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Drive Time Devotions is a Saddleback Church Podcast. We want to invite you to
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I hope you are enjoying this walk together through 2 Timothy chapter 2 day 4 we
are looking at verses 14-19.

These are incredibly encouraging verses from God's Word about how to live in the
midst of everyday real life, live genuine faith. We have been talking about how
you and I need to be strong in grace, how we need to entrust what we are
learning to other people, how you and I endure because we know that God is
faithful to us. And now today we are going to focus on, if I am going to make
it, if I am going to last, I am going to learn to enrich my soul.

I am going to enrich my soul with God's Word. And if I am going to do that,
there are two things, two choices I have got to make. I have got to avoid
godless words and I have got to choose God's Word in my life.

I have got to make both of those choices. And those choices are talked about in
verses 14 down through verse 19 of this second chapter. Let me read those verses
for you.

Paul writes, "Keep reminding them of these things. Warn them before God against
quarreling about words. It is of no value.

It only ruins those who listen. Do your best to present yourself to God as one
approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles
the Word of Truth. Avoid godless chatter because those who indulge in it will
become more and more ungodly.

Their teaching will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus
who have wandered away from the truth. They say that the resurrection has
already taken place and they destroy the faith of some.

Nevertheless, God's solid foundation stands firm. Sealed with this inscription,
the Lord knows those who are His. And everyone who confesses the name of the
Lord must turn away from wickedness.

" Paul talks in these verses about how we are to enrich our soul. And one of the
ways to enrich your soul is to avoid godless words. Avoid quarreling about
words.

It goes into the depth of your soul. Now as Paul talks about this, is he saying
that we should never discuss anything or express an opinion if we have a
difference of opinion? Of course not.

I mean just read Paul's letters. He was more than willing to say he had a
difference of opinion with some people to express the truth. Now what he's
talking about here is false teaching.

He's talking about those who come up with arguments that seek to twist words and
play on emotions so that they hide the clear truth. And Paul says when you pick
up on that, just don't get involved in it. And he gives us some indications here
in these verses of the kind of false teaching that Timothy was battling.

And it gives you maybe some ideas of the kinds of things to stay away from. This
kind of false teaching. This false teaching had a number of different elements
to it.

One of the elements was controversial and confusing questions. You might call it
speculative intellectualism. That's what we call it today.

People who just love to ask questions without any answers. They love to incite
and excite emotions without knowing where it's going to go. There's a lot of
people who teach in that kind of way.

They never give any hope. They're interesting. There's no doubt about it.

It's interesting to listen to those kinds of questions. But Paul says that
interest is just an emotional interest. It's just a base interest.

It's never going to get you to hope. It's never going to get you to truth. And
in the end, it ruins those who listen.

It's like eating junk food. If all you ever eat is junk food, it's going to ruin
your health. It might taste good, but it's going to ruin your health.

And that's what the speculative, these confusing questions are all about. The
kinds of false teaching that Paul was dealing with with Timothy and this
Ephesian church were a sense of pride in their own understanding. People who
felt like they were smarter because they could ask smarter questions or at least
questions that had bigger words.

They acted like, "Well, because I'm willing to ask a negative question, somehow
I'm smarter than you are. " It does not take intellectualism to see the negative
side of life. That's the easiest thing in the world to do.

And yet there are people who somehow are prideful that they can see the negative
side of life. What takes real faith, what takes real courage, what takes genuine
wisdom, is seeing the positive side of what God is doing in this world. The
false teaching that Paul was dealing with in this church was a teaching that
tended to deny people the enjoyment of life.

Back in 1 Timothy, Paul encouraged them to enjoy what God had made because the
false teaching was saying, "You can't enjoy anything that God has made. It's all
empty. It's all meaningless.

" So you need to deny yourself. You need to deny your will, deny yourself the
things that you want. And if you deny yourself the things that you want, somehow
you will make yourself, that's the key word, make yourself more spiritual.

Well, the good news is, the good news is you cannot make yourself anything. It's
what God has made you and what he'll make you through his Spirit. So this idea
that somehow I need to deny myself things in order to make myself better before
God, you can just write that off.

Now, Jesus did teach us to deny ourselves, but you don't deny yourself this
certain food or this certain celebration on this day or the kinds of things that
are in this list of false teaching in order to make yourself feel more
spiritual. It doesn't work. And what's interesting in this false teaching, and
this often happens in false teaching, there's opposite sides.

So sometimes they denied enjoyment, but then they would flip entirely the other
way and they would encourage indulgence and immorality. They'd encourage
materialism and greed. Just ask anything you want to come into your life.

You know, it's okay with God. He's forgiven it all already. So just ask it all
to come in.

