Spotting the Wolves

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Transcript:

A while back, Benjamin and I were walking through the Walmart in Fayetteville, and some of you all have ties to Arkansas, some of you do not. But just in case you do not, I want you to understand here, imagine the most rabid OU fans that you can find, or the most rabid OSU fans that you can find. And they are out there.

It’s just not everybody here. But imagine a whole state of people like this. And that pretty well describes Arkansas about their football team, their Razorbacks.

And I always felt like I walked around with a target on my back at times for wearing my OU Sooners stuff. So I had to buy some Razorback things to blend in, too. But Benjamin and I happened to be walking through the Walmart, where just before football season started, they dedicate a whole area of the Walmart, maybe the size of this auditorium, close to it, if not that big, to just Razorback memorabilia.

And they had the snouts you could buy, and they had the hog hats and bumper stickers and grills with the Razorback. Anything you wanted with a hog on it, you could get. And being in Fayetteville, we were close to the university, so people were even crazier about their football.

And we were walking through Walmart, and Benjamin picked up a piece of something, I don’t know, some kind of Razorback something or other, maybe a bumper sticker or t-shirt, something, and said, Daddy, look at the cow. Daddy, I don’t like that cow. And people began to look at us.

And I thought, we are not getting out of here alive. He did things like that on a regular basis. But on that day, I was actually just a little bit fearful for my life.

And I thought, he has just insulted the state animal. And we’re not getting out of here alive. And so we quickly made our way to the other side of the store and got out with our purchases. But I learned from that that it can be very dangerous to be confused about what kind of animal you’re looking at.

And if you’ll turn with me to the book of Titus, chapter 1. I told you this morning that we were going to talk about wolves in sheep’s clothing. That’s not a term that’s used in this passage as far as the words being there in black and white, but it’s certainly a concept that’s taught.

And there are all sorts of times that the phrase wolves in sheep’s clothing, where that phrase is used, I’ve heard that used in spy stories, that they thought so-and-so was an American. Turns out he was a Soviet. He was a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

I hear that phrase used a lot in terms of churches. Well, I thought he was a believer, but it turns out the stuff he was teaching was false. It was wrong.

He was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. And the problem with wolves in sheep’s clothing is that they can look like the real deal because they’re wearing the sheep’s clothing. They look like one of the sheep.

And yet, what is the main objective of the wolf? It’s to devour the sheep. We were on the same wavelength there.

I was thinking eat is a good word, but devour just says it so much better. Because he’s going to eat the sheep and he’s going to enjoy doing it. The objective of the wolf, if you’ve not paid attention to the Little Red Riding Hood story or the Three Little Pigs story, you know what, there’s some truth in those stories.

The objective of the wolf is to eat the other little animals. It may look like a sheep, it may sound like a sheep, but it’s a wolf. And we need to learn it can be dangerous, ladies and gentlemen, in the church.

It can be dangerous as we’re listening to so-called church leaders outside the church, which that’s a whole other can of worms calling ourselves the church, but I won’t get into that tonight. So-called Christian leaders outside of the local church. It can be dangerous for us if we don’t know what kind of animal we’re dealing with.

So we’re going to start back. I promise I won’t give you everything I’ve given you before in Titus chapter 1 because we’d be here all night. Brother Shank asked me how I did an hour on the first four verses a few weeks ago.

I don’t know. I still don’t have an answer for you. But I leave here beating myself up thinking, yeah, why take 20 minutes to say it when you can take 40?

But I want to read back through this for context so you understand. Not so you understand, but so you remember what we’ve been talking about and the things that we’ve looked at previously. And then we’re really just going to focus in on two verses, verses 10 and 11.

It says in verse 1, Paul, a servant of God, and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God’s elect, and the acknowledging of the truth, which is after godliness, in hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie promised before the world began. But hath in due times manifested his word through preaching, which is committed unto me according to the commandment of God our Savior, to Titus, mine own son, after the common faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Savior. And again, not going to go into all the detail I have in the past, but what he’s basically doing here is setting up the purpose of writing the letter, that it’s Paul writing to Titus, who was a young pastor, and sort of reminding him why it is, Titus, here are the reasons why we do the things that we do.

