 We're going to be looking today at verses 1 through 3, and we're going to be looking at a subject, the subject of false teachers. And so as we begin, let's read together, beginning at verse 1, I'll read to verse 3, 2 Peter chapter 2, the apostle writes, but there were also false prophets among the people. Even as there will be false teachers among you who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them and bring on themselves swift destruction. Many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words. For a long time their judgment has not been idle and their destruction does not slumber. Now Peter is writing and continuing actually, he's segued from what he had just stated and he's writing concerning the truth of God's Word and that there will be those who distort it. Now remember with me, he had just written that holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. So the Word of God, the Bible that we have received was written not by man, but by the movement of the Spirit upon man. And he had made that very clear for us to know, even as he had said in verse 21 at chapter 1, prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. And so holy men of God wrote the Word of God. And these holy men of God would be what you refer to as a true prophet. You see, Israel had genuine prophets and the genuine prophets that Israel had were moved by God in order that they might communicate, that they might preach his truth. Now we use the word prophet quite often. A prophet is an individual who is a servant of God, who through the Spirit of God communicates God's mind and will to man. And so a prophet would be moved by the Holy Spirit to communicate God's mind and his will to us. That's what a prophet does. And when you read your Old Testament, you see that there are numerous prophets. So many, I didn't want to name them all, but you can see men like Enoch and men like Abraham, men like Moses and Samuel, men like Isaiah, Ezekiel, Haggai, Jeremiah, Daniel, Micah, Jonah, David, Amos and men like Joel. They're all regarded as prophets because they revealed the mind of God to man. Now, the fact is you can call yourself a prophet. But how do we know when someone is a genuine prophet? And how did they know in the Old Testament that this person is actually being moved by the Spirit of God to communicate the mind and will of God to man? How did they know that? Well, God actually gave to them safeguards. He gave to them scripture in order that they might be able to know whether or not somebody was genuine or somebody was false. And one of those tests of the prophet was the accuracy of their prophecy. They needed to be 100% accurate. So if someone presented themselves as speaking for God, it would be demonstrated whether they were or not, if what they had to say came to pass. In Deuteronomy in chapter 18 verses 21 and 22, it says, And if you say in your heart, how shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken? When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You shall not be afraid of them. And so the prophet was to be 100% accurate, which is why when you're going through the shopping line right around New Year's Eve and you see all these prophecies for 2013, that's why you don't need to get those newspapers unless you're wrapping fish with them. A second thing about a false prophet is or a true prophet, a true prophet was not to contradict the word of God. They were not to lead the people away from God. Deuteronomy 13, one through three says, If there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams and it gives you a sign or a wonder and the sign or wonder comes to pass of which he spoke to you saying, Let us go after other gods which you have not known and let us serve them. You shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. And so one, they had to be completely accurate and two, they must not lead you away from God. And from the things that God had already revealed. Now Israel had genuine prophets, but she also had false prophets and these false prophets plagued the nation. You see them spoken of in various books of scripture. You see it in Ezekiel chapter 13 verses two and three where it says, Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who prophesy and say to those who prophesy out of their own heart, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God, woe to the foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing. Jeremiah 23 16, thus says the Lord of hosts, do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They make you worthless. They speak a vision of their own heart, not from the mouth of the Lord. Jeremiah 23 21 and 22, I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran. I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied. But if they had stood in my counsel and had caused my people to hear my words, then they would have turned them from their evil way and from the evil of their doings. And so the Lord speaks concerning false prophets quite often. And so he wanted people to know the way of truth. He wanted them to know the way of peace. The things that were pleasing to God and would bless them. Well, today some people would ask, what's the big deal? So what? What does it matter anyway? As a matter of fact, aren't all religions true? Isn't it judgmental to suggest that somebody might be wrong, even if they're speaking with complete sincerity? Isn't it wrong? And didn't Jesus say somewhere that you shouldn't judge one another? Well, somebody once wrote, anyone today who is bold enough to suggest that someone else's ideas or doctrines are unsound or unbiblical is dismissed at once as contentious, divisive, unloving or un-Christian. It is all right to espouse any view you wish, but it is not all right to criticize another person's views no matter how patently unbiblical those views may be. When tolerance is valued over truth, the cause of truth always suffers. Is it important or is it not? Well, the answer to that question is it is important. Why? Because truth matters. And there is such a thing as truth. Jesus made it very clear. He said, in John 8, 32, you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. In 1 John 2, 21, John