Learn to Spot the Scammers!

0:12 Take a seat. Hope you guys are able to high five some folks around you. It is good to be in the house of the Lord. Amen. It's good to be here. Man, that time of worship was incredible. Like Matt said, I too, I could have just kept going. But nonetheless, we are here. Well, hey, I am glad that we are together. I do hope that you have a Bible with you. If you have a Bible, let's hold it up. We like that. We like physical Bibles. I see a couple iPads. That's okay. um i just in fairness i make jokes like that i use like the bible app every day like that's what i do my quiet time out of so um i just make a couple jabs at your expense but like matt said we are continuing in our midweek series required reading we have been thus far looking at books in the bible that christians often neglect or maybe christians don't read as often as they do other books uh the First week, we kicked it off looking at Haggai.

1:10 If you remember, this is a story all about how the exiles came back to Jerusalem, but they kind of lost some of the momentum. They got stuck in a rut of spiritual apathy and passivity, and it's all about how we're supposed to turn back to God. Second week, we talked about the book of Philemon, which is all about how do we forgive people who have wronged us. Last week, we talked about the book of Habakkuk. If you were with us, we were wondering, asking if God is truly good, why is there evil in our world? And this week we're going to be in the book of 2 Peter. 2 Peter. So you can turn there, not 1 Peter, not 3 Peter, because that doesn't exist. 2 Peter is where we're going to be. But that's ultimately because we live in a world filled with people who are trying to scam you. We live in a world full of scammers.

2:05 And I'm sure if you like me, you'll open your email app and you have countless emails from your bank or different retailers telling you, here's how to spot fraud, here's how to spot a scam. When I worked in the corporate world, we had quarterly mandated cybersecurity training that was all about that. And I can remember a time when scamming, when you talk about internet scams, it was usually like when you get an email from somebody who says, hi, my name is so-and-so. I'm the daughter of a deposed Nigerian president. And if you give me $500, we can import $2.4 million of diamonds and you can take half of it, right? Those were the funny scams. We knew those right off the bat. That's not real. That's a scam. That's fake. But scammers have gotten smarter now. They've gotten better at what they do, especially in this age of AI that we live in, right? So what do you gotta do?

2:58 As scammers get better, you gotta look for red flags. Like, hey, this email, just something seems fishy about it. So you're looking for words that are misspelled. You're looking for grammar that looks like it was written by somebody who doesn't speak English as a first language. It's like, that looks a little suspicious. You're looking for the email address that looks fishy. If you're looking at an AI video, is this real or is it fake? You're looking at the hands. What are the hands doing? What are their lips doing? Because there's still something just not quite right. It's getting good though, which is terrifying. AI, absolutely terrifying, but that's a subject for another sermon. But what you gotta do is you gotta look for red flags to spot scammers. So tonight we're talking all about spiritual scammers. So I wanna call this talk, guess what? Look, learn to spot the scammers. Because like there are red flags to look at when you're trying to spot a scam that's trying to steal your money, there are red flags that we need to look out for for people who are out to teach false doctrines, spiritual scammers. The Bible would call these people false teachers. You probably have heard that word a lot in the Bible, false teachers, false prophets. But you might be thinking, okay, yeah, like that was maybe a problem in the early part of the church, but is that really a problem now? Like, are we really, I just know that I don't watch TBN and I'm good. Like I'm immune to false teachers. But I would say this, the New Testament authors were very, very concerned with false teaching. There's 27 books in our New Testament. 26 of them refer to false teaching.

4:35 In fact, the only one that doesn't is, guess what? Philemon. That's the only book in the New Testament that doesn't talk about false teaching. So I would say if it is serious to the authors of the New Testament, it ought to be serious to us. Amen? They obviously thought that this was a big deal, so we probably ought to give it some time. Because the fact is, when we think of false teachers, we are thinking about the televangelists. We're thinking about the cult leaders who we watch the documentary on. And yes, those people are false teachers, but oftentimes false teaching isn't so obvious. It's far more subtle. It's far more pernicious. It's much harder to detect. And as we will see here in 2 Peter, I believe that this is the apostle Peter's last will and testament. This is his farewell address to Christians. The entire book is devoted to how to deal, how to spot, and how to disregard false teachers and stay on the path that God has set for you. So if that is what Peter wanted to spend his last moments on this earth thinking about and writing about, then this probably is pretty important. Would you agree? So we're going to do some things differently tonight. Okay. Do a little bit differently. Shake it up. Um, then we have the last few weeks tonight. Uh, I'm going to be using a different translation. I really like this CSB, the Christian centered Bible. It's one of my favorite translations. And I really like how it renders this book. Um, especially some of the more difficult words that Peter uses. I really like this CSB, but more importantly, we're going to start our study in the back of the book. And that might sound weird. It's like, why would you start in the back of the book? Well, let me explain. In the Greco-Roman world, oftentimes, if you are writing a letter, you might not tell the person you're writing it to the reason until the very end of the letter. So we see this in the book of Romans. When Paul is writing this magnum opus of Christian theology, we don't really see the reason for him writing it until chapter

6:41 14 out of 16, because there's a divide between Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians in Rome. He's writing this book to solve that divide. We don't know that until chapter 14, until the book's almost over. Same with second Peter. This book is talking about false teachers, but we don't really get the main point of the false doctrine until we get to chapter three. So we're going to use chapter three as kind of a springboard as we explore the rest of the book as we work backwards. Does that make sense? That makes sense? Good. Here's one other thing I have to tell you, is if you are familiar with 2 Peter, then you'll know that in chapter two, he talks about Noah. He talks about the flood. He talks about the Nephilim, right? Fascinating things to dive into. We're not going to talk about that tonight. Sorry if that disappoints you. It's not because that's not a fascinating topic. It's in the Bible. However, what I find in my life as well and the lives of many Christians I know is that we can fixate on the mysterious aspects of scripture.

