Standing for The Truth

Thank you for joining listeners worldwide for Leading the Way with pastor and International Bible teacher, Dr. Michael Yusef. Living as a Christian is more than being part of a local church or even adhering to a specific belief system. It is a relationship with God. It is your identity based in truth. Look at that today on Leading the Way.

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Give us a call, 866-626-4356. And online, we're at ltw.org. Now with his message from Second Timothy encouraging you to stand for the truth, here is Dr. Michael Yusef. Here in Second Timothy chapter 2, Paul gives Timothy three imageries to help him understand how to stand for the truth and how to invest that truth into others. Three imageries. One is that of a soldier.

The other is an athlete and a farmer. Now, I want you to start thinking with me, particularly in verse 1. Verse 1, he said, Therefore, my son, be strong. You remember, he's a son in the faith.

He's not a physical son. Be strong in the faith. How? By gritting your teeth. No. Trying to pull yourself by your bootstraps? No.

By self-affirmation. I can do this. I can do it. I can do. I can do. Yes, we can. Yes, we can.

No, no, no, no. But by becoming strong in the grace that is in Jesus Christ. The verb be strong here is in the imperative, which is making it a loving command from a father to a son. Lovingly asking the son to do something that he knows.

It's wonderful for him. Paul begins the chapter by lovingly, lovingly and gently commanding the son in the faith. The next generation leaders of the church. To draw his strength, not from himself, not from his qualifications, not even from his gifts, but to draw all of his strength from the grace of God. How will he experience that grace of God? And Paul immediately goes on to explain that you can only experience that power of the grace of God in you when you invest this treasure, when you invest this truth in the lives of others. That's the only way you can truly experience the power of the grace of God when you pour it into somebody else. Not only that Timothy to be strong in the grace of God, but he also needs to teach others to be strong in the grace of God. Verse 2. What you have heard from me before many witnesses, entrust this message to faithful men who will also teach others. And he's saying to them the secret for victory over fear and timidity and anxiety and sorrow is to invest himself in others.

Listen to me, discipling and mentoring somebody else is the greatest blessing that you can receive. Can I get an amen? By the same token, sitting on your gifts, all gifts, sitting on your blessed assurance will cause you all sorts of inner anguish. I am absolutely convinced that our faith is like electricity. It does not enter you and me fully. You notice why I said fully? Unless it can pass through us.

Don't electrocute yourself by sitting on hot water. If you are unwilling to pass God's truth to the next generation, you are the one who misses out on the greatest blessing. Why soldier? That's the first one. Why soldier? Most of you know my deep, deep, deep appreciation for those who wore the uniform of the United States of America. I deeply, deeply appreciate those who have served this great country.

Why? Because soldiers do not expect a soft or easy time. Soldiers take hardship as a matter of course because soldiers take risks because soldiers fight to win in the battle.

There's only two people. There are the victors and there are the victims. If you want to win and have victory, you must learn the rules of warfare. If you want to win, you have to get into the battlefield.

You can't watch it on television. And the reason the secular forces are succeeding in diminishing our biblical world view from our society today is because as true Christian believers surrendered the battlefield in the schools and in the universities, the unbelievers took over. And as Christians surrendered the battlefield in denominations and Christian institutions, the non-believers took over. And as Christians deserted the difficult areas in our society, non-believers took over. And that is why Paul said, as good soldiers endure hardship.

Soldiers don't get entangled in civilian life. As good soldiers, we must not fall in the trap of pleasing people instead only seek to please our commander in chief, the Lord Jesus Christ. The second way we are to faithfully pass on and transfer the truth of the gospel is found in the image of an athlete.

Verse 5, look at it with me. As spiritual athletes, we do not compete against each other. We don't try to outperform each other.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. But we are competing against the world, the flesh, and the devil. In ancient Greece, a winning athlete receives an evergreen wreath. But the athlete, no matter how good he is, no matter how accomplished he may be, he had to compete according to the rules. That's what Paul is saying here. As a matter of fact, the motto was, no rules, no wreath. Say that with me, no rules, no wreath. And while we are in the race of our lives, we must not run according to our own fancies and desires, not according to the rules of the new morality, not according to the rules of reinvented Christianity, not according to the rules of feel good Christianity, not according to the rules of some false preacher and false teacher, not according to the rules of I will get to it if I feel like it.