said, I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it and that no lie is of the truth. And so truth matters because it sets you free. And early in the history of the church, false prophets and false teachers began infiltrating church gatherings. Now, false prophets had influenced Israel, and Peter is making it clear that false teachers will come to church. Notice how he says it in verse 1. Notice how he begins here again. It says, there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them and bring on themselves with destruction. And so there were false prophets among the people, and there will be false teachers in the church. This isn't something that the apostle Peter says. Alone there are other ministers, other apostles who gave the same warning. Paul gave similar warnings to the elders of the churches, of Ephesus in Acts chapter 20 verses 29 and 30. He said this. He said, I know this, that after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves, men will rise up, speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after themselves. And so early in the history of the church, people began to stand up and began to draw disciples after themselves. And not only that, they began to infiltrate. They came in amongst the people and they began to bring in destructive heresies, things that were not proper that would end in great harm to the people. And that's why they're referred to as being savage and destructive. They come from the outside, but they also develop from the inside. Well, Peter is saying the same kind of thing. He's saying there are going to be false teachers in the church. Now, a lot of times people wonder, are we in the last days? And they speak concerning the last time, just before the rapture occurs and all of the last days events begin to transpire. And so they ask, what are the signs of the times and how do we know that we're in the last day? Well, Jesus was asked the question, when will the temple be destroyed and what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age? And in Matthew 24, verses four and five, Jesus answered and said to them, take heed that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name saying, I am the Christ and will deceive many. And so the key sign that we're in the last days is spiritual deception. And you'll see this as a key thing throughout the New Testament. When you survey the New Testament, the warning concerning false teachers is repeated throughout. Romans 16, 17 and 18 says, I urge you brethren, note those who cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine in which you learn to avoid them. For those who are such do not serve our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly and by smooth words and flattering speech deceive the hearts of the simple. First Timothy chapter four, verse one, the spirit expressly says in latter times, some will depart from the faith giving heed to deceiving spirits, doctrines of demons. First John four one, beloved, do not believe every spirit, test the spirits, whether they're of God because many false prophets have gone out into the world. Jude 18, there will be mockers in the last time who will walk according to their own ungodly lusts. So that's gonna take place and that is taking place even in our time. How are we gonna know when somebody is telling the truth and when somebody is lying? How do you know when somebody is opening the word of God and speaking truth from it or just twisting the scriptures to their own destruction? Well, here in this passage, the apostle gives us some insight. Notice what he says and gives to us as characteristics of false teachers. In verse one, first he says they will secretly bring in destructive heresies. That word secretly speaks to them being deceitful and sly. They're gonna be crafty. A false teacher will come alongside of something that is true and as they are coming alongside of that which is true, they're gonna secretly slip in something that is error. They're gonna outwardly appear as Christian but they're gonna mix error into the gospel. They're gonna learn Christian terminology but then they'll apply different meanings to the words. They're gonna take words that you and I know scriptually and have been taught and they're gonna change the meaning of those words. When I was a young believer because I came out of the lies of the world, I made a determination. I wanted to know what truth is. Now I had to ask myself because I was brand new in the Lord, where am I gonna find truth? And the answer I discovered was in the Bible, the word of God, the word of truth. So I made a determination that if it's in the word of God, I'm gonna adhere to it to the best of my ability. I'm gonna try and understand it by the power of the Holy Spirit. And so that's basically what I did. I remember going to my sister-in-law at that time, my sister-in-law's house. She had a big old family Bible. You know those 500 pound Bibles that they put in the middle of the house? Nobody can pick up, nobody reads. And I was waiting to speak to her because I'd just gotten saved and I wanted to share the gospel with her. And as I was there, I opened up the Bible. And I started just looking at it. I was fairly new in the Lord, but it was one of these huge Bibles that you could actually open up to the very back and it had doctrine from A to Z. And so what I did is as I was waiting, I was interested in doctrine. Doctrine simply means teaching. I was interested in it. And so I said to myself, and I'm a brand new Christian, I said to myself, if it's in the Bible, I'm gonna believe it. If it's not, then why would I? I don't wanna adhere to traditions of man. I would like to know what scripture has to say. So I started, and it was a Catholic Bible to be honest with you, and I was raised as a Catholic. And so I started from the letter A and I went to the letter Z. I just started going through, so I looked for different things. The assumption of Mary, and it says this is a church tradition. There's no scripture for it. So I said, well, I'm not gonna believe that she was assumed body and soul into heaven. I went from there and I started looking at various things like limbo, you know, where the