7:45 And sometimes we'll spend all of our time trying to figure out what are these mysteries that will miss the very clear ethical instructions that it's giving us. So tonight, not saying that that is not valuable. You should study all up about Noah and the flood and the Nephilim and Lot and Sodom, but tonight we're going to focus on the very clear, straightforward, ethical instructions that Peter gives us. Does that sound good? Can we do that? So like I said, we are looking at red flags. There's three red flags that we ought to look out for when we are looking for spiritual scammers, but we're going to end it on a good note. We're going to tell you what a green flag is. Here's something positive to look out for, but here's the first red flag. We're not to the positive part yet. Just wait. I got to keep you here for some reason. Red flag number one is there is a denial of accountability. Spiritual scammers, false teachers deny accountability. Look at verse one of chapter three. Dear friends, this is now the second letter I have written to you in both letters.

8:43 I want to stir up your sincere understanding by way of reminder so that you recall the words previously spoken by the holy prophets in the command of our Lord and Savior given through your apostles. Above all, be aware of this. Scoffers will come in the last days, scoffing and following their own desires, saying, where is his coming that he promised? Ever since our ancestors fell asleep, all things continue as they have been since the beginning of creation. They deliberately overlook this. By the word of God, the heavens came into being long ago and the earth was brought about from water and through water. Through these, the world of that time perished when it was flooded. by the same word, the present heavens and earth are stored up for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and the destruction of the ungodly. Let's pray.

9:36 Father, we thank you for this time. We believe that anytime we open the pages of your word that you are speaking to us. So we pray that you'd give us open ears, open hearts to hear what you're saying. Help us to focus on what you want us to walk away from tonight. So we give you this time. We pray that it honors you in Jesus' name. Amen. Like I said, I worked in the corporate world for a while before I became a pastor. And I remember one time, the last team that I worked on, one of my associates, he made a mistake. His name was Mike. Mike made a mistake, which, okay, that's fine. No biggie. But it was a big enough mistake that I needed to at least talk to him about it. So I go up and I was like, hey, Mike, do you see what happened? Do you see the email I sent you? He's like, yeah. So you made this mistake. And so the first thing he says, he's like, I didn't know that I was supposed to do it like that. And I said, okay, that's interesting, but all right.

10:31 So I said, did you have, you know, did you look at the instructions? And he said, no, I didn't check them. And I was like, well, that's interesting because they're up on your screen right now. So you didn't read them. It's like, no, they're not written clearly. I couldn't understand them. I was like, okay, all right. And he's like, well, you didn't teach me how to do it this way. And it's like, no, I did. Cause I'm the one who taught you how to do your job. And I definitely taught you how to do it this way. So the point being, Mike didn't want to take accountability for his actions. It wasn't even that big a deal. But it became a big deal because he just refused to say, oh, you're right. I made a mistake. Oops, my bad. And I'll be like, yeah, hey, let's not do that next time. Okay. He ducked and dodged accountability. He just couldn't do it. He didn't want to be accountable for his actions. And I would say that one of the biggest red flags to look for when trying to spot a spiritual scammer is asking how do they deal with accountability?

11:25 How do they deal with accountability? How do they deal with the idea that there's someone above them in power or authority who may have something to say about how they're living their lives? Look at verse three with me again. Scoffers will come in the last days, scoffing, following their own desires, saying, where is his coming that he promised? And just as Paul throughout the New Testament will square off against his theological opponents, the Judaizers, these are the people who said, it's great that you Gentiles are Christians, but to truly be saved, you have to follow the Jewish law. Paul oftentimes was sparring with them. Peter is going after a group that he calls the Pseudo-Didascaloi, which is Greek for false teachers. That's all it is. He's going after false teachers. And we don't know a lot about these false teachers, but what we do know is that at the heart of their theology is a denial of the return of Jesus. They did not believe that Jesus was coming back. They did not believe that that was going to happen. That was the kind of the key element of their false teaching. Why would they believe that? That's a strange thing, especially early in the New Testament period, that's a strange thing to believe. But here's why I think that is.

12:42 If there is no second coming, then I don't have to answer to Jesus for what I do. Because if Jesus is coming soon, then there's that possibility that he could show up in my lifetime. And if he's going to show up in my lifetime, I'm going to have to face him and tell him what I was doing at the moment that he arrived. These false teachers didn't like that. They didn't want to believe that. They said, no, Jesus isn't coming back. That's just simply not going to happen. They didn't want to face the music. So they had a theology that allowed them to skirt accountability.

13:15 It's the same today. We can think of false teachers. You can fill in the blanks with people in our world. What do they do is they build systems around them that keep them from accountability. They will build a platform for themselves where they minimize Jesus, the word of God. It exalts themselves. They will oftentimes say some of the most unbiblical things, but they've built it in such a way that nobody can ever question them. Nobody can question them. Nobody can hold them accountable for what comes out of their mouth. And I do want to linger on verse one for a second. I'll kind of explain why. Look at verse one. Dear friends, this is now the second letter I've written to you. In both letters, I want to stir up your sincere understanding by way of reminder. And we're going to have to get just briefly nerdy, briefly technical, so bear with me. But here's the reason why, is that frequently there are critics of the New Testament that say, oh, you can't trust the New Testament because it wasn't even written by the people that said that they wrote it. They will oftentimes say that multiple books of the Bible were written by people hundreds of years after. No single book of the New Testament is more controversial than the one we're reading right now. No single book of the New Testament has undergone such lengthy attacks against its validity, against its authority. Critics have been saying for a very long time, oh, Peter could not have wrote this book. This had to have been somebody else writing way later. And there's some reasons for that belief. Number one, the Greek, so again, remember, the New Testament is written in Greek. The Greek that is used in this book is very, very different from the Greek that is used in 1 Peter.

