Tough & Tender - Week 3 - The CORE - Pastor Michael Ewart
Tough and Tender
Week 3 - The CORE
Pastor Michael Ewart
Again here we are in week three of our sermon series. In the first two weeks, we covered the first chapter of 2nd Peter. Today, we're going to look at the whole second chapter of 2nd Peter and I've had this question, a few people ask me this, they said Pastor Michael were two weeks and they said last week, we've heard to full sermons on this and not once during the sermon, did you really mention tough and tender and yet that's the title of the series. Why are you calling it that if you don't even talk about that? Fair question. The reason is that, in the first two messages, in chapter 1, Go reread that chapter again and I think you'll agree with me that the tone overall of chapter one is overall quite tender, that there's a lot of tender and I didn't really see a lot of tough. And so I really didn't highlight that were reading.
There were those of you who were wondering, well, where's the top? Welcome to week three today is going to be a little bit hard today. Peter, it gets really blunt, really direct, really tough, as he talks about false teachers in. No, uncertain terms using some pretty harsh language, as he talks about them, addresses them talks about their fate. What's going to happen to them? He does not mince any words as he talks tough about false teaching. Now, honestly, for many of you here today, this is going to be a little bit of a tough message to hear because of where our culture is today, you see in second Peter chapter 2, Peter assumes and talks about absolute morals, moral absolutes. He talks about absolute truth. He talks very clearly about what's right? And what's wrong? And he misses no words when he talks about God's condemnation of what is wrong and that is very counter cultural to our society today.
If you notice that in our culture, in our society today, it's all about subjectivity and moral absolutes. Certainly not morals, are very individual, morals fluctuate. Morals depend on what you think is right or wrong and absolute truth, not in our culture today, there's my truth, there's your truth. We all have our own truth and don't impose your truth on anybody else. That's what our culture is today and condemnation. Oh no. We don't talk about that today. It's all about tolerance and you just whatever anybody wants to do, or believe. We've got to let them do that and if not just to let them but a firm it as well. This is our culture today, isn't it? Our world is all about if you're going to be spiritual. That's okay. But religious pluralism is what today's culture is all about, you know, that is just the belief that all religions are good in their own way.
And who are we to judge that one religion is better than another? Everyone should practice spirituality the way they feel that they should practice it. And who are we to judge? Okay. And by the way that word judges that maybe triggers a memory of a recent past. Sermon might want to check that out on our YouTube channel that God actually does require us to judge and you're going to hear Peter doing a lot of judging he is evaluating what the false teachers are doing and saying and saying this is wrong God says so but this is not something that we're overly comfortable with in our culture. Except there's this, there's one thing that just perplexes me because tolerance and acceptance.
The word of the day and yet cancel culture is a thing like there are no moral absolutes but what that person did is absolutely wrong. And, and we must condemn it and we cancel them and they can never be forgiven is kind of, the way it works. So there's that one exception to our odd culture today when it comes to the cancel culture, part of it. So, anyway, as we go through the second chapter today, there's gonna be a bit of tension because it doesn't follow with what our worldviews are today. But that's what the Bible has always been. There are always aspects of a culture that the Bible has said, nope, God calls it out and he says, that that's wrong.
That's not in line with the truth. So this would be a good time to share with you. One of the values that we have at 922 Ministry is one of the values that we have here at the core. It's in our, it's in our, in our official documentation, even that one of our values is 200, proof Grace and Truth, kind of made it that way because it Rhymes a little bit 200-proof Grace and Truth simply means that we will not compromise on God's grace or God's truth that you're going to hear both you're going to hear
Taught and preached clearly from this stage and from everything that happens in this building, we are going to teach and preach 200-proof Grace and Truth which is sometimes not popular. But if you will go back again to our YouTube YouTube channel and look at some of our past sermon topics and sermons, you will see that we hold true to that value that we tackle some topics head on that don't make us overly popular. Sometimes maybe we lose some people because of it but it's what we value. 200 proof God's grace, and God's truth. That's what you're going to get here at the core and that's what you're going to get today. So with that little disclaimer,
Let's start today about well, let me do something this little bit uncomfortable. I want you to spend a moment thinking like Satan, we don't do that a lot around here, but what I, what I mean by that is your pretend pretend you're the devil and you, you hate God. You've attacked God in fact you've rebelled against him? That didn't go so. Well you still hate him though you know attacking him directly doesn't work. Not only do you hate God but you hate everything. God loves. Oh, that's you. So, the devil hates you and he wants to separate you from God because he hates God.
