The Word of God is the center of all we know and do.... or at least it should be.

There will always be people who teach their own ideas, but the Word of God is sure and certain.

2Ti 2:14  Of these things put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers.
15  Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
16  But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness.
17  And their word will eat as doth a canker: of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus;

Paul gives Timothy a warning and direction here, and it is based around following the things of the Word of God, and not the teachings of men.

Paul has already given a lot of teaching for Timothy and in this section he tells Timothy to put the people in remembrance of these things - the things he has taught.

Then He says to Timothy that he needs to study - this is in particular the study of God's Word, and it is in contrast to the striving about words, and the vain and profane babblings.

This is the real point of this - for someone to be a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, he must do two things: study the Word of God, and not to strive about words to no profit.

The first and most important part of this is the study of God's Word.

You do not have to study all the many, many, many false teachings out there. In fact, it would be impossible for any man to have enough knowledge to be up to date with every false teaching.

There is value in being aware of the main errors, but the greatest value is in knowing the truth so thoroughly that you instantly recognise the false.

It is a well worn illustration, but apparently, when training bank cashiers, they don't tell  them what counterfeit money looks like - they give them real money and get them totally familiar with the real thing. Then when a fake passes through their hands they instantly "know" something isn't right - they may not know straight away what is wrong, but they instantly know that they need to stop and look closer - it doesn't fell right in their fingers, it doesn't look quite right, it may not smell quite right - something is not right. So they look closer - they study the note, looking for the vital signs of truth they have been taught - and they see the problem.

If you know the truth well through your study of the truth, then when someone comes with a false teaching, you may not know immediately what is wrong with it, but you know instantly that something is wrong with it.

And you know this because you have studied the truth from God's Word.

On investigation and comparison with the truth from God's Word, you can see that the words that are being passed off are in fact vain and profane babblings - not from God at all.

And that if these words are followed they will lead to spiritual sickness and death.

I will just add in here that the first verse I quoted says "....strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers."

We need to not get into a debate with people who bring in false teaching, for they will twist and turn things, and sometimes they are great debaters. They are often skilled at arguing their position, and can run rings around most people, by twisting and turning words, and shifting the subject before a resolution can be found.

We are not to engage in this kind of unprofitable talk, for it will cause you to doubt when you can't "win the argument".

This doesn't mean that we are to let people get away with false teaching - but we are to keep on the point, and not get sidetracked and turned around in the discussion.

Keep bringing them back to what the Word of God says on that issue, and don't let them drag you into other subjects until the Word of God has prevailed over their worldly philosophies.

Above all else remember that in such discussions it is the knowledge of the Word of God that is of utmost importance - don't debate on what they think or what you think - stick to the Word of God.

After all:

Heb 4:12  For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 

A lesson from the protective plan of the Tabernacle.

The Old Testament is for our edification - we can learn from it by looking at the things in it as examples for us.

Num 1:45 So were all those that were numbered of the children of Israel, by the house of their fathers, from twenty years old and upward, all that were able to go forth to war in Israel;

Num 1:46 Even all they that were numbered were six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred and fifty.

Num 1:47 But the Levites after the tribe of their fathers were not numbered among them.

Num 1:48 For the LORD had spoken unto Moses, saying,

Num 1:49 Only thou shalt not number the tribe of Levi, neither take the sum of them among the children of Israel:

Num 1:50 But thou shalt appoint the Levites over the tabernacle of testimony, and over all the vessels thereof, and over all things that belong to it: they shall bear the tabernacle, and all the vessels thereof; and they shall minister unto it, and shall encamp round about the tabernacle.

Num 1:51 And when the tabernacle setteth forward, the Levites shall take it down: and when the tabernacle is to be pitched, the Levites shall set it up: and the stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death.

Num 1:52 And the children of Israel shall pitch their tents, every man by his own camp, and every man by his own standard, throughout their hosts.

Num 1:53 But the Levites shall pitch round about the tabernacle of testimony, that there be no wrath upon the congregation of the children of Israel: and the Levites shall keep the charge of the tabernacle of testimony.