14:57 It is, it's very different. 1 Peter is very polished, it's very good Greek. 2 Peter is not, it's kind of messy, it's very wordy. It has a lot of new words that aren't found elsewhere. So the Greek is different. Likewise, Peter doesn't make reference to really anything that he talks about in 1 Peter. 1 Peter is all about suffering and enduring hardship. This book is all about false teachers and the day of the Lord. So it's like, it doesn't seem like there's congruity between these two topics. And that's led some to say, well, then that just must mean that Peter didn't write this, right? He's using words that are too advanced for a Galilean fisherman. Surely he couldn't have wrote this. Okay, those are fair critiques, but I'm gonna say this. I believe that we can say with confidence that Peter wrote this book. I believe that, that this is very much Peter's word.

15:50 I do not believe there's any reason to cast out on this or any other book of the New Testament as to its authorship. I believe that when it says that Peter wrote it, Peter wrote it. And I think the facts actually back that up. Here's the first thing that you wanna know is in the ancient world, there was something known as an amanuensis, an amanuensis, which is a secretary. Oftentimes when somebody was writing one of these epistles, this was a lengthy, expensive process. So they would basically have a scribe and an editor to help them compile their thoughts, maybe polish their Greek or their Latin a little bit. And we know that Peter used an amanuensis when he wrote first Peter. It says, Silas, who helped me write this letter, Silas Silvanus was Paul's amanuensis or Peter's amanuensis. Paul also used amanuensi. I don't know. I'm not, I don't speak Latin, so I don't know. But anyhow, he used secretaries, very common in the ancient world. So it's possible that Peter is using a different secretary who maybe has a different vocabulary, or perhaps Peter is not using a secretary at all.

16:51 And this is just how Peter spoke. He actually was very well read and knew about all these Greek terms. And he didn't use a secretary here. Either way, it's true. We don't have to assume that somebody else wrote this behind Peter's back or a century after he died. Could he just use a secretary? Could he just written it himself? We don't know that. Like in the same manner is the fact that Peter uses his personal name. So it says at the very beginning, Simeon Peter. Not Simon Peter, Simeon Peter. And that's notable because that is his Hebrew name. His Hebrew name was not Simon. His Hebrew name was Simeon. He was named after one of the sons of Jacob, Simeon Peter. So Peter is using his personal name here, which if this was being written by somebody forging Peter's signature, basically, it would have made sense that they just copied the way he introduces first Peter.

17:44 So he's using his personal name, which I think adds a lot of validity. But for me, the nail in the coffin that to me ensures that Peter wrote this is found in verse 16 of chapter one, where it talks about that he is an eyewitness. So if somebody else who's faking it a century later is claiming to be him and claiming to be an eyewitness, they'd be lying. Peter is claiming to have been there with Jesus at the transfiguration during his ministry. He's claiming eyewitness knowledge of these things. And even from the earliest days, because there's a lot of Christian documents in that first century that were written by people who were not the person they claimed to be. Like that's where you have the books that came about 50 to 100 years after the New Testament, the Gnostic Gospels, the infancy Gospel of Thomas, Gospel of Peter, all these things. The early church from the very beginning said, that's not genuine.

18:38 We know that Peter didn't write that. We know that Thomas didn't write that. They rejected books that were written by people who were writing in the name of somebody else. So they accepted 2 Peter. So I think all of the evidence combines to tell us that we have a very secure case for believing that Peter wrote this. That's what I believe. I think that is the only honest option. But as we'll see shortly, it is a common tactic for false teachers to attack your belief in the Bible, to cast doubt on the truth and the validity and the accuracy of the Bible. But I would say that that is oftentimes a symptom of something that is a deeper problem, As my late mentor, Carrie Rose would say, it's because people don't want to read the book. People don't wanna do what the book says. Because again, if you deny the second coming, you are denying the idea of final judgment.

19:31 If I don't believe that Jesus is coming back, I don't believe that I ever have to answer to him. Which means that you can do whatever you want. There is no accountability for your actions. Which is exactly what these false teachers believed. If you take notes, I want you to write this down. Christianity is not Chipotle. Christianity is not Chipotle. Let me explain what I mean. If you've been to Chipotle, I think they should be open after church so you can go head there once we're done. But you go there, the whole restaurant is designed to serve you overpriced food. Not actually not kidding, that is true. But you go in there and it's all about choice, right? You can decide, do you want a tortilla? Do you want a taco? Do you want a bowl? Do you want rice? Do you want white rice or brown rice? Do you want pinto beans or black beans? What kind of meat do you want? It's all based to let you pick and choose what you want in your Chipotle meal.

20:27 And in contemporary Christianity, it is very popular to take that same approach, to say, I'm gonna pick and choose the pieces of this faith that I like, and I'm going to either ignore or reject the pieces that I don't like. First on the chopping block is often a belief in final judgment. It's often a belief in the second coming that goes out the window. Why? Because it makes, like we talked about last week, it makes contemporary Western people uncomfortable because Jesus has described his second coming as he's showing up as a warrior. He has a sword. He's showing up on a conqueror's horse to do battle to destroy the enemies of God, that he's going to judge the world. And people don't like that. like these false teachers, they don't want the accountability. So they'll say, oh, I don't like that. I know that it says in Psalm 2 and Revelation 19 that Jesus is showing up as a warrior.

21:22 I don't believe that. I don't believe that. That makes me uncomfortable. The problem is that Christianity is not Chipotle. It's not Chipotle. You don't get to accept the truth of the first coming of Jesus if you reject the second coming. Because while he was here at his first coming, boy, did he talk a lot about his second coming. So you don't get to dispense with one because you don't like how it makes you feel. Christianity isn't pick and choose. There are definitions. There are rules and boundaries to what you must believe if you want to call yourself a Christian. Look at verse two again, that you recall the words previously spoken by the holy prophets, you speak in the Old Testament, and the command of our Lord and Savior through your apostles. Critics will often try to cast doubt on the validity of the resurrection. I'm sure you've encountered people like that who, oh no, Jesus couldn't have raised from the dead. Well, why do they reject it? Well, I would say ultimately, if Jesus wasn't raised from the dead, then you don't have to take him seriously. He's just another religious leader who was killed unjustly. Okay, cool. I can like certain teachings, but I don't have to really give him any time of day because he didn't rise from the dead. Or people will cast doubt on the belief that Jesus is coming back again, because it gives them an out.

