← ArchiveSunday, May 18, 2014DateMay 18, 2014Speaker—Text2 Timothy 2Passages in this sermon2 Timothy 20:00TranscriptClick any line to jump there.0:00If you have your Bibles with you, I want you to turn to 2 Timothy chapter 2. 2 Timothy chapter 2. You know, somebody said, well, you're going to preach our challenging and scolding sermon to seven of our graduates.0:24And I thought, well, that's just seven of them. I think we all sometimes need a good message to challenge us and to pick us up and take us to the next level of our spiritual walk. And hopefully that's what happens. There are messages that are proclaimed that speak to our heart in such a way that we come to understand that there's another level that God wants to bring us to in our followership and in our walk with him.0:49It's a greater level of commitment, a greater level of understanding. It's a pursuit and a desire ever in our sanctification process to grow in our knowledge and our understanding and our obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't want to stay where we're at. We don't want to be here. You know, I look back and yesterday I turned 60 years old.1:15And, you know, somebody said, well, what do you think it's going to be like that last night that you're 59? And I thought, oh, God, I never thought about it. You know, I never thought about what it was going to be like when I turned 49 and would be 50. Or when it was 39 and I was going to be 40 and it was 20. And I can tell you this, I couldn't wait to get 13 and be a teenager.1:43I couldn't wait to get 14 and get a motorcycle license. I couldn't wait to get 15 and get a permit and 16 and get a driver's license. I couldn't wait to turn 21 for whatever reason. My dad told me, my dad gave me an admonition when I was a young man.2:03He said, I got married when I was 21 years old. And I said, so? And he said, well, that means that when you're 21, no one has to sign for you back in the day. You know, everybody had to go to Tennessee, Georgia, or somewhere else if you got married before you turned 18 or 21.2:28So I thought, well, I've got to wait until I at least, I couldn't wait until I got 21. And then I could get married, even though I hadn't found anybody to marry yet. But, you know, it's going to happen when I turn 21. But yesterday, it was amazing. We had a little get-together. And I told Gail last night, I said, from the time we were 50 to the time I was 60 has been one of the biggest decades of my life.2:51And, yes, my sons were born in my 20s and 30s, but there's two decades that they were born in. But I had, I've been blessed with six grandchildren in this decade, in this past decade. Six grandchildren, two granddaughter, or two daughter-in-laws, and 20 years at Bethel Baptist Church.3:17Gail and I will have been met 39 years come September. And, you know, every decade has its own interesting concept, but I'm glad I'm not where I was 10 years ago. I'm glad I'm not where I was 10 years ago spiritually. I'm glad I'm not where I was 40 years ago.3:48I'm glad I'm not where I was 20. Somebody said, wouldn't you love to turn? No, I think I want to just finish this one up. And a friend of mine texted me as I got a bunch of texts, and he said, hey, is it true I hear you're 60? And I knew what he meant, and I said, yeah, it's time now to get serious and finish strong. It's time to finish strong. I want to challenge you this morning as we read this passage,4:16because this passage comes from the heart of the writer, Paul, as he's imprisoned in Rome, and Paul's life is coming to its end. Paul is in the second time in prison in Rome, and they are about to persecute Nero as the ruler and reign. And so Paul is writing this letter. If you read the letter, if you'll just stop and read 2 Timothy, and take the fact that it's written to Timothy out of... Take it and place yourself in Timothy's position. It's a fresh letter.4:46It's written just to you and just for you. And read the heart of this great writer, this great apostle that God had called out of Judaism to become this great strength and leader in the Christian church as he was giving birth to it. And you see the emotion, and you see the strength, and you see the desire of Paul to want to leave something in the life of Timothy, and for Timothy to leave something in the life of the congregation that he was leading,5:13and for that congregation to leave something in the community where they lived, and that community where they live leaves something that could be going on and on and on. Because you see, that's what we should want. We should want for our lives to mean more than getting up every day and going to work.5:37Our lives should be more than sitting in a pew on a Sunday morning. Our lives should be more than singing a song in the choir or teaching a Sunday school class. As great as those things are, we ought to every day say, God, what new and great and grand adventure do you have for me that I may continue in the progress5:59that you have established for me, and that I may continue to seek to be everything that you would have me. Lord, it's not time to give up. You know, retirement came about here, not there. And so, we don't quit. We