2 Tim. 4:1-5 (ESV)
I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: [2] preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. [3] For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, [4] and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. [5] As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
There is great temptation when it is denied that God punished His own sinless Son for the sins that others, to gloss over that aspect of the Gospel for the sake of keeping an audience. In a day when saying there is only one way to God is misunderstood in many ways, there is great temptation to conveniently leave that out when we speak of Jesus to lost people.
II Timothy 4:2 says “…preach the Word…” and then verse 3 says “for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching…” This is mind warping stuff. Paul says that in view of the fact that there is coming a time when people will not listen then we better preach what they do not want to hear. This could mean that the Gospel better be preached before the time comes when no one will listen any more. It can also mean that in view of the fact that people will not listen to sound stuff that we better be committed 100% to delivering it even when they do not want it. It must mean the latter as well as the former.
If there is only one Gospel and it speaks of the only way to peace with God, then we must preach that and nothing else. It does not matter what people’s reactions will be to the preaching – we have nothing else to preach. We must not allow the unresponsiveness of people to stop us from giving the Gospel.
The days are here when people do not put up with sound doctrine. So what shall we do? Preach it and then watch in stark wonder as God takes the message preached and brings people who did not want to hear it into belief in the Gospel. It is a miracle.
Do not believe that delivering the Gospel is useless in the face of all that works against it. The Gospel is the power of God and you will see it in the lives of some who hear it. You will see it in all those the Father chooses to give to the Son, for Jesus shall lose none of all that the Father gives Him. Go with hope and confidence in the Gospel that is such power.
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