No, the crown and the victory is awarded to those who compete according to the rules of the Word of God and the authority of the Scripture. The next imagery Paul gives us here that he uses for faithfully passing on the baton, passing on the baton of the truth of the gospel to the next generation, is the hard-working farmer. Being a soldier on active duty, being an athlete willing to run according to the rules, and in verse 6, being a hard-working farmer. In the old days, of course, before the days of mechanization, farmers did some back-breaking work. I mean, they tilled the soil whether the soil was good or bad, they worked whether the weather is good or bad. They could not afford to sit back and say, well, you know, I just don't feel like planting today. Or when the harvest is ready, you said, you know, I don't feel of the Lord that I need to be harvesting. I tip my hat to farmers because they cannot afford to be lazy and just operate by their emotions, how they feel.

They don't feel like it, they don't do it. In the book of Proverbs, it says the lazy farmer loses his harvest either because he's asleep when he ought to be reaping or because he's too lazy to plow the fields. Verse 6, look at it again, that's why Paul said the hard-working farmer deserved the first fruit of his labor. That means that we are to be very careful in the tilling of the soil of our character. That we daily plant the seed of the Word of God and that we harvest a crop of holiness in our lives. But that's not enough, that is not all.

Listen carefully because that's the burden of his heart in this passage here. We will not get a great harvest unless we do the same things in other people. Unless we till the soil and plant the seed and gather the harvest. And here's the summary, there will be no victory for the soldier who does not fight to win.

There will be no wreath for the athlete who does not compete according to the rules. There will be no harvest for the farmer unless he tells the soil to plant the seed and gather the harvest. Look with me at verse 7 please, because here he gives us a balance that enforces our faithfulness as being soldiers and athletes and farmers. What I mean by this is this, here's what he said, reflect on the Word of God and the Holy Spirit is going to grant you understanding of everything.

Why is that? Because the Holy Spirit dwells in us, the Holy Spirit have written the book, the Bible and the same person who wrote the book is the same person who dwells in us and that's why you must never start your Bible reading before praying, Lord Jesus open my eyes to see wonderful truth from your Word and he will do, he will answer that one. Otherwise there's some people who might read the Bible every day. You know why?

Because they want to tick the box. Read the Bible, done that, James said a person who does that is like a person who looks at a mirror, see what he looks like and then he goes away, he forgets what he saw. Because that person is not reading and applying the Word of God into his or her life. That person who reads without meditating on the Word of God in his life is not going to take hold and that is why as I often say, pray Holy Spirit open my eyes. In the early hours of the morning when I'm all alone with God and that book is open on my lap and I cried to the Holy Spirit to open my eyes and teach me from his Word invariably, invariably and I'll be reading something and the Holy Spirit will stop me and it would say, Michael read that again, this encouragement supposed to be for you, this affirmation is for you today, oh this rebuke is for you, because and he pointed his fingers on things I needed to be rebuked about. This challenge is for you, this correction is for you and then he goes on verses 8 to 13, Paul really just takes Timothy back to basics. This is 101, he takes him to basics, those verses 8 to 13, look at them with me please, remember Jesus, what? How can Timothy forget Jesus? He said that he remembered his tears when he came to Christ, coming to Christ with tears, how could he forget Jesus? How can you forget Jesus? How can I forget Jesus?

Don't jump the gun on me and say well that's impossible. Let me just jog your memory, you know when you face a problem, a crisis pops up all of a sudden and you start making decisions and very quickly and you begin to think what's the ramification, what's the implication, what are the consequences, are you thinking of Jesus? No, what does he want me to do?

