January 10, 2024 -- II Timothy 4:1-5 --Everyone has a fav Bible verse

People loved by the Father, in the Spirit's power: Sh'ma ~ hear and obey Jesus!

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. 3 For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. 5 As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
II Timothy 4:1-5 ESV
 
Recently I have been listening to a series Ligonier teaching on Christian worship. Jason Helopoulos teaches the course. He has a wonderful phrase “everyone has a favorite bible text, even heretics”. Consider how true that is. People caught in the act of wickedness of some sort or another coyly say, “Judge not”. Of course, they are ripping those words out of context and twisting their meaning. Jehovah’s Witnesses blaspheme the very name of God by twisting John 1 so that they claim “the word was with God and the word was a God”—you see they have added the article “a” where the Greek does not have it, so that Jesus’ status as fully God is brought into question.
 
Certainly, this is an age that wanders off into myth. Sometimes the myth is science. Sometimes the myth is human sexuality as if this is not to be subjugated under God’s Sovereign control. Sometimes the myth is ignoring one’s own sinful impulses whereas the Scriptures declare the strong pull of the iniquitous heart.
 
How does one counteract this? Simply, one must go to a Bible-believing, faithfully Word-preaching church. Where the believers gather and confess their sins and look to God for His grace poured out in Christ. Believers hear the Bible preached and look to the Spirit of God to rescue them from every evil deed, and corporately the people of God encourage one another in living for Jesus. The world around mocks and despises Jesus and His claims of ultimate Truth, so it takes corporate Christianity, the gathering of believers, to sing together, to pray together, to hear the word preached so that the power of Jesus Who has overcome the world will be made obvious in the life of believers individually, as families and corporately.
 
Father in heaven we confess how easy it is to neglect the gathering of Your people. How readily we find excuses or allow plans to keep us from gathering with Your people for the worship You command. Already in Paul’s day he warned of believers who are in love with this presence world; this wicked infatuation with the world has increased greatly in this generation. Blessed be Your Name, Father in heaven, for You have rescued Your people through the redeeming work of Jesus Christ and sealed His blessings to believers through the powerful work of Your Holy Spirit. By Your Spirit rule in our hearts so that the world and all in it that is rotten with sin will be repulsive to us and by magnificent Christ will be for us the fragrance of life and the marvelous Captain of Salvation. Amen.
 
https://youtu.be/_irIeaAWVyw?si=EpIhBONVJ15vbytB “We Shall Behold Him”
 

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