So if you are Satan, how do you accomplish that?
Satan knows what we learned last week and that is when you know God's truth when you know God's grace for you in Christ Jesus. When you are certain that Jesus happened, when you are certain that what the prophet said really took place hundred percent of the time. Your faith grows. Your connection to God gets stronger. You love God even more because you know, he loved you first and Satan hates that. So what caused that what made you grow in your faith? The word of God that is, you know, and celebrates the grace and truth of God is revealed in his word, your faith in connection to God, grows stronger, and stronger, and stronger. Okay, you're Satan. How do you mess that up?
Obviously, you can't detect God himself. You're going to attack the word, right? Doesn't that make logical sense? Okay. If that's what's connecting them to God, if that's what's encouraging them, if that's what's giving them Faith and Hope and ultimately eternal life with him. And I want to stop that and I'm saying, I'm saying, okay, let's make them forget about the word, let's try to hide the word. Let's try to discredit the word of God. Let's try to distort the word of God, let's try to bring up. Oh, he's telling his band of Even if we can somehow within the church, distract people from the word of God or make them believe. Something that God said that he didn't actually say to distort the word of Truth. Yeah, that would work. That would separate people from God, ultimately. Makes sense to me. And sure enough that is Satan's plan, he knows that. If he under undermines the word of God, he will undermine the church.
He will shipwreck our faith. And that is exactly what he tries to do. So we're going to take a look at the second chapter and I've got two suggestions as we do this. There's a lot we're covering today is poor slide runner back. I told her warm up her finger because we're going to go through a lot of slides today. So because of this all I know a lot of you aren't note-takers, you just like to sit and listen which is fine if you ever thought. I wonder what it'd be like to take notes. This would be a great Sunday to try it out because there are some really important things that aren't in the outline and some things that you're going to Remember and jot down and come back to later. And think about, because we have 22 verses that we were looking at today. And I really wanted to read through all 22, and unpack them all with you. And as I prepared this message today, I realized it's just not possible. And unless you want to stay for two hours, we take a quick vote. Majority rules. Say for two hours? No, I didn't think so. So instead of going through every 22, every one of the 22 verses I want to give you an outline of this important chapter. Some key thoughts that are in it. Things to pay attention to some notes that you can take. And my assignment for you will be to go and read second Peter chapter 2 tonight tomorrow and maybe four or five other times. During this week, read through it, several more times with the insights, in the outline that we get today during this message. So we'll get the big key takeaway is going to look at a lot of the content of these verses. We're just not going to read through every one of them individually. So with that, let's jump in. Look at second Peter chapter.
I will share with you the first three verses because I think they summarized very well what's happening here. Now remember the context? Remember, where we ended last week? Peter was just talking about prophecies. Remember that he was talking about how the prophets, the prophets did not speak from themselves, they spoke from God and that the prophets had a hundred percent success ratio in, predicting the future all about Jesus. All those details about his life. Therefore what the prophets said is certain God's word is certain, that's what we left.
Last week with. And now he says this, But there were also false prophets among the people in the Old Testament just as there will be false, there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies even denying The Sovereign Lord, who bought them bringing Swift destruction on themselves.
