There Are Many Wolves, But They Will Not Prevail

Let's go to 2 Timothy chapter 3. I had this message pretty much studied out and prepared, then thought, no, I don't want to preach that on Mother's Day.

I looked at other things then and perused through some things and just could not sense leadership to do anything else, so I'm coming back to this text. We'll actually refer back to verses 1 through 5, but the next text in our study through this book of the Bible. If you're visiting with us, we go verse by verse, chapter by chapter, and we've come to this section of 2 Timothy. 2 Timothy chapter 6 beginning, or chapter 3 rather, beginning in verse 6. Paul writing to young Timothy, who's pastoring the church at Ephesus, says, For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women, weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning, but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed to Moses, so these men also opposed the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith.

But they will not make further progress, for their folly will be obvious to all, just as Jannes and Jambres' folly was also. I've entitled the unpacking of this text, There are many wolves, but they will not prevail. There are many wolves, but they will not prevail. Jesus said in Matthew 7 15, Beware of the false of the false prophets. Now, false prophets, false teachers, and wolves, especially in the New Testament, all mean the same thing.

They're referring to the same kind of person. Jesus said that there'll be wolves in sheep's clothing, Matthew 7 15. In other words, these wolves come to savage the church, to undermine the truth, and to mislead God's children.

But they will come dressed like a sheep, an outer camouflage, but they're just false prophets, they're wolves. Then in Matthew 10 16, Jesus said, Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. John 10 11 through 16, Jesus said, I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand or hireling and not a shepherd, who's not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he's a hireling or a hired hand, and he's not concerned about the sheep. But in contrast, verse 14, I, Jesus, am the good shepherd.

I know my own and my own know me. Even as the Father knows me and I know the Father, I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep which are not of this fold, and I must bring them also, and they will hear my voice, and they will become one flock with one shepherd. So here our Lord himself says that he is the chief shepherd of the sheep, Christians, and he's not like the false teachers of his day who claim to love the sheep, who claim to be serving God, but they do not man up and fight nobly against the wolves who try to come in and devour and scatter the sheep. There's got to be a manliness about proper shepherding to guard the sheep from the wolves, the false teachers, the false prophets. And this church that Timothy is now pastoring the church at Ephesus, here's what the Apostle Paul said to them before he left them very close to when he appointed Timothy to come here and be the pastor.

Here's what he says to the elders of the church at Ephesus, Acts 20 29 through 30. I know that after my departure, here it is, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock, and from your own selves men will arise speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after them. Now there are many, many other passages, but I wanted you to see from the Bible text there are many wolves. The Lord warned about them. Paul warned about them.

It's continually taught in the Old and New Testament, these false teachers, these false prophets, these wolves who want to damage the church and undermine and usurp the truth of God. So three thoughts here in our conclusion. Number one, there are lots of wolves. Number two, they are very dangerous.

That's why there's such a stern warning. Number three, the Word, our faithful shepherding, and the Word of God will expose them and protect the sheep. The Bible says in Acts 20 32, I commend to you, over there, I commend you to God and the Word of his grace. This is in the context of the wolves coming in. He said, but it's the Word of God faithfully taught and stood upon that will guard the church and God's sheep from the devastating effect of these wolves.

Now outlining the text before us and jumping back up into verses one through five a little bit there, I'm going to give you this outline. Number one, Roman numeral one, the common characteristic of wolves. What does Paul say here to Timothy that says this is commonly what these guys are like. This is their character, commonly speaking. Well, not you call them wolves, false prophets, false teachers, same thing.

I'll use those interchangeably. But his point is, here's what they look like. Number one, subpoint A, they are sin embracers. They are not fighting against sin. They're not repenting against sin.

These guys embrace sin. Look what he says in verses one through five of chapter three there. But realize this, that in the last days, difficult times will come. Well, the last days, this is the days we're in now. It's the time from the beginning of the church until Christ returns. This is the last days, the last events on earth until Christ returns.

What are they going to be like? Verse three or verse two, for men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, brutal haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. Nothing wrong with pleasure, but these men only live for the pleasures of this world. And they don't live for the deeper, richer pleasures that we only have in God.