22:43 They don't have to face the music. They don't have to face up to what they've done. Oh, I like the idea that Jesus, he died sacrificially, but again, oh, I don't like the idea of judgment. That makes me feel icky, right? So I just get to live however I want to. Either way, those two attacks on Christian belief, they are denials of accountability. I don't want to be accountable for what I do. If Jesus is raised from the dead, then that means he is God. And that means I have to take what he says seriously. And if Jesus is coming again, that means that I will have to answer to him one day for the way that I live my life. False teachers, spiritual scammers like to skirt accountability.

23:26 True servants of Jesus welcome it. We welcome accountability. because I know, because you know that Jesus is coming back, then it causes us to think about how we're living our lives. It gives us perspective. It reminds us that this world as it currently is, is not how it's always going to be. So whether Jesus comes back tonight in 40 years or a thousand years, I need to live wisely. I should make the best use of my remaining time on this earth to achieve kingdom goals. It's what Paul talks about in Ephesians 5. Verse 15, pay careful attention then to how you walk. Not as unwise people, but as wise. Making the most of the time because the days are evil. We can only say that because we believe that at some point Jesus is coming back, right? We have that eternal perspective of our lives. Second red flag is a deterioration of morality.

24:23 It's not just a denial of accountability. It's a deterioration of the false teacher's morality. And I'll just say this. Maybe some of you can relate. Maybe some of you are holier and better than I am. But I'm pretty good at saying no to sweets. Like when I want to, I can say no to sweets. Like I can see stuff in the break room. I'm good. I can do without the cupcake. It's not really that hard for me, except when I'm on a diet. Like when I'm on a diet and then suddenly saying no to that donut, that cupcake, that piece of pie is like the hardest thing that I have ever done in my life. This happened to me earlier this year. I was on a diet and I was doing good. Like, I just want you to know this. I was doing great. I was doing great. I lost some weight. And then I was scrolling through Instagram and one of my favorite donut shops, I saw an ad for them. They were launching a new donut that month. And it was Bristol Donuts, actually.

25:17 And what happened is, and they are the best donuts in the city if you haven't tried them. But here's what happened. I was doing so good guys. I was doing so good. And then I was sitting at my desk and like Homer Simpson, I couldn't stop daydreaming about how that donut must taste. It was a fixation. It was an obsession for me, right? I did okay. I didn't give in two days later. I did. I did. I drove up to Bristol and I got the donut and it was as good or if not better than I expected it to be. But then the problem is two days later, I gave in again. And it was even easier to give in. Why? Because it's like, well, I've already, I've already broken, broken the diet. Why not? Right? Dieting, as I find it, is early on is pretty easy because you're motivated. You're excited. You're like, yes, come on. I'm going to do this and get healthy. Dieting only gets harder the longer you do it. As time goes on, stats even show that 40% of people bail on their diet within the first week.

26:17 80% of people will bail on their diet within the first month. The fact is, these false teachers, they were looking for people who were weak and they were preying upon them. They were preying upon them. They knew what they were weak to. Look at verse one of chapter two. We're going backwards now. There were indeed false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will bring in destructive heresies, even denying the master who bought them and will bring swift destruction on themselves. Many will follow their depraved ways and the way of truth will be maligned because of them. They will exploit you in their greed with made up stories. Their condemnation pronounced long ago is not idle and their destruction does not sleep. I do wanna pause here. Who are these false teachers? Peter is spending his last letter that he will ever write in his life talking about them.

27:12 Who are they? There's been a lot of ideas throughout church history. certain scholars would try to say, oh, they were Stoics. Oh, they were Epicureans. Oh, they were Gnostics. And the fact is none of those answers really seem to do what they believe justice. None of those seem to be exactly what they believed. We don't exactly know who they were. Peter doesn't give us a full rundown of their theology. And at some point, I don't think we really need to stress about who were these people. People believe wonky things. Like you can go walk on any street in Albuquerque, and I guarantee you, somebody you will bump into believes something funky. People just believe wonky ideas. We don't always have to know where they come from. But what we do know is that they are arrogant because Peter calls them scoffers. They're arrogant. These aren't winsome, super intellectual, erudite people. These are rude. They're angry. They're aggressive. They deny the reality of the second coming. Again, they're the ones saying, where's the promise of his coming? They're saying that they reject that. They twist scripture. Peter says that they are going to, they're trying to exploit you with their made up stories. And what we will also see is they are very open, very out in the open with their sexual sin. He says this, that following their own desires, talks about their depraved ways.

28:32 I don't think this should surprise us because very often in church history, there's a connection between false teaching and sexual sin. In fact, in so many cases that I don't have time to name today, sexual immorality is often the cause of heresy or it stems directly from heresy. They go hand in hand. We see this in the 16th century. There's a group of radicals who took over a city in Germany or the city of Munster and the crazy people, you can watch documentaries on it. But one of the things that they were really big on was forced polygamy. Everybody had shared wives. We see this, of course, with Joseph Smith, everybody's favorite heretic. He was really big on polygamy, right? He said, oh, God told me I'm supposed to take all these wives, some of them being wildly underage. Around the same time in the 19th century, we also see people up in New York, in the Oneida community, they're basically like attempted to be like Christian communists, which is an oxymoron, but that was their thing. They're this kind of like weird cult in New York. And they were all about polyamory, all about free love, right? We even see this sort of sexual deviancy in a more modern time. If you're familiar with the story of David Koresh, the Branch Davidians of Waco, he was also big on polygamy. He said, and this was a unique, he said, I get to be a polygamist. So I'm going to have to marry all of your wives, but all the other men, you have to be celibate. So very convenient for David to get this revelation, right?

