Read with Me
2 Timothy 3:1-5 (HCSB)
But know this: Difficult times will come in the last days. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, without love for what is good, traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to the form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid these people!
Listen with Me
Although it might be surprising to many, Paul’s vision of what he calls the “last days” is not about society in general. The characteristics he lists are always characteristics of people who belong to the world and its corrupt philosophy. Thus, the increase of those characteristics among the people of the world is natural and normal. It was not what Paul was concerned about.
Paul’s intent is masked in modern texts by the introduction of a chapter break here, which was inserted nearly 1000 years after Paul wrote this letter. His forecast is that in the “last days” these characteristics would become endemic in the Church itself. This is clearly shown by two things, bookends to this passage.
First, he had just finished a lengthy instructional section at the end of chapter two on dealing with the false teachers who were already teaching heretical things for financial gain, and by those teachings destroying the faith of some in the Church. His final prayer in that section was that those false teachers would finally come to their senses and escape from satan’s trap.
The second “bookend” verse 5 of this chapter, where he describes the corrupt people he is addressing in this part of his letter as having an outer form of godliness but no power, and in fact denying the reality of God’s power, a very good description of those false teachers in the church at that time. And he strongly instructs those who are truly following Jesus to avoid them at all cost.
Paul’s point to Timothy was that if and when those kinds of teachers rise boldly in the Church, men and women of corrupt character and impure motives, and take control of the Church of Christ, it will mark the end of the Church’s ability to do its working God’s power. And that will surely be the sign that Jesus’ return is imminent.
Over the course of the last 2000 years, there have been times and places where those kinds of teachers and leaders have risen to positions of power in the Church and have led it far astray. But so far, when that has happened, God has always held aside a remnant that He has empowered to spark a revival and to restore the proper power and passion of his Church.
But, as Paul understood well, there may well come a time when the corruption of the Church reaches a point where it completely loses its saltiness, its ability to prevent society from sliding irrevocably into decay. And then it will only be fit to be thrown out and trampled by men (Matthew 5:13). But until that day arrives, God’s faithful people are tasked with identifying false teachers, exposing their false teachings and the corruption of their characters, and isolating them so that their damage in the Church is minimized.
Pray with Me
Father, as you have spoken to me, I have been strongly reminded of our human bodies as a model of the Body of Christ. When an invader gets into our bodies with intent to corrupt and to reproduce its harmful effects, the whole body marshals a powerful, overwhelming defense to eliminate the harmful invader. And if the body is unwilling or unable to repel the invader, it will ultimately cause the death of the whole body. Lord, help us to be discerning, to see how serious it is when we allow false teachers to corrupt parts of the body under the aegis of “niceness” or “loving everybody”. That way lies destruction and the fulfillment of Paul’s prophecy. Instead, help us to always stay salty, and to let our light shine clearly, so that we can continue to do the work to which you have called us. Amen.