Winning The End Of TImes

Title: Winning the End Of Times

Text: 2 Timothy 3:10-17

10 You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness,

11 my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet Ps. 34:19 from them all the Lord rescued me.

12 Indeed, all who desire to Titus 2:12 live a godly life in Christ Jesus See Acts 14:22 will be persecuted,

13 while [Rev. 22:11] evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and Titus 3:3 being deceived.

14 But as for you, [1 Tim. 4:6] continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom 1 you learned it

15 and how [Eph. 6:4]; See ch. 1:5 from childhood you have been acquainted with [John 5:39] the sacred writings, Ps. 119:99 which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.

16 Rom. 15:4; 2 Pet. 1:20, 21 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

17 that See 1 Tim. 6:11 the man of God 1 may be competent, [Luke 6:40] equipped See ch. 2:21 for every good work.

Introduction

Last week we discussed what kind of people will there be in the end of time. In our own personal perspective, these kind of people are sinful and ugly, but once we are in that the same specific situation, there we will begin to see all those sins to be attractive to do or else no one will be tempted.

But what are we to do then in order to win this great dilemma of our time? It is obvious, that we really cannot just sit down and wait for the bombardment of temptations to us. We have to do something.

In the passage, Paul did not only introduced us to what kind of people will there be in the end of times, but he also gave us instructions in winning these temptation.

How To Win Temptation

Obedience and continuation of what you have been taught

In other translations, the passage used the word “doctrine”, which means teaching. Paul is instructing Timothy to keep a hold of what he has received and heard from the teachings of Paul. It is obvious that this involves Godly teachings and doctrines which definitely affects to what Timothy believes.

Not only is the doctrinal stand of Paul that is involved here, but also his life style. Timothy is also to follow the how Paul lived as an example to him by life, by purpose, by faith, patience, love and endurance.

In addition to all these, living as a Christian was never easy. This is why Paul is very precise in instructing Timothy concerning his walk as Christian. Paul even made it clear that he suffered a lot as a Christian, and everybody must suffer the same. Of course in our time where democracy is very important, Christianity has been given the right to practice its beliefs.

But looking with the circumstances now in America, persecution to Christians is again emerging. Many American lawyers and human rights advocates are trying to pass laws to legalize moral issues like abortion, divorce, same sex marriage where all these are against to the practice and teaching of Christianity.

There were already some cases that some States are already forcing parents to teach their young children about “Same Sex Marriage” as a normal thing to do and that there is nothing wrong with it. There are already some Christians who were imprisoned by refusing to teach this immorality.

This is why if this happens to us, Paul urges us to suffer with him instead of giving in to sin. Another thing to note is that, God did not promise us deliverance from persecutions but deliverance through it. This means that we cannot escape persecutions from the non-believer, but we have to endure it and stand to what is right.

Continuity of what we have learned from our Bible teachers is very important. Perseverance is one of the measures of our maturity in Christ.

Following the good example

Timothy is a blessed man because even from his childhood, he was already exposed to the Christian teachings. And he grew up a godly man. Therefore, it is very important that we as parents needs to become a good example to our children. They are looking at us as role models. For them, what we are doing is right, and if not, at least tolerable.

Even if we do not instruct them a word, but they see our actions and what we do, I assure you that they learning from us. So here we see that in many ways, our actions affect the lives of our children.

Would we not try to become a good example to our children especially when it comes to godliness, morality, and life style?

On the other hand, we in younger generation should try our best in following good examples. It does not mean that our parents lived as bad examples, and then we have to live also as bad people. Sometimes, what we love to follow are the bad things about our parents and our family. But we can do more than that by following what is good and what is right.

Living by the book

There is nothing more reliable life book than the Bible. Historically speaking, there is no other book more reliable than the Bible. It was written by about 40 different authors who lived in different time, in different places for about 1500 years. Yet, all of them have only one central theme, the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ.

There have been several groups who started to take some other materials. Unfortunately, all these materials are not reliable compared to the Bible. But despite all these reliability issue, people chose to believe in those materials more than they believe on the Bible.

In addition, to the issue of reliability, the Bible said something about itself, which it is:

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.

People keep asking what is God’s will for them. Here we see that if only we live by the Book (the Bible) we will be seeing what God’s will for us is.