In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of staying focused on the things of the Spirit and not being led astray. He warns against the temptation to get caught up in intellectualism and philosophy, which can distract from the simplicity of the gospel message. The speaker also highlights the need for believers to be salt and light in the world, influencing various spheres of society with their faith. The primary goal for Christians is to spread the love, truth, and grace of Jesus Christ and to see people come into the kingdom of God.

Alright, we're picking up tonight in verse 11 of 1st Timothy chapter 6, and Paul is coming now to the close of this epistle to Timothy, and so he's once again warning Timothy about the pitfalls and the dangers that lurk for the servant of God, and he speaks of those who have been led astray because of their love for money, and they've pierced themselves through with many sorrows as they've followed after greed, and so Paul now turning to Timothy, he says, but you, O man of God, flee these things. Timothy, stay away from covetousness. Don't let it overtake your heart. Keep your heart right. Keep your heart fixed on the things of the Spirit is what Paul is emphasizing here, but you, O man of God, flee these things and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, and gentleness, and so Timothy is to guard his heart. He's to watch out for these different things that are there really as traps. You know, the devil, we're told by Paul in Ephesians, we're told that the devil schemes against us. He plots. He strategizes. Paul there refers to the wiles of the devil or the tricks of the devil, and he sets traps for us. He wants to trip us up, and one way, of course, is getting our hearts off onto material things and getting us out pursuing those things, and so we have to be aware of that, and a good way to make sure we're going to avoid getting caught up in those things is if we have a consistent pursuit of the things of the Spirit. You know, if I'm busying myself with seeking after the things of the Spirit of God, it's much less likely that I'm going to be led away after the things of the flesh in the world. What happens is a lot of times we're sort of sitting around idle as Christians. A lot of times we're in a place of inactivity. You know, we're not really doing much, and it's then that we get tempted. It's then that we are vulnerable to being led astray, so one way to to combat that, one way to guard ourselves against that sort of thing is to be in hot pursuit of the things of the Spirit, to be continuing to press into the realm of the Spirit. You know, there's no time really to slack off spiritually, especially in the days that we're living in. I mean, we are in the last days, truly, and all you have to do is look around, and you can see the battle is raging, and things are intense, and it amazes me. It astounds me that so many today in this time would be slacking off and sort of, you know, going into an idle state, and it's not the time to do that. So we're to be pursuing after the things of the Spirit, and here he defines a few of them. Righteousness, living a right life, the kind of life that glorifies God. Godliness, that just is a reference to cultivating the spiritual aspect of our lives. We're to be pursuing faith. We want to be believing God, trusting God, living by faith, taking steps of faith, and ventures of faith, as the term has been used sometimes. You know, now's a time to be adventuring out for the Lord, and seeing all that we can do for him in these days. I had the pleasure yesterday afternoon of spending some time with Heather Mercer, and she spoke here for the ladies yesterday morning, and then we were able to talk a bit at lunch, and then I was able to interview her on the radio yesterday, and man, I'll tell you, she was such a blessing. I got excited just sitting and listening to her, and the passion in her life, and the zeal, and as she's telling me about not only, you know, the past, the history there in Afghanistan, as a captive of the Taliban, but as she's telling me about what's happening now, and how God's leading her into new areas of ministry, and she's going out in October with a team, and they're going into a whole new region to reach people for Christ, and you know, her passion, and just this big step of faith. You know, here she is, a 28 year old young lady, and she's going out into uncharted territory, really, but she's going out as a pioneer, and I was so excited to see her passion, and her excitement about that, and that's what Paul is saying, that we're to be doing in these days. We're to be pursuing the Lord, and in the area of faith, taking steps of faith, looking for new opportunities for God to work in and through our lives. He said we're to pursue love. You know, the mark of the believer, we've talked about this before, but just to refresh your memory, the mark of the believer is love. That's the thing that is to really sort of be the designating mark upon the Christian. They will know that we're Christians if we love one