What steps does he lead me to take? What decisions that you want me to make to glorify him first and foremost or let's get closer to home, okay? When you have a humbling argument with your spouse and the first thing you think about or the first thing that happens is that all your self-defense mechanisms start rising up to the surface, you're not thinking of Jesus, are you? Come on now, the last thing you're thinking of Jesus, somebody said if there's an epitaph written over Israel of the Old Testament, it would be go something like this, how soon they forgot the Lord, read the Bible and Paul is telling Timothy, remember Jesus, not only because he is the heart of the good news, not only he's the heart of the good deposit, not only because he is the essence of the gospel, but he's also our own model that you can only follow by the power of the Holy Spirit. Without the power of the Holy Spirit working in us, without his strength, without his grace, we will stumble in the first step we take, remember Jesus, he is risen from the dead, that's his divinity, he is the son of David, that's his humanity, remember Jesus who died on the cross, but he did not stay on that cross, remember Jesus who was buried in the tomb, but he did not stay in the tomb, remember Jesus who's Good Friday followed by Easter Sunday, remember Jesus who's Gethsemane was followed by the resurrection, remember Jesus Timothy, remember Jesus Robert, remember Jesus Sue, remember Jesus Fred, remember Jesus Joe, remember Jesus Susan, remember Jesus as you are soldiering for him, remember Jesus as you compete as an athlete for him, remember Jesus as your labor as a farmer for him, remember Jesus as you strive to fight temptation by his power and his strength and his victory, remember his pain as suffering all alone, remember Jesus who suffered alone is also saying to you that your suffering is only for a season, that your pain will not last forever, the time of coming Timothy when all of the strain and the struggle will be over, the time is coming when the tears will be no more, the time is coming when the heavy weight of sin will be no more. Then the Apostle concludes this particular section with a hymn, most historians believe that this was a hymn that was sung in the early church, if we die with him we shall live with him, if we die to self, if we die to self gratification, if we die to self-centeredness we will rise with him in glory, if we endure we shall reign with him forever, if we persevere and stand up our biblical grounds, if we do not give up the battle we will be honored by God himself. Ah but if we deny him he will deny us, do you find that hard to take, it's the truth, if we deny him, if we are unfaithful he remains faithful to himself, did you get that? There's a whole movement among certain evangelicals who preach something called hyper grace, you say Michael what is hyper grace, well let me tell you because I'm glad you asked, but you can send your hearts content and don't worry about it, God's grace will cover it, you don't need to confess, you don't need to repent, you don't need to do anything, you don't need to acknowledge your sin, grace will cover it and they use this verse as a cover and so Paul said if we are unfaithful Christ remains faithful, he cannot deny himself, they say here's the license we've been looking for, they're looking for it, he covers all the shortfalls, don't worry about it, well he does, but when there is an acknowledgement, when there is confession, when there is repentance, when there is such hatred of sin in us, beloved this could not be further from the truth, here's what Paul is saying really listen carefully, if we are unfaithful to him, he will be faithful to himself, he will always be faithful to his promises, what are these promises? If we deny him, he will deny us, that's a promise and he's faithful to his promise, here's a much better translation, if we disbelieve him, he remains faithful, he cannot deny who he is, he cannot deny who he is, he cannot be untrue to himself, that's the one thing God cannot do, is deny himself or be contrary to himself, he remains forever himself, some of these false teachers and preachers misinterpret this verse and say well in the end God is going to feel sorry for people and he's going to let them all come into his heaven, really?

That would be contrary to himself, that would be God contradicting himself, in fact God's faithfulness to himself is demonstrated in his justice as much as it is demonstrated in his love, his love says come to me, come to me in repentance and faith and I'll forgive you, his justice says you reject me, you reject my truth, I will deny you before my father in heaven and his holy angels, his love and justice are two sides of the same coin, his love and his justice are the evidence of his faithfulness and that is why every believer under the sound of my voice must ask themselves the question, am I passing on this truth to other faithful men and women, boys and girls, am I passing that truth, am I soldiering, am I running the race according to the rules, am I telling the soil, planting the seed, gathering the harvests, but for those who are also under the sound of my voice whom I never taken the first step of coming to Jesus in brokenness and humility say Jesus I can't save myself I'm a sinner forgive me and if you haven't done that there is no greater time to do that than today, this very moment, whatever conviction the Holy Spirit who wrote the book brought to you, please don't shrug it, respond and I am absolutely certain there are as many people here the different conviction, God speak to us differently, we come from different places and different situations and the Holy Spirit is convicting us differently but whatever it may be please let me plead with you, don't put it off, respond as we go to the Lord in prayer, Father God we thank you for your love, we thank you for your patience, we thank you for your perseverance, we thank you for loving us all the way to the end and Father I pray for that person who may be tempted to say I give up, may that person be strengthened today and no one at the sound of my voice will give in to the spirit of discouragement but of courage, love and self-control in Jesus name, amen. Thank you for joining Dr. Michael Youssef for another challenging message in his series, Never Give Up. This is Leading the Way. The unique challenges of our world lead many to thoughts of giving up and giving in and that's why we want to make sure that you know you can speak with someone about anything, anytime. Make the first step to having a conversation with one of our pastoral team by filling out a short contact form. Go to ltw.org slash Jesus.

You'll be glad you did. Now Dr. Youssef spoke straight up today, he always does, hitting hard the necessity to be anchored in the truth and to anchor upcoming generations in that same truth. This straightforward teaching is not only available in Dr. Youssef's audio teachings but it's also what he proclaims through all media channels of Leading the Way.

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