souls of unbaptized infants go and it's not in the scripture, it's a church tradition. You know, and I went from A to Z and the only doctrine that I saw that I now understand is actually the true one was the doctrine of purgatory because purgatory exists here in the church. It's junior high ministry, but as I was looking at the scriptures, I discovered that these things, if they're not in the word of God, I'm not gonna hold fast to it. I made that decision early on. I was a new Christian and early on I said, if it's not found here, I'm not gonna believe it. Why am I gonna hold to the traditions of man because I wanna know the truth as God gives it. And so I believe those kinds of things because they're inscriptions. So what I discovered is there are people who will come and actually take words that you know and will change the terminology and load those words with different meaning. And so as you look at those words, for example, the word sin, the word sin is to fall short. It means to come short of the mark, to miss the mark. But if you look at the Christian science terminology, they define sin as mental error. You look at the word salvation. Well, there are those who say that a man can be saved after doing all that he can do. That comes out of Mormonism. You see the word Jesus and Mormons will say he's the spirit brother of Lucifer and Jehovah's Witnesses will say that Jesus Christ is the first creation of God. And so the terminology has changed. Some will call Jesus a great prophet or a great teacher but they do not regard him as God in human flesh. And so you have to know your terminology. You have to know what the words actually mean in order to understand the things that God would have you to know. And here comes a false teacher alongside of what truth is, they begin to appropriate that word and begin to invest it with different meaning and in doing so they move you off from the true path into an incorrect one. Now Jesus made it very clear that this would happen. In Matthew 7.15, he gave a warning. He said, watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly they are savage wolves. They come to you in sheep's clothing. Sheep's clothing is another way of denoting a prophet because during that day, the prophets often would wear the clothing that was made out of sheep's wool. He's saying they're trying to appear to be real but in reality, they're false and destructive. So Peter says they're gonna be infiltrators. They're gonna pass themselves off as the real thing. Again, that's typical of false teachers. And Jude 1.4 says certain men whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They're godless men who changed the grace of our God into license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only sovereign and Lord. We have had false teachers who have infiltrated, attempted to undermine members of our fellowship here. We used to have them come onto the grounds. They would come into the bookstore and I found out about it a little bit as a matter of fact, too late because they would come into the bookstore and they'd walk around the church grounds and they would speak to people on the grounds. And I didn't know they were doing that because they were coming in secretly. And we used to have a young man here many years ago now who used to work on the grounds and they began to speak to him and share with him. And before you know it, he was quitting. He quit his job here. He went off to be with them. And before you know it on Facebook, he's writing how I'm a false prophet and I'm teaching error because the place that he went to taught you could become perfect. That there's a sinless perfectionism that he adhered to. And we discovered that these people were coming into the church here and were beginning to infiltrate and doing their best to undermine the grace of God that God gave to us and it happens. We've had people leave things on the pews there. We actually have our ushers going in and out of the pews in between services to look and to find anything because there have been false teachers who've left their material here. Sometimes they'll try and put it inside of some of the information that we might have here. They've gone out onto the parking lot. There are a lot of reasons why we have parking attendants and one of them is because people come off from off site and they'll put things on your windshield as you're here in church. And so that's part of the reason that we have that because a false teachers will infiltrate. The Bible teaches that and we've experienced that. You know, they come in secretly but Jesus does his work openly. John 1820 says, Jesus answered him, I spoke openly to the world. I always taught in synagogues and in the temple where the Jews always be it. And in secret, I have said nothing. He says they're gonna infiltrate but he also says they're gonna bring in or import destructive heresies. Now that word heresy, we don't use that word very often. It can mean the act of taking captive or storming a city. It can speak of a group following their own beliefs. It can speak of dissensions arising from diversity of opinion and goals. In this context, it speaks of undermining truth through making a willful choice. Heresies arise over differing opinions instead of over the plain truth of the word of God. It's an error that creeps in. Just yesterday, you know, Facebook's a good social media if it's used properly. Sometimes it's not used properly. It can be a good ministry tool. Just yesterday I wrote a response to somebody on Facebook who was claiming certain things and was basically bringing error and it gets onto my page and people can read the various things that he's posting and all. And so that happens all the time and it's introducing heresy. There are basically five fundamental things that we adhere to that are part of the truth of God that God has given to us that all genuine Christians will believe. Five basic things. We believe in the deity of Jesus Christ. We believe in the virgin birth. We believe in the atonement through the blood of Christ. We believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ and we believe in the inerrancy of Scripture. Five basic fundamentals that every genuine believer adheres to. These are the things that we hold fast to. You find those things in Scripture. And so what we try to do is we try to teach it from the A to the Z. We try to go from the basics to the depth of the meat of the word and you find that here in the word of God and the false teachers have a tendency of grabbing one thing and building an entire doctrine on that. And you have to be careful about that because when they bring their false doctrine in they undermine genuine faith. Notice how he says they deny the Lord who bought them. That word deny means to disregard or to reject. They're gonna use the name of Jesus in the teachings but they don't teach the truth about him. They especially are undermining the need of man for a savior and they undermine the cost of salvation which is the cross of Jesus Christ. You see in 1 Corinthians 117 and 18 Paul said Christ didn't send me to baptize but to preach the gospel. Not with the words of human wisdom lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power for the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing but to us who are being saved it's a power of God. Now remember two young men who came to my door many years ago and wanted to speak to me about going to a Bible study and I was already pastoring this church and say they came to my door and they said we'd like to invite you to a Wednesday night Bible study and I said well you know thanks for the invitation I already have when I attend. I didn't tell them I was the pastor of the church I just said thanks for the invitation. They said oh really where do you go? I said I go to Calvary Chapel. They said oh you do. And then I remember these young guys looking at one another and kind of like their eyebrows going up that kind of thing and then one of them looked at me and said to me you know that's a false church. I said really get a little closer so I can pop you in the head. I said oh really? I really yeah that's the church that teaches that you need to have Jesus in your heart to be saved. I said oh so we had an interesting conversation that day they'll come to your door and they'll speak to you. They'll come to your door and they'll argue with you. They'll infiltrate the church. They always bring in destructive error. They want to destroy the grace of God that has been revealed to us through the Lord Jesus Christ. They empty the cross of its power and substitute instead man's best efforts to be saved. And instead of having grace where God has poured out on us that which we do not deserve they twist it to the degree that you have to now do your very best to earn the love of God which he's already demonstrated to us in a merciful way by sending his son Jesus to die on the cross for us. You see it's the power of God for salvation of everyone who believes this cross in the blood of Jesus and it's under constant attack. The enemy consistently does all he can to undermine the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so these teachers may use his name. They may even quote the Bible but they're deceivers. He might be a God among other gods and Lucifer's brother. He might be Michael the archangel, the first creation of God. He might be presented as a man indwelt with Christ consciousness or an advanced medium or as some today say the reincarnation of the world's soul or a great man and wonderful teacher and these are all heresies that result in destruction for themselves and those who follow. Paul wrote warnings concerning twisting scripture. His desire was for the church to be protected from spiritual abuse. In Galatians 1 6-9 he says, I marvel that you are turning away so soon from him who calls you in the grace of Christ to a different gospel which is not another but there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ but even if we are an angel from heaven preach any other gospel to you than that which we have preached to you. Let him be accursed as we have said before so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you've received, let him be accursed. How can I be safe from this false teaching? I mean, I've encountered it all of my spiritual life. I encountered it probably within the first week or two of my salvation. I was in the den, I was reading at my parents' house, I was 20 years old, I hear a knock on the door and I go walking up the door and answer the door, hello, and there are two ladies standing there. Hello, we are Jehovah's Christian Witnesses and we want to share with you about Jesus Christ. I'm a brand new Christian, I don't know the difference between a Jehovah's Witness, a Mormon, a Christian or whatever, I don't have a clue what that is. I don't know the difference, I just got saved. I said, oh really? Now I was a hippie, I was wearing a Japanese robe. You know, I was wild eyed, I had big old bushy sideburns and granny glasses, I was barefoot and I'm standing there with this Japanese robe on and they're talking to me and I looked freaky to them and I know I did and so they said, yeah, we wanna talk to you about Jesus Christ, I said, great, I said, I just gave my heart to him. What do you wanna talk about? And they're looking at me and I'm looking back at them and I'm thinking I'm talking to the genuine article, how would I know otherwise? But as we begin speaking, they start saying things and as they're speaking to me and I'm a brand new Christian, I've been reading the Bible a week or two, you know, no Bible major of any sort, but I finally said to them, you know the things that you're saying, I can see you're sincere in your belief, but I don't agree with you. I don't think those things are true. Now where did I get that from? The Holy Spirit who dwells within you. It sounded, my mom used to use this phrase, it sounds like tin, it's just not the genuine article and the Spirit of God was already working in me to be able to discern truth from error and I remember speaking to them and I said, well listen, I don't really know what you're saying whether it's right or wrong, it doesn't seem right to me, to be honest with you, but anyway, I know Jesus already and thanks for stopping to talk to me about him and I closed the door and it was only over a matter of time that I began to read the Bible and began to see some of the things that they were teaching and they're going house to house to teach you, were error and then I began to learn how to refute the error, then I began to understand what I was learning, what I meant, what the Bible means and it's very important to us, all of us, to understand this because you need to know the word of God because that's how you're protected from that which is false. You need to know God's word. In 1 Timothy chapter six, verse 20, oh Timothy guard what was committed to your trust, avoid the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. You see, that's all verse one, we better get to verse two. Many will follow their destructive ways because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. How is it that many will follow their destructive ways? Well one is the church ceases teaching the truth because the time will come when people will no longer endure healthy doctrine but begin to heap unto themselves teachers having itching ears and they're gonna turn aside from the truth and be turned into fables. They're gonna get tired of Bible studies and they're not gonna wanna know what the word of God has to say. And so they're gonna follow the ways because they're not in the word of God. Very often false teachers are very popular. Some false teachers can feel convention centers, some are on television, some print magazines. Their message appeals to the carnal appetites of their listeners. Sometimes I wonder on some of these TV programs, sometimes I wonder if Jesus could give his sermon found in Matthew 23 on TV. And I wonder if John or Jeremiah would be given airtime on some of these programs. I don't think they'd be very popular because today everybody wants to hear simply those things that make them feel good about themselves. And Peter says these are destructive ways. These are ways that destroy it. These are ways that end up with eternal damnation. Proverbs 1412 says there's a way that seems right to a man but its end is a way of death. The fruit of their ministry is that the way of truth will be blasphemed. Their ungodly conduct brings dishonor on the name of Jesus. Had they called themselves by any name but that of Christ, Jesus' religion, his true religion would not have suffered. What is their motivation? Verse three, covetousness. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words. For a long time their judgment has not been idle. Their destruction does not slumber. By covetousness they will exploit you. Their hearts are filled with greed and they're gonna use you to become rich. They will tickle your ear with fantastic stories and they will make merchandise of you. I've been around a long time now in the church world. I've seen a few things. I've received things in the mail, a prayer mat, some false teacher cent where it has, it's big enough for you to kneel on and in each corner there was somebody's idea of what an angel looks like. So an artist's conception of angels. And then in the center, the instructions came, you're supposed to kneel on this prayer mat and if you kneel on this prayer mat and pray, then the prayer that you're praying, God will answer. And then as you're praying, you're to take your wallet or your credit card out and put it in the center of the mat. And then you're to take the largest bill you have in your wallet and put it in the center of that mat. And then you send that to the person who's praying for you. And then for sure, your prayer is going to be answered. And so I wrote Raul and said, that's just not a good thing to do, man. I mean, that's just wrong. I've had others send me watermelon seeds. You know, you plant a watermelon seed and it creates a watermelon that has all these seeds and that's how you have your seed faith money that you put into it, put a dollar into my ministry. I had, there was, this one guy was advertising a specially blessed wallet where your wallet will never be empty of money if you send him money. And I thought, why don't you just use one of your own wallets and stop bothering me. There was another guy who said he was so filled with the Holy Spirit that he was preaching and stepped off the platform and hovered in the air until he realized that he was hovering in the air and he turned and walked back on the air onto his platform. He said that he was preaching and he stood still for many hours, I forget 24, 36 hours without moving and then came back to himself and preached and people were watching him. I've heard so many outlandish things. Some guy was saying that, he said, this is gonna run contrary to your theology but I cast a demon out of myself. And I said, no, you didn't, he's still there. And he's a lying demon too, by the way. You know, and so, I mean, there are naive, simple-hearted people who wanna believe. That's what breaks my heart as a pastor teacher. They wanna believe, they wanna believe. And their hearts are broken by charlatans and they use their, the gospel to make money off the innocent. And that's what Peter is saying here, by covenant-ness they will exploit you with deceptive words. They're gonna use the gospel, twisting it for their own use to make money off of you. Popularity and prosperity are their earmarks. Titus 1 11 says they must be silenced because they are ruining whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach and that for the sake of dishonest gain. And so over the course of the years that I've had the privilege of pastoring and teaching, I've tried to be faithful to teach you the truth out of the word of God so that you might be kept from the deceptive, exploitive, lying teachers who will use you to line their own purses. I've been doing this for 39 years because I really believe that God's word is true. And I also believe that their destruction does not slumber. Their judgment has not been idle. Their destruction does not slumber. Is doctrine important? Absolutely. They will ultimately be judged for what they believed and those who adhere to what they taught will also fall in the same snare. We have to be careful with what we believe because what we believe is how we live. May we live according to scripture.