Continue in the Word (2 Tim 3:10-17)

Introduction

If you have your Bible with you, please turn it to 2 Timothy 3:10-17.

Last week, Josh did an excellent job working through the issue of godlessness in the last days. He did a good job at not only describing the issues of godlessness mentioned at the beginning of the chapter, but he did a great job at contextualizing these issues and helping us see how these issues are still existent today. Last week’s message really hit hard this idea that as we continue towards the End Times, sin is expected to continue it’s corruption upon mankind and things will progressively get worse and worse.

I appreciated his connection back to the issue of false teaching and false teachers in Ephesus because that was part of Paul’s primary emphasis and thrust in that text. That those who are teaching false things are helping to propagate sin within the people and it is this sin that’s growing and expanding. It’s also this sinfulness that shows you whether someone is a false teacher or not—you can see it in their fruit, whether they’re partaking in the sinful lifestyle or the fruit of their ministry is that their people indulge in sin rather than seeking holiness.

What we’ll see as we continue in 2 Timothy is a contrast from those who teach false things and the false teachings themselves with how a true teacher ought to live and what the truth is.

Keep this in mind as we read 2 Timothy 3:10-17:

2 Timothy 3:10–17 ESV

10 You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, 11 my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet from them all the Lord rescued me. 12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, 13 while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

As we study this passage, we’re going to break it into two parts: (1) Paul’s Example During Persecution (10-13) and (2) Paul’s Exhortation to Remain Faithful in the Word (14-17). The idea is essentially this: instead of being like the false teachers that were stewing in their sin and leading the people further into their own sin—Paul says, “look at my example” and stay focused on the Word of God.

Prayer for Illumination

Paul’s Example During Persecution (10-13)

Our text starts with this idea of Paul’s example in life. He says that Timothy has “followed” or watched him.

And there are a handful of areas in which Timothy has watched him. In particular, he mentions that Timothy has:

Seen his teaching, his conduct, his aim in life, his faith, his patience, his love, and his steadfastness—these are all positive statements concerning who Paul is and how he has acted and what he has taught.

Remember, that this is in contrast to the false teachers teaching false things—so the idea is this:

Unlike the false teaching, Paul has taught true things. Unlike the false teachers who continue in sin, Paul’s conduct is in line with the Gospel.

Unlike those who aim for their own benefit, he has aimed his life towards the truth and the spread of the Gospel.

Unlike the false teachers who aren’t patient, aren’t loving, aren’t steadfast or able to endure, Paul was and is.

So much so, that despite everything that has happened in places like Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra—places in which Paul was attacked and beaten almost to death, he still endured because the Lord rescued him.

Timothy had witnessed how Paul taught, how he acted, how he behaved even in the light of persecution, pain, and suffering.

And the way that he acted and what he taught were completely different than those of the false teachers not just in Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Ephesus, but really everywhere.

The false teachers were known to teach things contrary to Scripture and they were known to live in a way contrary to how those of the Word of God were supposed to.

Paul mentions that Timothy had witnessed how much Paul had suffered for the sake of the Gospel before he outrightly states that “all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and imposters will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.”

Those that seek to live in accordance with Scripture—according to what God has spoken will face some sort of persecution.

In the United States, we’ve been blessed to not deal with significant amounts of persecution. Occasionally, we find people attacking Christianity and occasionally, we’ll see governmental decisions that were clearly made to combat biblical ideas, but for the most part, most of us have never faced the concept of being beaten because of our faith or the potentiality of losing our lives because of our life.

The reality is that for most of the world, Christians are facing consistent persecution for their beliefs. And for much of church history, Christians have faced consistent persecution for their beliefs.

And that’s exactly what Paul is stating—Christians, those who desire to live a godly life in Jesus will be persecuted.

While those who are evil and those who are pretending to be Christians, which refers particularly to false teachers, will continuously get worse and worse.

This correlates with the false teaching that we see today and throughout church history. False teaching has always been false, but throughout history, these false teachings have adapted.

Whereas in the first few centuries after Christ, the false teachings were relatively easy to find because they were so brash—like those who claimed that Jesus wasn’t fully man or that He wasn’t fully God; or those who claimed that salvation required adherence to the Old Testament Law.

