Difficult Times Will Come

Author - Andy Smith

“Difficult Times will come”

2 Timothy 3:1-7

“But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to knowledge of the truth. 

Who is this passage talking about? If you are looking for a boogie man to stand up in pulpit and claim that Jesus is Not the Christ, I’m afraid you have missed the point of this passage entirely. I don’t have to go very far to find someone that fits this description, or least used too. I’m talking about me. I look down the list of sins mentioned here and I find myself wincing as it gets farther down the list. In fact I am guilty of all of them. In fact I suggest you look in the mirror of God’s word and see yourself for who you are. My question to you is this. Do you love God with your whole being? Do you Love His Word and I’m not just talking about on Sundays when you find it and wipe a weeks’ worth of dust off it so you can go to church. Do you work out your salvation with fear and trembling (Phil 2:12)? Paul also said in 2 Cor. 13:5 “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you- unless indeed you fail the test”                 This idea must be pretty important for Paul to mention it in two different gospels.  I confess that this was not something I did until after I got saved. See, I was too afraid of the answer. I look at a lot of churches in America and I see a social club! A physical representation of your Facebook account; I used to say things like “I must be a Christian because I love Christians”, and I would tell you “I Loved His Word”, but I didn’t read it. And who wouldn’t like Christians. They are for the most part descent folk. Who dress nice and talk about good morals and even live them out, at least on the outside appearance. Let me bring out another dynamic. Do you Fear God? Proverbs 9:10 “The Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” Hebrews 12:29 “ For our God is a consuming fire”. If you read God’s Word, do you only read the good verses? Do you skip over the parts that you don’t like or understand. See, I suggest that we are all much more guilty of breaking the first two commandments. 

Exodus 20:3-6 “You Shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God,” 

If you create a false god in your mind based on incomplete theology, and then you attend a church and worship your created god. You are guilty of this. And so was I.

So what is my point? That if you are going to claim the name of Christian, there are things that should be true in your life. Start by Loving God with your whole heart, soul, mind and strength.  If you love Him you will obey Him. You can’t make Him LORD! He is LORD!

Read His Word, start in Mathew stop when you get to Revelations. And then throw in a few old testament books!  2 Tim 3:16-17 “All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.”

And start working out your salvation with fear and trembling! Test yourself to see if you are in the faith. Your eternity depends on it.