Teaching that Produces Love

Well, good to see you all. let me have you guys turn in your Bibles to First Timothy chapter one. For our time of study in the word this morning. First Timothy chapter one.

And, we're, we're doing a verse by verse study through the book of First Timothy. We began this series, through the book of First Timothy, a few weeks ago and, as we continue in our study of this book, we come this morning to 1 Timothy chapter 1, verse 3. And my goal this morning with the time that we have is to try to cover verses 3. Through 5.

And if you want to give a title to the message, it would be teaching that produces love. Teaching that produces love. And let me just begin by reading these three verses to you. In verse 3, Paul, Says this to Timothy.

He says, as I urged you upon my departure for Macedonia, remain on at Ephesus in order that you may instruct certain men not to teach strange doctrines, nor to pay attention to myths and endless genealogies which give rise to mere speculation. Rather than furthering the administration of God, which is by faith. But the goal of our instruction. Is love from a pure heart and a good conscience.

And a sincere, faith. I think it was in August of this year that we had our last Sunday evening service and, during that evening service, you guys will recall we were kicking off our week of prayer, and I preached about a 2025 minute message on the subject of prayer. And in that message, I I shared with you guys that I had been asked to do something. that created some anxiety for me.

it was a speaking opportunity, and I'll, I'll quote myself here just to make sure I get it right, that what I was asked to do, I said, scares, quote, the wee wee out of me. And how many of you were there for that message? OK, good. Well, I just wanted you to know the thing that I was asked to do, that was terrifying, happened this past week on Friday.

I, I, preached in chapel at Cal Baptist, Friday morning in the two chapels that they had. And It was a new experience for me. I've never preached a full-on sermon to audiences of that size. It was about 1000 in the first chapel and about 900 in the second.

And, in, in the weeks leading up to, to doing that, being fully human and more than human, often sinfully human. I, I found that my anxiety would come whenever I would get absorbed with myself and just start thinking about me and what are people going to think about me and, and I want to do a good job to impress people or whatever. what if I mess up in, in some way, what would they think of me then? And the more I thought about those thoughts, the more anxiety I experienced.

But I found that the more I would just lose myself in the needs of the young people that would be attending that chapel, and what my purpose was in being there, which was to preach the gospel. and to let the gospel impact, their lives, both saved and lost. The more I got absorbed in that, the more a spirit of calm and a sense of mission and even excitement, would come over me. but I would go back and forth between those, two different extremes.

And on the day that I preached on Friday morning, I was heading towards Cal Baptist, Friday morning, and I, I called a brother from this church. and told him where I was heading and asked him to pray for me. And he did, but he also did what I expected him to do. And that is, he, he was, he just showered me with words of truth that, that gave me a sense of purpose and mission.

It's like, man, it's God's will that you're going to be there. And here's the needs that are there. And here's how God's going to use you and, and just redefine for me my purpose and being there, and put that front and center in my thinking, then prayed over me and And that really blessed me and gave me a spirit of calm until I pulled onto the campus, and I saw hundreds of cars on the campus and started freaking out again. And but then I, I went through a ritual that I often go through almost every Sunday, even here at Cornerstone.

And I said to the Lord, I said, Lord, this is not about me. This is about you. This is about glorifying you. And then, having said that, I then imagined the worst thing possible that could happen to me up there.

And that is I could pass out or say something really stupid. So I imagine that happening. And then I said to the Lord, Lord, if in your good providence, you want to make a fool out of me today, that's OK. As long as you get glory for yourself.

And then I waited until I got a sense of promise from the Lord that yes, I will glorify myself through your ministry today, no matter what happens. And then once I Received that into myself. I said, Lord, I'm willing to be a fool for Jesus. And a spirit of calm came over me, and it never left me, all the way through the two chapels and ministering to the young people there.

these things can make these opportunities can make our lives more complicated. But one of the things that I relearned on Friday, is how powerful just a succinct reminder of purpose can be. It was hugely powerful for me. There's nothing more bracing.

and more calming that instills us with a sense of mission any more than just a succinct reminder of really what our ministry is all about. And I begin with that this morning because there is a sense in which Paul is doing exactly that as he speaks to Timothy. Timothy has been left with some unpleasant tasks, things that no doubt were very intimidating for Timothy to do while Paul was away. From Ephesus, and Paul is wanting to, to brace Timothy and to instill him with a sense of mission and encourage him.

