isn’t our sin, it is His. In this teaching liberating us from sin becomes liberating us to sin. They will undermine marriage and reject God’s condemnation of homosexual acts.

 

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2 Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron. 3 They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth.

We see certain sects forbid the priests and nuns to get married. This sounds holy and chaste, but what has happened is that about 25% of priests do have sexual relations with other adults. As a result you have a serious problem. Either you don’t have enough priests or you cover up this behavior. This teaching pushes many priests into committing fornication which in turn compromises their ability to condemn sin. Then you have pedophile priests. If they excommunicate the pedophile priests they might in turn expose the priests who are committing fornication, so the whole house of cards comes down. So instead they simply shuffle the pedophile priests around from parish to parish. This teaching promotes a religion of lies, deceit, hypocrisy and evil.

4 For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, 5 because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.

This becomes a distorted and twisted view of the Bible. God doesn’t forbid priests to marry, the Bible doesn’t, but because the Catholic church does people then think that God does. That in turn makes everyone think that if they are married they are somehow less holy or less consecrated to God.

6 If you point these things out to the brothers and sisters, you will be a good minister of Christ Jesus, nourished on the truths of the faith and of the good teaching that you have followed. 7 Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives’ tales; rather, train yourself to be godly.

The worldly society is filled with godless myths. Santa Clause, Halloween, horror movies, zombies, vampires are all examples of godless myths. Don’t have anything to do with them.

8 For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come. 9 This is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance. 10 That is why we labor and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all people, and especially of those who believe.

Train yourself like someone going to the gym. We have put our trust in the living God who is the savior of all people. That is why we preach the gospel, that is why we speak of the Lord, that is why we teach people to repent of sin, that is why we obey the Lord’s word. We do His commands because we love Him and know Him. We know that He is the savior of all people and we want all to receive Him by faith and repent of their sins.

11 Command and teach these things.

The deceiving spirits mock the idea of “command these things” they even attempt to
discourage you from teaching these things.

12 Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity. 13 Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. 14 Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through prophecy when the body of elders laid their hands on you.

The Lord is coming and until He does come we need to devote ourselves to these things: public reading of scripture, preaching and teaching.

15 Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. 16 Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.

The more diligent we are the more we will progress. It is like the guy who goes to the gym and works out. When we preach and teach and read scriptures it can save those who hear, but it will also save us. Doing this is a salvation to you first and foremost.