Because the whole letter he’s about to write, the whole letter that Titus is about to read is about this ministry in the local church and taking care of the sheep who are under their care, taking care of the believers that they’ve been sent there to feed and protect. And he says this is why we do these things. And he talks about the promise that God has given of eternal life before the world began, and that that promise is manifested in preaching.

It’s proclaimed when the word is preached. People hear and understand the promise that God has made. Verse 5 says, for this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou should set in order the things that are wanting, the things that are lacking, and ordain elders in every city as I had appointed thee.

And he talks here and he describes the characteristics of the elders and says these need to be placed in every city. And what that means is every church, because in the beginning they just had one church per city. It would be trouble finding parking in today’s time if we did that.

But when he says in every city. He meant that every church needed godly leadership. And I can’t remember now, two, three weeks ago, I discussed with you some of the characteristics of what it means faithful men in leadership in the churches and what he expected there to be because they were going to need to be people who were able to teach the sheep, who were able to feed the sheep, who were able to protect the sheep.

And I don’t say sheep in a derogatory sense because the elders are sheep too. They’re just sheep with a little extra responsibility. But he says, If any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot or unruly.

So we’re talking about a man of good reputation, a man who’s faithful in his dealings. For a bishop must be blameless, the steward of God, not self-willed, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre. So you want somebody who’s got self-control.

But a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, and temperate. You want somebody who knows how to treat the people at the church, and holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers. So you want somebody also who’s going to be able to teach, who’s going to be able to guide the people in their pursuit of their relationship with God.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, you can have a relationship with God without the pastor, without the elder. Amen? This is not a priest kind of situation.

We have a high priest. We have one mediator between us and God, and that’s the man Jesus Christ, as the Bible says. You don’t need the pastor to go between you and God. And quite honestly, I can’t go between you and God.

But there is room in the church for pastors, for elders, for people who are going to be stewards and who are going to be teachers, who are going to help spur the church along in the right direction as far as understanding God’s Word. Now, can you understand God’s Word for yourselves? Absolutely, you can, and you should.

And yet there’s this role of people who dedicate even more time and energy to the study of God’s words so that they can be prepared to help guide you in the right direction. Because honestly, I’ve read things in there and understood it incorrectly. And I don’t think I’ve told you the story where I was in eighth grade and I was in reading class and they said, you know, you have to pick a book to read and do a project on.

And I said, can I, you know, or you had to, that was another story. I read and did my project on the book of Joshua. But we were supposed to just sit in reading class and read.

And I used to read my Bible. And I remember being there and reading the book of Ezekiel. And it says something about God sending fire on the aisles.

And I looked at another kid in the class. I said, God’s going to destroy England. Now, could God destroy England?

Yes, he could. Is that what Ezekiel’s talking about? No.

But it wasn’t for a few years that I realized I was reading that incorrectly. And it was after talking to a pastor friend of mine when I was in high school. He said, that is not what that says.

And so sometimes we need somebody who’s a little more well-versed in the scriptures, who purposely dedicates that time to studying and understanding with the intent of helping others. And so we need teachers and exhorters. Verse 10 says, after having talked about the faithful elder, being able to hold fast the faithful word as he’s been taught, and being able to exhort and convince by sound doctrine.

He then turns and looks at the other side of the coin and says, the reason you need that is because there are people who will come in and will sound convincing and sound biblical, and you need people who will be able to refute ideas that only sound biblical, but are not. And he says in verse 10, for there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, especially they of the circumcision, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not for filthy lucre’s sake. And he goes on to talk about it a bit more, but that’s where I want to focus in tonight.