Num 1:54 And the children of Israel did according to all that the LORD commanded Moses, so did they.

Just doing some reading, and I came across a curious thing in the book of Numbers.

Earlier in this chapter is says time and time again that they were numbered according to those old enough to go to war.

This sets an environment to this instruction that indicates a defensive attitude.

It appears as though the instruction that follows in chapter 2 about the tribes and their positions in relation to the tabernacle, are to do with protecting the Tabernacle from attack.

Judah would be on the East side.

Issachar is next to Judah.

Then Zebulun next to them – it indicates maybe the other side from Issachar – so Judah in the middle, with these two covering either side but on the east side of the Tabernacle.

Reuben was on the South side of the Tabernacle.

The tribes of Simeon and Gad were either side of Reuben.

The West side: Ephraim, with Manasseh and Benjamin.

The North side: Dan, with Asher and Naphtali.

And the Levites ringed the the Tabernacle inside the other tribes.

So what we have is a set position for each tribe around the Tabernacle, when travelling and when encamped, which means that every side is protected by three tribes, and it numbers these tribes according to the number of “every male from twenty years old and upward, all that were able to go forth to war;”

Now we know that many things in the OT are not directly to the church today, but the things are recorded for our edification – in other words, we can take the principles and apply them to our situations.

The thing that caught my eye about this is that it was not the job of the Levites alone to protect the Tabernacle.

It was the job of all of Israel in the places that the Lord had set them.

We often think that it is the place of just the Pastor to protect – after all we read things such as:

Tit 1:7 For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre;

Tit 1:8 But a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, temperate;

Tit 1:9 Holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers.

Tit 1:10 For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision:

Tit 1:11 Whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake.

This puts the burden of dealing with these “unruly and vain talkers” upon the “Bishop” in this passage.

We have the idea sometimes though, that it is up to the Pastor alone to guard the flock.

Don't get me wrong here – it is primarily my job, but in fact if you search out “false prophets” you get no verses addressed specifically to Pastors.

As the “overseer” (Acts 20:28), as the one who watches for your souls (Heb_13:17 Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for that is unprofitable for you.), of course it is my job to protect our flock here.

But what we see in this picture from the OT is that it was not the Levites alone who protect the Tabernacle.

It is any and every man who is able to defend – remember “all that were able to go forth to war;”

And that lines up with NT instruction regarding false prophets and false teachers:

1Jn_4:1 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.

John was not writing to only the Pastor, but to “my little children” - all the saved.

Peter was not writing only to the Pastors of churches when he wrote:

2Pe_2:1 But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.

Peter was writing to:”.... them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:”

What I think we can glean from this illustration from Numbers is that ultimately it is the job of the Levites to protect the “tabernacle”, but the people who are able to go to war are to be the first line of defence.

When an attacker comes, it is important that each family is protected by the leader of that family – the tribes were to stay in their tribes and defend that section assigned to them.

What I see here is by this illustration is a principle:

That God assigns each and every one of us a place around the heart of this church (the Tabernacle, so to speak).

Where the Lord has placed you, it is your job to defend. But in defending the heart of this church, you do it as a family – that means that you must protect your own tribe from these attacks.

What Father will not protect his own family?

If your family is between the enemy and his goal, you will protect your family and by doing so, you will protect the heart of this church.

But we do not do so alone – if the attack came from the East, you can be sure that Issachar and Zebulun would not just sit back and say “Judah can take care of this by himself”.

They would come to the aid of Judah.

So you do not defend all alone, but knowing that there are others close by ready to help.

And knowing also that the Levites are always there as a line of final defence, to back up and help you to protect the heart of this church.

We have on occasion false teachers come in, and I am pleased to say that I have seen just this principle in action here many times.

We must protect our own family, we must protect those around us, and we must protect the heart of this church.

And the heart of this church is each of us, serving the Lord, according to His Word.

As I read this, I saw a principle in parallel that we can and should follow.

I will do my best to guard and protect, but if I know that there are others who on the watch and who are ready, then it gives us all a greater confidence of sticking to the narrow way.

Remember:

2Pe_2:1 But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.