Then holding to a form of godliness, although they've denied its power, avoids such men as these. So these are sin embracers. Now look, there's only two types of people in the world.

You hear me? Only two types of people. They're the sin embracers and the sin repenters. When you became a Christian, you didn't stop sinning, but you became a sin repenter. Something in your heart has changed and you begin to read the word of God and hear the word of God preached and you begin to say, oh God, my mind and my heart and so often my actions are wrong and God, I don't want to be like that.

I want to grow and be sanctified. You're a sin repenter. But these wolves, these false teachers, they act like they're sin repenters, but they're really not. In their heart of hearts, they're sin embracers.

Two different kinds of people and only two different types of people. These wolves love sin and they live for sin. Now while all do sin, the sin embracer has never entered into the fight against sin and in parallel has never been the journey to know and love God. That's the journey you're on as a sheep, as a child of God. You're beginning to repent of sin and you're beginning to learn to embrace and love the things of God.

And only the chains of the Holy Spirit in your heart can give you that desire. But the point in this text is these wolves, these false teachers, these false prophets. Common characteristic is they're sin embrasers.

Well, here's the second thing, subpoint B. They are shells only. Shells only. Look what it says in verse 5. Holding to a form of godliness although they have denied its power. So the word form here is a word that means external outline or the outer shape, the outer shell if you will. It's the outer covering that they wear that looks like Christianity but it lacks the inner substance. An outside cosmetic of Christianity but no inward heart possession of the truth. Now when Paul wrote to Titus as he's left Titus on the island of Crete, I hope to go there when Pam and I go to the Greek Isles if we ever get there.

And we hope to go there. And Paul put Titus on Crete and said get the church in order there. They're in a mess. And he says this to them, there are those there Titus, Titus 1 16, they profess to know God but by their deeds they deny him. Again, they have the outward shell but that's all they have. And it's hard to know what's real sometimes when someone puts on a good outward shell.

One scholar said it this way and I want you to remember this phrase because it is so prominent in our day. He said they have a Christianized form of paganism. They have a Christianized form of paganism. In other words, they're basically worldly pagans, ungodly, but they've learned how to put a Christianized shell on the outside of it.

i.e. what Jesus said, they're wolves but in sheep's clothing. They have the outward appearance but not the inward possession.

Now Satan has been very active and has been quite successful at taking base paganism and covering the exterior with Christian sparkles to make it appear as something it's not. Now I've got grandchildren and you know what I've learned about grandchildren? They like sprinkles. You know what sprinkles are? And sometimes you can get those donuts and the entire donut is covered with sprinkles. You don't even know it's a donut. Well, at risk of being a little crude, but this is biblical, these false teachers are common dung covered completely with Christian sprinkles.

It looks great but you don't dare want to bite into it. The apostle Paul said his whole life as a lost man was but dung. It's a biblical principle.

So they're shells only. They are embracers of sin and they are shells only. In the last part of verse five, Paul commands Timothy. It's a present imperative. It's a command and Timothy you are going to have to keep on doing this. Timothy, avoid such men. It means avoid them and keep on avoiding them.

Now let me give you some encouraging news that I'm confident is true. If a church has been pastored well and has matured decently, these kind of attacks get easy to handle. The men of your church, the ladies of your church are mature and they can repel the wolves about the time they hit the door. But in the early days, like what Timothy's doing, these are the early days of the establishment of the church at Ephesus. And in the early days of planting a new church or revitalizing an existing church, when I say days, I mean years, the pastor has to be one who continually girds up his loins, plays the man, and keeps these errors, these false teachings, these wolves from entering into the church.

Well, number one, we talked about the common characteristics. They're sin embracers and they're shells only. Secondly, let's notice a common tactic. Not the common tactic, though I'm convinced it's probably a primary or the primary common tactic that these wolves use. Subpoint A, they are sneaky manipulators. Sneaky manipulators. The case says it in verse 6, for among them, among those false teachers I've just been describing to you in verses 1 through 5, there's a certain kind, and this is their tactic, there are those who enter into households.