Many. Follow their depraved conduct and we'll bring the way of Truth into disrepute in their greed, these teachers will exploit you with fabricated stories. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them and their Destruction has not been sleeping. Those three verses give us a great summary of the whole content of chapter by chapter to go back and read the whole thing. I'm going to give you some more highlights from the rest of the chapter as we go along. But why don't we go ahead and fill in our first blank here? And the first blank I'd like you to fill in. If you're taking those notes would be this. False teachers are Let me say it differently. False teachers are: It just starts with that simple truth. False teachers. Are they exist? They're out there. God wants you to know this. Be aware of this to believe this. There are false teachers, Jesus warned us of that. To, in Matthew chapter 24, verses 10 and 11. He said, at that time, many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other and Jesus says, as Jesus himself, many false prophets will appear and deceive. Many people, not occasional false prophets, will deceive a handful of people. Many of them will deceive many people. So, in other words, Jesus is saying that throughout your life. Is there a one in 100 chance that maybe you'll bump, you'll bump into a false teacher, know Jesus is saying there. Many of you are going to meet against false teachers, it's the warning Jesus himself gives by the way, that is throughout the Bible, do a little home study on this if you like. But these warnings about false prophets and false teachers are throughout the Old Testament there throughout the New Testament, Jesus and multiple places talks about false teachers Paul. And multiple of his letters talks about false teachers, Peter obviously talks about false teachers, Jude talks about false teachers, John talks about false teachers,
it's a repeating theme far more than you maybe realize a repeating theme throughout the Bible. The danger is real false teachers are we have to be aware of that. Fact, now, what are they, there are three main things. I want to show you about these false teachers because Peter mentions them. First of all, false teachers are destructive. False teachers are destructive. If they're false teaching, don't do any harm and who cares if there's false teachers but there's another false teacher. It's tattooed on his forehead so we'll ignore him. Nope, they have influence, they deceive people and what they do is ultimately destructive. Here are some things that Peter said in verse 1 he said they will secretly introduce destructive heresies. Have you heard that term, heresy? Sometimes you might think of, you know, times past that that's not a word we use so much today. Heresy is simply this counterfeit truth. Truth but it's counterfeit. It's not actually true that it just looks like the truth, kind of like a counterfeit bill looks real but its not actually real and therefore has no value. There are destructive heresies that look real sound good but they're empty their value. This is what Peter warns us about in verse 13. He said the they these false teachers have done harm. It's not just a potential for Destruction. They could do harm. No he says they already have in Peter's day within 35 years of Jesus ascending into Heaven.
There were already false teachers. They were already bringing harm to people. Next he says they seduce the unstable. Remember earlier, in Matthew chapter 7, we were talking about that solid foundation that we should build on, but there are some who are still building that Foundation. They're still learning God's word. The foundation isn't real set yet and then a false teacher comes in. And those unstable people are rocked in their faith. They are deceived and they are LED astray. And then he says, in verse 18, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error. There are people new to the faith, they're escaping the false teachings of the world, understanding the corruption of this world, they're being brought into the light, brought into the truth and a false teacher comes along and he leads them. Astray entices them away. False. Teachers are destructive. We need to understand that there is a real and present danger when it comes to false teachers.
Next thing. What are false teachers, false teachers are doomed. False teachers are doing listen to what Peter says in verse 3. He said their condemnation has long been hanging over them so you Peter also want you to know God knows what they're doing. God sees what they're doing, they're not getting out of this unpunished. They will be condemned for this. They are doomed. God wants you to know, okay. He says they are like animals and they too will perish. He says that in verse 13, false teachers are like animals, they too will perish there. Going to succeed. They are an accursed brood. There's a thing. You don't want to get called by God. And a cursed brood like a brood of vipers are snakes. It also says, verse 13. They will be paid back with harm for the harm that they have done. Paid back with harm. God will not let them get away with this. And they are entangled in the corruption of this world. He says, in verse 20, Entangled in the corruption of this world, false teachers and this sinful world are working together to try to destroy our faith.
And finally, their fate is confirmed. They will be judged by God. God knows what they're doing. They're going to be judged for what they have done. Okay. So they are doomed. The false teachers are destructive false, teachers are doomed and this third one I want to spend a little more time on with you. False teachers are described This is important so that you can recognize the false teachers they are described so that you will recognize them. Because again, Unfortunately they don't have false teachers tattooed across their forehead, that makes it so much easier, but instead they are very deceptive, they're very secretive. So you need to be able to recognize a false teacher when you see one, Peter helps us out here. So we're going to take a look at what he says. We're going to take a look at their characteristics. First of all, we're going to take a look at their characteristics are also going to see their promises.