30:03 But often, as we see in church history, people will often embrace false teaching to justify their own warped desires. They will accept a theological system that allows them to live the way they want to live. Oftentimes, these are the people who are the first to say, oh, Christianity, it's so repressive. It's so outdated. But really, they just want to live their life and they don't like the idea of accountability, of being said, no, you can't do those things. That's wrong. That's sinful. It's immoral. But I wanna say this. Am I saying that somebody who leaves the church, leaves the faith, is they're only doing it because they want to go practice sexual sin? No, I'm not saying that at all. If somebody who leaves the church, that's a tragic decision, it's the wrong decision. And it's a complicated one. That's a personal one. It's unique to every single person. But I will say this.

30:54 I have been a church kid my whole life. I've been raised around Christians all of my life. This is a pattern that is undeniable. it happens so often, where somebody wants to indulge in some sort of sexual sin, and so they find a theological system that allows them to do it, and then eventually they leave the faith entirely. I'd like to say that's an isolated case, but I've seen it happen over and over and over.

31:19 There's oftentimes a clear link between false teaching and sexual immorality. And I would just say this, if somebody around you that maybe you're listening to or being influenced by is advocating for a loosening of morality, redefining the Christian ethic in any number of areas you ought to approach with caution. And I would even say, if anybody that you listen to is suddenly, they're saying, hey, everybody who went before me was wrong. I'm the first one to get it right. And here's what the Bible means. That's just not, don't listen to them. That's a very foolish, very arrogant. Just stay away from people like that. Look at verse 18. For by uttering boastful, empty words, they seduce with fleshly desires and debauchery people who have barely escaped from those who live in error. These are new believers. These are the people in Haggai who are trying to get their life back on track, but they're having a hard time. They, the false teachers, promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption since people are enslaved to whatever defeats them. False teaching is not a victimless crime. False teaching is not a victimless crime. If false teachers just kept their heresy to themselves, that would be bad enough.

32:39 But they don't. They never do. False teachers love to share their false teaching with other people, and so it infects them. And like what was happening in Peter's day, it oftentimes happens now that false teachers are walking around like theological predators, looking for people who are weak, who are newer in their faith, who do not know their Bible very well. Those are the people that they go after. That's how predators behave. People who are false teachers often act like theological predators, looking for somebody that they can target. That's why false teaching is such a problem because it's never an isolated thing where one person just has funky ideas. They share it, they spread it. They try to take advantage of people. And you can see this, especially in our day and age, if you've ever gone onto TikTok or gone into Instagram and just simply searched Christianity or theology, the amount of unbiblical, just unbalanced, ludicrous opinions that people will share is wild.

33:46 And they will share them with such conviction. Like they will sound so confident, so convincing, and it is clear. It's like, what are you talking about? Do you, like, where are you getting this from? But they say it so confidently. And somebody who might be newer to their faith is likely gonna be susceptible to that sort of thing because they sound really confident.

34:09 That's why it's so essential for all of us in this room tonight to be students of scripture. You don't have to be a Bible nerd, but you need to know your Bible. You need to study your Bible. Why? Because you need to constantly be going back to the Bible to say, hey, here's what I believe. Is this actually what scripture says? Is I'm gonna go back to the source. I wanna make sure that my beliefs actually line up with what God's word says. So we need to all be students of scripture where we're going back to the source of truth to evaluate what we believe. The reason we need to do that is because we are no less fallen than these false teachers. I'm not saying that we're less sinful, but we are no less fallen than they are.

34:59 Because we have a proven propensity to self-justify our own sin. Do you think that it's only heretics who go to the Bible and try to twist it to define and to defend what they believe? No, we can all do that, even unintentionally. We can have our belief, we can have our pet sin, and we say, ooh, I don't wanna give that up, so I'm gonna read the Bible in a way where it doesn't make me give it up. We avoid the correction. We avoid the parts where God says that is wrong, and we twist scripture, even with the best of intentions, to justify ourselves, to self-deceive. We are very good at self-deception. are we giving in to every wanton sexual desire like these people in the bible goodness i hope not if that's you i come talk to me i'd love to pray with you um are you spreading false teaching to vulnerable christians around you i certainly hope not if you are we definitely need to have a conversation before you leave this building um i may not let you leave this building until we have that conversation, but like I said, we are very capable of self-deception where we can read the Bible, not as a mirror, like James 1.23 says, but as an echo chamber. We only read the passages that are happy and we skip the passages that we don't like, where it only offers us encouragement. It only offers us affirmation, never correction. We too, like these false teachers, probably to a lesser degree can still twist scripture to justify our own beliefs, our own desires. And we have to be on guard for that. But I'll say this, if you're looking at somebody, you're trying to evaluate, maybe your friend sends you a book or they says, hey, take a look at this video. What do you think?

36:51 If you're trying to evaluate, is this person a spiritual scammer? If you're able to, try to do some research on who are they? What sort of life do they live? Like, are they faithful to their spouse? Do they love their kids? Are they part of a local church? Do people who know them say, hey, they're the same person in public that they are in private? Do they have integrity? We can look for those things when we're able to. Sometimes that can help us discern, is this person spot on? Or is this person pretending to be something that they are not? red flag number three is this a deconstruction of belief a common red flag with false teachers is that they will regularly try to deconstruct your belief in the bible we're going to move now to chapter one so again we're moving backwards in time in the letter but i'm always astounded at what we as kids believed like you know it's fun getting to see what my kids believe what i can convince them. I was able to successfully convince my kids for a time that strawberry milk came from pink cows. But truly, it's funny what we'll believe. And I had this friend growing up in elementary school, middle school, high school. He always used to have the tallest tails.