another. Jesus said that. You know, I had one of those sort of instant flashes upon my heart the other day as I was, you know, reading my Bible, and just waiting on the Lord, and thinking about some things, and often thinking on the subject of evangelism, and you know, getting the gospel out to people, and just in an instant, the Lord spoke to my heart a beautiful thing, something that I know in theory, but I think I needed to be reminded of it just in a real sense, and the Lord did that for me. The Lord spoke to my heart and said, Brian, evangelism begins with love, and I, you know, it just sort of stopped me in my tracks for a second. I thought, wow, that's right. Evangelism begins with love. That's where it starts, and that's the thing that is the attractive element in what we're offering to people when they see us genuinely loving them, reaching out to them in love. I think sometimes within the Christian church today, there's an attitude that's far less than loving going out towards sinful people today. You know, I remember a while back, there was a guy that was being interviewed on one of the TV programs, and he was a representative of the church, and boy, I'll tell you, I was so embarrassed listening to this guy. He was ranting and raving, and his veins were popping out in his neck, and you know, he was, ah, these sinners, and we're gonna, and I thought, oh, Lord, help. Have mercy. I mean, this guy's, he's being put forth to the whole nation. I think it was on CNN, so the whole world probably, you know. He's being put forth as a Christian leader in the USA, and I thought, oh, Lord, help us, because there wasn't a trace of love in anything that he was saying, and you know, we have to really be on our guard, because it's easy to get caught up in all the stuff that's going on in our country politically. It's easy to get caught up in the social issues, and it's easy to look at people that are not living right, and perpetrating evil upon the culture, and say, man, we got to deal with those people. We got to, you know, we've got to get those people out of here. We got to somehow stop the wickedness, and all of that, and it's understandable that we can get frustrated, but I think when we get frustrated, it's because we've sort of lost sight of what we're supposed to be doing, and I say this frequently, but I don't, you know, I don't want to sound like a I feel like it's sort of sometimes a voice crying in the wilderness. I think we've got to get back to what is the church supposed to be doing today? What is our goal? What is our mission? And I think there's a lot of confusion in the Christian community about just exactly what our mission is. Well, let me put it real simply. Our mission is primarily to see people come out of darkness into the kingdom of God. That's our primary mission. Our mission is not primarily to change the culture and make it back into some sort of a Christianized type of a culture. That's not our mission. If that were to happen through a great move of the Spirit of God and many lives being changed, that would be a wonderful second benefit, but that's not the thing that we're called to do. We as the Church of Jesus Christ are left in this world not to change the world, not to bring in the kingdom of God to the world, but to call people out of the kingdom of darkness into God's kingdom. The church is always going to be a minority in the world. The church was never meant to dominate the culture. The church was never meant to rule the world, but you know, the church got confused about that many centuries ago. In the first three centuries of church history, there was the conviction coming from the apostles themselves and Jesus that Jesus Christ was going to come back and literally set up an earthly kingdom in Jerusalem, and he was going to inaugurate a reign of peace and righteousness for 1,000 years. That was the belief of the church for the first three centuries, but something happened. In the fourth century, the Emperor Constantine, he had somewhat of a conversion to Christianity. The scholars are divided as to whether it was a genuine conversion. I've read both sides of the story. To me, it doesn't sound like he really was a genuine convert, but yet he was in some ways attracted to Christianity, and I think more than anything else, he saw it as politically advantageous to embrace it. And so when he embraced Christianity, Christianity then, because he's the Emperor, Christianity then becomes the religion of choice throughout the Empire. And because it becomes the religion of choice throughout the Empire, Christianity is now being promoted. It's now being spread, not in its purest biblical form, but in a bit of a compromised form. But things are going in that direction, and then a man named Augustine comes along. And Augustine is a great theologian, and he looks at the situation, he assesses it, and from his perspective, from his point of view of what's going on in the world, he comes up with the new idea that Christ is not going to come and set up a millennial kingdom. Christ will come at the end