Gospel Light Christian Church Thru-The-Bible Series (26.1)

The First Epistle of Paul to Timothy

1 Timothy 4:1-2 - Read this Bible passage once through before referring to the notes below.

Memory Verses: 1 Tim 6:6-8 But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

Warning on the coming apostasy

v1-2  Paul here sounded a warning to Timothy about the coming apostasy as foretold by the Holy Spirit.  See how he describes the Holy Spirit as speaking expressly.  Can anyone deny that the Holy Spirit is a Person, the third Person in the Godhead?  Yet today there are people who teach that the Holy Spirit is nothing more than the breadth of God, something impersonal.  How can something impersonal speak, let alone speaking expressly? 

What is the warning that the Holy Spirit speaks expressly of?  Paul calls it a departing from the faith.  We call it apostasy.  It is the same thing.  The Holy Spirit is here warning of a coming apostasy in the latter times.  How will this apostasy take place?  When men begin giving heed to seducing spirits. Learn therefore that where the word of God is taught faithfully, seducing spirits will make their entrance in due time.

What will these seducing spirits do?  They teach perverted doctrines of their own.  Their doctrines can be described simply as doctrines of devils. This positively identifies for us who these seducing spirits are.  They are Satan and his demons.  No wonder they have to be seducing, for these fallen angels have to present the devilish doctrines in such a way as to be acceptable to people. 

How do they achieve this?  In the same way as Satan succeeded in the Garden of Eden when he deceived Eve – by appealing to the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of man.  Paul put it this way – speaking lies in hypocrisy.   Speaking lies is already bad; to do so in hypocrisy is doubly bad.  But that is the way Satan operates. 

Remember in the Garden of Eden, Satan told lies to Eve in a seducing manner.  How?  By quoting God.  Or rather, by misquoting God.  He added words to what God had said to Eve, and he subtracted words from what God had spoken previously.  This is perverting God’s word.  And he made it all sounded so loving and caring, while portraying God as being selfish (not wanting Eve to know good from evil so that she would not be like God).  Yes, Satan portrayed himself as the one that is truly a friend of Eve, one who would tell her what God didn’t want her to know.  That is hypocrisy of the highest order.

Let’s examine how Satan perverted God’s word in the Garden of Eden.  Satan’s first step is to plant the seed of doubt in Eve’s mind.

God said in Gen 2:16-17a: And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it.

Satan said in Gen 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?

Did you notice how subtle the perversion was?  God said Adam and Eve could eat freely of every tree in the Garden of Eden, with the exception of one tree.  Satan focussed on the one single exception and perverted it to mean that God had selfishly prohibited the first couple to eat of every tree in the Garden of Eden.  That question was phrased to raise doubts in Eve’s mind about God, and to confuse her about God’s word. 

Now let’s look further.  Having raised doubts about God in Eve’s mind, Satan’s next step is to misquote Scripture by adding to God’s word.

God said in Gen 2:17b For in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Satan said in Gen 3:4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die.

Here we see Satan telling an outright lie. He did this by adding the word “not” to God’s word.  God said thou shalt surely die, but Satan said ye shall NOT surely die.  Now the third step in Satan’s strategy is to proffer a “reasonable” explanation of God’s word.

Notice what Satan said in Gen 3:5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

Here Satan is proffering the explanation that the real reason God didn’t want Adam and Eve to eat of that particular tree was a selfish one, namely, God didn’t want them to be like Him, knowing good and evil.  And we know what happened next.

Gen 3:6 says: And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

So Satan’s strategy, simply stated, is this:  go after the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life.

Satan has not changed his methodology today about speaking lies in hypocrisy.  But the question may well be asked, why would people believe such devilish doctrines today?  The answer is because they have their conscience seared with a hot iron. They have become so exposed that their God-given conscience no longer work as alarm clock to sound a warning.