38:11 And he loved to always top whatever you had. If you had a story, he had one better. I'd talk about a band I liked, and he's like, oh, I met them. My parents took me on a concert to see them. Oh, cool. Okay. And again, I'm like, the internet was pretty new back then. Okay. Maybe sure. Okay. I'll believe that. Like, or they're talking to us like, I'll be talking about somewhere where I want to go on vacation. They're like, oh yeah, I've been there like 10 times. Oh really? Okay. All right. And again, when I was a child, I thought as a child, I spoke as a child, like Paul said, like I believed it. I was like, wow. Like I used to think, man, how are they so lucky? Like, how are they so lucky? What's the, what's their connection? And then as I got older, it's like, oh, they're lying. None of that happened. That's all the fabrication. None of that happened. It's like, this is fake. This isn't real. Because as it turns out, my friend, God bless him, as I got to know him as an adult, it's very obvious that he was a deeply insecure person. The way that he coped with that insecurity was to tell tall tales to ones that made him look good and made him feel better and more important than everybody else around him. That's how he handled it. Like I said, the older I got, the more obvious it was that none of those stories were true. He was fabricating all of them. We need to understand that attacks on biblical truth don't just come from the outside. The attacks on biblical truth do not just come from the atheist professor at UNM or the Muslim apologist. Those are not the only attacks on biblical truth that we need to contend with. Look at verse 16 of chapter one. For we did not follow cleverly contrived myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Instead, we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received glory and honor from God the Father when the voice came to him from the majestic glory saying, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. We ourselves heard this voice when it came from heaven while we were with him on the holy mountain.

40:14 We need to be aware of this because we'll see this happen a lot, right? Some pastor, some speaker, some self-proclaimed apostle or prophet says, I have been to heaven and I want to tell you all the secrets about it, right? There's plenty of TV shows that broadcast these individuals. I'm trying to find a nice word. But the whole point is just like, I have been to heaven. Jesus took me to heaven. Angels took me to heaven. In fact, I go to heaven all the time. I want you to know about it. I want to share these secrets with you. And all you have to do is to just buy my book. If you buy my book, you'll learn the secrets. If you just buy my class, my masterclass, you're going to learn it too. You can learn these secrets because I have special access to God and I want to share it to you at a very low cost of $29.99 plus shipping, right? It's pretty common to see that. And if we were telling these stories, if they were sitting on the playground with us as kids or at the cafeteria, we'd be like, that's made up. That's fake. You're lying. What are you doing? Unfortunately, in the Christian church, we tend to be less discerning. We tend to be less discerning. Why? Because we want to think the best of people who claim to be Christians. Oh, maybe that did happen. Oh, I should check it out. You never know.

41:36 Maybe that did happen. Maybe that did happen. Maybe I should buy their book. Maybe they do know something. And that's what's terrifying is people can sound very believable. Very believable, very convincing, very heartfelt, right? They can crank on the tears at just the right time to get you in the feels or just like, man, I do need to buy that book, right? They're good at it. and yet they can sound educated, they can sound winsome, but they will say the most outlandish, unbiblical things possible. And like the people on TikTok, they will say it confidently.

42:12 I've gotten, I guess maybe the fortune or misfortune of getting to see a lot of this sort of false teaching. Do you wanna know what all people like this have in common? Every single one of them, they like to be the center of attention. They want you to look at them. They're saying, I'm special and I want you to acknowledge my specialness and then I can bestow that specialness to you. Every single one of them. They want to be looked at. They want to be the center of attention. Just like my friend who, for whatever reason, felt like he needed to cope with his own insecurity by lying and self-aggrandizing, these people oftentimes love it when they get to become the focus of the attention. when all eyes are on them. And this person is the wisest person. I need to listen to them. Man, they've been to heaven, wild. They've been to heaven 17 times and they've written 14 books about, wow, like that's so crazy.

43:10 But here's the issue. They don't want you to go to the Bible to find truth. They want you to go to them. They want you to go to them to find truth. Because guess what? Those false teachers, not only are they trying to sell you something, they're also not saying, hey, how's your quiet time? have you been reading the Bible every day? Oh, you should read this. This is a really good book, right? They don't do that. They don't really care if you've been reading your Bible regularly. They don't care if you've been praying regularly because that doesn't interest them.

43:40 They want to be the person that you listen to. And in this case, what they're doing is they're deconstructing your faith that is based on God and what he has revealed in his word. And they are reconstructing it where they are now the center of truth in your life. Well, I need to listen to what they say so I can understand the Bible because again, they've been to heaven 19,000 times. So they know so much more about it. So I should just listen to what they say. They are deconstructing your belief and what God has spoken and reconstructing a faith based on them. because what do they do? They say, oh, listen to me. I know the secrets. And again, I'll give them to you. I want to give you the secrets. That's not what the Bible really means. Let me tell you what it really means. Who does that remind us of? A character who arrives pretty early on in the Bible who says, did God say that? Is that really what he said or did he say this? Actually, Eve, let me give you the deeper truth. This is what God really means. In fact, God's holding out on you.

44:49 Satan from page two of the Bible has been working overtime to convince you that what is in this book is not accurate. You can't believe it. You can't trust it. You should actually listen to him because he knows what's actually going on. false teachers claim to have special access special knowledge they only you have to go to them if you really want the secrets notice how differently peter speaks look again verse 16 for we did not follow cleverly contrived myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our lord jesus christ instead we were eyewitnesses of his majesty for he received honor and glory from God the Father. Had Peter had eyewitness experiences that his readers hadn't? Yes, he was there at the Mount of Transfiguration. He was there with Jesus throughout his ministry. However, he's not saying, I look at me, look at me. I had special access to Jesus.