Today’s primary false teachings are more subtle (though we do have some, like the prosperity gospel or Mormonism that are blatantly false)—for instance, most of them don’t claim that you need to follow the whole Old Testament Law for salvation, but they’ll instead substitute legalistic rules that show your belief in Jesus (whether that’s coming to church every single time the doors are open or dressing a certain way or doing certain things). Very few today would outrightly claim that Jesus wasn’t fully man, but then in the way that they teach about Jesus, they’ll emphasize His deity more than His humanity or vice-versa to detriment.

What we’ve seen is that those who teach false things intentionally, those who are pretending to be faithful teachers have gotten to the point where they not only deceive others, but they’ve deceived themselves with their false teachings.

In the case of 2 Timothy 3:10-13, there a huge emphasis by Paul of contrasting those that are teaching false things with those who are teaching true things. And there are two primary ways to tell whether someone is a false teacher or not:

The first has to do with the teaching itself—whether what the individual is teaching is biblical or whether it’s contrary to the Bible.

This sounds like it ought to be common sense—that if someone was teaching something contrary to Scripture, that you shouldn’t support that person, that you shouldn’t listen to that person, that you should reject them and remove them.

But the reality is that despite the common sense nature of that idea, the majority of churches, the majority of Christians completely fail in doing this and I’ve personally found that there are two primary reasons why churches and Christians fail in this:

First, because they like the individual who is teaching or they like the teaching itself. They ignore the false teaching because they like the person or the ignore the false teaching because they like the false teaching.

Second, because they think pragmatically rather than biblically. They ignore the false teaching because the false teacher can fill the seats or if they say something, they’re going to rock the boat and make ripples in the water.

Both of which are completely unbiblical and I would even say sinful reasons to ignore false teaching and refuse to remove false teachers.

In fact, the Bible is very clear on how to handle false teaching and false teachers, we see it in a passage like this, but we see it in various other passages like Romans 16:17-18, “Watch out for people who cause divisions and upset people’s faith by teaching things contrary to what you have been taught. Stay away from them. 18 Such people are not serving Christ our Lord; they are serving their own personal interests. By smooth talk and glowing words they deceive innocent people.”

We see it in 2 Corinthians 11:13-15, Matthew 7, 1 John 4, Colossians 2, 2 Peter 2, and so on and so forth. I think it’s rather telling that there are so many passages of the NT dedicated to the issue of false teaching and what to do with false teachers.

What it shows us is two-fold: (1) there will be false teachers trying to teach false things in the local church. And (2) it shows us that the tendency will be not to do anything about these false teachers and false teachings otherwise, Paul, John, Peter, Jesus, and the other apostles wouldn’t need to constantly remind the people to avoid false teachers and reject false teachings.

What Paul says to Timothy is that there will be false teachers and there will be false teachings.

You can tell that they’re false by what they’re teaching.

And you can tell that they’re false by their character.

And Paul’s exhortation to Timothy in 2 Timothy is rather simple. Don’t be like the false teachers who are teaching false things and rejecting the truth. Instead, stay true to the Word of God; and we see this exhortation in vv. 14-17. Let’s look at those verses:

Paul’s Exhortation to Remain Faithful in the Word (14-17)

2 Timothy 3:14–17 ESV

14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

The idea is that Timothy is to eschew false teaching and to reject false teachers and to keep his focus and mind on the Gospel itself, which he has believed and He has learned and He has been acquainted with since childhood.

Paul speaks highly about Timothy’s past. And he really emphasizes that all that Timothy knows about the truth of the Gospel he has known since childhood.

This is actually the second time that he’s spoken about this—remember, all the way back in the introduction, Paul writes, 2 Timothy 1:5, “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well.”

This speaks highly of the importance of raising children in the faith. Of course, we all know that this doesn’t always happen the way that we hope it would; and yet, the fact that not every child believes is not an excuse to reject raising them in the faith.

In fact, the Proverb to “raise up a child in the way he should go” is for the very purpose that hopefully, the child won’t depart from that way.

In the case of Timothy, he clearly didn’t depart from the faith.