of the millennium, which is an indefinite period of time, or actually in Augustine's day, he thought the thousand-year mark, which would be several hundred years from where he was, he thought the thousand-year mark was going to be when Christ would set up his kingdom. So he now says that there isn't going to be a thousand-year reign of Christ. Christ is going to come back and reign forever, and we the Christians, the church, our job is to spread Christianity throughout the world. Our job is to infiltrate the governments of the world, just like that happened in Rome, and we are to actually present a kingdom to Jesus when he returns. And from Augustine all the way up to the late 1800s, mid to late 1800s, that particular view held sway over the minds of most Christians. That is the dominant view still to this day among a large number of Christians in this country. The premillennial view is the view that we at Calvary Chapel hold. Premillennialism means that we believe that Christ will come before the millennium. He will come and actually bring in the thousand-year reign. But today in our country, among people from a reform background, among people from a lot of the mainline denominational backgrounds that are some segments of them are still holding fast to biblical Christianity in most areas, but in this particular area they all embrace that same idea that Augustine came up with so many hundreds of years ago. And because they have this idea that the church is somehow supposed to sort of take over cultures, take over nations, take over governments, there's a lot of pressure and a lot of push. You can read it in a lot of different Christian publications today. There's a big push to Christianize the culture, but it's all part of a theology that is wrong. Because Augustine, he was a brilliant guy in a lot of ways, but he totally missed it on this one. So again, we are to pursue the spreading of the gospel. That's the Great Commission. That's the call that Jesus Christ has upon the lives of his people. And of course, wherever we are as believers, we're to be salt and light. We're to let our light so shine before men that they'll see our good works and glorify our Father in heaven. We're to be the light of the world. If I'm in government, great. I should try to be a great Christian influence in government. If I'm in education, I want to be an influence in that realm. Whatever I do in life, I want to be a witness. I want to have a testimony. I want to spread the love and the truth and the grace of Jesus Christ to people around me. But the primary goal is that of saving souls, is that of seeing people come into the kingdom of God. And so Paul says, these are the things, Timothy, that you need to be pursuing. You need to be pursuing love. If we lose sight of what our true mission is, we'll easily lose sight of love. You know, when you look back in history at the unbelievable things that have happened in the history of the church, we have Christians killing one another. You have Christians condemning, holding, you know, court, burning their brothers and sisters at the stake, and things like that. It was all because of this messed up theology. Back in the time of the Reformation, of course, the Reformation was a revolt against this oppressive Roman church. And so Luther led the charge, and Zwingli led the charge, and some years later a young man named John Calvin came along. He was instrumental in it. In Geneva, Switzerland, John Calvin set up, or a community was set up, John Calvin was invited to come and sort of be the spiritual leader over that community at a point in time. But they sought to establish sort of the kingdom of God in Geneva. And in Geneva, they whipped you if you sinned, they publicly humiliated you if you sinned. If you sin severely enough, they executed you. And you know, you look at that and think, now, okay, where in the world do you find that in the New Testament? You don't find it in the New Testament. You don't find it anywhere in the New Testament. They borrowed a bit from the Old Testament. They looked at Israel, which was a theocracy, a nation that was directly ruled by God, and they took a lot of those things, and they brought it over into their own experience because they were thinking that the church was just a continuation of Israel, and that the church was the new kingdom of God on earth. And you look back at the time of the Reformation, and I'll tell you, there was a severe lack of love going around in those days. And it was a very severe time of judgment, and executions, and things of that nature. Christians killing each other. So you see what happens if you lose sight of the simplicity that's in Jesus, and what it's really all about? It's all about getting the gospel to people, and that has to be coming from a basis of love. Love is the foundation. Love is the thing that motivates us. Not hate for those wretched sinners who are messing up our culture, but love. Oh God, have mercy on these people. Oh Lord, have pity upon them, remembering ourselves that we were there one time as well. And now