45:49 I had special access to Jesus. So you need to listen to what I say. No, he's saying, no, we, it was actually other people there too. You can go ask them too. We saw these things, but ultimately he's not talking about him. I don't have some special relationship with God that you need to bow before me. Then I can decide if you get to receive the secrets of life. It's like, no, we saw God do some incredible things. Oh, and by the way, we saw Jesus get the glory. Don't look at me, look at Jesus. I was just there. In fact, God had to tell me to shut up while we were there. Like I was just present, right? That's Peter's focus. He's saying, no, look at Jesus. He's the one who has all glory and all power and all authority. I just was an eyewitness. I saw it happen. False teachers want you to look at them. Don't look at me. I am the arbiter of all that is true. You should let me tell you what the secrets are.

46:42 Don't look at Jesus. Look at me and I'll get you to Jesus. And again, it sounds bad when we talk about it like this, but sometimes it can be very convincing in the world. Oh man, they seem really well read. They seem really well studied. They seem to know what they're talking about. Oh, wow, I should listen to them. But then you start to see the slow progression of their theology, which is like, no, no, no, listen to me. I'll unlock the secrets of the Bible for you. And it's always at a price. They never, it's not funny. Nobody wants to unlock the secrets of the Bible for free, only for a cost, right? So you can spot that.

47:21 And Peter also says this, check our sources, right? He's like, we're not making this up. Like you can go research these things for yourselves. This is what he says in verse 19. We have also the prophetic word strongly confirmed and you will do well to pay attention to it as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Above all, you know this. Peter's assuming that these people know the Bible. You know this. No prophecy of scripture comes from the prophet's own interpretation because no prophecy ever came about by the will of man. Instead, men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. Peter assumes that these people know their Bibles.

48:09 And I was raised on Reading Rainbow. Anyone else in this room watch Reading Rainbow? LeVar Burton, a show all about inspiring kids to read. He's better known as chief engineer, Geordi LaForge to me. But at the end of every episode, he would showcase a book. Here's a book. He'll tell you all about the book. He'll tell you who wrote it. Here's what's cool about this book. But then he'd say, but don't take my word for it. The point was to inspire us as kids. Oh, I'm gonna go to the library because that's what we did back then. I'm gonna go to the library and I'm gonna check out that book and read it for myself. Don't just take my word for it. That's what Peter's saying here. Don't just take my word for it. Hey, we have the prophetic word confirmed. you should pay attention to it. You should study it. You already know that no prophecy of scripture is from human interpretation only. Peter assumes that they know their Bibles well. So if you're trying to fact check, is this person legit? How do they interact when somebody, or how do they act when somebody tries to fact check them? Because guess what? It is completely okay for another believer to fact check a believer, to fact check a pastor or teacher.

49:20 The Bereans did it, right? Paul comes down. Paul's the guy. Like he's Mr. Theology. Mr. Theology rolls up to town. Like this sounds really convincing. Let me fact check that. Let me go check your sources. And they find out, oh man, Paul knows what he's talking about. You can do that. Anything that comes out of the mouth of a pastor or a Bible teacher that you read, you see online, you should fact check it against what God's word actually says. False teachers do not like that. They want to be your source of authority, not the Bible. They don't want you going to the Bible and being a student of the Bible. They want you to be a student of them because they want to be the purveyor of divine truth because they get very, very upset when you start fact-checking them. Hey, you said that, but what about this? How do they act when that happens? False teachers want to deconstruct your belief in the Bible, even people who claim to be Christians. Why? Because they want you to depend on them.

50:19 I'm not gonna go to the Bible and try to understand it myself and study it myself. I'm just gonna go to them and they can interpret it for me and they can become the sole arbiter of divine truth for me. And I'm just gonna listen. In fact, sometimes it gets so bad, I just don't know how to understand the Bible unless I go figure out what certain teacher says. Oh, what do they say about this?

50:40 Aren't we blessed to be at a church where we've been taught to just study the Bible for ourselves? Praise God. we get to study the Bible and our senior pastor encourages study it fact check me see see if what I'm saying is true that's not always a common thing in the American church because there's plenty of people who just want uh people in their church to depend on them there's three red flags that we've studied so far is number one that false teachers deny accountability they don't want to be held accountable for what they say there is a there is a degradation of their morality they endorse loosening and ignoring what the Bible clearly teaches about how to live. And they will twist scripture to get it to say what they want it to say. They'll encourage you to do the same. We know that they are going to deconstruct and twist scripture so that you are dependent on them and they sever you from your connection to God's word. But here's how you can usually spot somebody who's worthwhile. Let's end this on a positive note. Here's a green flag, not a red flag, where it should warn us, this is a green flag, is there's a determination to finish well.

51:50 There's a determination to finish well. I've been getting back into guitar recently. I've been playing on and off for almost 20 years now, but I haven't been playing, just been really busy. I've been pursuing other hobbies. I tend to do that. But I've been getting back into guitar and it's been awesome. I've been loving it, but I've been frustrated with how rusty I am, right? I remember how good I used to be, which in fairness is not that good. I'm like the world's most okayest guitar player ever. But I remember that I used to be better. So I'm watching a lot of content on YouTube. And now the YouTube algorithm knows that I'm really into guitars. And so what it's doing? It's feeding me more ads for guitar stuff. Here's a guitar lesson. Oh, try this. Every single ad or program has always, change this one thing and you'll be the best guitar player ever. Just do, the experts do this one thing. It's always like this quick fix. But what's interesting is when I talk to people who are actually good musicians, not me, real musicians, they don't say, oh yeah, I downloaded this one nice course and it changed everything. 40 bucks and I'm now the best guitar player around. No. You ask an actual musician, they're just like, practice, practice some more. Just do the right thing and do it over and over and over and over and over again. And then eventually you'll be okay. Right? That's the actual path to getting good at a musical instrument. Or you can say a sport or getting good at the gym. You don't go to the gym and immediately say, I'm going to do this one single workout that's going to fix everything. No, you'll hurt yourself. It takes time. Doing the same exercise over and over and building strength. But guess what? That's boring. We like the quick fix, right? We like the quick fix. I want that secret tip that's going to unlock everything. Why?

