So please turn with me in God's Word to 2 Peter. We're continuing in 2 Peter. We're going to begin chapter 2 tonight. Chapter 2 is where Peter begins to address false teachers. But I think it behooves us to read a little bit more. So let's start in chapter 1, verse 19, and we'll read through chapter 2 verse 10 in your pew bibles it's on page 1207 1207 we're going to start in 2nd peter chapter 1 verse 19 this is god's inspired word and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts knowing this first of all that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them, the way of truth will be blasphemed. In their greed, they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment, if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, and seven others when he brought the flood upon the world of the ungodly. If by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes, he condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly. And if he rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked, for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard. Then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. This is the reading of God's holy and inspired word. when you hear false teacher what comes to mind who do you think of do you think of maybe sex of christianity such as the mormons or jehovah's witnesses who've strayed so far that they're no longer christians do you think maybe of something a little closer to home in the evangelical world maybe the the televangelists and the prosperity gospel preachers maybe Joel Osteen and Kenneth Copeland when you think of false teachers do you usually think of people out there because something that Peter's warning us of here in this passage in chapter 2 verse 1 he says but false prophets also arose among the people Israel just as there will be false teachers among you and he's writing to Christians so he's saying among true Christians in true churches false teachers will arise among you this is true of the old testament church in israel this is true of the new testament church and the church continuing today this is true of god's people that satan will assault the church and false teachers false prophets will try to infiltrate the church in every age and we see here he's talking to christians and this warning also comes to us. So even in Presbyterian and Reformed churches, even in URCNA churches, and perhaps even in this church, false teachers, wolves will arise, and we need to be on guard against false teachers. So if we hear this warning from Peter that false teachers will arise among us, we need to consider how could we spot a false teacher. And I think Peter helps us with that in this passage. And really in verses 1 to 3, he's characterizing false teachers, telling us what they'll do and what they'll look like. And I think Peter has given us the answer of how we can guard against false teachers in verses 19 through 21. And then he tells us, lastly, what God will do to these ungodly false teachers. So again, kind of following the logic of this passage, I think we have how to spot a false teacher, how to guard ourselves against false teaching, and how God will deal with false teachers. So thinking of how to spot a false teacher, looking out among you, I don't immediately see any false teachers. And that's because Peter says they come secretly. He says these false teachers will secretly bring in destructive heresies. And Jesus, in Matthew 7, describes false teachers, false prophets, as wolves in sheep's clothing. So they'll look like an ordinary Christian, maybe talk the talk. But secretly, they're bringing destructive heresies into the church. So we need to be looking out for subtleties. I imagine most false teachers will not stand up and say, I'm a false teacher, I'm a heretic, and I want to bring in destructive heresies and deny the master, Jesus Christ. False teachers aren't going to do that, so we need to see what Peter's pointing out here to discern who's a true teacher and who is a false teacher bringing in heresy. When we're calling someone a false teacher or a heretic, that's a big charge, and that's a big deal to call someone a heretic. So I think it'll be really important for us to distinguish between error and heresy, because calling someone the h-word, calling someone a heretic, is a big deal, and it's not something we want to throw around lightly. So thinking of what an error is, an error is any mistake or error in your theological thinking, in your theology, in whatever you think about the scriptures. Anytime what you think is at variance or disagreeing with the scriptures, you've made an error. Now, everyone makes errors. No one has perfect theology, until we're glorified in heaven and our minds are purified from sin, all of us will make errors. I've made errors. Your pastors have made errors. Everyone, even the trained theologians, make errors even if they don't know where those errors are. Even Peter himself was found in error when Paul came to him, and he was with the Judaizers in the circumcision party, right? Peter was found in error. But a key thing that distinguishes error from heresy is a repentant heart. That if someone comes to you with the scriptures and says, brother, sister, you've made a mistake. You've said something wrong. You aren't thinking right. And they show you that the scriptures show a different truth and you humbly repent, then that's error, right? That's error versus being a heretic or a false teacher. Augustine said I may err but I shall not be a heretic so part of that is willful obstinance and to call someone a heretic or to say you're thinking or teaching heresy is a more formal charge and it would be something we'd reserve for something that strikes at the heart of the gospel defining heresy our very own michael horton says heresy is any teaching that directly contradicts the clear and direct witness of the scriptures on a point of salvific significance so if it's heresy it's a point of salvific significance right it's something that strikes at the core of the gospel, the core Christian beliefs, that if you believe these things, you're not a Christian, right? You're stepping out of the Christian faith that has been handed down once and for all. It's something that really strikes at the heart. We have Christian beliefs and doctrines that are different than other religions, right? Muslims believe in something about Jesus Christ. They believe things about who God is, but we