in verse 12, Paul says, fight the good fight of faith, Timothy. Fight the good fight. This phrase, fight the good fight, could be translated, run the great race of faith. The Greek words that are used here for fight, the verb is agonizomai, and we derive our English word agonize from that. But that word was taken from the world of athletics, because the athlete would agonize. The athlete was in a struggle, and that's the idea behind the word here. So fight is legitimate, although it's not fighting in the military sense in this context, although Paul certainly used military metaphors in a number of other places. So those are valid metaphors, but in this particular place it's more of an athletic metaphor. So fight the good fight, or run the great race. The whole idea is simply this, Paul is saying, Timothy, struggle. Stay in the struggle. Stay in the fight. Stay in the race. Keep on going. You know, the Christian life is really a long-distance race. It's a matter of endurance. It's a matter of persevering on to the end. And so he says, fight the good fight of literally the faith. Fighting the good fight of the faith. Holding on to the faith. Believing God and being faithful all the way through to the end. Being faithful to get that gospel out as God leads us and gives us opportunity to do that. Timothy, fight the good fight of faith. He says, lay hold on eternal life. Lay hold on eternal life. And what Paul means by that is, Timothy, don't have just sort of a light grip on it, but Timothy, grip it with everything that's in you. Have a death grip on it. Lay hold of it. Appropriate it. Experience all that there is in this thing called eternal life. You know, sometimes I read about people in the past. I read like the story of D.L. Moody, for example. And I see the great impact he had, and the great influence, and the great experience he had with God. And you know, sometimes I read, and I think, Lord, am I laying hold of eternal life like he did? I mean, obviously not everybody's called to the same exact thing, so we can't necessarily judge based upon one ministry over another. But it's not so much about a ministry, it's more just about a personal experience with God. And the question that we have to ask ourselves is simply this, am I experiencing eternal life to the full as God intends it for me? Is there a full, deep experience of eternal life for me, or is it a very limited experience? I have eternal life, and I'm participating in some of the blessings of it, but am I participating in all of the blessings of it? Am I receiving all that God wants for me? That's the question. That's what Paul is saying to Timothy. He's saying, Timothy, lay hold on eternal life. Don't be satisfied to just, you know, okay, great, I'm going to heaven. That's great. Don't be satisfied merely with that. There are, of course, people who are quite happy to just be going to heaven. Man, not going to hell, that's great. As long as I'm not going to hell, everything's okay. Don't be happy simply with that. Realize that God did not redeem us just to keep us out of hell. He redeemed us so we could know him in a deep, and an intimate, and a powerful, and in a significant way right now here in this life. Eternal life itself, the very term, refers not only to life in a chronological sense, or, you know, life in a sense of longevity. The very term refers to life, the quality of life. It's not merely a quantity of life, it's a quality of life. It's basically the experience of heaven while we're still here on earth. That's what eternal life is. Eternal life is a present possession. Are you experiencing heaven on earth? That's what eternal life is. And so Paul says to Timothy, lay hold of that. Lay hold of eternal life to which, lay hold on eternal life to which you were called, also called, and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. So Timothy had confessed the good confession. He was confessing Christ publicly, as we are all called to do. He said, I urge you, Timothy, in the sight of God, who gives life to all things, and before Christ Jesus, who witnessed the good confession before Pontius Pilate. So now he's giving Timothy this charge, and he's charging him before God. This is a serious thing Paul's doing. He's saying, Timothy, I'm charging you in the sight of God, and in the sight of the Lord Jesus Christ. You've made a good confession, Timothy. Keep it. Hold on to it. Don't let go. Don't back down. And then he reminds Timothy of the confession that Jesus made before Pontius Pilate. And of course, the significance of that is that Pontius Pilate was the one who sentenced Jesus to death, as you know. And there Jesus stood his ground. He didn't back off. He didn't waver. He didn't compromise in any way, but he stood firm there in the presence of Pilate. And you remember, as you look back at that event historically, although Jesus seemed to be the one that was on trial, Pilate was really the one that was on trial. Jesus seemed to be the man being judged and condemned that day, but Pilate was the one who was actually being judged. He was actually being condemned that day because he went against his own conscience and condemned an innocent man just to save himself politically. But Jesus was there before Pilate, and he made that noble confession. And so Paul is saying, Timothy, I urge you in the sight of God and Christ Jesus, keep this commandment without spot and blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ appearing. So he's exhorting Timothy to hold firm to the end. Now, of course, in this period in the church's history, there was much persecution, and there were many martyrs. And church history tells us that Timothy was one of those martyrs. We don't have an absolute certain account of his martyrdom, but the stories are that he did ultimately give up his life for the faith. And it is highly likely that that was the case. That, of course, happened to many. It happened, we know it happened to Paul, and good traditions tell us that it happened to the other apostles as well. But, of course, we know many Christians lost their lives in these days. And so Paul is exhorting Timothy, Timothy, fight the good fight. Go right down, right down to the wire. And just as Jesus Christ made that good confession before Pontius Pilate, if the day should come when you stand and they are going to condemn you, he's saying, Timothy, don't back down. Don't let up. And, you know, that's a message that we need to be reminded of today. Whether or not we ever stand before a magistrate, or a judge, or whether or not we ever find ourselves in a situation like that, it could be that we would someday. It might never happen, but the reality is we go out into the world every day, and there's pressure on us to compromise. There's pressure on us to give in to what the world says we ought to be thinking, and doing, and so forth. But when that pressure comes to us, we need to remember God who gives life to all things. Even if they kill us, don't worry about it, because God will raise you from the dead. And we need to remember Jesus. He stood before Pilate, but he said, Timothy, keep this commandment without spot, blameless, until the Lord appears. Now, Paul was anticipating the coming of Christ. Every generation has rightfully anticipated the coming of Christ, because the Bible leaves us with that sort of a perspective. The Bible leaves us with this sense of the imminency of the return of Christ. Imminency meaning that Christ's return is at hand. Christ's return can happen at any instant. And so, basically, each and every generation in the church has had the sense that Christ would return in their generation, and there was a biblical basis for that, because God left it that way. He left it that way, I believe, intentionally, so we would always be anticipating the Lord's come. We would always be ready for that event. Now, some people say, oh, well, you know, the Lord can't return until such-and-such a thing happens. Well, if you say that, then you eliminate the idea of imminency. If I stood here tonight and said, you know, the Lord's coming soon, but he can't come until such-and-such-and-such, then you would say, oh, okay, well, the Lord's coming soon, but these things have to happen. Then what happens? You start looking for those things to happen, but the Scriptures always point us to Jesus. We're to be looking for Him. We're not to be looking for the rise of the Antichrist. We're not to be looking for the tribulation period to come. We're not to be looking for those things. We're to be looking for Christ to return. Now, Paul says, when Jesus returns, listen, He will manifest in His own time the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see, to whom be honor and glory forever. Amen. Now, here's the thing that strikes me about this. All of us, I believe, when we look at many of the things that go on in the world, all of us, in our hearts, we just say, oh, Lord, come. When I read or listen to or observe people who are blasphemers, people who hate God, people who mock Him and ridicule Him and persecute those who follow Him, when I see this stuff, when I hear this stuff, and I think it's true with all of us probably, we just think, oh, Lord, why don't you do something about that? Lord, how can you let them get away with that? You know, all the blasphemy that goes up daily, all the people that just mock God and scoff at the idea of a God and, oh, these Christians are just a bunch of idiots and mindless fools, they don't know anything, and, oh, Jesus, you know, and they curse His name and all of this stuff, and you think, oh, Lord, just, would you just zap maybe just one of them? Lord, just show them who's in control. Show them who's the boss. Well, Paul says to Timothy, I think Timothy probably had those feelings at times, he said, Timothy, he will manifest in his own time who is a blessed and only potentate. You know, God has His timing, and God, as we well know, and as the scriptures tell us plainly, He is long-suffering, not willing that any should perish. The people that I think should be zapped right now, evidently God does not think so because He doesn't do