53:29 Because I get to be lazy if I do it. I don't have to be diligent. I don't have to build rhythms and habits and self-discipline. I can just do this one hack and then everything gets easier. it scratches that itch for self uh for instant self-gratification when we get the quick fix false teachers operate on that same principle they don't want you they're not talking about hey why don't you just spend this year reading through the bible why don't you just do that well just make sure you're praying every day that's just not really what they care about they're not interested in that nobody's buying the books nobody's going to the conference because the speaker says hey just keep doing what you're doing. You're doing the right thing. Just keep doing it over and over. That doesn't sell books. That doesn't sell tickets. Slow, consistent progress is the way to real growth. And false teachers aren't interested in that. They're just, they look at you and they see a dollar sign. Right? Look at verse three of chapter two. They will exploit you in their greed with made up stories. You feel a connection to these false teachers. Oh, let me assure you, they do not feel the same connection towards you. You are a dollar sign to them and they will tell you whatever they need to, to get you to believe in what they're saying. There are no quick fixes that will make you a better Christian. Peter understands this. And of all the people in the Bible to talk about this, it is very appropriate coming from Peter, Mr. Hasty, all about rash action. Yeah, Lord, I'm gonna jump out of the boat, right?

55:05 For Peter to acknowledge, there's not a quick fix here. Look at the last two verses of the book. Verse 17, chapter three. Therefore, dear friends, since you know this in advance, he's talking about false teachers, be on your guard so that you are not led away by the error of lawless people and fall from your own stable position, but grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. instead of focusing on here's how to live your best life now here's four tips on how to live your best life right now there's suspiciously all things that you're already doing you know it's like you just need to do this no no no real changes but you bought my book so that works it's not what Peter's here for he's not here for the quick fix he's not here for the silver bullets instead Peter actually says hey let me give you God's perspective because you've been doing the same thing over and over and over and over. And there's these false teachers and they're more exciting and sparkly. And you want to go follow them. And you're wondering, why am I keep doing the same thing over and over? And that's why he says this in verse eight, don't overlook this fact with the Lord. One day is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like one day. The Lord does not delay his promise. And some understand delay, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. I'm sorry, Calvinist. That's what it says.

56:29 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. Peter is giving these people an eternal perspective. Don't focus on how to live your best life right now. Here's 14 quick tips. I want you to know that Jesus is coming back. And I know it's hard waiting, but we need to understand that God works on a different timetable than you and I work. but on top of that God wants everybody to have a chance to come to repentance so that's why the delay that's why this seems to be taking so long that's why there are people saying where is the promise of his coming this was written in like 65 AD we're in 2026 plenty of people saying where's the promise of his coming same word be patient a thousand years is like one day and you know one day is like a thousand years God works on a different timetable you wait you be patient because the lord is not slack concerning his promises he's going to come through remember Peter knew that his time was running out if you read in verse 14 of chapter one he says this since I know that I will soon lay aside my tent as our Lord Jesus Christ has indeed made clear to me Peter knows his time is running out because we're pretty sure that Peter would have been executed before Nero died by suicide in 68 AD so this could have been days weeks months maybe a year at most before Peter died.

57:59 Peter doesn't arrive with some, hey guys, I've been thinking about it. Here's my magnum opus. Here's all the tips and tricks that I have saved up for you to the last. He doesn't do that. In fact, he actually just says, hey, I really just want you to know that according to, like it says in verse three of chapter one, you have all that you need. Everything you need to live the life God wants you to live, you already got it. God's already given it to you. You don't need to go look at the new shiny thing that this false teacher's dangling. You already got what you need. But there are all these false teachers and I'm worried about them. I'm afraid that they're gonna distract you and they're gonna pull you away from the truth. So here's how you can handle that. But most importantly, here's what you need to do. Just grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. Not here's all these things that you have to do. Because I think a lot of times we can go to church and we can walk away. Oh man, there's just all these things. I'm screwed up. I need to do so many things.

58:51 I need to change. I need to work harder. I need to be better. need to push harder, be more diligent. And I'm not saying that there are not times where we do need to up our game in our devotion to Jesus. But that's not what Peter ends his life in ministry with. It says, grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus. Hey, Christian, I know you've been working hard and you've been wondering, man, is this, I'm seeing all these other people around me that seem to have it figured out. Should I listen to them? because what I'm seen to be doing, it doesn't seem to be working for me like it does for them. Peter's saying, hey, be encouraged. God has already given you all that you need. God's already given you access to all the things that you need to live the life that he wants you to live. You already got it. All you gotta do is just grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus.

59:44 As big as you think your sin is, Jesus' grace is bigger. Peter's just like, just think about that. you're thinking in this time, you're thinking in this moment, man, life is so hard. I don't know how I'm gonna make it. And Peter's saying, hey, just know Jesus is coming to get you. He's coming back for you one day. You're gonna see him. And until you see him, all you need to do is not some new flashy program. Just grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus. That's all you gotta do. What a relief that is. We don't have to go seeking some guru. to tell us and explain to us how to be a good Christian.

1:00:24 God has given us what we need. We have his word. It is accurate. It is true. And we can base our lives off of it. We have community. We are surrounded with people who love the Lord and who are going to encourage us to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus. And according to Peter, that's what we need for growth. That's what we need. So be encouraged tonight. Be encouraged. This is not a time to worry about doing more. This is a time just simply to receive the grace of Jesus. If it turns out that's all we ever needed in the first place. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this book. We thank you for your servant, Peter, a man like us who in so many ways does things the way we do them. When you first met him, he was impetuous. He was hasty. He was foolish.

1:01:15 and even after he met you, he still didn't have his theology right. He was still figuring things out, but you had grace for him. You used him. We thank you that we get to read his final words of encouragement. Yes, that we are still waiting for your return. We know that it is coming. We know that we have your word, that it is not a fable. It's not a myth that we can base our lives on its truth. And we thank you for your grace. so God we pray that all of us tonight would grow in the grace and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus