Read with Me
2 Timothy 3:6-9 (HCSB)
For among them are those who worm their way into households and capture idle women burdened down with sins, led along by a variety of passions, always learning and never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. Just as Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses, so these also resist the truth, men who are corrupt in mind, worthless in regard to the faith. But they will not make further progress, for their lack of understanding will be clear to all, as theirs was also.
Listen with Me
Paul is continuing his exposition on the false teachers who were present and doing damage in the Church at that time but who, in the last days, would have the potential to drag the whole Church down into the abyss. This was not only a warning to Timothy, but to Christians in all ages.
Paul ended the previous paragraph with the insight that the men he was writing about maintained an outer semblance of godliness by publicly obeying the “rules”, often to a legalistic level, but who denied the power promised to the godly. Since they themselves did not possess divine power since they were ungodly at heart, they claimed that that kind of power no longer existed; that God didn’t work that way anymore.
Those men tended to focus their efforts on women who were alone and lonely, who were only marginally connected to the Church, and thus were easy prey that could be brought under their spell before others in the congregation were alerted. By the way, the descriptions “burdened down with sins” and “led along by a variety of passions” are descriptions of the false teachers, not of the women they target, although those women are frequently brought down to that condition themselves after being beguiled out of the light to live in the shadows.
These men were always learning, studying the Scriptures to find words that could be twisted or reinterpreted to justify their sins and their lifestyles. They specialized in “secret knowledge” but were ignorant of and completely blind to the real truths that were containing God’s word, focused only on their own appetites and on building their own “brand”.
Paul uses the illustration of Jannes and Jambres, Pharaoh’s magicians, who are able to replicate or simulate Moses’ divine signs through sleight of hand but, but only up to a point (Exodus 7:11-12, 22; 8:7, 18). Ultimately, God’s power completely overshadowed and overwhelmed them, and finally left them devastated in its wake.
Paul knew that if God’s people would remain faithful to him, even in challenging times, those false teachers would also fall away. They would be exposed for the charlatans they were, and left completely powerless to do any damage in His Church.
Pray with Me
Father, these men (and women) are still here with us today, beguiling those on the fringes of the Church with promises of secret knowledge, and the ability to engage in sins that those initiated into their “secrets” would see are actually allowed. And if we have not given those people a solid grounding in Your word, they become easy prey, and are often led astray before we realize it. Lord, we need Your wisdom to be able to see these false teachers and expose them before they can damage Your Church. We need Your wisdom to build our disciples on the solid rock of Jesus and His word. Wolves in sheep’s clothing are still wolves, no matter how much we want to believe that they are becoming more sheeplike. Thank You for this clear and greatly needed instruction today. Amen.