In fact, he has learned and he has believed and he has been saved through Jesus Christ.

Now, I do want to clarify again that Timothy’s faith is not a result of his upbringing, though the way that his mom and grandmother brought him up in the faith is commendable.

Nor is that the point that Paul is trying to make—no where in this text is Paul saying that the reason that Timothy believes is because his mom and grandmother pointed him to Jesus throughout his childhood.

Likewise, notice how Paul points out Timothy’s familiarity with Scripture, that since from childhood, Timothy had been acquainted with the sacred writings—no where in this text is Paul saying that the reason that Timothy believes is because he knows the Word of God.

In addition, notice how Paul points out how he had learned from legitimate sources concerning the Bible, concerning the Gospel (and he probably includes his own teaching of Timothy in this statement)—no where in this text is Paul saying that the reason that Timothy believes is because Paul taught him everything he needed to know.

Timothy does not have salvation because of his parents nor does he have salvation because he has learned from Paul nor does he have salvation because he knows what the Bible says. He has salvation because he believes and has faith in Jesus, which is who his mother and grandmother had been pointing to, and who Paul had taught him about, and who the sacred writings are all about.

Timothy has salvation because he believes in the Jesus that the Word of God proclaims; and he believes in the Jesus that Paul taught him about; and he believes in the Jesus that his mother and grandmother pointed him to.

Ultimately, what Paul is saying is that Timothy has salvation because his mother, his grandmother, and Paul had pointed him consistently to the Jesus that’s proclaimed in the Word of God, which leads Paul to make a profound statement about God’s Word in v. 16, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and [is] profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” This last verse is probably a very familiar verse, if you’re like me, you have it memorized, which is good, but it means that when you read it, you probably have a tendency to sort of glance over it. So, let’s take an in-depth look at these two verses:

Paul starts with the statement that “All Scripture is breathed out by God,” which is a significant statement because it forms how we think about the Bible itself.

If the Bible, which is the idea of “all Scripture” is breathed out by God, then everything in the Bible is absolutely reliable because it is the very word of the God that is truth.

Likewise, if the Bible is breathed out by God, then there is an implication that it ought to be taken with the same authority that God ought to have in your life.

Meaning, if the Bible is genuinely breathed out by God, then those who claim to follow God need to obey the Bible because it is God’s Word.

Now, I do want to clarify, that when we say “all Scripture is breathed out by God,” we specifically mean the Bible in its original languages—Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic.

This is why when we look at English translation of the Scriptures, we can see minor differences in translation even in this verse. The ESV says “All Scripture is breathed out,” which is also used in the NIV and LSB. Most of the other translations, including the KJV, NASB, CSB, and NLT states that “All Scripture is inspired by God.”

In most cases, it’s just a difference of terminology, which doesn’t change the meaning of the text. Occasionally, there’s a slight difference of meaning, which can be understood by looking at various translations.

Regardless, even with the minor differences of meaning in very specific passages in modern English translations, what we mean by inerrancy is that in the original languages, there is no mistake. In the translations, there might be minor meaning differences that can be solved by reading multiple good translations.

Paul says that all Scripture is breathed out by God and thus, it is reliable, it is without error.

And because it is God’s Word, there are some uses of the Word of God. We can use it for teaching, for reproving, for correcting, and for training.

Meaning, God’s Word can and should be used to teach right things about God and the world around us.

It ought to be used to expose our sins and convict us of our sins.

It ought to be used to correct our wrong thinking.

And it ought to be used to train us to live righteous lives.

Or put differently, because God’s Word is reliable and truthful and without error, we can trust it to not just speak to every part of our lives, but we can trust it to change us or to sanctify us—there’s a reason in the high priestly prayer that Jesus says, “Sanctify [my disciples] in your truth; your Word is truth.”

In fact, Paul states in v. 17, that the Word of God is sufficient to change us enough to “complete us” or to perfect us. It is enough to help us grow spiritually and it is enough to equip us to do good work.

Which is different than how most people, even Christian people think of the Word of God.

There is a tendency amongst Christian people to think that the Bible is sufficient for things concerning faith, but nothing else; but consider 2 Peter 1:2–3 “2 May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. 3 His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence,”

All things have been granted to us through the knowledge of him, who breathed out this Word, for all things pertaining to life and to godliness.

God’s Word rightly understood grows us and matures us. God’s Word sanctifies us in truth.

Which leads us this morning in our last few minutes to our application. And our text finds its application in two ways. First, our application deals with the issue of false teachers, which stems from the beginning of the passage. Second, our application then deals with the need to stay firm on God’s Word. Overall, the idea is this: (1) you can tell a false teacher by what he teaches and how he acts—so when he teaches false things or he acts wrongly, stop listening to him, reject him, and move on; (2) true teaching comes from the only inerrant truth, which is God’s Word. So, seek truth in God’s Word and remain firm on what it says.

Application

So, let’s start with the issue of false teachers and false teaching (10-13) — Paul spends the first four verses contrasting how he has taught and how he has behaved with those of false teachers. He explains that Timothy has watched him and Timothy know what Paul teaches and how Paul lives his life (again, which contrasts to the false teachers in vv. 1-9). He says that he has endured persecution and that those who seek to follow God will face persecution, but the primary point is that true teachers of the Gospel teach the truth and they live differently than those who don’t teach the truth.

We’ll come back to the idea of teaching the truth when we get to the rest of the application, but I want to focus with these verses on the issues of persecution and character.

In our present time period, we’ve had several pastors of very large churches get caught in sin and be removed from their churches.

For instance, Mark Driscoll at Mars Hill Church in Seattle.

Everyone thought that he was a phenomenal pastor who was preaching the truth, which was resulting in a massive surge of new believers in Seattle. Mars Hill started as a small group of people and grew to multiple campuses and thousands of attenders throughout Seattle.

Until, some things in Mark’s past started coming up—he had said some vulgar things online to some folks. And some things in the way that he was leading the church started coming out—apparently, he was very forceful, rude, and sometimes belligerent to people.

According to Paul, he wasn’t acting in the way that true teachers of the Gospel ought to act; his character disqualified him from ministry.

Or, think of Carl Lentz with Hillsong Church in New York City.

Hillsong has been accused of false teaching multiple times over the decade, but even without talking about their false teaching—Lentz was placed in New York City and that particular branch of Hillsong exploded—even celebrities had started attending the church.

Until, it came out that Carl Lentz had affairs with women in and outside of the church.

According to Paul, he wasn’t teaching the truth and he wasn’t acting as a true teacher of the Gospel ought to have acted. His false teaching and his character disqualified him before the affairs even happened.

Something similar happened with Perry Noble and Newspring Church, it has happened throughout the country at multiple churches.

But the reality is that in every church that these sorts of issues has happened, if the congregation had actually taken seriously what they were teaching and they had actually taken seriously the issue of character, none of it would’ve actually happened.

If the people held these leaders accountable for sinful behavior and red flags that happened prior to the explosion or the implosion later, the explosion and implosions may never have happened.

Paul tells that Timothy has watched Paul—and he knows what Paul teaches, he knows how Paul acts, and what Paul teaches and how he acts validates who he is as a teacher of the Gospel.

In the case of Paul, his faith, his love, his endurance through persecution is evidence of the Gospel, which he teaches actually changing his own life. His character validates who he is.

Likewise, he mentions his aim in life, his goal in life, which was to proclaim the Gospel and to point people to Jesus is validation of himself as a teacher.

Conversely, what Paul is saying is that character matters—and if someone who claims to be a teacher of truth has character that doesn’t befit someone of the Gospel, it ought to set off red flags that call into question the message that he’s proclaiming.

Just paying attention to how a teacher or preacher acts outside of the pulpit will give validity to the message or cause you to doublecheck the message.

We need to be discerning concerning who we listen to and who we follow.

The reality is that if the teacher or preacher truly understands the Gospel, his life will reflect this truth.

You need to be sure that the people you listen to and the people you watch and the people you follow are exhibiting lives changed by the Gospel. You need to check their character before just accepting that they say.