To see the damage that they do, all of this is how they are described, okay? So their characteristics, let me share three verses I want to share with you before we get into what Peter says about them about their characteristics. Three versus the first one is in Deuteronomy chapter 18. The people ask the very question that we want to ask and that is okay. Moses, there's going to be false prophets. How are we going to recognize them? How will we know what they say? God told me and the true prophets say no God. Told me, how do we know which one is from God? He gave this very, very simple test. Moses said if what a prophet proclaims in the name of the Lord, does not take place or come true. That is a message. The Lord has not spoken.
There you go. They say this is going to happen, it doesn't happen. That's a false prophet. So there were prophets in the Old Testament. That said God told me go into battle and you will succeed and then they went into battle and they were destroyed. Guess what? That was a false prophet. Pretty easy to recognize now you know don't listen to that person. How does that work today? Not a lot of profits today and not a lot of them will foretell the future, but pay attention, if they do, when I, when I was a kid, we grew, I grew up in Broken Arrow. Oklahoma, it's a suburb of Tulsa, Oklahoma, back in the day, that was the hometown for Oral Roberts, Oral Roberts. Anybody hear of him, it is not in the news as much these days. If you're older, you probably have. He was one of the big televangelists in the late 70s, early 80s, mid 80s, and he said, God told me I need to build a massive Hospital right here in Tulsa Oklahoma, it's going to be called the city of Faith. People will come from all around the world where we will do faith-healing, coupled with modern medicine and it is going to be a mecca for healing from all around the world. God told me, give me money. Lots and lots of money is gonna be expensive. It's gonna be a skyscraper and people gave and he started building. And then they didn't give as much. And it got harder to build and eventually he finished the shell, he ultimately after much pleading and begging was able to finish the first third of it. And his 777 hospital beds were never realized. He only did the couple hundred and ultimately by the end of the decade, he had to sell the whole thing. He did, he never completed and realize the vision, God gave him and it all fell apart.
Now is Oral Roberts, a false teacher, a false preacher or false prophet or not. I can say definitively false prophet. Pastor Michael, did you evaluate everything he taught? I don't need to, he said this is what God Said, but it didn't happen. Therefore, false prophet. So that's one way that you'll recognize them. If what they say doesn't come true second way, you're going to recognize them in John 8:31. It says Jesus said, if you hold to my teaching, You are really my disciples who is really Jesus' disciple. The one who follows his teaching. The one who follows his teaching, who holds to it. Here's a simple thing, you have to do read God's word. Compare what the preacher says. Read God's word and compare it to what the teacher is teaching. Do the to line up perfectly great. Is there a discrepancy? False prophet a false teacher Requirement, you got to know God's word, right? So that's the second thing that you have how you recognize a false teacher. What they say does not line up with the truth that Jesus taught third thing, it's kind of similar but slightly different, this goes back to again that Matthew 7 verse. We're going to look at Luke 11:28 where Jesus said, blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and what's next
Hear it, not just know it, not just affirm it and Nod your head about it. But obey it put it into practice in our lives. How will you recognize some false teachers their moral teaching? And their moral lives will not line up with what God says, they will not be putting into practice what they preach. You're going to find that false teachers are often hypocrites Okay? So those are the three main criteria. So for how you can recognize a false teacher, what they say doesn't come true. What they say doesn't line up with what Jesus taught, and what they, how they live doesn't line up with with what, what Jesus said, how we need to live? They're not putting into practice what Jesus taught. So, now let's go take a look at how Peter describes the false teachers because you're going to see a lot of overlap here. So first of all, he says in verse 1, they teach heresies counterfeit truth doesn't line up with what Jesus taught
Second thing he says, they're secretive, they don't do this out in the open as much. They say things that sound good, but then they teach you some false things. They do it very secretly and deceptively. 3, they deny Jesus' work or literally it says deny the Lord who bought them. Jesus is the savior, our substitute, the one who went to the cross and died for our sins, the false teacher ultimately. In some way, denying that might have a Bible open, might be talking about the name of Jesus. But is Jesus the one who bought you with his own blood? Blood shed on the cross if that's not the center of their teaching, you've got a false teacher, their depraved depraved conduct is a characteristic of a false teacher. Their lives do not line up with the kind of life. God is looking for, they fabricate stories. They make stuff up to manipulate you to get you to give to them, so they can enrich themselves or whatever. They make up the stories. Remember how Peter said in chapter one? We didn't make up cleverly invented stories, where I