don't retire. We don't let down.6:28You know, there are deacons that say, well, I'm of this age. It's time for me to become inactive. No, you're not dead yet. You become inactive when we put you out there. You become inactive for the Lord when we bury you. And then think about this. I heard this the other day. Here's how important you are. When the last person that you know says your name and dies, that's the last time you'll ever be remembered. Unless your life has really meant something for the kingdom of God, as we see here.6:56Listen to what Paul says. Do you remember what I wanted to do, and I've been doing a series on remembering and reminding. And so, Paul writes this letter to 2 Timothy. He writes this letter to Timothy. In 2 Timothy, beginning in chapter 2, we look down at verse 14. In 2 Timothy, chapter 2, and Paul says,7:25Remind them of these things and solemnly charge them in the presence of God not to wrangle about words, which is useless and leads to the ruin of hearers. Be diligent. Be diligent. Present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed,7:50accurately handling the word of truth. But avoid worldly and empty chatter, for it will lead to further ungodliness. And their talk spread like gangrene. Among them are hymenius and filthius, and men who have gone astray from the truth, saying that the resurrection has already taken place,8:19and they upset the faith of some. Nevertheless, the firm foundation of God stands. Now, think, let me just stop there and think for a minute. Here's Paul imprisoned in Rome, and he's reminding young Timothy in this second letter, Nevertheless, the firm foundation of God stands.8:47Folks, that's a challenge to all of us today. No matter what we're facing, no matter how big this obstacle is in front of me, no matter whether death is looming, heartache is looming, struggles are looming, physical maladies are looming, mental maladies are looming, economical maladies are looming, all these things may be looming out there. Nevertheless, the firm foundation of God stands.9:14That means those that are in the faith, those that know Jesus Christ, have no reason to move one way or the other, but stand because God is immovable. You know, we live in a wishy-washy world, amen? But you know, this thing hasn't changed much. I went with Gail this past Friday. She's on the State Board of Missions9:44for the Alabama Baptists here, and she represents our county, and so she, our association, so she went down, I went in with her and sat and listened, and our state director, Dr. Lance, gave a really compelling message, as he always does before these meetings. But the message was interesting because he was talking about the struggles of generations. And he says, you know, we got the millennial generation, and then we got my generation,10:13which is, which one? Come on, you, baby boomer generation. That's right. We got the baby boomer generation. We got the millennial generation. We got all these. And basically what he said was that while we get all tore up about what's taking place in various generations and at various times, these things have always been happening. They've always cycled through generations. But the one thing that doesn't cycle and the one thing that stands sure10:43and the one thing that stands strong for you and I today is the firm foundation of God. If we have a foundation that is founded and sure in the word of God and our faith is affirmed by the work of the Holy Spirit in our life, it doesn't matter what happens in the world around us. We will stand. And stand we shall.11:14Even after Jesus comes. And somebody says, we'll stand until Jesus comes. Well, no. They may lay me to rest out there, but I'll still be standing with Jesus. And I want to tell you, that gives me hope. That gives me energy. That gives me great vision to know that what is happening in our world is going to happen in our world, but what is happening in my heart where the Lord Jesus will never end. Having this seal, he says, that nevertheless,11:44that nevertheless, this firm foundation of God stands. Having this seal, the Lord knows. This is critical. The Lord knows those who are his. And everyone who names the name of the Lord is to abstain. Is to abstain from wickedness. There's a God knows you. God's challenged you. Now, abstain. Did God know how many of us infill this? We don't know. But we do know that whatever truth they had, they strayed from that truth.12:13Now, in a large house, there are not only gold and silver vessels, but also vessels of wood and earthenware. Some to honor. Some to dishonor. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from these things, he'll be a vessel of honor. Sanctified. Useful to the master. Prepared for every good work. Well, first of all, I want you to notice that what young Timothy,12:43I don't know which one of these things to pick up when I'm looking, but what the Bible, well, the Bible is here. But what young Timothy is challenged on is one of the more critical areas. I want you to listen. He says, remind them of these things and solemnly charge them in the presence of God not to wrangle about words. Do you realize that there are, and I really wanted to come, I said, you know, I'm going to be excited about studying this passage. This passage is not about gossip. It's not about people13:13who slander people out there in the world and slander. You know how that's one of the most vicious things that we can do is slander one another by talking about one another. I said, well, that's it. That's gossip. But no, that's not what he's talking about. The first thing he says is he says, do not argue and strive with words that do not profit the hearers. In other words, don't allow people in your church to get caught up in what Arminius and Philistus have done in a lot of different ways. For instance,13:43For instance, they were out there talking about the resurrection and they were saying, oh, the resurrection has already passed as a spiritual resurrection. In other words, it's different than the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ and people are spiritually and it's, and you know, there are young believers out there that are getting caught up because they're listening to some of these things. It's kind of like baptism. You know, you get people that want to, oh yeah, we had a great revival event here and several people and I had a guy come up to me and he said, man, fill the Baptist strip. You need to baptize these tonight. You need to do it right now. I said,14:13I said, man, I ain't gonna fill the Baptist strip. It takes two days to fill that Baptist strip anyway and if I could fill it up, I couldn't get them baptized today. They'd have to stay here for two days before I could baptize them because baptism was everything to him and I heard these people, these people were standing around and he was wanting to wrangle with me on the importance of baptism and salvation and I wasn't going there and that's what he's talking about. Don't get caught up in these foolish arguments that are going to cause people that are young in their faith and that aren't certain14:42about certain areas of their faith to get caught up in because it will cause them a distraction and he uses three, I think, three interesting words, speculations and I want you to listen to what speculations are. People speculate. You know, some people want to speculate on the Bible. You need to quit speculating on the Bible and just obey it. Amen? We speculate on way too much. Here's what it means. The forming of a theory or conjecture without firm evidence. That means if I'm going to speculate on something up here,15:12I don't have a whole lot of evidence to do it but I'm going to, let's just speculate on it. Let's just, we don't need to do that. What we need to do is understand that what Paul is being is concrete here. He's not being speculative. He's not speculating on something that God might have said. He's saying this is something that we can build our lives on. We don't need to be speculative in our teaching. I don't want a study school teacher going to get up there and let's speculate on the Word of God today. Think about that. Let's form some theories15:40and some conjectures on the Word of God today and then let's come up with some evidence if we've got any. Now let's start with the evidence and let's just proclaim the truth, folks. Don't get caught up in trying to argue Scripture when you don't need to argue Scripture. All you need to do is live it and proclaim it. That's all we need to do. Theories. He said, don't get caught up16:10in theories. A supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something, especially one based on general principles, independent of a thing to be explained. I've always gotten kind of tickled by everybody's are you an evolutionist or are you a creationist and so they say, well, I'm an evolutionist. I said, well, what do you base your thoughts on evolution? Well, of course, Darwin's theory of evolution and I said,16:40theory. And I go online and y'all know, I've told you this, I go online and I listen to these debates on creation because I learn from those and there's these guys and here they're bringing up Darwin's theories and I'm thinking, theories, that's all they are. There's nothing that's sustainable and some of the greatest arguments that are thrown back at the Darwinist, the agnostic and the atheist that are trying to lean upon these theories17:10these theories are that these theories, many of them are unprovable and they have stopping points. They can't dig up enough bones to sustain them and they keep digging and they find a bone and they say, oh yeah, we got a bone here, here it is and they take that bone and they create something out of it. I'm going, you can create that out of a bone? When we look at theories and then he uses17:39something I think is real important. He said, petty matters. A little importance are trivial. You know, it's amazing how people get caught up in church over trivial, petty and speculative matters and there are churches that war over those things and so Paul, and it's interesting that Paul's taking the last chapter of his life to write a letter to a young preacher that he has helped pull alongside and mentor18:09and mentor and say to him, be careful about your tongue. Now, there's a reason