2 Timonthy Ch 4

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Protecting life through all its stages. Welcome to If Not For God, stories of hopelessness that turn to hope. Here is your host, Mike Zwick. If Not For God with Mike Zwick.

I've got my good friend Pastor Dana Coverstone back on, and he is out of Berksville, Kentucky. A couple years ago, he had some dreams that were absolutely amazing. I tell you what, he foretold a lot of things that were happening.

In his first dream, I believe it was back in June of 2020, he said, be prepared for hyperinflation. He's had many, many other dreams, but it's interesting that Pastor Dana and I in the past probably month or so have actually had a very similar dream. And so, I was thinking about this earlier this week. I said, I feel like I need to talk to Pastor Dana about something. So, I invited him on the show, and I was praying about it and thinking about it. And 2 Timothy 4 came along to my mind, and it's a very serious chapter. Some of the things that we're going to be talking about are going to be a little bit difficult to hear.

So, if you have young children, I would consider just, you know, use parental guidance, do what you want to do. But I think that what we're going to be talking about today is also very, very important. We're looking at 2 Timothy 4, and I'm going to read the first 11 verses, and Pastor Dana, I'll let you finish it off. I solemnly exhort you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead and by his appearing in his kingdom. Preach the word.

Be ready in season and out of season. Correct, rebuke, and exhort with great patience and instruction. For the time will come when they will not tolerate sound doctrine, but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance with their own desires, and they will turn their ears away from the truth and will turn aside to myths. But as for you, use self-restraint in all things. Endure hardship. Do the work of an evangelist. Fulfill your ministry, for I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight.

I have finished the course. I have kept the faith. In the future, there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing. Make every effort to come to me soon, for Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescents has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia.

Only Luke is with me. Take along Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for service. We go on to read, it says, But Tychicus, I have sent to Ephesus.

When you come home, when you come, bring the cloak, as I left it for as the purpose and the books of special departments. And then listen to this verse that he says, Alexander the coppersmith did me much harm. The Lord will repay him according to his deeds. So Paul, here in this benediction, is now going to talk about someone who really came against him in the ministry. Be on guard against him yourself. He tells Timothy, He didn't just come against me, he will come against you too. Be on guard against him yourself, for he has vigorously opposed our teaching. And then at my first defense, no one supported me, but all deserted me.

Hear that. You know, a lot of times we focus on the earlier parts of this chapter, but he says at my first defense, no one supported me. Paul basically says everybody left, everybody deserted me, but all deserted me.

May it not be counted against them. And then he says an incredible statement. But the Lord stood with me. Even though he was all alone, the Lord was standing with him, facing the challenges. This is the last thing he's going to write down as far as the word of God.

It will be counted as the last chapter he wrote. But the Lord stood with me, and he strengthened me in order that through me the proclamation might be fully accomplished, and all the Gentiles might hear. And I was delivered out of the lion's mouth.

There's a reference to Daniel there. So basically Paul says, I wasn't just in prison. I was in the lion's mouth. I was in the lion's den. I was close to dead. I was deserted. I was abandoned. Alexander the coppersmith had hurt me.

I was all by myself. But yes, the Lord stood with me. Then in verse 18 he says this, the Lord will deliver me from every evil deed and will bring me safely to his evil kingdom. To him be the glory for ever and ever.

Amen. One of the neat things about that verse to me, Michael, is the fact that he says the Lord will deliver me. So the context of that deliverance is that he will bring him safely to his kingdom. So Paul basically says, you know, I fought the good fight. I finished the race.

I finished the course. He makes that incredible statement. And now he says, I will one day be delivered from this world. All the challenges, all the difficulties, all the things that I'm facing in Timothy. One day God's going to take me home, but I'm leaving opportunity for you. I've commissioned you. I've laid my hands upon you. I've prayed for you. And I'm trusting the Lord's going to use you, Timothy, in the world in which you live. After I'm gone, I'm going to my heavenly reward. God's going to take me home. It's not going to be too long from now, but I want you to stay braced. I want you to keep fighting.

I want you to keep doing the things you do. And you know, the first part of second Timothy chapter four, he says, I solemnly charge you. In other words, he was saying, I earnestly tell you, you've got to preach the word. You've got to make sure people hear the truth. Know what's going on out there.

What's happening. God, just this morning, I mentioned the headline in my pray with me podcast that there was a cab driver in New York, drop, drop some young people off. He dropped some people off.

