2 Timothy 3
3
Difficult Times Ahead
1-5Don’t be naive. There are difficult times ahead. As the end approaches, people are going to be self-absorbed, money-hungry, self-promoting, stuck-up, profane, contemptuous of parents, crude, coarse, dog-eat-dog, unbending, slanderers, impulsively wild, savage, cynical, treacherous, ruthless, bloated windbags, addicted to lust, and allergic to God. They’ll make a show of religion, but behind the scenes they’re animals. Stay clear of these people.
6-9These are the kind of people who smooth-talk themselves into the homes of unstable and needy women and take advantage of them; women who, depressed by their sinfulness, take up with every new religious fad that calls itself “truth.” They get exploited every time and never really learn. These men are like those old Egyptian frauds Jannes and Jambres, who challenged Moses. They were rejects from the faith, twisted in their thinking, defying truth itself. But nothing will come of these latest impostors. Everyone will see through them, just as people saw through that Egyptian hoax.
Keep the Message Alive
10-13You’ve been a good apprentice to me, a part of my teaching, my manner of life, direction, faith, steadiness, love, patience, troubles, sufferings—suffering along with me in all the grief I had to put up with in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra. And you also well know that God rescued me! Anyone who wants to live all out for Christ is in for a lot of trouble; there’s no getting around it. Unscrupulous con men will continue to exploit the faith. They’re as deceived as the people they lead astray. As long as they are out there, things can only get worse.
14-17But don’t let it faze you. Stick with what you learned and believed, sure of the integrity of your teachers—why, you took in the sacred Scriptures with your mother’s milk! There’s nothing like the written Word of God for showing you the way to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Every part of Scripture is God-breathed and useful one way or another—showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us.
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THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.
2 Timothy 3
3
The Dangers of the Last Days.#The moral depravity and false teaching that will be rampant in the last days are already at work (2 Tm 3:1–5). The frivolous and superficial, too, devoid of the true spirit of religion, will be easy victims of those who pervert them by falsifying the truth (2 Tm 3:6–8), just as Jannes and Jambres, Pharaoh’s magicians of Egypt (Ex 7:11–12, 22), discredited the truth in Moses’ time. Exodus does not name the magicians, but the two names are widely found in much later Jewish, Christian, and even pagan writings. Their origins are legendary. 1But understand this: there will be terrifying times in the last days.#1 Tm 4:1; 2 Pt 3:3; Jude 18. 2People will be self-centered and lovers of money, proud, haughty, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, irreligious,#Rom 1:29–31. 3callous, implacable, slanderous, licentious, brutal, hating what is good, 4traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5as they make a pretense of religion but deny its power. Reject them.#Rom 2:20–22; Ti 1:16. 6For some of these slip into homes and make captives of women weighed down by sins, led by various desires,#Ti 1:11. 7always trying to learn but never able to reach a knowledge of the truth.#2:25. 8Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so they also oppose the truth—people of depraved mind, unqualified in the faith.#Ex 7:11, 22; 1 Tm 6:5. 9But they will not make further progress, for their foolishness will be plain to all, as it was with those two.
Paul’s Example and Teaching.#Paul’s example for Timothy includes persecution, a frequent emphasis in the Pastorals. Timothy is to be steadfast to what he has been taught and to scripture. The scriptures are the source of wisdom, i.e., of belief in and loving fulfillment of God’s word revealed in Christ, through whom salvation is given. 10You have followed my teaching, way of life, purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, 11persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra, persecutions that I endured. Yet from all these things the Lord delivered me.#Acts 13:50; 14:5, 19 / Ps 34:20. 12In fact, all who want to live religiously in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.#Jn 15:20; Acts 14:22. 13But wicked people and charlatans will go from bad to worse, deceivers and deceived. 14But you, remain faithful to what you have learned and believed, because you know from whom you learned it,#2:2. 15and that from infancy you have known [the] sacred scriptures, which are capable of giving you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.#Jn 5:39. 16#Useful for teaching…every good work: because as God’s word the scriptures share his divine authority. It is exercised through those who are ministers of the word.All scripture#Rom 15:4; 2 Pt 1:19–21. is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for refutation, for correction, and for training in righteousness,#All scripture is inspired by God: this could possibly also be translated, “All scripture inspired by God is useful for….” In this classic reference to inspiration, God is its principal author, with the writer as the human collaborator. Thus the scriptures are the word of God in human language. See also 2 Pt 1:20–21. 17so that one who belongs to God may be competent, equipped for every good work.#2:21.
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