for that. I want to share with you why Paul's doing that. Listen to how James sees it. If anyone thinks himself to be religious and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man's religion is worthless. In other words, James looks at it the same matter in a different way. Paul's talking to young Timothy and he's saying, don't get caught up in these arguments18:38over speculative matters, over speculative religious matters, you know, people humming or hanging upside down in church, whatever. He said, but notice, he said, the tongue. He said, a person needs to bridle his tongue. You know, there are some things we just don't need to say. In Hebrew, the thought is this, if a word's spoken, it's an eternal word. It means it can never be withdrawn, that it's out there forever. And sometimes, I wish I had kept my mouth shut more than I had19:08left it open. So he says, that man's religion is worthless. Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father's this. He said, it's action. You know, there are a lot of people that want you to think that they are very religious because they can argue or they can speculate or they can discuss or they can bring into conversation. But James says, this is it. Go visit some orphans and some widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world.19:38He said, it's not those that are out there running around. You know, have you ever run into somebody that just thought they knew everything about religion and that's why they weren't religious is because they know everything and they know nothing about a relationship or they wouldn't be there. And so that's what he's saying. James goes on in chapter 3, he says, so also the tongue is a small part of the body and yet it boasts of a great thing. See how great a forest it sets aflame by such a small fire.20:07You know, there's things that I could probably set up here and I'd say, well, let's just speculate on some things that are brought up in the scripture and let's talk about them and I could start speculating and I could have this side of the church so mad, this side of the church mad, this middle of the church mad, that part of the church over what? Over foolish speculation. You know, we've come through a battle of foolishness, folks.20:36We've battled over worship and whether to stand or not to stand and we stand too much and we sing too many, somebody says, you know, you sing 17, I love Jesus 17 times. That's foolish. We need to repent and get right with God and come back to the church for the purpose that God established it and that's to glorify and honor Jesus Christ21:05at his feet and hands. So he says, don't argue. Then he says, study. Notice he says, study and seek to be a true teacher of God's word. And you say, well, he's just talking to Timothy there. No, he says, Timothy, remind them and I'm going to remind you and you tell them this is what's good. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need21:34to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. Let me tell you, that's not just a declaration declaration to preachers, friends. That's a declaration to every born-again believer in Jesus Christ. Every man, woman of God, young person, old person, I don't care if you can read, you ought to spend time in God's word so that this firm foundation that God has laid for you is something that you can live on in the days ahead. It's something22:04It's something that will see you through those dark hours. When you stand for God's word, notice what you do. First of all, you're approved by God. Notice he says in verse 15, do your best to present yourselves to God as one approved, a worker. You know, there are a lot of people that still don't understand what a worker is. There are a lot of people out there, you know, I get tickled, I run into people22:34all the time that say, man, I'm looking for somebody that needs a job. And then I run into people all the time that say, hey, I'm looking for a job. And then I try to put the two together and come to find out this person actually should say, I'm looking for somebody that will work and the other person needs to understand that with jobs comes work. With faith comes work. No, works doesn't precede your faith, your works23:03your works follow your faith. We have faith in God so we work for God. We have faith in God's word so we obey God's word. We don't see it and we don't absorb and we don't whine and complain and speculate over things that are or aren't, but what we do is we read and we study and we show ourselves approved and we show ourselves23:33ourselves unashamed. How many times have you taught somebody and they say, well, you know, I'm just ashamed I don't know more about this. Well, I am too. You ought to know more about it. How long does it take to read the Bible? Well, if you just start and read a little bit right now, you probably read it before you die if you're not as old as I am. You know, you can read it and you can, you know, and I'm not just saying, don't just grab your Bibles and just say,24:03oh, I'm going to read through the Bible in a year and bless God, I'm going to put that, I'm going to write that and read through the Bible in the