Now, let’s talk about the significance of God’s Word (14-17) — in the last few verses Paul then emphasizes the significance of God’s Word while encouraging Timothy to continue in the truth. The question is, where do we get this truth that Timothy has firmly believed, that he learned in childhood, that he has found salvation through? It’s all in the Word of God itself and it’s the Word of God that’s profitable for all of us for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness. And I think you can see where the application is in this section, it’s really simple.

If we genuinely believe that the Bible is God’s Word breathed out for us, there is literally nothing else more important for us despite the fact that so many of us neglect the Word of God and we settle for things within and outside the local church that we ought not settle with.

For instance, we know that God’s Word is the Bible and yet, we’ll go to church and we’ll settle for people not actually preaching God’s Word, but preaching their own opinions, their ideas of politics, their own philosophies or psychological principles and we don’t seem to understand how wrong it is.

Or, we know that the Bible is God’s Word, and yet, we’re content with allowing CNN or Fox News to inform us and change our thinking rather than going to God’s Word to inform us and change our thinking. We don’t seem to understand how wrong it is to let secular media to disciple us instead of God’s Word.

Dr. Royce Short said that God wrote his people one single love letter called the Bible, the least we can do is read it; and yet, we don’t. We neglect it, it sits on our shelves and get dusty, and we don’t use it for what it’s for.

So, we read verses like this, where all Scripture is breathed out and is “profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” and we say, “yep, that’s great,” and we don’t actually try to utilize God’s Word for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness.

Again, we take it for granted and we neglect it, but Paul says it is through God’s Word that the Holy Spirit completes us, perfects us, and equips us for every good work.

And it is through God’s Word, according to Jesus, that the Holy Spirit sanctifies us, and grows us.

You need God’s Word because God through His Spirit uses it to mature you.

And how that works is found in James in which God’s Word is compared to a mirror and the lack of applying God’s Word equates us with being someone who looks into a mirror and doesn’t fix anything wrong on their face.

Essentially, what we see is this idea that when we read God’s Word, when we hear God’s Word, when we hear God’s Word preached accurately, we need to be asking certain questions.

What does this teach? What can I learn from this passage?

Is this convicting me? Am I sinning, do I have sin in my life that I need to repent from and of?

How does this correct the way that I’m thinking? Or, what am I thinking that is incorrect? And how does Scripture correct it.

What about this passage trains me to live righteously? How does this passage equip me?

If we truly believe that the Bible is God’s Word, then it has all right and all authority to teach us, to convict us, to correct us, and to train us.

In context then, what we get out this passage is relatively simple. There are those who teach false things, they are false teachers and you can tell them apart from true teachers of the Gospel in two ways: (1) by checking their character and (2) by checking their teaching with what God’s Word says.

Because ultimately, it really doesn’t matter what they say if it doesn’t say what Scripture actually teaches.

And ultimately, it really doesn’t matter what they think if it doesn’t accord with Scripture.

And pragmatically, it doesn’t matter if they can fill the seats, if they’re teaching something that isn’t Scriptural.

And while it’s primarily the elders of the local church that are responsible for determining whether someone is teaching false things and preventing them from doing it.

It is your responsibility as part of the church, to keep your eyes open and ears open and from preventing yourself from being influenced by false teachings and false teachers.

It is your responsibility, as part of the church, to be so influenced by God’s Word that you can tell when someone is teaching things that don’t accord with God’s Word.

It is your responsibility as part of the church, to be so in God’s Word that the Holy Spirit teaches you, and it convicts you, and it corrects you, and it trains you, and it matures you and equips you.

Which is the opposite of what false teachers and false teaching does.

Put simply, what we learn from 2 Timothy 3:10-17 is that (1) we have to be discerning when it comes to who we listen to—we need to be more careful with what we take in; and the teacher or preacher’s character can act as validation or warning of the message they’re preaching; and (2) we know the truth by not just knowing God’s Word, but letting it change us.

We live in a world in which there are plenty of teachers and preachers, but many of them aren’t teaching and preaching the truth. The only way we can discern truth from falsehood is to take seriously the qualifications of eldership, remove those that ought not be teaching and preaching, and focus on the Gospel revealed to us in God’s Word.

Pastoral Prayer