have a line that at some point you're a Muslim and at some point you're a Christian, right? So if you step out of that, you're stepping into heresy. We have beliefs about who God is, about the Trinity, about Jesus Christ, about the gospel. If you do not believe these things or if you get them wrong, you're not a Christian. So this is what Peter's saying when he says, they'll bring in destructive heresies, even denying the master. Because if you believe something about God that disagrees with his word, and if you believe wrong, incorrect things about Jesus, then you have a different God and a different Jesus, and you'll end up with a false gospel. So if someone is teaching or believing heresy, we should be concerned for their salvation. That is why it's such a big charge to bring against someone, is you're saying, I don't think you understand who Jesus is, and I'm concerned that you are not a Christian, and you do not believe in the true Jesus Christ, who's revealed himself in the Scriptures. So when someone departs so far away from the Scriptures, and then stubbornly holds that belief, obstinately, that even when you've brought the Scriptures and said, brother, this is an error that is so serious that it's heresy, and they say, no, that's what I believe, and they're obstinately holding to that belief, then that person, you could call them a heretic. And then if they're teaching that, then they're a false teacher, right? So a false teacher is someone who's believing and bringing in these destructive heresies. And teachers are held to a higher standard. If someone in Sunday school, if someone in the catechism class or a brand new Christian makes a serious error and you correct them, that's one thing, right? But if you have someone who's a teacher, the Bible says not many should become teachers because they're held to a higher standard, and we need to call out false teaching. These destructive heresies are destructive in multiple ways. They're destructive to the false teacher who's teaching them because if they believe in a false God, a false Jesus Christ, and a false gospel, then we should be concerned for their salvation. It's destructive to them. We'd say, we think you're not saved and you're on your way to hell. And if someone is bringing that into the church and trying to pull away Christians to believe these heretical doctrines, then that's destructive to the church, to our unity, and perhaps to other souls as well. So we need to watch out for destructive heresies and false doctrine. But false teachers usually don't only bring in doctrinal error. That's one way we can spot them, is understanding the scriptures and seeing where the errors are. But Matthew Henry says, false teachers bring in damnable heresy as well as damnable practices and jesus surely agrees with this in matthew 7 which i'm sure pastor gordon will will preach on in a few weeks in matthew 7 jesus says beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. See, they're secretive, right? Wearing sheep's clothing. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? So every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire thus you will recognize them by their fruits so it's not only the doctrines of false teachers that we need to walk watch for but the way that they live their lives the way that they walk and remember in chapter one peter's been talking about how christians walk on this path of righteousness the path of virtue and godliness and false teachers and heretics are characterized by ungodliness he describes it in verse 2 as sensuality so these false teachers that bring in heresies that deny the master they're bringing upon themselves swift destruction and many will follow their sensuality and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed so they they walk in sensuality they teach sensuality in verse 10 peter says that they indulge in the lust of defiling passion and these false teachers teach these sensual indulgent lusting passionate practices and it draws many away he says many will follow them and that's the sad truth is that ultimately people love the sensuality people love the false teaching some of the false teachers out there have some of the biggest churches right they have the biggest most attended churches because they're teaching something that scratches itching ears that want to hear do whatever you want live however you will that's what false teachers will tell you is you can live a sensual life as a christian you can live however you want and they're denying judgment they'll say god is only a god of love he doesn't have wrath he doesn't have judgment he doesn't have a righteous law he doesn't call christians to a virtuous life but rather live however you want i mean just think of all the open and affirming churches out there right open to ungodliness they will allow you to live however you want. And my mother told me this recently, they'll pat your back as you go on your way to hell. So these open and affirming churches are full. They're well attended, which is a terrible truth. People love to hear it. There's even a church in San Diego with an advertisement that they're a church by sinners for sinners and say, what other church has a pastor's wife who stars in adult films? And that's part of their advertisement is you can live however you want. They're advertising sensuality. And that same pastor of that church just last month was arrested for sexually assaulting his younger sister. You see unbridled, unrestrained lust and passion sensuality that is what characterizes these false teachers and that same thing could arise among us perhaps more secretly just telling you you can live however you want that's not what the scriptures say the scriptures tell us you're redeemed from the wicked lifestyle and empowered to live godly virtuous lives. See, folks like these that walk in sensuality lead the church to be blasphemed. The way of truth is blasphemed. People would think that that's what Christians believe. But if the church walked in perfect righteousness, no one would have anything to say against us, right? We'd stop every mouth. But when false teaching arises among us and leads us astray to walk on ungodly paths and the way of truth is blasphemed so these same false teachers in verse 3 Peter says that in their greed they will exploit you with false words so greed characterizes false teaching and it's greed that exploits God's people and they use their greed to exploit