They didn't pay the tip off running. He chases them down trying to get his pay. And they beat the man to death. Now we understand that violent crime in New York is not something new, but we're seeing more and more and more of this type of situation happen. A guy walks up behind a person in a restaurant, clubs him upside the head, knocks him down. He's in a coma. That guy goes to jail, but he's already been released. And you think, how in the world can these things happen? And that's the kind of world that he was saying, Hey, preach the word in.

Be ready in season, out of season. In other words, you don't stop witnessing. You don't stop telling people about Jesus. You don't stop, you don't stop, um, being faithful. And there's another, another key thing we got to understand in verse three is that the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine.

And that doesn't just mean that we're the shoes there for sound also means healthy. In other words, there'll come a time when they will not want the good stuff. They're going to want whatever tickles their ears, whatever pleases their life, whatever, whatever fits their agenda. And that's why we've got churches that have literally jumped off the mountain.

They've jumped off the bridge. They're, they're, they're believing and teaching all sorts of things. You can be, you can be a gay and be a Christian, which violates the word of God. You can, you can have drag queen events in your churches and God's okay with that.

Well, we know better. The word of God is very, very clear. We've got people that are believing doctrines of demons. They're hearing it in their churches. And that doctrine of the demons means there's something satanic being spoken, you know, in the pulpit. And he also mentions in verse four that they'll turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myth. You know, you and I grew up in times where we were taught Greek and Roman mythology and the stories of Zeus and, and, uh, Medusa laid with a head of snakes and stuff like that. But we, we, we were smart enough and had enough common sense to know that those things aren't real.

We understood there was a spiritual world. There was a supernatural, but yet Paul is saying that Timothy is going to come a time and a day when people will simply stop believing the word. They will stop accepting the word of God as the banner of truth. And they will stop saying that what the word of God talks about and deals with and addresses is what we need to live by. And so Paul is speaking to these, these people is let them realize that you better be sober.

And that's why verse five is there. You better be sober in all things. You better have a clear head because you're going to have to, and this is not about just for the argumentation sake, but you're going to have to have a clear head about what's going around you. You know, there's this, this, uh, this, this concept of being, you know, being socially aware of your surroundings, uh, being aware of what's happening around you at all times. I'm in my office right now and my dogs are near the, are near the two windows in my office, one at each window. And they're, they're kind of growling outside. So that means one of two things. Either somebody's just pulled up to the turf.

I didn't know what's coming. And they're letting me know, Hey, hey dad, somebody's out there. Or one of our cats was out there and they're like, Hey, we want to get up and play or something else.

But because my dogs start doing this, I understand, okay, maybe somebody's here. Um, and we live in a day and age where I don't just leave the church unlocked. About, about two years ago, somebody said, pass that, you know, you ought to just leave the church unlocked every night. And that way somebody comes by that can just go in and pray. And I said, are you willing to replace the sound equipment?

And they said, what are you placed the sound equipment or are you willing to, you know, Hey, well, you came in every morning and sweep the building to make sure that somebody didn't come in and sneak and hide and hide in a closet. And then it's going to try to rob us for me when I walked in the office. Oh, that, well, that won't happen. I said, let me show you some headlines. Let me show you because a lot of people just don't realize how bad the world's getting. And it's not that Jesus didn't warn us. He said, you know, as it was in the days of Noah, we're going to see those, those sorts of things. So when he, when he says be sober and all things, he's literally saying, look, the road's going to get to place. And Paul's the one that said, you know, in the last days, perilous times will come. He was telling Timothy, look, it's going to get ugly.

It's going to get bad. And you better, you better have a sober mind. You better be, you know, don't let anything, don't put anything in your body that can influence the way you think or activate. I always say, I don't want to put anything into my body with a strong medicine or even a lot of caffeine. I don't want to put anything in my body that will impact my ability to think for a reason.

I don't want to put anything into my body that will impact the way that I behave or I talk. And that's why I have such a, I don't, I don't agree that alcohol is good for any believer because I've seen Christians blow their witness. I've had to go to a jail and talk to somebody who was a former board member who was in jail because he had a DUI. And then was worried about, you know, it's going to be on the air and it's going to be in the newspaper someday. Well, I can't help that. You got drunk, you got busted and you know, boom.

But he knew enough to know, oh boy, I shouldn't have done this. And I'm a board member of the church and all this and all that. And so it's about being sober. It's about being aware of the things happening around us. He also says endure hardship.

