Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Does the Gospel Fit In With Culture? | New Testament | 2 Timothy 4

Episode Date: September 28, 2023

Where are you willing to accommodate the gospel to fit in better with your culture? Do you take the threat of false teaching seriously? In today's episode, Patrickdiscusses 2 Timothy 4 and the danger of striving to fit in. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Join the TMBT community in reading the entire New Testament in one year. Get your FREE reading plan here. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: 2 Timothy 4

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. Do you love the truth? Are you prepared to speak it, to defend it? In the 1930s, a nationalistic movement swept across Germany. Its leaders wanted Germans to return to their roots, to their past greatness, to their Germanic heritage. And they often said that part of this was their Lutheran Christian heritage. Maybe it's not that surprising, but there were a lot of church leaders who found this message thrilling, but it was an exercise in foolishness. By the end of that decade, this nationalism became militaristic and anti-Semitic. It became Nazism. German greatness and ethnic supremacy were ascendant. And they hadn't really become a Christian nation. No, the church had

just become a national propaganda machine. This always happens with nationalism. It's always the state that's in charge with the church as the court prophet. By the end of that decade, Germans wouldn't be surprised to see swastikas on the altars of their churches beside the scripture and the communion bread and wine. Very few Christians spoke up. Very few Christians saw the threat. They only saw the possibility of national greatness for the church. You see, they didn't love truth more than power. And they certainly weren't prepared to speak truth to power. What about you? Speaking for truth will look different in every generation. In some generations, Christians will be tempted to accommodate their faith to secularism or secular sexual ethics. In other generations, Christians will be tempted to accommodate

their faith to the state or a nationalistic identity. In other generations, Christians will be tempted to accommodate their faith to consumerism and greed and the pursuit of stuff and wealth. What about our generation? Well, we're probably tempted by all of these, and a lot more. So we desperately need to hear Paul's words to Timothy in 2 Timothy chapter 2, verse 4 to 8. In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I will give you this charge. Preach the word. Be prepared in season and out of season.

Correct, rebuke, and encourage, with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge the duties of your ministry. For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near.

I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith. Now there is in store 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 longed for his appearing. Even in the earliest days of the church, Christians experience the temptation to let go of the truth, to accommodate their faith to their cultural moment. Paul says that he has fought the good life of faith, guarding the deposit of truth in the gospel,

and he's encouraging Timothy to do likewise even after he dies. He knows that as a young pastor, Timothy will constantly be faced with people who want him to say what they want to hear, not the truth that Jesus is king. And so he tells Timothy to be constantly on alert, constantly ready, always prepared. What about you? Do you take the threat of false teaching seriously? Are your ears tuned so well to the truth that you can recognize your own temptations to accommodate the gospel to your culture? Jesus has given us a glorious deposit, a glorious message. He has died for the forgiveness of sins, and he's been resurrected into new life, and he has ascended into the heavens where he reigns over all things. And one day he will return to raise the dead and renew all creation.

Do not trade this glorious truth for nationalism or consumerism or a progressive sexual ethic. You have something far more beautiful, something far more powerful, something that will last beyond this generation into eternity.