you by twisting god's word he says they do it with false words which is in contrast to the prophetic word more fully confirmed in contrast to the true undoubted scriptures of god they will twist the scriptures just like satan did in the garden right satan said something close to what god said but twisted the words in such a way to bring eve into sin and the same thing happens with false teachers today they're using the same satanic practices to twist god's word to get close to what god says and twist it just enough to deceive they despise authority they despise the authority of god's words they twist it to their own purposes to exploit christians think of the televangelists online on tv that are telling you that god will bless your giving which is is true but they're telling you no it's like a lottery it's like the best investment you've ever made that if you put in a thousand dollars you get ten thousand dollars back they're saying using a passage of scripture and twisting it in such a way to exploit Christians. So how do we guard ourselves against damnable heresy, destructive heresy, and sensuality, and greedy, exploiting false teachers? How do we guard ourselves? I think Peter gave us the answer just before in verses 19 through 21 when he said, we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. He's telling us we do well to pay attention to God's Word, God's inspired, true Word that was primarily written by the Holy Spirit as God used men. Because this word, the scriptures, illumine our path. And as we walk in darkness on this earth, there's dangers in front of us, including dangerous false teachers and wolves on this path. And the light of God's word will expose them to us. And by God's word, rightly understanding it, we could see who's a false teacher, who's twisting God's word, and who rightly understands God's word and teaches us the truth. He says God's word is more sure than any human opinion. False teachers teach their own opinions. God's word is trustworthy and we can stand on it. It's even more sure than Peter's witnessing the glory of Christ on the mountaintop. The scriptures are the standard by which we can discern the truth and expose error. We can expose false teaching and heresy by the light of God's Word. God's Word should govern and control everything that we believe about God. He's revealed Himself in the Word. So it should govern and control everything we believe about Jesus Christ, our God. We should use the Scriptures to govern and control everything we believe about the Gospel as well. It's important that these don't come from private interpretations when we read the Scriptures. We interpret God's Word with our brothers and sisters in the pews, with our deacons and elders, with our pastors. We interpret the Word with other churches. We have a whole federation of churches. We interpret the Word together. It's not just a private interpretation. Whereas a false teacher would like to take one passage of Scripture and rip it out of its context so that they can twist it and deceive you, but rather we want to read the Word in its context and with others, that we can all put our eyes on it and see God's Word is teaching one thing. See, the true gospel revealed in the Scriptures does not lead us to sensuality, but empowers us to lead virtuous lives. So we should get all of our doctrine from God's Word, we should get all the ways we should live our lives from God's Word, and every true doctrine we believe. And we have the creeds and confessions written by our brothers and sisters that we're not only interpreting God's Word with everyone here and with other churches, but also with the true church across time, right? The creeds connect us to the early church. The confessions connect us to the Reformation church, that we can interpret God's Word without private interpretations, but we can stand upon true interpretation. The creeds and confessions are just explanations and summaries of what the Bible teaches because part of the problem is that a heretic and a false teacher would take god's word and they would hide behind affirming something about god's word but denying the meaning of the passage denying the meaning of words so we've laid down doctrinal standards to say okay this is what it teaches. So if you try to, you know, maybe someone would say, I believe Jesus is God, but not eternally God. We'd say, no, the scriptures teach us that Jesus is eternally God of the same substance. See, the creeds have come from generations of Christians dealing with false teaching and heresy, and they've searched the scriptures and ascertained the true meaning of God's Word and written it down for us so that the next generation of Christians can easily see where the error is and where the truth is. There's some resistance these days in evangelical circles to creeds and confessions, but it's just an explanation of God's Word. And we, when we're just trying to love Jesus, when we're just trying to read the Bible, everything we say about Jesus is a doctrinal claim so when we're trying to know and love jesus we make doctrinal claims about him when we praise him so it's helpful to have what we believe about jesus written down we get it from the scriptures and it's encoded in the creeds and confessions and christians have been working for 2 000 years to discern what the bible means we don't rely on private interpretations Christians. That's why we recited the Apostles' Creed this morning and the Nicene Creed this evening. It connects us to true Christianity, and like we said before, this sets the bounds of what it means to be Christian. If you can't affirm the Apostles' Creed, that is the basic undoubted Christian faith. If you can't affirm those things, you're not a Christian, right? So that helps us discern who false teachers are and helps guard us against false teachers is truly knowing god's word and what it teaches and we need trained pastors who've been educated and taught and elders that know god's word they can oversee the true preaching of the gospel from the pastors and these elders can oversee the flock and and search out wolves and false teaching and ungodly living and these elders can train and catechize the children along with the parents we need to teach these things to our kids to pass it along to guard them against false teaching but ultimately it leaves us with the question what will god do about false teachers and i think that's what the rest of this passage is