And I think we, we, we, we overlook that verse because we look at censorship. It was just announced that the UN, United Nations had come out with a bunch of people who were watching and monitoring all social media feeds, you know, during the pandemic. Now, hospitals and doctors are starting to come out and realize that they made some pretty serious mistakes. And, and, and some of the ways that they treated COVID were not good. And now we're also finding there's even a medical report released just in the last couple of days.

And in the UK, there's things, there's a thousand people extra dying on every day. Well, well, Pastor Dane, I wanted to, I wanted to jump in and tell you something real quick, because this is something that happened very recently. In the past year, and it was probably maybe March of 2021 or maybe a little bit later, maybe March of 2022. I'm sorry, but I called up one of my insurance companies because I sell life insurance and I called them up and I just said, I said, you know, I'm just curious because you hear so many things. And I said, have the death rates gone up? And they said, yes. And they, I, well, I said, you know, is it a little a lot or is it COVID? They said, no, it's not COVID. They said it is, it's, people are dying of things like, uh, heart, heart attacks and strokes.

And I said, oh, okay. Well, recently, but in the last month, uh, I asked them again, I said, oh, by the way, are the deaths way up? They said, yes, we used to have three or four people working in the death claims department. And they said, now we have 10 people working in the death claims department and we can't even get to all of the claims.

And once again, I asked them, I said, what is the reason for all of these deaths? She, and I didn't even say anything about COVID. They, she said, it's not COVID.

She said, it's other things like heart, heart attacks or strokes. And so there's many things that we told people not to do about a year and a half ago or two, almost two years ago, about a year and a half ago now. And we screamed it from the rooftops and people thought that we were crazy. Okay. So, uh, but what I'm telling you, and when I hear you say this about, be very careful about what you put into your body. If the government is telling you to do something and they're pushing it really hard and they're pushing it really fast.

I would really, really pray to the Lord before I did something like that because I, I, and I hope I'm wrong, but it just doesn't seem like it turned out too well. Uh, but, uh, more recently, uh, there was a, uh, there was a, uh, there was a dream that I had and people were in my dream. Uh, the United States had been, uh, invaded, I believe. And it was, it looked like they were Asian. So I, and, and something in the dream told me they were Chinese and they were, it was, it was like on a whole nother level. It looked like hardcore communism, but you actually had a recent dream pastor Dana, where it was hail to the chief. Is that right?

Yes. And in that dream, I was waiting for the state of the union address for, uh, you know, February, 2023, wait for the president. And I did not have any sense that it was president Joe Biden was going to come walking out. And I say that very clearly. I say that very, uh, I'm not prophetically. I just, that was the sense of the dream.

It was not Biden. And pretty soon nobody came in. Uh, all the leaders were sent down. People were getting nervous, getting afraid, and I can't figure it out. And the crowd begins to panic. A guy walks in, walks up to the crowd and tells them that, you know, to be quiet, uh, the hell of the chief is going real loud. He takes the gun out.

He fires the speaker, the music stops. He tells everybody basically, uh, sit down and be quiet. And they basically say, you know, we have lost the president and, uh, and so no one can figure that out.

No one can figure out what the world's going on. We have a people come in and they're wearing black suits, but they've got military Kevlar and stuff, which to me says it's like intelligence people. Um, and they're watching, watching what's going on. He also then tells these people to stand, raise your right hand, pledge allegiance and meal. And they're told to, and people start getting nervous if they won't stand.

Some people are injected with stuff in the neck by the people wearing the, the, uh, the, uh, Kevlar and have the AR stuff. But then suddenly a young girl who looks about to be the age of 12 or 13, wearing like an Olympic gymnast outfit walks in the door where you would see the president come through. She's Asian and she's, she's walking very militaristically.

Like she is, you know, if you're an Olympic athlete, you have really come a long way. There's great precision in her step. She's marching, almost like military. She's playing this flute and she gets about 10 feet from the platform where the president would have spoken. And she does this split in the air and she lands on her feet. She's holding that note. And then she basically, she basically, uh, you know, looks at the people that are there that are talking. And she said, you, you said you were with us.

Now we see. And what I caught while I talked to the dream, that's just a, just a real quick, you know, synopsis of it synopsis, but I believe that we're about, I believe that, that we've been sold out in many, many ways by leaders in Congress, uh, by leaders and people in power and that we are going to see, you know, some crazy things. And then just about a week ago, Mike Adams does this, this, uh, health ranger report situation update. And he says, he's hearing, he's hearing some people that are hoping that, uh, this Mar-a-Lago raid, I think that that will push conservatives to go kind of crazy that the Trump supporters will go nuts.

And then they can declare martial law, call in the United Nations, which would be Russian and Chinese troops. And, and, and suddenly that dream I had that I can't, that came out back in June of 2020, uh, doesn't seem so crazy. And I've actually had somebody, somebody sent me a message saying, oh, I apologize. Cause I never thought I'd even hear that stuff in the news. And now here, Mike Adams was saying, this is, you know, something that could happen. So we're, a lot of people are starting to realize, uh, you know, Pelosi took a trip to Taiwan.

Her son was her escort. Who's got investment with Chinese corporations. That's, that's, that's, that's out there in the news. You see, uh, China's surrounding Taiwan during military maneuvers. Uh, some video has been, some audio has been released of some speeches by the military leaders in China, you know, that what they're going to have to do to America and that sort of thing. And we know that, uh, we're not the strongest nation on the planet right now, based on the leadership in Washington, DC, uh, based on the compromises based on what we, what we have in the white house.

Uh, and one, one of the things that I saw in my first dream was I saw an empty white house and I believe that we've had an empty white house probably since November, 2020. So there's some things that are happening. And a lot of people in the church, you know, some, a lot of people are seeing it. A lot of people are waking up, but at the same time, you just think, oh my goodness, why can't people see this? Just like the death rate, the medical stuff is coming out. The CDC kind of really seriously backtracking as school starts again. You know, the CDC backtracking to some of the ideas and things they said you have to do, or that we should have thought differently.

Uh, you've got, you've got a new, uh, sexually transmitted disease, uh, you know, monkey pox. And yet, and instead of saying, folks change their behavior, they're saying, oh, we need to protect people. No, call it what it is.

It's thin, it's sinful behavior between men, uh, having sex with men. And that's why this is spreading like it is, but yet no one wants to deal with the underlying issues of spin. And that's when, you know, when Paul was saying, preach the word, be ready in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, and exhort with great patience and instruction. He was saying, there's going to come a time when people do not want to hear sound doctrine. There's going to come a time when even people in America don't want to hear clear instructions from the family.

They just want to be told what to do, how to do it, you know, shut up and go on. And that's where we are. And so in a time and place when the gospel needs to be preached and taught more than ever, when the gospel needs to be lived out more than ever, we've got folks that are just going crazy in their theology.

They're jumping off, you know, they're jumping off the narrow road. And Jesus basically said, you know, the road you have to walk as a Christian, it's not broad. The road that leads to destruction is very wide, it's very broad.

You can bring your baggage, you can bring your ideas, you can bring your own agendas. For the road that leads to life, it's narrow. And even Jesus said, few are those who find it. And that's why we need people preaching and teaching the gospel no matter what it costs.

And it's eventually going to cost pastors and preachers a whole lot more than it's costing us right now. I believe that the censorship ideas, I think censorship's about to take a whole new level. And I do believe that what happened with Trump's estate, there's power grabs going on, people want to be in the know, people want to have authority. And we're seeing a lot of political, governmental things that are being revealed and exposed.

Confidence in the FBI right now is not very good, based on Russiagate, the Mueller investigation, all these things that come out trying to get Trump. The very day that Trump took the oath of office, one of the Congressmen, last name Green, was filing papers to impeach him. He was taking the oath of office, and they're wanting to impeach him. So that attitude that Trump brought into office about basically draining the swamp, he took it seriously. And those that knew he took it seriously are still trying to get to the place where he can't run again. And I think, I wish America would wake up to that. Now, here's my statement on that. I think the church has put way too much confidence in Trump.

They put way too much confidence in man, or a man. Our answer's not in a president. And my concern would be, whatever happens in the midterm elections, which I don't think are always going to be everything we think they're going to be, you know, the news right now is all Democrats are headed to win, Democrats are headed to win. I don't think Democrats are really watching what's going on with America. People are fed up, they're tired of the circus, the constant circus, with the Dan Rich stuff and impeachment, and they just want to get it over. We want to get our nation back.

But my question would be, if the House and the Senate remain the same, and Trump will win a presidency, what will get done? I'm not anti-Trump by any means. But right now, I'm afraid that the church is putting their faith in what they can see, instead of what they can know in the Word. And our faith can't be in a man. No president is going to save our nation.

No president of either party or whatever political structure is going to save this country. What's going to save this country will be the preaching of the Word, Christians living their Christian lifestyle out before the watching world, and us making the difference where we are. Living the kind of life we're supposed to live, not chasing the unhealthy stuff that's out there in the pulpit, not bowing down to the doctrines of demons, but being the church. We're really, really being the church. Those things that are going on. You've got churches that are sponsoring drag queen bingos. There's a real problem.

There's not a real problem. That is satanic, that is demonic, that is pathetic. And these churches that think that, well, we can just live this way, they've denied the Word of God. They have basically said, we reject the Word. We want to do what we want to do. And God says to them, okay, you can do that. That's fine. So they seemingly forget that the wages are sin's death.

That's it. And in this second Timothy chapter four, I don't know if you, and you probably know this, I don't know if all the listeners do or not, these were Paul's last words. Paul was about to be killed.

And because he was a Roman citizen, I've seen that he actually had his head chopped off. So it wasn't as bad as some other people were, but I know with the dreams that I've seen, with some of the stuff that I've seen, I've even seen some stuff bad coming to me. And I think you've said the same thing about yourself, but I think maybe so long we've seen, oh, you know, people are going to say things that are going to put us down, and it's going to hurt our feelings. We may be at a point now where we're about to come, where you stand for Christ, you could actually lose your life.

Is that right? I believe that. I believe we're going to see people put into prison.

I believe we're going to see people, you're going to see censorship. You and I did a talk several months ago about abortion. I think you told me that it was, it was taken off of Facebook or something. Yep.

It was. Yeah. So, and basically if they can shut down the airwaves, shut down the media, they can shut down the message. So I know I've talked with a guy who helps me with my social media stuff, and we've already, we've already got a presence on, you know, five or six other, other platforms. And so if Facebook shuts down tomorrow, then we can go to another one. If YouTube shuts down the next day, we can go to another one.

Braidon looks to be a pretty solid, pretty serious one that's going to hold its, going to hold its strength. But, you know, compromise is out there, and nobody wants to hear the truth. And that's the one thing I think that we forget. The Antichrist, the Antichrist himself wants to keep people from hearing the truth, experiencing the truth, and living the truth out. Because that truth lived out basically exemplifies what the Word of God says. And so if he can silence the believer, he can silence the preacher, he can silence the conversation in the workforce, he can shut down social media, you know, he thinks he can set it all down. But as long as we've got a mouth, we've got a tongue to talk. We need to share with anybody and everybody who will listen what we're saying, even if they don't listen.

We need to continue to share the truth and speak the truth as much as we can, because all of those things matter in this day and age, for sure. Yeah, and the Bible says that we need to count the cost, you know, whether you think all of this stuff is right or wrong or whatever. But just, if you're listening right now, I want you to just think about the cost of being a Christian, because time and time again, the Bible says that, and Jesus said that, you know, if they persecuted me, he said, what do you think they're going to do to you? And this is, by the way, this is nothing new. There are countries that are all over the world where Christians are being persecuted. They're being killed, they're being imprisoned. I mean, if you look in Iran, if you look in Afghanistan, if you look in China, and, you know, Canada, you know, you say Canada, yeah, if you stand up in Canada and you say that, uh, that marriage is between a man and a woman and that it is, it is sinful for a man to have sex with a man, or it is sinful for a woman to have sex with a woman, and you try to help somebody who's living that lifestyle, they call it conversion therapy, and you can get right away five years in prison.

So, you know, the stuff that we're talking about, it's happening around the world, but it's also happening over in Canada, and, unfortunately, I think it's going to be happening pretty soon here. But, Pastor Dana, you're on Facebook, you're on YouTube, and you do something every day, is that right? Yeah, I do a podcast called Pray With Me at 7 a.m. Central every morning.

It's about 20, 25 minutes. I talk about some headlines. We're going through the book of Deuteronomy. I go through a book at a time. We look at the theology of it, the content, the structure. We pray about it, pray through it, and people can comment and chat. And then I do something called a practical prayer in the Spirit, about the baptism of the Holy Spirit on Tuesdays at noon, and a podcast called From the Perch, which we just deal with news and headlines and things that are going on every Thursday at noon and stuff, too. And you've got a book out? I've got a book out called Simple Accountability, and it's just based on 30 years of my life of being accountable to several men and people surrounding me, to where I share temptations and frustrations, the failures that I have on a weekly basis. I share the victories. And it's just a model of accountability that I've used for 30 years.

God brought me to a very, very difficult situation because I had someone I could talk to and share my temptations and share my concerns and share my heart and my life. And it's available on Amazon, and they can get it from me for a little bit better price. Just contact me at realstanacoversoneatgmail.com.

That's realstanacoversoneatgmail.com. All right, guys, please pick up the book, and thanks again for coming on If Not For God. Thank you for having me.

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