This stuff really happened. The false teachers. Yeah, they start making up stuff He says, next follow corrupt desires of the flesh. Okay, their own Pleasures. The corrupt desires of the flesh flesh. I'm often sexual immorality, not always, but sometimes that is a sign of a false teacher when they, when they fall into such sins, especially if that's aah. Step part of who they are. That's a sign. Next one, they despise Authority. God's in charge, I'm in charge. Listen to me, that's the way cult leader is right. I am the one who speaks for god, listen to me. And you're not going to hear that at the corporate. It's to listen to God. Listen to his word kind of coupled with that. They are bold and arrogant. Those two together are bold and arrogant, they both have to go together because God calls preachers to be bold in teaching his truth but not arrogant. But we should always be teaching with humility, recognizing God is in charge, not me. But the false teacher you're going to put. You're gonna see some arrogance about the false teacher. The Pride that they are the ones in control. They're the ones in charge. Next, he says they're like unreasoning animals. Not always, not always fully reasoning out. They appeal to the base levels of people to the animal instincts. That's what a false teacher tends to do next one. Reveling in Pleasures, they enjoy.
The stuff of this world and they're less focused on the Eternal Pleasures that God promises next when they are experts in greed. You ever heard about televangelists or preachers living very, very high Lifestyles? There was one televangelist that was recently on that recently couple years ago was appealing to his Watchers his viewers to give more money for what purpose he needed his third private jet. Seriously, and he justified is saying to do the Lord's work all around the United States. I can't take commercial airlines, too much time is wasted. I got work to do for the Lord so give me your money so we can buy my third private jet so I can do more work for the Lord that sounds kind of greedy. That sounds typical of a false teacher, right? Never stop sinning is the next one. Peter says they never stop sinning verse 14. They're always doing what God hates empty boastful words and you can put that together with the next one. They appeal to low.
Four desires. Their words are. Ultimately the ultimate empty. And they appeal to the emotional side of people, rather than being reasoning and showing What God Says in his word of Truth. Okay, that's all I know, that's a lot to remember. You can't probably can't even John all that down, but you're getting the impression of what you're looking for. In a false teacher, you have to know their character and know what they're looking for know, their characteristics to know them. So let's look at the kind of coupled with this one. There are typical promises that false teachers make so we know their characteristics. Now, let's look at their promises. What kind of promises do false teachers make? First of all, short-term pleasures. Do what feels good do. What you want. Now, they're looking more at the short term in the long term. You need a healing, pray to the Lord for healing and he'll give you a healing right now. It's all about the right now. Not about the Eternal healing of the soul that the Lord provides or the eternal life that he gives. If you will just pray to Lord, who just asked him, you will be prosperous. You're going to get more money. You're going to get a raise. It's all about the here and now and being rich in this world watch out for false teachers and their promises kind of coupled with this one very similar.
Purely physical worldly pleasures, they emphasized the purely physical worldly pleasures. Whereas what did Jesus say? He said, in this world you will have trouble. False teachers, say almost directly the opposite in this world. If you will just have faith. If you'll just believe, if you'll just ask Jesus, you are going to prosper, you're going to have healing. You're going to be wealthy, they're focusing on this world instead of the next. And finally they promised Freedom. This was a little bit deceptive because God promises you freedom to but their freedom is actually the opposite of God's freedom and it's slavery. It's not freedom. God says
In obedience to me, trusting in me, knowing my son living independently on me. You are free to love, free to serve free to enjoy life the way I intended life to be enjoyed now and forever. You have freedom and the false teacher says, yeah, you have freedom freedom to do what you want with your life. Freedom to do whatever you want. In this world Freedom, To Be Your Own Boss and call your own shots. Very different kind of freedom, and the Bible says, No, actually that's not Freedom, that's You just made yourself a slave to sin. And that's what the false teachers promise: watch out for their promises. You know, their characteristics, you know what? They're going to promise. You also need to know their damage. What kind of damage do false teachers do? Slavery. Peter talks about that. And I already touched on this one, they claim to be giving you Freedom. They're actually enslaving you in the way you live. Second exploitation. What is the damage that these false teachers? Do they exploit people? They manipulate people. They take people's money. They burden people's consciences. They are exploiting people for their own benefit, their own enrichment, their own authority, their own Fame.
They exploit people's third thing destruction. Now we already talked about how they are doomed for Destruction. But false teachers also bring destruction to the people that follow them that believe the false things that they say they are doomed for Destruction as well. And this one is an important one. The fourth one, and final one, they ruin the reputation of Christ's Church. They ruin his reputation of the church. Many will follow their depraved conduct and they will bring the way of Truth into disrepute. This has happened, the church has gotten a bad rap because of the false teachers. Did you know that today? I just looked up this in a survey: only 39 percent of people, consider pastors, to be honest on and of high, ethical standards, high or highest ethical standards only 39% of people. 61% think pastors do not have the high or highest honesty, or ethical standards. Why do you think people don't trust pastors anymore? There's a lot of false teachers out there who have heard a lot of people and you see it in the news all the time, I get it, I understand there's a bad reputation for the church. There's a bad reputation for leaders of the church but it's caused by these false teachers. So by the way, if you're one of those who has that opinion of pastors, if you have that opinion of church leaders or if churches in general and you're questioning all this and you're just kind of checking things out today, I would encourage you to. Check out. This is a little bit of a vulnerable thing to do. Ask questions of others about Pastor Mike and about myself, Okay, check out our character. I just told you what the identity of a false prophet is what they look like, you might not know us well enough, yet talk to staff that work with us. Ask how authoritarian we are, ask how hard line we are, ask how involved in the pleasures of this world, we are. Go ahead and ask him. I give you full and free permission and the staff members listen to this. Talk to anybody freely about your pastors, please and share what, you know about our character and about the way we are because I think you should check out our church. If you have been hurt by a church or a church leader in the past, I want to apologize. First of all, I'm sorry. So sorry, that happened to you.
But that is not representative of the church. So if you went to a doctor that turned out to not be ethical and hurt you, in some way that is not a good reason to stop going to doctors all together.
And if at some point in your past by somebody, in the church. I'm so sorry that happened but please don't judge the whole church by that one bad experience. And would you please give us another chance and check things out in more detail here. That's my challenge.
Okay, so It's kind of tough. Wasn't it pretty heavy? Rooms pretty quiet. I don't want to leave today on a heavy note. I want to be able to leave today on a happier note. There's not a lot in this chapter. You're going to look for it hard but it is there. And that's what I want to share with you. In our last take away most of us was tough. Tough, tough, tough. There's one line. It's tender but it is in Chapter 2. Here's the tender part. Take heart because God rescues the righteous.
It sounds all doom and gloom All Is Lost. Woe is me? There's no hope everything's going down. The ship's going down. No, it's not. God, rescues the righteous. He does. Now let me share some verses with you. Where he talks about this in verse 5 he says but God protected Noah. Remember that great big flood where everybody on the planet was destroyed. Not everybody, Noah was protected. God protected knowing a preacher of righteousness and seven others, his whole family, God protected the righteous, he rescued the righteous, a second one. He rescued Lot, a righteous man may be another story to look at if you're not clear on the details.
City of Sodom and Gomorrah were super wicked. And lat a believer in the Lord who lived there with his family and God destroyed that City. But he saved and rescued Lot out of that City. And then he says exactly this point in verse 9, he says the Lord knows how to rescue The Godly from trials. The Lord knows how to rescue The Godly from trials. They see that the Lord rescues the righteous, maybe I needed to find that word righteous, because that's not a super common word. There might not be a clear understanding of it. The right righteous means that God considers you to be of perfect moral quality.
Get that. What does it mean to be righteous? It means that God considers you to be of perfect moral quality. That you are exactly what God is looking for means your righteous. Now, you're thinking yeah but that's not me. So here's the good news, God makes you to be. What he requires you to be. God gives you what he requires of you.
You know, I'm saying here, what does he require of you? Perfect, moral quality and he can't compromise on that. By the way. So what is God in his love? Since you don't have perfect moral quality, He sent his one and only son. Of perfect moral quality. He said it twice. Once at his, baptism my son, whom I love. With him I am well pleased. He said it again at the Mount of transfiguration where Jesus shone like the sun. This is my son, whom I love. With I am well pleased, he had perfect moral quality. Jesus was righteous. .
And then he went to a cross like that. He took your imperfect moral quality. He took it upon himself, he went to the Cross, he was punished for your imperfect moral quality. So that yours can be perfect. The Bible says that Jesus is your substitute, your savior. All who believe in him have his righteousness, the righteousness of Jesus, the perfect moral quality of Jesus. As determined by God himself, is imputed upon you given to you. You are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus. That's what it says. In Galatians chapter 3, you are clothed in his righteousness and God considers you to be exactly what he is looking for. Will the false teachers ultimately win the day? Not when you are in Christ Jesus. Not when you have the righteousness of Christ and our clothes in Christ. So, There will be, there are false teachers. You have to be watching for them, be where God says again and again, and again and again in scripture and Peter spends over a third of his book, talking about them. So we have to be aware of false teachers and we have to be watching out for them. And by the way, I'm applying that to the core to keep an eye out on this guy, keep an eye out on that guy that's on vacation right now. Listen to our sermons, critically and carefully. Take careful notes, go home. Check scripture is this.
What the Bible says. Please keep doing that. Because false teachers do arise within the church. And if you ever have a question and you ever challenged us on something, we taught here, we're going to be really happy. We will truly be proud of you. If you say Pastor, you said this. But scripture says that I don't really understand come to us first because sometimes we do miss speak up here, believe it or not. We have so many words we say sometimes we say something wrong, we appreciate your correction and that you will come and talk to us about it. We promise we will not be authoritative. We will not put you in your place. How dare you. We will not do that. We will welcome you. We will smile that you search the scripture and that you are comparing it with what we are preaching from this Pulpit. So please do that. So, don't wrap all this up. Why? Why is Peter so tough? Maybe this will help, maybe this will help understand. I want you to imagine a little three-year-old playing outside having a great time is Mom standing right near by him, having fun, and he just tears off in an open Sprint and freedom. It's a beautiful day, he's enjoying himself as he's running. All of a sudden his mom. Grabs him lifts him up violently, put some on the ground. A few feet away. Grabs him by the shoulders and he is just in shock. What is Mom doing? Why is she acting this way?
Why is she so violent? She's normally loving, and kind what is Mom doing? And she says, you were half a step away from running into that busy street. You were about to get run over by a car. Don't you understand? You can't do that. There's a sidewalk here. You never go past the sidewalk. Do you understand? She being mean, no, she loves her son. He was in danger and so she was tough. That's what Peter's doing with us today. It's been a little tough, taking us by the shoulders. Watch out there are false teachers. But now you'll recognize them. Now, you'll be on the lookout for him. They hold no danger for you because the Lord rescues the righteous and in Christ that's you.
Let's pray. Dear, heavenly father. Thank you for this time together today to, to consider your word of Truth and a tough message that was put before us today. Lord, it's true. There are false teachers who corrupt what you say, who distort your word of Truth, who erode your grace to distract us from? What is most important who take our eyes off the cross? But Lord help us to see them. Help us to recognize them. Keep our faith sharp. Keep us well grounded, On Your Word Of Truth. Help us to build on that.
Foundation not just to know your word but also to put it into practice and Lord, we know that we will stand firm with your help with your rescue with your son Jesus. We will stand to the end. So bless us and be with us and help us to be alert and aware as we go about our daily lives. Evaluating all that we hear from people who claim to speak from you bless us and be with us in Jesus name and all God's people said, amen.