peter demonstrating looking at the old testament scriptures saying that god will judge false teachers and heretics and he gives three examples of old testament judgment and he makes it an if then statement if this then that and if you notice these examples are all examples of defiling lust and passion and despising authority so reading verses 4 through 10 for if god did not spare angels when they sin but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until judgment he begins with angels he says angels were cast into hell he could be thinking of isaiah 14 or ezekiel 28 or perhaps the beginning chapters of genesis Peter doesn't say exactly what passage he's thinking about, but we can tell from the Old Testament angels sinned along with Satan and were cast out of God's presence because God cannot bear to be in the presence of sin and ungodliness. So he cast them out of heaven and he's keeping them to judgment. And this is, for Peter, an argument from the greater to the lesser, right? he's saying, if God would judge angels who are more excellent than we are, greater in might and in power, these angels that are greater than humans, if God judged them and cast them out of heaven for their sin, surely he will judge lowly, ungodly men who are false teachers. And then Peter brings up Noah and the flood, and he says, if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, and seven others when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly. See, the world had gotten so evil that the whole world was ungodly. And it says in Genesis, the Lord saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The earth was corrupted in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence, and God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on earth. When God saw this ungodliness, despising authority, and defiling passions, he brought a deluge, a flood, on this ancient world and destroyed the world and the sinners, preserving Noah and seven others. Then Peter says, well, if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes, he condemned them to extinction making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly so there he's telling us what these three examples are they're examples of what will happen to the ungodly because we have one true unchanging god and if this is how he dealt with ungodly sinners in the past this is how he'll deal with them in the future as well they're bringing upon themselves judgment and their condemnation from long ago is not idle and their destruction is not asleep because in genesis 13 the men of sodom were great sinners they were wicked and there was an outcry because their sin was very grave and jude says of sodom and gomorrah that in the surrounding cities they indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire and served as an example by undergoing punishment of eternal fire so these old testament examples are a precursor to god's ultimate judgment on the last day the same judgment peter's been teaching us about the fire judgment coming on the last day. God swept away all the wickedness in the world with a flood, with fire, casting the angels out of heaven. But one of the points that Peter's making here is that God did not sweep away the righteous with the wicked. He preserved his angels in heaven to servant. He preserved Noah and seven others. He preserved Lot and his daughters. We see that God did not sweep away them, even in this cataclysmic total destruction in the Old Testament. False teachers and the ungodly will be destroyed, but not God's people. Because in verse 7 he says, if god rescued righteous lot greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked for as that righteous man lived among them day after day he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard so brothers and sisters as you and i see the ungodliness and wickedness in this world and we torment our souls over it and think when will this wickedness be brought to justice. We're getting a guarantee and a comfort from Peter that God will surely judge wickedness and ungodliness on the earth, and he will surely spare his people. It says in verse 9, then, the conclusion of all these ifs, if God judged this way, if he spared righteous lot, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. God will preserve us in that last judgment. God will rescue the godly from trials. He says in 1 Thessalonians 1.10, Paul says, God's people are to wait for his son from heaven whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come. So for all of us who have true faith in Jesus Christ, we're delivered from the wrath to come. There's no condemnation left for us. Jesus on the cross took all the wrath that we deserved because we were ungodly, wicked sinners who believed false things about God. But God has drawn us to himself and given us true faith in Jesus Christ that all the record of our sin has been blotted out. And now in Christ jesus neither life nor death nor angels nor rulers nor present things nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor anything else in all creation not even false teachers that might arise among us nothing will be able to separate us from the love of god in christ jesus our lord and nothing will be able to destroy jesus church jesus told peter that he will build his church and that the gates of hell will not prevail against it. No matter how many false teachers Satan sends into our church, into Christ's church, Christ's church will not fall. God's people will not be taken away from him. So trust in that, brothers and sisters. There's no judgment and condemnation left for you, but God will surely bring the wicked and ungodly to justice. Let's pray together. Lord God, we thank you for your inspired and true word and this warning against false teachers. Lord, we pray that you would keep false teaching, error, heresy, everything out of this church, Lord, and that we would uphold the true gospel taught in your scriptures. We ask that you'd help all of us to faithfully believe in everything taught in the scriptures. We thank you for our creeds and confessions that help us understand your word. Lord, we hold up your word above everything else, knowing that it is sure and firm it's guaranteed and it is a light to our path but we thank you for your word and that in christ jesus there's no condemnation but only life that lies before us we pray that jesus would come quickly lord and bring justice to this earth we pray in his name amen