year 2014. No, read it. Read it. Let it speak into your life. Let it speak into your heart. This past weekend, reading the Bible and reading through the Psalms, you know, there were some things that God spoke into my life that were extremely encouraging to me24:32because he reminded me of who he was as the God of creation and he reminded me of who I am as one of his children which we're always excited to be and then he says you can accurately teach the word. I'm going to tell you there's enough inaccurate teaching going on in our world today that if you don't know the word accurately, you can be sucked in to a lie before you know it and you can be given25:00to fables and to sayings and to lifestyles that are as ungodly as they can be because of your lack of knowledge of the word of God and we can't blame anybody for that when that happens but ourselves because God's given us an opportunity to sit at the feet of some of the greatest teachers that I've ever been around right here in this church and to also study his word privately25:30and daily to the point that I am not ashamed of what I've learned and not ashamed to proclaim and to stand on it. Notice he also says in verses 16 through 18 shun godless chatter and discussions others always chatter amen he says in shunning in verse 16 but avoid irreverent babble now25:59now I don't know that I really want to go into that I believe it speaks pretty much for itself there's a lot of babbling that goes on I've been pastoring for about 35 years there's a lot of babbling that goes on in church there's a lot of babbling that goes on among Christians outside of church we ought to not do that we ought to hold ourselves to a higher standard and understand here's Paul latter days Timothy remind him don't stand26:29don't stand avoid irreverent babble well how many times I wish I had listened to that myself for it will lead people into more and more what what ungodliness it'll lead them to more and more ungodliness it's amazing when you start listening to somebody else's babble how you'll begin to think well if they do that and they go to this church I can do that and go to my church and before you26:58know it their sinfulness has crept into your life because you've been foolish enough to stop and listen to what they've said and get caught up he said their talk will spread like gangrene it'll spread like infection and he said if you don't believe it among them are Hymenaeus and Philtus and who have I like this in the English version he says who swerved said they hadn't run from the truth he said they just swerved from the truth27:27and maybe that gives him some help there but he says saying the resurrection has already happened they are upsetting the faith of some Paul's already heard about it he said so make sure you don't get caught up and he said this is an example of what happens Timothy when we get out there and start recklessly talking about people we can't do it we don't need to do it it's not worthy of us it's not a call of us27:56we need to we need to shun it you know and I'll tell you something the best way I know how to shun that is is is is is just stop somebody sometimes and say wait a minute is this edifying God I'll tell you what I like is when somebody says you know I know this ain't going to edify God but I want to talk to you about something well Lord if it's not going to edify God why do we even need to talk about it why do we want to get caught up in something that's not edifying the Lord why do we want to discuss something and then you know28:26there are those discussions and I want to defend this there are those discussions I love to get into and I've gotten into a few of them through the years with men of God like Don Alvey and my own son and discussing truth and not babbling over propensities that are false but talking about the meat of God's word and the truth that's in God's word there's plenty of good stuff to talk about to keep us from running our mouths about stuff we don't know anything about and so we need28:55to look at what God's word says he says so Sean he said it leads to ungodliness he said it eats away like an infection he said it's like a cancer and he said there's already examples among you he said they spiritualized the resurrection he said so they've already delved in to taking away or swerving from the truth and folks that's why it was so important back during Easter and when I was preaching to make sure29:25that you know that we believe in the bodily resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ and he has been resurrected but the resurrection of the dead has not taken place yet and won't take place until God is ready for it to take place and at that point in time it'll take place in such a way that no one's going to have to come tell you guess what the resurrection took place yesterday and you slept through it I promise you29:52you'll know it I don't believe that God's gonna let a trumpet sound from heaven and an archangel shout that we're not going to hear what he's got to say and so we don't need to get caught up and we don't need to get worried about those things that aren't true and then finally I want us to look at what I think is one of the most critical parts of Paul's words here as he closes out this chapter30:22chapter it's very important as he challenges young Timothy beginning let's go back up to I believe about verse 19 but God's firm foundation stands bearing this seal the Lord here's the seal here's how God's found do you you want to know how Christianity has been passed down through the centuries right here's how it was if you want to know how you know we people speculate there we30:51there we go they speculate I'm gonna tell you what people speculate on you know the church how did the church last for over 2,000 years and you know it's getting to the point we're fixing to be overwhelmed and we're fixing to be run over and we're gonna die out no we're not no we're not the church will not die out why here's why look what he says the Lord knows those who are his my31:18my my friend I've said it before and I'll say it again it doesn't matter how hard you claim knowing him what matters is and I believe you do or you don't know that he knows you why because I've talked to people throughout my ministry that told me they knew the Lord had no fruit had no31:46had no means or understanding oh yeah I know the Lord Jesus oh yes I know and I love it oh I know I'm saved can you you know if you stop them for a minute and say well tell me this how do you know you're saved why I want to tell you how I know I'm saved I'm saved God told me God has affirmed it in my life over and over and over and over again and I always have people come to me and say brother Chris are you saying32:16you heard the audible voice of God say Chris Burns you are my child no I have felt the awesome presence of God's Holy Spirit working in my heart and in my life to change me and motivate me to serve him in a greater more powerful way by acknowledging me as his son and when you know that I want to tell you something it is the most affirming peace you'll ever have in32:46your life death truly loses its hold on your life notice he says those the Lord knows those who are his and let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity so the Lord knows he is and he says if he knows you then depart from iniquity you ought not partner with iniquity but then but then he goes on further now in a great33:15house he says now he's talking about a nice home and Paul's been around some nice homes nice house he's in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and clay some for honorable use and some for dishonorable so let's get this right let's get this picture right Paul said there's houses they've got these33:44vessels in them and some of these vessels are made of gold and silver and he said there's a special place of honor for them and he said some of these are earthen vessels and they're made of wood and some of them are made of clay and they're just what they are would you want to be a golden vessel a silver vessel or would you want to be an earthen and clay vessel which one you think is gonna hang around the longest I mean you ever had a piece of pottery break he said there are those34:14that are there that are earthen and he said there are those that are there he said so he goes on he said therefore if anyone cleanses himself from this this arm excuse me so he said silver and gold wood clay some for honor honorable use some for dishonorable therefore if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable he will be a vessel for honorable use set apart as holy34:43notice he's a describing this person to us he's set up for honorable use God's going to honor him he's going to use him honorably he's going to set him apart for a holy use useful Paul says to the master of the house notice what else he says ready for every good work there's a thing that35:11sets a vessel of honor apart from a vessel of dishonor I'm gonna tell you what it is it's God God is the master of this house God establishes the vessels of honor and he knows those vessels of dishonor in other words there are those that make intellectual assents to Christ all the time and I those assents don't get past the ceiling but those35:41who make relational assents to the Lord Jesus Christ and are washed by his blood by faith and trust in him their lives are forever changed and they're vessels of honor God works through them you see them you know them you walk with them you know the difference you see the difference in their life they have different desires they have different wants they have a different walk they sing a different song they preach a different sermon their whole life is different displayed before you why because that's how it looks you can't tell me36:10you walk in a house and you find a vessel of honor and you can't tell it's a vessel of honor I want you to know something my grandmother on my dad's side of the family if I ever or any of her grandkids ever gave her something she kept it forever now I think I remember telling you this story but I made a coat hanger fruit basket one year at vacation Bible school and we painted those coat hangers and and we put them together and and we put plastic cheap plastic fruit in them and hung36:40greenery around them and put wire on the back of it and my grandmother hung my cheap fruit basket in her kitchen they took it down when she died it was a it was an honorable thing for her I want to tell you something there were a lot of things that she threw away because they had no meaning in her life when God establishes you as a37:08vessel of honor he establishes you as a purpose with a purpose and a design to complete that purpose by getting up from where you are and going out and doing the work that God has called you to do and it's honorable work we are not to sit in these pews Sunday after Sunday so that we can give an account to me that you're here we get up37:38from this place and we do what God has called us to do as vessels of honor he says go he said he'll be a vessel for honorable use set apart as holy useful to the master of the house ready for every good work let me tell you I want to know that God has me in his hands and that I am the one that he wants to use I'll tell you what I got two I got three lawnmowers in my house I got a push more and I got two38:06riding mowers and I got one riding more that I like better than the two the push more for sure and the other riding more and I I keep that thing where I can get it out and I can use it and I use it and I use it and I use it and thank God it's still using you know that's what God wants to do God wants to come into your house and into your life and he wants to change you and then he38:35wants to use you and he wants to use you and he wants to use you and you say what happens when I just get tired now he'll just keep feeling you and he'll feel you you'll never run out of fuel you'll never run out of strength you'll never run out of wisdom you'll never run out of heart you'll never get to the point that you don't want to serve him because he's constantly going to infuse you and infuse you and infuse you to use you and to use you I want to tell you something preachers don't burn out they burn up people don't burn39:05out serving the Lord they burn up serving the Lord because God has chosen to use us and to use us and to use us for his honor and for his honor and for his glory and for his honor and when we get ready and he's through with us he brings us up and he parades us down the streets of gold as born-again believers in him who faithfully trusted him for who we are and what we are my friend are you39:34a vessel of honor if you look in the mirror vessel dishonor and I say that because of this my wife reading a book I want to tell you she read me the chapter on this that the book is called dealing with fools in your life is that right dealing with fools in your life what is it foolproofing your life excuse me same thing same thing isn't it I just retitled it39:59foolproofing your life well she got to this chapter and she said here I don't it I loved it when she'd say this throughout while she's reading it she said I want you to think that I'm wanting you to read this just because I think it relates to you I really don't I just want you to read it this chapter was the fool in the mirror yeah oh goodness the fool in the mirror40:27now I can't remember what I read on that but I want to tell you something how long does it take you to look in the mirror and determine whether you're looking at a fool or not if you get up every day and you don't know nothing about it the first time you40:56saw it you see if God is working in our life to use us as vessels of honor and let's place ourselves out there to be used up for his glory and his honor never ceasing to stop slow down or quit but to realize how important it is that our lives our tongues41:26our minds our hearts our vessels to his glory let's pray father as we gather here and God is Paul challenges young Timothy to remind them remind them not to get caught up in foolish conversation remind them to study the41:53word of God to show themselves approved a workman not ashamed to remind them that whatever happens God is a firm foundation to remind them that there are vessels of honor and there are vessels of dishonor so they're going to be those that want to catch up those that are the vessels of honor and they want to get them entangled Lord and the things of this life42:23Lord help us see show us that spiritual mirror this morning and if we don't see or hear you call us son or daughter or child God may we come to understand today may be the day the most important day in our life it's the day of our salvation father I pray that Lord in these latter days that we will be as42:53urgent as Paul and as a tentative as Timothy that Lord we would obey to be used by you Jesus name I pray amen I pray that Lord in these lands of God my son I pray that Lord in these lands of God God bless you all and I pray that Lord in these words of God bless you all and I pray that Lord in God bless you all and I pray that Lord in these blessings of God bless you all and I pray that Lord in peace of God bless you all and I pray that Lord in43:22peace of God bless you all and I pray that Lord in peace of God bless you all and I pray that Lord in peace of God bless you all and I pray that Lord in peace of God bless you all and I pray that Lord inMore sermons on 2 Timothy →