it. God wants to give them more time. He wants to give them more chances. I'm shocked at that. Sometimes I'm annoyed at that because sometimes their antics are being directed at me, and I think, Lord, how come you're not wiping those guys out over there? But you see, God's, He's got this thing all under control, and what, you know, to put it in modern terms, what Timothy is, what Paul is saying to Timothy is, is basically, Timothy, don't worry about it. Jesus will come soon enough, and He'll show everyone who's in charge. That's what He's gonna do. He's gonna come and show everyone who's in charge. He's going to reveal who is the only potentate. Oh, there's a lot of people strutting around the planet thinking they're hot stuff. A lot of people thinking that they are powerful. He's gonna show who is the only powerful one, the all-powerful one, the only potentate, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the one who alone has immortality and dwells in the light that no man can approach. You know, I'll tell you, truly, of course, God doesn't wipe these people out because He's love, and He knows the facts that He dwells in light no man can approach. These men with their blasphemous words, their pompous attitudes, and, you know, that whole mentality of, I'm gonna tell God a thing or two. Oh, no. God dwells in the light that no man can approach. Just as the Lord said to Moses, Moses, no one can see me and live. You know, for the guy today who thinks he's gonna give God a piece of his mind someday. Oh, he can't even get close. He can't even approach. God dwells in light no man can approach. He can't get close enough to even put in a word. He'll be consumed. But the Lord is going to take care of that when he comes. He is coming again, and he will make everything right. But that goes back to what I was saying earlier. You see, Jesus is going to write the world. Jesus is going to set up a truly Christian culture all over the planet, the whole thing. He's gonna set up his kingdom. He's going to do it. Not me, not you, not the church collectively in this generation, and that notion has been a curse upon the church historically. The notion that the church was somehow to usher in the kingdom has been an absolute curse, and it still occurs today. Because within that thinking process, there's something known as Reconstructionism. And if you read enough literature today, you know, Christian-based literature, you will find that there's a lot of this going on, especially those ministries and groups that are oriented toward political activism. What you find out behind the scenes is that they believe in this, many of them, not all of them, but many of them believe in this idea of Reconstructionism. And Reconstructionism is the idea that the Christians are to actually go in to nations, take over the governmental structures, and reconstruct them in preparation for the return of Christ, so we can offer him, again, sort of a Christianized world. But that's not what Paul thought. That's not what the apostles taught. That's not what anybody in the first three centuries of the church believed, with the exception of a few men who went down historically as heretics. It was not the belief of the church until, as I mentioned, the fourth century with Augustine. But that has had a tremendous longevity because it's still a part of what's going on today. But make no mistake, Jesus is coming back. He's the one that's going to set up the kingdom, and he's going to do it right. He's going to do it wonderfully, gloriously. And so Paul says, to whom be honor and everlasting power. Amen. And then in verse 20, we looked at the 17th of the 19th verse last time, his final words to Timothy, Oh Timothy, guard what was committed to your trust. Oh Timothy, guard what was committed to your trust. What was committed to Timothy's trust? Well, simply, it was the gospel. It was leadership in the church. It was the care of God's people, all of those things. Paul says, Timothy, guard it. We are in a battle. There is, as I said, there's that element to the Christian life that is like a great endurance race. But again, as we said, there is certainly a militaristic tone in much of Paul's writing, and here it comes up again. Timothy, guard what was committed to your trust. You see, we've got to guard what God has given us because somebody wants to take it away. The devil wants to steal it from you, and in doing so, he wants to rob you of God's work in your life. When we come to Christ, we are delivered from the grip of the devil. But you know what? He doesn't stop harassing us. He doesn't stop attempting to lure us back into his trap. He doesn't stop trying to thwart and undermine the work that God is doing in our lives. So we have got to guard what God has given to us. We've got to hold on. Guard what was committed to your trust, O Timothy, avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge by professing it some of strayed concerning the faith. Says Timothy, guard the gospel. Guard the gospel in all of its simplicity. You know, there's a big temptation, and there always has been. One of the things that men pride themselves in is the intellect. Jeremiah chapter 9, the Lord spoke and said, let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, the rich man glory in his riches, or the mighty man glory in his strength. But let him who glories glory in this, that he knows me. But that's a tendency of man. There's a tendency to glory, to take pride in wisdom or in the intellect. And so one of the ways that the enemy tries to get in and rip us off is he tries to come in and get us caught up in a big head trip. He tries to get us caught up into intellectualism. He tries to get us caught up into philosophy and things of that nature that rob the gospel of its simplicity. You see, the gospel is a simple, straightforward message. It's a straightforward message about the fact that men are sinners, and Christ came to save them from their sin. And if we put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ, we will be saved. The gospel is very simple. Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, he said, I'm fearful that as the serpent beguiled Eve and robbed her of the simplicity, that you might also be robbed from the simplicity that's in Christ. And this has been a big temptation all throughout the history of the church, was to try to accommodate the world, accommodate man's ideas. And so we've got to dress the gospel up with man's ideas to make it acceptable or appealing. And it's happened over and over and over again. In the early days of the church, they started mingling Greek philosophy with the gospel because they wanted to be thought respectable. So, well, what did Plato say? Let's see if we can get Plato and Jesus hooked up. Or what did Socrates or Aristotle? And they did. They united the gospel with philosophy. And in the process, they lost the gospel. The Catholic Church, believe it or not, their version of Christianity is a combination of New Testament, Old Testament, and Aristotle. Those are the three things that predominantly make up Roman Catholicism. Aristotle, where in the world did he come into the picture at? He wasn't a Catholic, but that's what they did in an attempt to be relevant, in an attempt to impress the world. Back in the late 1800s, Darwin and those guys over there in England, they began to promote Huxley and them. They began to promote this idea of evolution. And many in the church just bought it hook, line, and sinker, even though it blatantly contradicted the plain statements of Genesis. People in the church just thought, well, this is surely the intelligent position. We don't want to be seen to be dummies, so we'll embrace it, and we'll fix the scriptures. We'll work the theory of evolution into the Bible, and we'll just say that Genesis is just poetic. It was never meant to be historic. It was never meant to be taken literally. It's just a poetic way of describing the creation. But now we learned these guys over here that it all happened through an evolutionary process, and the church buys into it. They didn't guard what was committed to their trust. And at that time, higher criticism had come along as well, and people were saying things like, well, you know, you can't really trust the Bible, and it's not historically accurate or geographically accurate, or, you know, it talks about empires and kingdoms and things that we've never heard anything of and never found any trace of them, and surely it's just a lot of mythology. And the church says, oh, yeah, that's right. Okay, yeah, it's a lot of mythology. And they embrace it, but the whole point is they want to be esteemed intellectually. They want to be thought intelligent, and that's been a big trap for Christians, and it's still a big trap today, because there's always some new thing that comes along, and there's always some sort of intellectual idea that floats around that people gravitate toward, and those who have a real desire to be thought wise, they, and then they grab onto it, but in doing so, they compromise the scriptures. They lose the simplicity. Those things have been happening since apostolic times. That's why Paul said to Timothy, Timothy, guard what was committed to your trust. Avoid the profane and idle babblings. That's what they are. They're profane and idle babblings, because you know what? In the end, they all prove to be not true. That's the crazy thing about it. I was reading an article last night where they're having a big debate again. I think it's back in Kansas. There's a school board back in Kansas that's wanting to no longer teach evolution as a fact and bring in intelligent design alongside of it, and I'm reading some of the interviews with the different people on the board, and I think there's six conservatives and four liberals, and one of the liberal persons was saying, but I just don't understand why science has to suffer in order to teach this religious dogma. Well, listen, get a clue. This isn't science. It's science fiction. It's not true. I don't understand why we can't keep teaching this stuff that's not true, because we've been teaching it for so long that even though it's not true, it should be true because we like it better. That's really what she's saying. She didn't know that, but it's just crazy, but the crazier thing is when the church embraces those things. That's the thing that is just unbelievable. Falsely called knowledge, these philosophies, these theories, these things, give them enough time, and they will prove to be wrong. If it comes and contradicts this word, you can bet your life it's wrong, and just give it enough time, and it'll be proven to be so. You see, the problem is people say, oh, but this is, and then they, you know, some people actually let go of their faith. Back in the 1800s when liberalism really hit, and they were saying, oh, you know, Moses couldn't have written the first five books of Moses. There wasn't even any writing at the time of Moses. There weren't even any written languages or anything like that. People said, oh my gosh, Moses couldn't have written it. We better put the Bible away. We can't trust that. They were saying all kinds of things like that, but you know what has happened? Give it enough time, and every single thing that they said has been proven to be wrong. Every single thing, not one thing they ever said was right. They were wrong 100% of the time. What does that mean? It means the Bible was right, always, always was, always has been, always will be. You can bet. You know, we read in the paper still today this nonsensical evolutionary thing, you know. Oh, now we found the missing link. This is the one. We've had 3,000 fakes, but this is really the one. Just know this. It's not the one because there isn't one. It doesn't exist. There is no missing link because there's no evolution. It's a farce, but these are the things that people have clamored after. These are the things that they've gone after, and in doing so, some people have, as he said here, they've strayed concerning the faith. Don't give up your faith for any of this junk. You know, we see a lot of times some of the young people, they'll leave here, and usually the ones that were kind of rebellious when they were here anyway, but they'll leave and they'll go off to junior college or off to college or something, and you know, you'll see them six months later, and they're talking about all the really brilliant stuff they've learned about philosophy and things like that. They'll be rethinking their faith because they've been subjected to, you know, the real world now of philosophy and things like that, and they'll throw around a few names, you know, like Nietzsche or Sartre or somebody like that. It's so sad because they just aren't mature enough yet to realize that these guys' theories have been proven absurd ages ago, but of course, they're still perpetuated in the universities because deceit is the climate that we live in, but guard what was committed to your trust. Don't let go of your faith. There's nothing out there with which you can replace it, and the things that seem to be attractive and oh, so wonderful, and the reality is it's smoke and mirrors. There's nothing there. Grace be with you, Paul said. Amen. Lord, we thank you that we can trust your word explicitly, that it is true through and through. Lord, we thank you that you're coming again, and you are going to show who's in charge, and Lord, we long for that day, and yet, Lord, we're still here. We're waiting for that day, and Lord, we're glad to be here because it's an honor to serve you in this generation, and so Lord, fill us with the Spirit. Fill us with faith. Give us the grace that we need in these days to pursue righteousness, and godliness, and faith, and love, and those things, and Lord, may we stay busy with the things of the kingdom wherever you have us, and whatever walk of life. Lord, we certainly do want to influence our culture. We certainly would love to see things change in our society for the better, but we know, Lord, that the most certain way to accomplish that is by changing the hearts of people, and that happens through salvation. So, Lord, pour out your Holy Spirit, we pray, upon us. Anoint us to get your word to people whose hearts are right and ready, and Lord, soften hearts. Turn people away from the blindness, the darkness that covers them. Lord, shine the light of your gospel upon many in these days. Lord, we pray for all of those that are going to gather tomorrow in churches all over the country and all around the world to worship you. We pray that your word would go forth in power to strengthen and bless your people. Lord, we pray that you would empower your church in these days. Lord, help the pastors to guard what was committed to them. Lord, for those that are being enticed by the world, for those that are being drawn away by vain babblings, idle chatter, impressed with those kinds of things, Lord, show them the futility of it all, the emptiness, the deceit behind it. Lord, restore to your church that clear understanding of the simplicity that's in Christ and the power that accompanies that. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.