He says, the reason you need these faithful men in the churches is because you will have men who are not so faithful, and they will come in teaching things that are contrary to the word of God, which we have already heard and been taught. And we see that so many times in Scripture. The end of Romans, he talks about, mark those who teach things contrary to what you’ve already heard and avoid them.

And so he says here that there will come into the church and I’m going to put words in here. Please understand I’m not trying to add to the scriptures. I’m just giving a name to the concept that’s indicated here.

He’s talking about wolves in sheep’s clothing. These men who would come into the churches and sometimes women who would come into the churches teaching new doctrines and things that were going to sound very good on the surface that we’re going to have all sorts of implications. And I’ve told you all before, I’m very skeptical anytime somebody says, let me show you this new thing I saw in the Bible.

Okay. It could be innocent. It could be just new to me.

I’ve never seen this before. But if you’re seeing something in the Bible that nobody in 2,000 years of studying the New Testament has seen, you might want to go back and check that because there might be a reason nobody’s seen that in 2,000 years. You know what?

I’m not so arrogant to think that everybody else up to me has been blinded to this and God has chosen to reveal this to me after two years. You know what? God’s word doesn’t work that way.

And I’m not so arrogant to think that I’m the chosen one. So if somebody comes along and says, I’ve seen this new thing, be skeptical. Maybe it’s new to them. You know, I’m forever finding stuff I’ve never seen before, but it doesn’t mean nobody’s ever seen it before.

But people would come in preaching some new doctrine, some new thing that It sounds, as I said, very good on the surface, but it’s very destructive when you get down to the. . .

when you get down to the. . .

put it in a nutshell. And one example I can give you from their very own day were the Gnostics, and we’ve talked about this some. The Gnostics came in with this idea that all.

. . that the material world, the tangible world around us is evil, matter is evil, and spirit is good.

That there’s a good spiritual world and an evil material world. And that sounds really good. That sounds really spiritually minded there to say, well, we can just reject the whole world and all the material things of the world because it’s all evil.

Well, never mind the fact that God created the world and said it was what? He said it was good. Now, that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been marred as sin entered into the world.

But they would say all matter is evil and all spirit is good. That sounds very good. It sounds very spiritual. And I bet they could make a convincing case for it until you got to the destructive power behind the doctrine when they said that Jesus Christ, in that case, to be all good, must have only come as a spirit and not in flesh.

Anybody see the problem with that? What’s the problem with that? Well, it’s not true, first of all.

Where does that present a problem for us if Jesus Christ didn’t come in the flesh? What could he not have done? How could he die?

Ding, ding, ding, we have a winner. You can’t shed your blood and die if you’re just a spirit. And my Bible tells me that without the shedding of blood, there’s no remission of sins.

And we see this today. There are all sorts of doctrines that people think, well, why is that a problem? It sounds good.

But when you take it to its logical conclusion, those doctrines are lies from hell that will lead people astray, that have terrible, terrible consequences as far as our faith. And so he said, you’ve got to be on guard. He said, there are people who are going to come in and teach these things, and we’ve got to be aware.

And he points out some of their characteristics and says, this is how you’re going to spot them. this is how you’re going to know them, some of the false teachers, because all of them are going to fall into at least one of these categories. Excuse me.

First of all, you can spot, we’re going to look at four things tonight, out of these two verses, and really should not take long at all. That when you look at a teacher, anybody who says they’re a Bible teacher, if you spot that they have interest in one of these areas, you need to take a really close look at who they are, what they’re doing, and what they’re teaching. And the first thing that I see in here is that they’re interested in honor over honesty.

Honor over honesty. He says in verse 10, there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers. There were going to be people who would come in and be disruptive in the church because they were vain talkers and deceivers.

They came in with these doctrines that made themselves sound good, made themselves sound spiritual. and you know what, I just, I see things that the rest of you, unfortunately, are not privy to at this point. And we see, we see teachers, oh, I hear people talking about Bible teachers on TV and even on the radio sometimes, and you know, I’m just amazed how he sees that in there. I never saw that in there.

Yeah, because it’s not in there. It’s not in there. And what does it say about, what does Jesus say about the Pharisees and wanting to be heard for their much speaking when they pray?

You know what, sometimes I think that goes for teaching as well, and I feel really bad saying that because I can be a little long-winded sometimes. I know y’all never experienced that, but I can be. But there are some people that I listen to them and think, not just because they talk a long time, but because they come up with these new novel doctrines and ideas and these convoluted arguments for how they got there.

And it’s almost as though instead of staying honest and true to the plain teaching of Scripture, They want to formulate these things that show off how smart they are. You know, if you have to have, let me say it this way, there’s nothing wrong with going to Bible college, having a Ph. D.

, any of that stuff, but if you have to have a Ph. D. to understand the theology of the Bible, something’s wrong with your theology.

Because as we discussed this morning, he made it so simple a child could understand. I’m not saying there aren’t things out there that are hard. There are.

The Trinity? I heard a story about a couple weeks ago, somebody going in to teach Bible, going in to guest teach the Bible class for the kindergartners at school. It was said they were discussing the Trinity.

I said, now I’ve got to hear this. How on earth did he describe the Trinity to the kindergartners to satisfy their curiosity? Because kindergartners are still sort of in that age.

Why? Well, how does that work? We talked about using the egg, the shell, the yolk, and the white.

It’s as good an explanation as I’ve heard. I’ve heard it before, but that’s as good an explanation as any that I’ve heard have come up with. You know, there are some things that are hard.

But if you need a Ph. D. to understand your philosophy, your theology of why Jesus came or what he accomplished, then your theology is wrong.

Because the Bible is very honest and very straightforward about the things that matter. Very simple about the things that matter. There are some hard things in there, but about the big things, it’s very clear.

I know people don’t like to believe that. These days, Brother Doug did a lesson. I’m not saying Brother Doug at Southgate doesn’t like to believe that.

But in a lesson recently, probably a few months ago, he talked about ten things that are said in church that irritate millennials, which would be people of my generation. And one of those things is the statement, the Bible is clear on this. They hate that.

They think the Bible is not clear. You know what? I don’t care what people my age say.

Some things the Bible is clear about. God created the world. Don’t think he could have made that any clearer.

Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. I think that’s pretty clear, pretty cut and dry. As far as your interpretation of Hebrews chapter 6, now that may take a little more work, but there are some things that God is very clear about.

And if we have to jump through hoops and come in with all sorts of vain talk and deception in order to get people to buy into our theology because we want them to think how smart we are, folks, that is a warning sign about a teacher. And I say that holding myself to the same standard. If you walk out of here going, what was he talking about?

I’m not saying that’s a sign I’m lying. That’s a sign I’m not doing something right. Now, there are times that I’ve walked in here and I’ve told you this saying, I don’t completely understand what I’m going to teach you about.

That’s not what I’m talking about. But if you walk out of here or any other church and say, I don’t know what he was talking about, but he sure is smart. Something is not right.

I don’t think that happens, does it? At least not the he sure is smart part. Second of all, so they value honor over honesty.

Instead of being honest and saying, this is the plain teaching of Scripture, I’m going to formulate a doctrine here, and I’m going to just keep going with it and make myself sound smart. Unruly and vain talkers. And you know what?

When they would come up against the people who were teaching the truth, they would be unruly. They would disrupt things. They would disrupt the truth that should be being taught in church.

Second of all, they value tradition over truth. Now, understand me when I say this. I have no problem with tradition, especially if it’s rooted in Scripture.

I’ve got no problem with us doing the things we’ve always done if there’s a reason to do them. If there’s a reason to do them. You know what?

I’m trying to think of an example. I can’t think of one off the top of my head. I can give you one example.

There was discussion this morning about singing at the nursing home and how the church for a long time went and sang the last Sunday night of every month at the nursing home. You know what? That’s a tradition.

The church went and sang the end of every month at the nursing home. That’s a tradition. There’s nothing wrong with that tradition.

Because there’s a reason for it. You’re going there to cheer up the people and sing to them and share God’s love with them. That’s wonderful.

There is nothing wrong. We as Baptists like to run from the idea of tradition because we hear the Catholics talking about tradition and especially talking about elevating it to be equal with Scripture. Now, that’s not right.

But there’s nothing wrong with tradition if there’s a reason for it, and especially if it’s rooted in Scripture rather than held equal with Scripture. And we as Baptists, we don’t like to admit it, but we have our traditions as well. But, if somebody elevates tradition over truth, and says, well, and what I’m talking about here, he says, especially they of the circumcision.

There were, in those days, there were teachers who, Even though Jesus had clearly said that it was not their descent from Abraham that was going to save them, Paul had clearly laid out the case in Galatians that it was Abraham’s faith that had justified him, not his works. For them, it was not their religious works and following after Abraham, but it was following in the footsteps of his faith that was going to justify them, that was going to give them a clean slate before God. There were still those who maintained that in order to have favor with God, to have good standing before God, They had to be circumcised.

They had to keep the feast days. They had to keep the kosher laws. And there’s nothing wrong with any of those things.

I have friends who today are Messianic Jews. And they will celebrate Passover. And they will not eat pork.

And they will not do this or that. But when I ask them, how are you saved? Not a bit of that is part of the response.

They understand it’s because Jesus Christ shed his blood and died for them on the cross. The rest of that they do culturally and because it’s a good idea. And you know what, if we stuck more to what the Bible said about healthy eating, we’d probably be better off.

There’s not a thing wrong with traditions. But when those traditions are elevated over truth, when we’re being taught that we’re saved by our religious rituals or our church traditions, as opposed to the truth that is taught in God’s Word, that we are saved only through Christ alone and what He did on the cross, then there becomes a problem. And we take that back to what Paul taught in the early, not the earliest chapters, In chapter 1 of Galatians, that if any man preaches any other gospel than what you received, let him be accursed.

And says it twice, so we know he wasn’t just being hasty in what he said, but he really meant it. Let him be accursed. If anybody is teaching Christ plus anything else, it is not the gospel.

If they’re adding any tradition, any religious ritual, anything to the truth of God’s word that says we are justified by grace, through faith, and that not of ourselves, then it is not the gospel. It’s tradition over truth. And it’s a sign of a false teacher.

So if they say, yeah, you have to be circumcised. Ooh, bad move. Wolf in sheep’s clothing.

If they say you have to come to my church or my group of churches to be saved. Wolf in sheep’s clothing. If they say you have to give your money in order to have a place.

If it’s Jesus plus anything else, it’s not Jesus at all. And it’s tradition over truth. And that’s why he calls out those who are the circumcision.

That’s not a blanket calling out of everybody who’s circumcised. He’s not saying the Jews as a whole are problematic. He’s talking about the Judaizers and those who said, oh no, you need Jesus plus Moses in order to be saved.

Third of all, those who are more interested in building followers than building faithfulness. What I mean by that is the leadership in the church, the elders, the teachers, are supposed to be working toward building up people in faithfulness. I don’t care whether it’s you, whether it’s any church I’m ever at.

I don’t care if you follow me. I want you to follow Christ. Only follow me to the extent that I follow Christ. And I’m here to tell you I fall way short of that. So don’t look at me, look at him.

Don’t follow me, follow him. The job of the church and the church leadership is to instill in people the idea and the desire to be faithful followers of Jesus Christ. And there are those who instead of training their people to follow Jesus Christ, want to amass followings to themselves. And he talks in verse 11, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses.

Now there are some contexts in the New Testament in the letters where they refer to a house and they mean a church. There are some contexts where they mean a family, a household. I don’t know which he’s talking about here, but either way it’s not good.

And you know what? Whichever one he’s talking about here, they’re both true. Because there were false teachers who came in and subverted entire families and led them away from the truth and led them away from the church.

And there were false teachers in that day who came in and subverted entire churches and led them off astray in some bizarre doctrine and amassed a following to themselves. If the guy you’re listening to, whether it’s here or whether it’s on TV or anywhere else you go, if he’s more interested in getting you to follow him than he is in getting you to follow Jesus Christ, you need to change the channel, you need to go to another church, or you need to throw him out. Because he’s a false teacher.

Or at least, at the very least, in danger of becoming one. Because he says here, those who subvert whole houses, their mouths need to be stopped. I want to be very clear here.

I’m not one who says, we’re going to go over to that church and we’re going to shut them up. I do believe in free speech. Very much so.

Because I know that there are a lot of people who don’t agree with what I have to say. You know, most Christians today don’t believe in eternal security. We’re some of the only ones.

So really, I don’t want freedom of speech subjected to a majority vote. And so when he says their mouths must be stopped, he’s not talking about get a sword and slaughter the infidel. And when I say it, I’m not talking about we need to go shut their church down.

But there’s a wrong idea about free speech in this country that if you don’t give everybody an equal hearing, well, that’s their free speech. No, it gives you the right to speak, not to be heard. And so free speech means they can go peddle their destructive doctrines all up and down Main Street if they want to.

But it doesn’t mean that we’re not going to follow them, tell them the truth as we go, and it doesn’t mean that we have to give them a hearing here. It doesn’t mean that we have to give them a hearing in our homes or in our churches. He says their mouths must be stopped.

And finally, and this one will tell you more, or maybe not tell you more, but you’ll see this one more than you may see the others. We can spot wolves in sheep’s clothing by their interest and greed over godliness. And I’ve said before, if somebody is in ministry for the money, they’re either dumb or crooked.

They’re either dumb because if you’re doing it right, there’s not a lot of money to be had. Or if you got a lot of money, you’re probably doing something you’re not supposed to be. Now, I know preachers who make a good salary, make a good living.

I think I was making a decent living at my last pastorate in Arkansas. I know people who are making twice as much as I am and they’re good men, or twice as much as I was and they’re good men. I don’t think they’re doing anything wrong, but they’re not getting rich.

They’re comfortable, but they’re not rich. What I’m talking about are these people who fly around in private jets, millions of dollars, TV studios and Hollywood mansions. How do you tell the truth of God’s word and have enough people want to hear what you’ve got to say to send you all that money?

Because last I checked, the gospel is offensive to the world. And he says that these whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, he says, for filthy lucre’s sake. They’re teaching the things that they shouldn’t be teaching because of what it gets them, because of the material benefit, because of the money.

And there are some preachers that I have said for years their messages are cotton candy. They’re fluffy and sweet, but not a lot of substance. And you know what?

Imagine a guy goes on TV and tells people that God is happy with whatever they want to do, and he just loves them and wants them to be rich. And surprisingly, people want to hear that. Surprisingly, people buy into that.

Turn on TV and the guy says, you’re a sinner and need to repent. I don’t get it, but people aren’t as drawn to that. And yet it’s the truth.

And some preach that because they really believe it, and some preach it because that’s what people want to hear. They’re the itching ears. And if we’re not preaching God’s word, you know what?

I’ve named names before. I’m going to name names this time because it was so glaring to me. How many of you know what Twitter is?

It’s like Facebook only, sort of. You send out messages to your Twitter followers. It’s called tweeting.

That doesn’t sound manly. I can’t say that I’m tweeting. I might say I’m Twittering or I sent a tweet.

But you get on Twitter, 140 characters, and that’s all you can say. So there’s not a lot of room for substantive discussion on Twitter. But I do have a Twitter just about every morning, if I can remember to do so.

About 7. 30, I’ve got it set up where 7. 30 in the morning, a Bible verse goes out.

And that may be the only thing I do on Twitter all d