A thought about the way we use our words.

James is not the only one who speaks about the tongue.

His passage in chapter 3 of his letter is an in depth discussion on how we use our tongues - that is our words - but he is not the only one that mentions our words.

I was reading Ephesians the other day, and when I came across chapter 4, towards the end Paul talks about putting on the new man, which involves righteousness and true holiness.
The thing that I had not noticed before is that the first thing Paul lists in his putting on the new man in this passage, is the putting away of lying.
Sometimes the order of these things is important, and sometimes it is not - it is not indicated that this is a particular order in this passage, but I noted that Paul begins with it.

Eph 4
24  And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
25  Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another.
26  Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath:
27  Neither give place to the devil.
28  Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth.
29  Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.
30  And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.
31  Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:
32  And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.

However, the thing that caught my attention is that the last thing Paul says to put away in this list of pursuing holiness and righteousness, is to put away "evil speaking" - another item of the tongue, of our words.

I am beginning to think that maybe Paul is deliberately beginning and ending with our words, and this is no random list.

In the middle of course Paul says "Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.", so we have our words spoken of at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end of the list.

I think Paul is trying to tell us something.
So let's have a quick look at this:
it begins with:
 "Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another"
This is talking about how we talk to others - it should be without lies, and spoken in truth. You know you can say things in such a way that whilst you are not lying, you are not really telling the truth either. But the prime point of this particular verse is actually in the last part - we are members one of another - this is talking about how we talk within our church!
Surely we don't lie to other church members do we?
Or do we?

Then we get to the middle "talk"  passage:
"Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers."

This is a broader phrasing that is used here. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth - this is a broader range of things covered - not just lies and truth, but nothing corrupt - now often we like to think of this as not using swear words, but it covers even more than that. It includes any form of talk that is corrupt. And the following phrase defines corrupt communications, by giving us the opposite: "that which is good to the use of edifying".
So corrupt communication is anything that is the opposite of edifying speech. I think there is such a thing as neutral banter - stuff that is not edifying, but neither is it harmful. But this passage is talking about speech, words, talk, that is the opposite of edifying.
To put it simply, if it does not build up, or direct someone closer to the Lord, but instead tears down someone, then it is corrupt communication.
And to further that point, the last phrase adds "that it may minister grace to the hearers".
It is not only edifying to the one spoken of, but also to the ones who are listening. It helps them to grow in grace.

The last part of this passage which is about taking away things while we put on the new man is:
 "Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:"
Most of these things are feeling, emotions, but the one that is clearly not an emotion, is evil speaking.
This probably sums up the other two we have looked at: to put it quite plainly, we should not be heard to have evil speech - this verse indicates that such speech - which would be considered to be "corrupt communication" is grounded in bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour, and malice, and is not edifying, nor does it minister grace to those who hear it.

Sound a bit like: Mat_15:18  But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man.

And remember that verse 25 places this section and teaching directly at the church members - we ought not to be heard to speak evil of one another.

This is something that we need to guard against with great diligence: for if we are heard to be evil speaking of each other, then it indicates an issue of the heart.

Good times, bad times, God's plans.

What we think is bad times, turn out to be God's good plans for us.

Gen_50:20  But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.

Joseph was an amazing man.

All he ever wanted to do was to honour his father and His God, but it seems that every time he took a step forward, he got knocked back a few.

His brothers were jealous of him so they sold him into slavery.
He hadn't done anything wrong - I guess he could have been a little more circumspect when telling his dreams, but even so this was a bit extreme.
We don't know what Joseph thought about this situation, but who could blame him if he began to wonder what he had done wrong to deserve this.

But, once in slavery, he worked hard, honoured God, and was promoted to the head of the house.
His thoughts probably slowly changed to "How good do I have it now?"
But Potipher's wife decided Joseph was a bit of alright, and so she tried to seduce him. When he refused, the master's wife accused him, and had him arrested.
Now this time he not only did nothing wrong, but he did exactly the right thing, and still ended up in prison.
While he was there, he once again honoured God and worked hard and became respected in the prison.
He eventually, through certain circumstances, came to the attention of the king, where his great wisdom and hardworking attitude finally brought him to the prime-ministership of Egypt.

Eventually, years after he was sold into slavery, his brothers came to Egypt looking for food during a time of drought. They didn't even recognise Joseph, but when it was made clear, they feared for their lives. They feared that Joseph would now take his revenge.
And that is where the verse I noted at the start comes in:

Gen_50:20  But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.

Joseph learned through his life, that what we see as bad things are not always bad things.

Sometimes these "bad things" are God's way of directing us into the place he needs us to be so that He can better use us. But we are so busy trying to get out of slavery, or out of the prison we have found ourselves in, that we forget to serve Him where we are.

If only we could take some of Joseph's attitude and bottle it up so that we could get it out when the bad things happen and take a drink of that quenching water and say "God meant it unto good".

Paul was another who had things in some perspective:

2Co 4:17  For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
2Co 4:18  While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.

I love it where Paul talks about "our light affliction".
I would love to see what Paul considers heavy affliction! If constant imprisonment, suffering a stoning, being beaten often, being without food often, being shipwrecked are "light affliction" then what counts as a heavy affliction?

Certainly not the small and petty things that bring us down, I think I can safely say that.

Paul's focus - the reason he could speak in such terms - was on eternal things, not on earthly things.

Maybe if we got our heads out of this world and its treasures and pointed our faces and our eyes toward the eternal things and the things of God, then we might actually be a little bit happier with our lives as we continue to walk, crawl, and drag ourselves through this light affliction.

Mat_6:33  But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

Online preaching.

2Pe 2:1  But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.

Peter warned about false teachers - they were there when Peter wrote these words, and he warned that they would be there among "you" - the readers of the letter.

And he points out the obvious - that they will teach wrong doctrine - Peter calls them "damnable heresies".

One thing I have found, is that today there appears to be so much more opportunity for these false teachers to influence people.

The "online" environment gives all sorts of people access to huge audiences that were just not possible for such crackpots prior to faceplant, forums, guggle+, and other electronic publishing.

And these guys (and gals) seem to be able to find others who like what they are saying and fall into line and encourage them in their false teachings.

Don't get me wrong, I am not against faceplant and guggle+ etc (I am, after all, doing this blog!) - I am on a forum where I see heaps of this, and I see faceplant (not on it myself) and hear about the rubbish that some people post up.

But as with everything, there needs to be discernment.

No, it is the ease with which these false teachers can find their way into the hearts and minds of people that I am warning about.

There are those who make up websites to promote their "out of context" understandings, and those who infiltrate forums to promote their false teaching, and those who just post this sort of rubbish on their social media panels, and people read them - either by coming across the site whilst searching for something, or it comes up in their feed on the page, or it gets discussed on their favourite forum.

The problem for most is not those who are blatantly wrong - most even half grown Christians can pick the serious rubbish. The problem is that some of these guys are pretty close in some of their stuff, but are wonky around the edges.

That wonkiness is presented as peripheral, but in reality it is stemmed in something deeper.

And people get drawn in by the decent stuff, and then just swallow the wonky bits because they like the guy - and most of the time they don't even notice the wonky bits on the way, because they are caught up with the guy.

It can be really hard to pick some of this stuff.

That is why it is even more important today than ever before that we follow in the footsteps of the Bereans:

Act 17:10  And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. 

Act 17:11  These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so. 

They searched the Scriptures daily, whether these things were so - they checked out what they were told by looking at what the Scriptures said.

These people didn't take anything that anybody said for truth until they had checked to see if it fitted with what God said.

And if you look at the context, these people did not even trust Paul on what he said - the passage is relating directly to what Paul said - that is what they checked out.

So if you come across any website, forum, blog, - even on line preaching - then by all means have a look, but don't accept anything ANYONE says as God's truth until you have checked out what the Bible says about what that person is saying.

And that includes me - it especially includes me, because I am just a man and I can make mistakes.

I try to rightly divide God's Word, but I won't always get it right.

If you are checking out what I say, and I say something wrong then two things can result - you are not led astray by my error, and you can help me to grow by pointing me back to the study of God's Word.