Godless words. The godless words included a lot of talk about genealogies and
tales and stories, things that people made up. Maybe you've gotten caught up in
that lately.

Just not interested in the clear truth of the Bible. You're looking for
something new, looking for something different. I found when it happens in my
life and other people's lives, the problem is I don't want to live out what
God's teaching me.

I want to hear some new truth just out of interest, not out of desire to live it
out. The truth of the matter is just the truth of loving one another. Love one
another.

I can spend the rest of my life on those three words. So if you're looking for
some new interesting truth, take a good close look at your life and ask
yourself, "Am I willing to live out the truth that God's put into my life? " Now
this false teaching that was in this church that they were struggling with, we
get a real clue in the verses we just read into one aspect of this false
teaching.

Paul says that Hymenaeus and Philetus were denying the resurrection of the body.
What's being talked about here? Were they saying that Jesus wasn't bodily
resurrected?

No, that's not it at all. What they were saying was that believers, those who
have come to faith in Jesus Christ, would not have a resurrected body. That
somehow either we would be in a spirit body forever, we wouldn't enjoy the
resurrected body that Jesus Christ enjoyed, or that somehow there's an
indication that the false teaching was that somehow those who were Christians
right after Jesus was resurrected and before Jesus returned would not have a
resurrected body, whereas everybody else would.

That somehow these believers, the first believers, would miss out on something
that many other believers would enjoy. Paul says God's foundation stands firm.
The Lord knows those who are his, as if God's going to forget, "Oh, those first
century believers, I missed it.

I didn't understand. " And somehow they're not going to enjoy eternity like the
rest of people. Paul says, "Are you kidding?

" Of course God knows. False teachers tend to twist words by using good words,
fancy words, words that excite your emotions. But those false teachings, they
don't hold water.

And when you and I get caught up in following after a false teaching, what I
need to do is realize that God's word is what lasts. And that's what Paul talks
about in verse 15. You want to enrich your soul.

You got to avoid these kinds of godless words that we've been talking about that
are all through first and second Timothy. And I've got to accurately handle
God's word. Verse 15, let me read it again.

"Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not
need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. " Now before we
talk about correctly handling the word of truth, what is a workman here? What is
he talking about?

A workman who does not need to be ashamed. He's saying these people who talk
about this fancy life, this life above other people's lives, this prideful life,
you don't have to go after that kind of a life. You're just a workman for God.

You don't need to be ashamed of who you are or to try to strive for something
more. Just enjoy the fact that God's made you to do work for him. And those who
have to play on your pride in order to satisfy their own pride, those are the
people that are the false teachers.

If you can't be satisfied with the simple work that you're doing for God, enjoy
what he's doing in and through your life. You've missed it, Paul says. You're a
workman who doesn't need to be ashamed.

And what do you do? You correctly handle the word of truth. The beginning of
this verse, verse 15, Paul says, "Do your best to do this, to present yourself
to God as one approved.

" You just present your life back to God, approved before him. False teachers
make you feel unapproved, like you've got to do something else to get God's
approval. You've got to keep this day or keep this celebration or think this way
or discover this new truth.

False teachers make you feel unapproved. You present yourself to God as one who
is approved because of what Jesus Christ has done for you. It is amazing how
people will try to twist the Bible to say what they want.

There's so many words in the Bible. That's an easy thing to do. I pick a word
from here and a word from here and a word from here.

Here is the key. Here's the core. It's the teaching that you're hearing, helping
you to see that God has given his life for you through Jesus Christ.

There's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. That you now, because
of the forgiveness that God has given you, you can live a life before him of joy
and you can live a life before him of hope and you can live a life before him of
loving him and loving others. Is the person who is teaching you lifting you up
before God or are they putting you down and making you feel like you need
something else, something they can only give in order to feel approved before
God.

That's the key. That's the core that Paul talks about in these verses. And if
I'm going to enjoy that kind of life, I got to correctly handle God's word,
God's truth.

I got to realize it's his truth for my life today. So as we pray together, let's
just pray and say, Jesus Christ, we haven't had nearly enough time to look at
this incredibly important verse. We could talk about it for hours, correctly
handling your truth.

I pray that we would correctly handle it today. That I would. That instead of
letting some lie hide the truth from me or instead of ignoring it based on my
own self-interest, that I'd realize how deeply you love me and how your truth of
loving others, your truth of the hope you want to give, your truth, even in
these verses about the fact that the Lord knows those who are his, your truth
can sink into my heart and your truth can cause me to live my life as one
approved before you because of what Jesus Christ has done.

And so I thank you, Jesus. I thank you in your name. Amen.

And join us tomorrow. We'll end our look at 2nd Timothy chapter 2. We're going
to look at the great purpose that God has for your life.