The word enter is the idea of sneaking in. It's the idea of worming their way in, clever and cunning, deceptive, manipulatively. Calvin in his commentary on this verse says, they use flattery to entrap the weak or silly women of the church. Their sneakiness includes silly superstitions. Again, they throw some Christian sprinkles on it, but basically they're getting church members, especially the ladies here they're focusing on, to get in their emotions and be drawn away into their enthralling charisma and insightful teachings as they hold themselves as elitist. They learn how to enthrall the shallow women within the church, and they do all of this under the veil of claiming a deep, superior spirituality. Now, by way of illustration, let me ask you a question. Who, according to the Scripture, was the first wolf who came into a household as a sneaky manipulator?

Who was the first one? Satan in the Garden of Eden. He sneakily manipulated his way into the house of Adam and Eve, and he gained the victory. You see, sneaky manipulation is the regular ploy of Satan from the beginning all the way up through Paul and Timothy's day and all the way up to today. Their sneaky ploy always includes putting a spin or a twist on what the Bible really is saying. They'll use the Bible, but they've got their unique spin on it. If you take a look at the Bible, they'll use the Bible, but they've got their unique spin on it. If you challenge them on it, they'll say, oh, but I have an insight you don't have.

You see, I'm an elitist, they would say. So here comes Satan with sneaky manipulation coming to Eve. And the Bible says in Genesis 3, 1 that Satan was more crafty than all the other beasts of the field.

You could say more sneaky. And in Genesis 3, 1, Satan says to Eve, now notice him twisting here. Now, Eve, has God said you can't eat from any of the trees of the garden?

I mean, here's what he's saying. Eve, you know what? God's Word is unreasonable. Eve, God's instruction for you is not relevant to the world, real world.

Eve, we've got to live in the real world. And so, is God telling you you can't eat from any and all the trees in the garden? Of course, God didn't say that, but see, his twist. He wants to make God look unreasonable, too harsh, too oppressive.

Then he moves forward. He goes further in Genesis 3, 4, and 5. And now, first of all, let me remind you what Eve told Satan when he said, well, you know what? He said, let me remind you what Eve told Satan when he said, did God say you can't eat of any of the trees? Eve responds back and says, no, we can eat from the trees in Eden, but the one tree in the center of the garden, we're not to eat of it. If we eat of it, Eve says to Satan, we will die. Now, Satan, more brazen, says in verse 4, Eve, you shall not die.

You shall not die. God, you see, is a cosmic killjoy, Eve. He wants to rob you of yourself and fulfillment.

He wants to rob you of having your best life now by restricting you. You're not going to die, Eve. And then verse 5, Satan says, Eve, God knows that in the day you eat of it, you'll be just like God. Now, is there anything contemporarily relevant about the lie, you can be your own God?

Do not we live in a culture where the cry of the predominant religion of America today is wokism? It's not their maiden doctrine, I have my own truth. I am my God. I decide what's right and wrong. I decide what's good and bad. I decide what's truth for me. Look, these folks are, these young people are marching in the streets and ranting and reviling and prevailing in the public square and on the internet, in social media, talking about they know what's right for them and they have their truth as if this is some new, special, modern insight. It's not some special, new, modern insight.

It's just old lies that started with Satan. When he tells Eve, you'll be your own God if you'll just decide to push God's Word away and do what? Now, here's the key word, you feel is right and best for you.

Feel is right and best for you. That's the emotional part of man. He's playing on the emotions of Eve. So Eve's emotions kicked in and she got carried away. Genesis 3 6 says, when the woman Eve saw the tree was good for food, it was a delight to the eyes. The tree was desirable to make one wise.

Oh, I'm so enthralled with this possibility. She took from its fruit and ate and she gave also to her weenie husband with her and he ate. Emotionally driven women and weak weenie husbands are sure to pray for the wolf's attacks. Well, did Satan's sneaky manipulation work?

Yes, it did. Eve eats and disobeys God. She gives it to Adam and Adam eats and disobeys God and then ruin slavery and degradation in their lives and the human race. That was the first of the sneaky manipulators who come in.

Remember those two things? They tell you that if you interpret the Bible this way, God's not that unreasonable. God's not that unrealistic. We need to be more relevant here, Satan would say. And then they'll come right out once they get you going and say, you don't really have to obey the Bible.

Just get the main truth Jesus keeps you out of hell and the rest of Christianity is just what you feel it should be. Well, not only are they sneaky manipulators, that's part of their tactic. Secondly, they target weak, sinful, waffling women. I'm not saying women are in general weak, sinful, and waffling.

I'm saying that men and women as fallen sinners are all naturally weak, sinful, and waffling. But there's an advantage Satan has with women, and that is because God has made women greatly superior to men in their emotional capacity and in their emotional depth. Women feel more deeply than men do. Women hurt more deeply than men do. Women are superior caregivers to men. Go in the hospital, why are 80-90% of the nurses women?

Because they care deeply. And we men would be tragically lost without their superiority in the area of deep passion and emotion and care and mercies ministries and things of that nature. But at the same time, just like a man's weakness strengths can be his weakness, a woman's strengths that God's given her can be her weakness.

And that's what Paul is speaking of here. Paul says they sneak into these households and they captivate, the New American Standard is, weak women. The word weak is a word that scholars say could really be translated several different ways. It can be translated a silly woman.

Instead of having depth and substance, she's just sort of flighty and silly. It can be translated a little woman. The point is these ladies esteem themselves as knowledgeable in rocks in the church, pillars of the church. And Paul says, in effect, they're not very much, they're just little. These particular type women are also idle women, one scholar says. Quite a few church historians and scholars tell us, like Faribane does in his commentary, these are wealthy ladies, but they lack spiritual depth.

Early church father Irenaeus lived in the second century, not long after Paul wrote this. And he says these are the well-bred, elegantly attained and very wealthy women. I don't know why they're saying that actually, but evidently in their context, that's what they noticed. That the women of little spiritual substance and depth, who were flighty and emotionally based, tended to be the more wealthy women in the church. Society ladies, they would call them. Now at this point, I'm not giving you my viewpoint, I'm giving you the viewpoint of some godly forebears. But the idea here of weak women is they're emotionally based and not truth-based. Now Paul goes on, not only do these guys sneak in manipulative and captivate weak women, he said there are weak women, verse 6 again, weighed down with sins. Weighed down with sins, it didn't mean sin, they've heaped up sin in their life. They hadn't been active, humble, repenters of sin, they've kind of collected sin.

So what does that mean? That means they have a bad conscience, and bound up by bad conscience, they were easy prey for the wolves, the false teachers. Maybe they weren't particularly religious ladies, though they paraded to be, but they spent their time in pleasure and in frolic. And from time to time, they needed a religious salve for their troubles. They needed a religious salve for their troubled conscience, and these false teachers gave them just enough twisted false religion to make them feel better about their guilt and their sin. They're masters at charm, they're masters at deceitfulness. You know, when you deal with false teaching creeping into the church, one thing you will always deal with is they minimize the sinfulness of sin.

Did you hear me? They minimize the sinfulness of sin. You see, the Bible has strong, robust, redundant teaching on the sinfulness of sin, but equally so on the mighty power of Christ to cleanse us of all sin. Amen?

It's both. But see, the false teacher doesn't want you to look to Christ, so he's got to give you another way to deal with your sin and guilt. So he twists the teaching to tell you, well, I'm okay and you're okay.

Lie from hell. You're not okay. And I'm certainly not okay. But Jesus is a-okay, and I need to be in Him. Amen?

And then we're better than okay, we bear His righteousness before the Father. Well, he continues in verse 6, they creep in their sneaky manipulators who captivate these silly, weak, idle women, and they're weighed down with sin so their conscience is burdened and they like this new teaching. It makes them feel better about themselves. Then he continues on in verse 6, and they're led on by various impulses. Verse 6, they're led on by various impulses. The phrase there likely does not mean evil desire so much as it means foolish things. They're just chasing one unsound, worldly, foolish thing after another, one gimmick after another. That's what they're prone to. These women, Paul is saying, do not genuinely desire to seek God, but do desire to be seen as holy and pious in the church.

They have not a godly quest for truth, but a carnal lust for novelty. Give me the latest fad. Give me the latest happening thing in the church. I used to go to meetings for pastors of large churches. And one of the last meetings I went to, because I didn't go back, was the pastors begin to discuss, well, all right, there's some new things out there we need to learn how to do. I thought, I'm still trying to learn how to do the 2,000-year-old stuff.

You do this stuff and it'll keep you busy, so busy you don't have time to chase the latest fad, the latest novelty. Well, that's the way these women were. Now, look, he's not saying all the women of the church are the same.

Timothy, be careful, especially in their earlier years of maturing a church. One of the great ways Satan will get into it with these false teachers, these wolves, is by manipulating the shallow women's emotions. And they'll start pulling their husband's string.

He might be the mouthpiece, but she's the power behind the throne. Then he says in verse 6, they captivate these women. It's the idea of capturing and carrying them away. And of course, this was not the first captivity these ladies had encountered.

They're already captive by their sin and their foolish lust. John R. Stott, rather, in his commentary, said these women are morally weak, spiritually weak, and intellectually weak. So they're vulnerable.

And by the way, can I say something to us guys? Guys, your job is to protect your wife. God made women of a different kind of fabric, the Bible says. They need the loving, sacrificial, compassionate headship and protection of godly husbands. A wife needs a man from time to time to say, baby, I understand you feel strongly about that, but we can't do that. This is where we're going to stand.

And she'll love you for that. No wonder in our present age, as Satan works in our culture, the first thing he worked to destroy was godly manliness and true masculinity. Because if he can defeat the men, the women become easier prey, because the men will not be there to protect and lead. Well, intellectually, these ladies had a problem.

Look at verse 7. They're always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. That's the waffling element there. They're weak, they're sinful, but they waffle all over the place. They're always learning.

In other words, what's the latest fad in doctrine and in practice for the church? He says they're always waffling around and they're never able to come to the knowledge. The word knowledge there doesn't mean just facts in your mind, it means to embrace the truth of what Christianity is. The true or full knowledge of who God is, who his son is, what salvation is, and what constitutes his true church. They're never able to get that because they're chasing other silly things.

Never able, the text says. It means having unconfessed sin and a lust for foolish frivolous things. They do not receive imparted truth, for God does not impart truth to those who embrace sin. That's why all of us sinners must be repentors when we come in the church door on Sunday, or we will not receive the imparted truth.

God won't give it to us. So having nothing solid in themselves, these ladies are tossed about by every wind of doctrine, and while they boast of being exceptionally wise, they actually can't reach a lasting conclusion about anything. Here, there, here, there, somebody writes a new book and that's the next fantastic thing. Some speaker doesn't say, oh that's the next wonderful thing.

And they're easy ploy for false teachers. A.T. Robertson, the eminent Baptist Greek scholar, said these ladies are hypnotized and pride themselves in belonging to the intelligentsia elite. Verse 25-6 says, but she who gives herself to wanton pleasure is dead even while she lives.

What he's saying is they may act like they're spiritual, but in their hearts they've given themselves to the worldly pleasures around them, not to godly pursuits, and they're spiritually dead. Well, how's this for a Mother's Day message so far? It's just the text, just the text. I say this a lot because it's the truth. I'm blessed to have an army of ladies who are not weak women, who are not silly women, who are not little women, but godly, biblically principled women. He's not talking about you. He said, Timothy, you hadn't been at this church long and you haven't seen folks grow much, so you've got a lot of vulnerable ladies. So ladies, not only should we men protect, you older ladies, you protect. Next time you run across some 27-year-old know-it-all in the church, say, sweetheart, sit down. We need to talk a minute. You don't need to chase this and chase that. Let's look to our pastor and elders.

They've got 40-plus years of reputation. Let's don't chase everything else that comes down the pike. It looks exciting. Thrilling. Number three.

Oh, I like number three. The common end of these wolves is, Timothy, I want to remind you of something. There's a common end.

Matter of fact, there's a timeless pattern. Satan hasn't really come up with anything new, Timothy. This has been going on from the beginning, and he gives an example here in verse eight. He says, just as Janus and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also opposed the truth, men of depraved mind rejected in regard to the faith. He said, there's no difference between these guys and those two magicians who showed up in Pharaoh's court trying to prove that their gods were more mighty than Moses' god. Now, the Bible didn't give us their name.

Their names come from Jewish oral tradition, and that's the names Paul uses. But you remember the story the magicians come in? Paul or the Moses has been the instrument through which God performed mighty powerful signs, wonders, and miracles in Egypt to prove to the Egyptians that their gods were false, but Moses' god was the one true god. So Pharaoh summoned his wise men and magicians, and they had a square off with Moses, and Pharaoh's magicians did these magic acts, and then Moses did these magic acts, and then Moses responded with the true power of God. Even Pharaoh's magicians later said to Pharaoh, that's the real deal out there. That's the real prophet, and that's a real god they serve.

But Pharaoh's heart was hardened, the Bible says, and he wouldn't listen. But what Paul's saying here is, Timothy, this pattern has been going on forever, and expected always to be tried to creep in and undermine the truth of God. These wolves, these false teachers, these false prophets. He says here in verse 8, they're men of depraved mind and rejected in regard to the faith. The idea is their mind has no solid spiritual good in it.

It's only base and worldly. It's depraved, and they've been tested and found a counterfeit. These men have been weighed in God's balance, Timothy.

We hadn't seen it yet, but they came up lacking in weight. To me, that's the timeless pattern we've seen. Now, B, subpoint B, not only the timeless pattern, but notice it's an encouraging pattern. Look at verse 9. But they will not make further progress. Now, that's contingent upon Timothy not quitting his job of being a faithful, manly shepherd to protect the sheep and guard the church from these wolves. So, just as Jane S. and Jane Bres were exposed and made to be frauds and impotent before Moses and Moses' God, the true God of scripture, Paul is saying to Timothy, Timothy, we're going to have the same kind of stuff in our day, and it's going to evolve down even all the way through to our day today and all the way through into the coming. Matter of fact, the Bible says imposters will increase and become worse the closer we get to the return of Christ. But their power fizzles toward the finish, just as happened in those who opposed Moses.

He says in verse 9, their folly will be obvious to all. Well, I'm telling you what, are you listening to me? If we had to fight the same fights we fought together those first 20, 25 years, I'd be in the grave.

I'm just telling you, I wouldn't have made it. But thank God, time exposes and removes the wolves. You try to undermine God's preacher, God's truth, and God's church. Time will clearly reveal the truth from the false. Time will clearly reveal the substantial from the shallow or the shell. Time will clearly reveal the wise from the silly. Time will clearly reveal the godly from the hypocrite. Now, he says they'll be exposed, they'll be revealed, but the world will not see it, only the sheep see it. The Bible says if you're saved, you've given eyes to see and ears to hear. So the true church, the true sheep will see it. So Timothy, Paul is writing, take courage, victory is assured. Stand against them. They will trouble you, but given enough time they will hang themselves. They may make a first big impression, a first big speech, a first big splash, but give it some time, they will fizzle out, and the true elect of God will see it and get it.

There are those that go up like a rocket but come down like a rock. Aren't you glad folks that for 41 years with our weaknesses, faulting failures, and a pastor that had to grow up a lot, me, nevertheless we kept striving to do it by the book and now 41 years later we're a long way from fizzling out, amen. I mean, I mean, this thing's new every day.

Just do it right and it has no expiration date. Now, something real quick on what we're going to show you, and I'm about done. 1 Timothy 4.15. In 1 Timothy 4.15 we have the opposite for Timothy of what's going to happen to the false teachers, the wolves. He says, take pains with these things, be absorbed in them, that is the true biblical shepherding I've taught you to do, so that your progress will be evident to all. He says, Timothy, keep on keeping on. Timothy, keep on going, stand on the truth, preach the word, trust the power of the spirit, bible methods only, don't use gimmicks and fads. Timothy, keep on and soon the word is, your progress will be evident to all. In other words, Timothy, the longer you're at it, the more the sheep will love you, the more the elect will believe in you, the more it will be proven to you, the more the sheep will love you, the more the sheep will believe in you, the more it will be proven you're the real deal and you're preaching the truth.

The opposite of that is that the false teacher, the more time goes by, the more the people of God see that they're not genuine and they're exposed. All right, three quick CPAs, not certified public accountants. We only have two of those as far as I know.

We only have three. But conclusions for practical application. We could do many things here, but because we live in a world today that is plunging into the abyss of following emotions and feelings and sentimentality, and that's what's wrong with these ladies. They're emotionally undisciplined and immature and they're easy prey for false teaching. So number one, we do not trust our emotions, we train our emotions. We do not trust our emotions, we train our emotions.

You know why? Because we trust the Word of God. Every man of God and every woman of God opens this book and reads God's truth and God's truth contradicts them. And they have to say, God, get my emotions out of it. I'm going to stand on the truth and let my emotions catch up with the truth.

I'm not to preach to you and lead you as a pastor about what makes you more most excited and enthralled and interesting. I'm to give you the truth until the Spirit of God gives you deep emotions for the truth. But you have to do that yourselves. We don't trust our emotions, we train them to follow truth.

Would you pray that way with your pastor? God, help me to have a deep joy about what's true. Truth doesn't start with you. Truth didn't begin with you, it began with God.

Now we have the privilege of catching up with God and standing on the truth. Don't let your emotions get in the way. Train your emotions to respond to truth. You know, there's only one being in the universe that can follow his emotions and be true and be right, and that's God. The Bible says God does whatever He pleases, but you're not God. You can't do what you feel, you do what His book says. And that's been my experience as your pastor for 41 years, and that is I've learned to find joy and emotional excitement in what's true versus what I felt ought to be true. And then when you get to heaven you're not going to be shocked. Then when you get to heaven you're not going to be contradicted. You'll be on the right course, you'll just take another step into the truth. So our emotions must be informed by truth and our emotions must follow truth, but our emotions can never be the foundation of truth. Number two, older women must train the younger women to devote themselves to honor their husbands, keep their homes, and to raise children.

I'm not saying you can't do anything else. The Bible didn't give me enough there to say that, but I am saying this, you've got to get this right. I don't know what that means, but you've got to get this right. Honor your husbands, keep your homes, and raise your children. Titus 2, 4, and 5, speaking to the older principled biblical ladies of the church, they are to encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands so that the Word of God will not be dishonored. In other words, so that God's Word and the infinite wisdom it contains will be shown to be the wise truth of God that it really is. Ladies staying devoted in these areas is a bulwark of protection against the enemy.

It's the idol, the novelty seekers, the frivolous and the shallow that become easy prey for the enemy. Number three, pray for pastors to protect us from false teaching. I do it every week, many hours, usually every week, counseling, encouraging, mentoring, admonishing, loving on pastors to see and stand on the truth and protect the church. And can I commend all of you, Grace Life Church family, I couldn't do that if you didn't support me in this work already. This is our ministry, not just my ministry.

You have to embody it if I'm able to teach it with any effectiveness. Paul again writing to Titus on the island of Crete says, holding fast the faithful word. This is in relation to those who are pastors or elders. They got to hold fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching so that he will be able to both exhort in sound doctrine and refute the wolves. Those who are beginning to act wolfy. Sometimes sheep can get a little wolfy.

Sometimes sheep can get a little wolfy. And sometimes sheep didn't, didn't, didn't Jesus look at Peter when Peter said, you're not going to go the cross. We're not going to God forbid it, Lord, you're not going to the cross. And what did Jesus say to Peter? Get behind me, Satan. He didn't mean Peter, Satan.

He said, right now you're acting the way Satan wants you to act. Well, sometimes sheep begin to act like a wolf when you're not a wolf, but you don't need to act like a wolf. So sometimes you have to teach sound doctrine and correct those who get the get into wolf theology and go astray. So the wolves are many, but they will not prevail. Church stay true to God, true to Christ, true to Bible methods, and you'll never grow old, you'll never be outdated, you'll, it'll never stop working. But the wolves holding the false doctrine, they will fizzle. Just give them enough time.

Give them enough rope, they hang themselves. Amen and amen. Don't you love, who could have come up with that but God? Don't you love the Word of God? Do you think it's a coincidence that on Mother's Day, this was my next text? That it gives me a chance, ladies, to highly commend you, most of you.

Some of you are still a little too silly, some of you are still a little too shallow, you're a little too frivolous and without substance. So many of you, you're on that track. And I love you as your pastor, thank God for you. I mean, you know how rare it is to be where I am and go talk to other pastors and say, I've got the strongest men in the world, and I do. But if I just had my leading ladies, I'd have a strong church. That's special. That makes you unusual. Stay the course. For the glory of God.