And in verse 5, Paul, verse 5 is one of those verses that you just want to memorize, because there is so much packed into this verse. In verse 5, Paul states for Timothy, the goal of his ministry in terms of the effect that Paul wants his ministry to have upon the live. of people and in doing so, Paul says, he's telling Timothy, I want this to be the goal of not just my ministry, but also your ministry as well. And look at this goal.

The goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. can you think of any higher dream for those that you minister to than this, that as a result of your ministry to them that generated within them is a pure heart, a good conscience, a sincere faith, and then from all of that comes an explosive love for God and for people. Can you think of any higher goal? Than this in terms of the effect of your ministry on other people.

Parents, I want you to ponder this verse with regard to your children. Can you think of any higher dream for your children than this? Would you like for your children to to grow up and have a pure heart, a good conscience, a sincere faith, a faith that is their own, not just borrowing your faith, but a faith that is their own and it's real, it is genuine. It is unhypocritical.

And, and from all of these things that your children have an explosive love for God and for other people, and they live daily in the grip of that love that they have for God and for others that God has generated within them. Can you think of any higher goal that you can possibly have for your children than this? Well, Paul, in speaking to Timothy, is reminding Timothy that this is why I left you in Ephesus. This is the goal of my ministry.

It is to be the goal of your ministry in Ephesus, and Paul fully intends for this reminder to encourage Timothy and to brace him for the intimidating tasks that are set before Timothy, one of which, we're actually going to see, this morning. But this is the goal of, should be the goal of all of our ministry, whether you're a pastor, a preacher, or a Sunday school teacher, or whether you're a parent. Our goal should be that through our influence, God would use our lives and our influence to generate in other people love from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith.

Well, if you want that, that raises a valid question, and that is how.

How? What should my ministry look like? What should I do in my ministry to people in order to be used of God to generate this transformation in them? And we have at least one of the answers to that question found in verse 5 itself.

And the answer to that is teaching, guys, a critical element of any ministry that generates this life change in other people. Is the element of teaching, communicating verbally. Yes, we need to be an example. Yes, we need to live the life and so forth.

And, and there's a variety of other things, but we also need to speak. We need to teach. We need to instruct. I get this from verse 5.

Look what Paul says, the goal of our instruction. That's one of the synonyms for teaching that Paul uses in the book of First Timothy itself. Paul is saying, we teach, and the goal of our teaching, the goal of our instruction is to be used of God to generate this life change in the lives of those that we are ministering to. In fact, I don't know what all of your translations say in the New American Standard in verse 5, it, it has the word goal.

You might want to underline that word. The word that is translated goal could just as easily be translated effect. E F F E C T. in fact, when you look at verse 4, you would get the impression that that is what Paul means.

He's not so much talking about the goal as much as he's talking about the effect. He's talking about different doctrine that we'll look at in just a minute and how that gives rise to just mere speculation. doesn't further God's purposes. And then you could translate verse 5 in this way, but the effect of our instruction is, and then he states what the effect of his instruction is that he is giving to people.

And so if we're really wanting to have this ministry to other people, and I, as a pastor, want this ministry to other people, that then raises another question. If, if teaching is an essential element of generating this life change in people, love, pure heart, good conscience, and a sincere faith, then what teaching is it that I give to people? Is it any teaching? I, I can just get up, I can teach whatever I want to my kids and to this congregation, and it'll automatically produce this effect?

No. You guys know the answer to that, but there's only a certain teaching that generates this type of life change, and that's what we're going to call sound teaching. We're going to call it sound teaching because that's what Paul calls it, and we encounter this phrase at the end of verse 10. Go to the very end of verse 10, where Paul speaks of those things that are contrary to sound.

Teaching. And when you hear the word sound, that's attached to teaching, think hygiene. All right? Our English word hygiene comes from the Greek word that is translated sound here in verse 10.

It speaks of teaching that is wholesome. In and of itself and teaching that generates well-being, it generates spiritual health and, and life in other people. And so if you want to have the ministry that generates the life change that Paul describes in verse 5, you need to be teaching and not just teaching, but the content of your teaching needs to be what's called sound teaching, life-giving, life nurturing teaching. And that raises one more question, and it's the last question that we'll answer, and that is what is sound teaching?

All right, I want, I want to have this impact, and I know it involves teaching, and so the teaching has to be sound teaching according to the end of verse 10. But what exactly is sound teaching? Well, Paul would say, I knew you would ask that. Look at what he says in verse 11, where Paul describes what sound teaching is.

He says, whatever else is contrary to sound teaching, and then you could translate it this way, verse 11, which is According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted. In other words, in the mind of Paul, sound, wholesome, life-giving, health giving teaching is teaching that is the gospel, teaching that emerges from the gospel, teaching that is centered in the gospel. It is any and all teaching that truly represents the gospel and the gospel agenda.

It is any teaching.

that passes the gospel test, as you see on the screen behind me, it is any teaching that conforms to the gospel. So teaching that generates life change, that generates love in people from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith, the teaching that God uses to generate this life change in people is gospel teaching. Teaching that conforms to the gospel. So with, with that thing put together, speaking as a pastor, and speaking on behalf of the elders, we as elders recently we're even talking about 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 5.

the goal of our ministry is defined in verse 5, and we want God to use us as pastors to have this impact upon you. And this passage is extremely helpful for us. Understand that, that Paul is speaking to Timothy here who is a pastor. In fact, he's a pastor, two pastors in the Ephesian congregations.

And so ultimately, this, this primarily applies to pastors, but certainly, as we've been talking about already, all of us can apply this to varying degrees to our lives and to our ministry. But as far as the sermon outline goes this morning, what I want to do is I just want to go over in these three verses two things. That your pastors must do if they want their teaching ministry to achieve the goal of verse 5. You might say, well, I'm not a pastor, so I don't know why I really need to listen to this.

Well, you do, you would do well to listen to this. Because these are two things you need to let your pastors do in your life. These are two things you need to support your pastors in doing, because these two things are not actually popular in our world today, and they're not, they wouldn't even be popular in many churches. And so you need to actually support and pray for and encourage your pastors in doing these two things.

I had a pastor friend of mine, not very far from here, who on his first Sunday at his church got up and began a series through the book of Ephesians and attempted to do the very two things that we're talking about, this morning or that we will be talking about his first Sunday, and the head of the deacon board came up to him afterwards and said, if I have anything to do with it, within 6 months, you will not be pastor here. And several months later, this pastor showed up on a Sunday morning ready to preach, ready to lead the services, only to find that all of the locks on his office and on the entire campus of the church had been changed.

changed and he was informed by someone waiting there for him that he had been fired. There are pastors who have sought to do these two things, and their congregations chewed them up and spit them out before they even knew what had happened.

And so, you would do well to observe these two things and then be instructed by them, just go, OK, I want to let the pastors and the elders do this in my life here. I want to support them. I want to pray for them as they engage in these two things. And then, Even in my own life, in my teaching ministries, I, I want to apply this in a secondary way to my parenting and to whatever teaching ministry that I have.

So, two things we're going to look at that we can learn. That we as pastors should do and that your pastors should do, by way of achieving the goal of verse 5 in 1 Timothy chapter 1. And the first thing they must do is they must teach against different teaching. They must teach against different teaching.

Guys, one of the most amazing things about the way Paul begins here, it's almost like the book of Galatians. Paul starts off Galatians, on a negative note. he comes out on the attack. It's amazing to me.

Look at verse 3. Paul says to Timothy, as I urged you upon my departure from Macedonia, remain on at Ephesus. In order that you may instruct. Now notice he says, I urged you remain on, meaning continue on at Ephesus without me.

It implies Timothy wasn't really excited about being left behind by the apostle Paul, and he was not excited about the things that at least some of the things that Paul left him behind to do. and the first thing out of Paul's mouth, the very first thing that Paul reminds Timothy of in this letter that Timothy is to do while Paul is away, is that Timothy, look at this, in order that you may instruct certain men not to teach strange doctrines. There are people today who are all about, let's just preach the gospel, let's just have a positive ministry.

let's not speak against anything.

Man, Paul is actually telling Timothy he has to do this. This is the first thing. Out of Paul's mouth in terms of reminding Timothy of his responsibility and Ephesus with regard to his teaching ministry. The subject of teaching is the first topic Paul addresses, and within the subject of teaching, the first teaching responsibility that Timothy has is to teach against different doctrine.

Look at this more carefully. He says, I left you behind at Ephesus in order that you may instruct certain men not to teach strange doctrines. Now, the word that is translated strange there, it's, it's the Greek word hetera. which simply means different, OK?

for example, a heterosexual is someone who is interested in the opposite sex, OK? heteros means different and so keep in mind how we've defined sound teaching. It is gospel teaching. Obviously, we're going to see in a minute that Timothy is to be preaching and teaching gospel teaching.

However, Timothy is to teach against anything that is different from that gospel teaching, and he is to instruct certain men not to teach. Different doctrine than gospel doctrine. Apparently, there were people in the Ephesian congregation that were teaching things that were different than what the gospel teaches. They were teaching things that contradicted the gospel, and then, they were teaching things that maybe didn't contradict the gospel, but it sidelined the gospel.

It just had nothing to do with the gospel. It's just these side truths over Here that they were presenting as central truths, and they never mentioned the gospel. And so instead of speaking gospel truth, these teachers were just teaching something different. Sometimes it contradicted the gospel.

Other times it just never mentioned the gospel. The content of their teaching was something other than the gospel itself. And so Paul says, Timothy, you're going to have to get in the faces of these people in the church who are up there teaching, and what they're teaching is something other than the gospel, and you're going to have to command them, literally, instruct them in a commanding way not to teach any different doctrine other than gospel doctrine. And then look at verse 4.

He says, nor to pay attention. Timothy is not only to tell people that they are not to teach in the church any doctrine different than gospel doctrine, but he is also to teach people in the Ephesian Church not to even pay attention to doctrine that is other than gospel doctrine. You see, guys, the only reason false teachers have any place in the church is because people pay attention to them. think about it.

If everyone ignored false teachers, what would false teachers do? They wouldn't have anyone to teach. There would be no one to listen to them. And so Paul says to Timothy, I, I want you to go beyond just telling people not to teach strange doctrine or different doctrine.

I want you to teach the people, the believers in the Ephesian congregation not to even pay attention to strange or different doctrines that are different than gospel. Doctrine. Now, every age has its fads. When it comes to teaching that is different from the gospel, we have our fads today that come and go.

Back in this day, this is probably going to seem strange to you guys, the big rage was genealogies, all right? Old Testament genealogies. We're going to find as we go through First Timothy that, that the, the false teachers that were plaguing the Ephesian Church, they were really big on the Old Testament. They, they basically were teaching legalism and salvation by works.

We're going to find later in the book that they were teaching abstinence from certain foods, no doubt, according to the regulations in the Old Testament law, they even went further than the Old Testament law and were teaching abstinence from marriage. And so forth. So there was some definite non-gospel teaching that was going on. Paul says, you're going to have to tell these people not to teach this doctrine inside the church.

You're going to have to teach the believers not to even give their attention to these things. But one of the aspects of this teaching was its use of myths and genealogies. Look what he says in verse 4, nor to pay attention to myths and endless. Genealogies.

Now, again, this was all the rage in this day. Even preceding Paul's day, we have evidence, written evidence in Jewish history that, that the rabbis would, they, they would spin yarns based on some hint that was allegedly in scripture, and they would go through the genealogy and, and maybe the, the man's name is mentioned, but they would supply the name of the wife, and then they would spin a tale that supposedly was implied there in the text and the Jews would listen and go, whoa, I never saw that there, but he's a rabbi.

Apparently it is there, and I just don't have the skills to see this, and And so they would spend these tales, these allegories, and, and these lessons and, and as if they were historical fact, when indeed they were not historical fact. And a lot of these yarns were spun from various names that would be in the genealogies that we find throughout the Old Testament.

one commentator says this, that the Old Testament list of ancestors were amplified, names of wives were invented, allegorical and additional tales were woven into them. Even in the Jewish Talmud that exists to this day, that is a collection of a lot of the content of what was being taught in Judaism, even back in Bible times. there is a book that is like supposedly a commentary, an interpretation of the Book of Genesis, but, it doesn't just exposite Genesis, it adds so many allegorical tales beyond what Genesis even reveals to where, the, you, you hardly even recognize the Book of Genesis in reading that.

And additional tales are told about how the archangels practice circumcision.

And how angels kept the Sabbath even long before, the world was created, and on and on the list can go of just additional things that were told and revealed that allegedly are hinted at in the book of Genesis. They're not there by explicit statement, but scholarly rabbis who have the eyes to see can divine this type of stuff from the book of Genesis. And even to this day, these stories are recorded in the Jewish Talmud. And so back in this day, apparently, these teachers were going around and just really fascinating people with, their knowledge of the genealogies and then, And then looking at alleged hints maybe in the number sequencing inside of the genealogies or the name and the literal meaning or etymology of a name, and then they would tell these tales and, and it was no doubt very gripping for people to listen to and they would embody lessons, more moral lessons inside of their stories and so forth, but this was the rage and this is the teaching that some inside of the church were getting caught up in.

Now, probably you guys, none of you have gotten caught up in genealogies lately, biblical genealogies and the stuff that maybe they were caught up in. But, but we do have stuff today. That seems to satisfy an interest that people have and things that go beyond what's revealed clearly in scripture. And some of these things that you see today from time to time or is the whole Bible code phenomenon.

Of people, with the use of computers, running number sequences and coming up with all sorts of things like the, the, the attacks of 9/11 were predicted. We find, the word twin towers that intersect, another word, if you arrange the letters in a certain way and it's all there in code and so forth, and, let me just say, by the way, regarding the whole Bible code thing, That when you look at how they work the system, the possibilities literally are infinite, totally infinite. And, and just know that there are Muslim scholars that are doing the same thing with the Koran, Hindu scholars that are doing the same thing with the Hindu scriptures.

There are unsaved non-Christian Jewish rabbis and scholars that are doing the same thing with the Old Testament.

the Hebrew Old Testament. In fact, they claim to have found a certain letter sequence in Isaiah 53 that has the words Jesus, false Messiah. And so they, they cite that to prove that Jesus is not the true Messiah. They go to the Bible code phenomenon.

To make their point, because the truth is the possibilities are endless. But what, guys, books are based on this, movies are made based on this. It seems to satisfy. This itch that people have for the unknown and what might be in scripture that's not clearly revealed.

And so people who look at God's law and disregard his law that's clearly revealed, they don't want to live by and listen to what God has clearly revealed in his word. They're very fascinated with what lies behind that clear language. And it's fascinating to talk about and to listen to. all the, all the rage over the last few years actually has been regarding the lost books of the Bible, the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Philip, and the Gospel of Judas, and, and what do those reveal about the true historical, Christ, the whole Da Vinci Code.

Book and, and movie is exactly the phenomenon that Paul is, is attacking here in verse 3 and 4, because the Da Vinci Code is based upon an alleged hint that's in scripture, when Jesus was raised from the dead, Mary Magdalene was told by Jesus, don't cling to me. Why would he say don't cling to me? Women didn't normally touch men in this day. Apparently, they were quite familiar with one another.

So perhaps they had a relationship with one another. Perhaps they were married. Perhaps they had children. And if you go to the lost books of the Bible, the Gospel of Philip and so forth that were written in like 200 AD, there's, there's vague references to his relationship with Mary Magdalene that he kissed her a lot and, and, and so forth.

And so they then spend this entire yarn. that even Leonardo da Vinci must have known about this. And so the feminine looking figure to the right of Jesus in the painting of The Last Supper, that's actually Mary, it's not the apostle John. And so Leonardo da Vinci knew about this, and he's cluing us into this.

And, guys, isn't that fascinating? that's like, exciting stuff for the world to listen to that, aha, we're finding something that is revealed in the Bible that has not been known. to many people throughout church history, but it is there nonetheless, and, and a whole gripping movie is made out of it that makes hundreds of millions of dollars. Other examples are the Jesus seminar that with their scholarly eyes and their trained eyes that are different than our eyes.

we read the Gospels and it says, well, it looks like Jesus walked on the water to me. But no, they read those accounts and say, This didn't really happen. We're able to see something that you can't. And that is that 80% of what the gospel writers say that Jesus said and did, he didn't say, and he didn't do.

It turns out he wasn't really raised from the dead. And then they give you the version of the gospels that have the 20% of things that he said and did, that they do agree he said and did. And most amazing, the Jesus they end up with is the one that looks exactly like themselves. Even secular scholars have made that observation.

But they're allegedly looking at hints that are in scripture that we the untrained cannot see, and then telling us how we need to view these things that are in the Bible. Also, there's allegorical interpretations of scripture that have been found throughout church history, the 153 fish caught in the net and the gospel story. What does that 153 mean? Well, if you take the 3 out of the 153 and set it aside, that represents the Trinity, and amazingly 3 into 150 goes 3 times or 50 times.

So that's 3 groups of 50. That's another example of the Trinity. And so this story teaches us all about the doctrine. Of the Trinity and all of that stuff.

Guys, we're not really into genealogies, but we have other fads that are rampant, today. And this just happened to be all the rage now. But the insidious thing about this rage, as with any of these other rages, is that it takes people's focus off of the gospel onto these other things. And yeah, they're tied to scripture.

People are like, man, we're having a Bible study. look, we're looking at the law, we're looking at the genealogies. So it's tied to scripture. And that's how Christians can get duped into this.

And so people are teaching this stuff, and Christians are listening, and they're gripped by it and titillated by it. But nonetheless, while they're listening to that stuff, they're not listening to the gospel. Look what Paul says. He says, nor pay attention to myths and endless genealogies which give rise.

Here's the effect of this teaching. It just gives rise to mere speculation. All it does is it raises more questions than it answers and creates a multitude of other questions and gets people going down further and further, a bunch of rabbit trails. Rather than furthering the administration of God, which is by faith, it's not serving God's purpose, which is that his people live by faith in Jesus Christ who died for them.

The first thing that pastors are to do and that you are to let your pastors do is to teach against different teaching, that we need to be able from this pulpit and other settings to, to teach against doctrines that are contrary to the gospel. and also, we need to be able to teach you of doctrines that maybe aren't contrary to the gospel, but they distract away from the gospel. They have nothing to do with the gospel. if I've been reading some secular book, for example, on marriage, and I get up here and say, guys, I, I, I, I was reading this book by so and so, and, and I want to give you guys 5 concepts that will revolutionize your marriage.

And I get up here and I preach those five concepts, those 5 concepts may actually be found somewhere in scripture. But if I give you those completely apart from the gospel, I have just taught you differently than gospel truth. And so the job of pastors is to oversee, to teach and oversee the teaching ministry. And one of our jobs is to, at times, tell people, listen, this is not to be taught here in this local body of believers because this is what this produces and it's not gospel teaching.

And at times we need to teach God's people what not to even give themselves to or pay attention to. There's a second thing though that pastors are to do, and that is They must teach only the gospel and what conforms to the gospel. We must teach only the gospel and what conforms to the gospel. Paul says in verse 5, but the goal or the effect of our instruction.

And notice he says, our instruction, Timothy, not just mine, but yours, your instruction and mine. In other words, my instruction, which is gospel instruction, I want that to be your instruction. So implied in that and stated clearly throughout the rest of the book, repeatedly is the fact that Timothy is to teach only the gospel and what conforms to the gospel. And I'm sure Timothy, poor guy, felt outclassed by some of these teachers.

that man, they've got all this stuff memorized and they can just quote these genealogies and wow people and then they've got all these, interesting facts that they can draw that are allegedly hinted at in the genealogies. And then here's Timothy and all he's got to say is the gospel. And people are like, I heard that before, I heard that before. Timothy is just not as gripping of a teacher as, as these other guys.

And it would be easy for Timothy to just go, man, am I missing something? Am I missing something? Paul says, no, Timothy, stay with the gospel, teach only the gospel and what conforms to the gospel. Why?

Because look at this, this different teaching only generates speculation. It doesn't further God's purposes. But the effect of gospel teaching. Is love, a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith, and none of this other different teaching can ever produce those things in the lives of their hearers.

I have taken way longer with this, than I, I intended. we may need to come back to verse 5 a little bit next week, but let's just real quick look at the 4 effects of the, of gospel teaching. And see if we can't cover this halfway decently. The first goal or the first effect is love for God.

and love for others. How does it, how does it do that? When you think about it, when people are being taught the gospel, they, and they believe in the gospel, what happens? They believe in Jesus, when they believe for salvation, they become children of God.

God is love. We are his children. That means the very DNA of God, the DNA of love is now placed inside of us. And so we can then begin to love like we never could have loved before we were children of God, and we were just children of hate, and children of wrath.

Also, when we believe in Jesus, we receive the Holy Spirit that, that God gives to us as a gift, and that Spirit pours out the love of God inside of our hearts, and then produces the fruit of love in our lives, according to Galatians chapter 5. Another way that the gospel produces love, guys, is that when we believe in Jesus, and we receive the forgiveness of our sins, here we are, we're broken over our sin. And we know we don't deserve forgiveness. We believe in the gospel, we believe in Jesus, our sins are forgiven.

And those forgiven sins now serve as fuel that energize a passionate love for God. In Luke chapter 7, Jesus says to the one for whom much is forgiven, that person loves much. Also, love is produced in us through the gospel, because in the gospel, we see the very glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. We see God's beauty.

And the more we see his glory, the more we see his beauty, the more lovely he is to us. And the more lovely he is to us, the more we love Him. And Parents, you, you want, you want your children to grow up loving God. loving others, the, the number one tool to use to accomplish that is the gospel.

That puts before them the ravishing beauty of Jesus, the ravishing beauty of God, that shows them of this love that is theirs in Christ, the forgiveness of their sins. As a parent, you want to help your children to see the magnitude of their sins, so that they can see then the magnitude of God's forgiveness of their sins. And then upon seeing that, they then love God all the more. It is the gospel that generates this love.

And those that we seek to minister to. We're going to need to stop here, but there's, there's other things, and we'll get into these next week. There's a pure heart, a good conscience, a sincere faith. There's only one thing that has the power to generate this, only one teaching that can generate this in the lives of people, and that is gospel teaching.

And that's why right off the bat Paul is reminding Timothy his first topic is teaching, and it's gospel teaching. Teach the gospel and teach against any other teaching in the church that is different. From gospel teaching. Let me ask you to bow your heads this morning.

There's a lot of people out there that are vying for our attention. Books out there that claim to speak great life-altering truth. Guys, we must, we must. Embrace the message of the cross and realize that it is.

More than anything else, The power of God unto salvation, not just conversion, but day to day salvation. And in our ministry here at Cornerstone, and your ministry to your children, and your ministry to anyone that you teach, some of you are Sunday school teachers, you're going to be leaving here and going to, to teach an adult class or a children's class. What is the essence of your teaching? What are you giving them?

You must give them the only thing. That is powerful enough. To turn them into passionate lovers of God. With a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith, and that is the gospel.

The truth that Jesus died. was buried, was raised, is ascended to the right hand of Almighty God, ruling as Lord of the universe from on high. And with all of that authority and power behind his name, Jesus now wants to wield that in a saving way in the lives of all those who believe in Him, rebel sinners that have broken God's law, deserving his wrath. And yet Christ wants to save them.

Let us never become so arrogant that we think there is more power in something else than this teaching. Paul says to the world this is foolishness, but to us who are day by day being saved. It is the power of God. Lord, help us to.

Embrace the gospel for ourselves, be passionate teachers of the gospel. Not just teaching with our words, but through our life, living in a gospel way, relating to people in a gospel way. That we might impart to them the gospel of God through our words, through our deeds, that they might thereby experience the power of God, the only power that can transform them. Keep our hearts open, Lord, as we continue through this book and bless us even tonight and for one group on Friday as we process these things together in our care groups.

We just commit ourselves to you in Jesus' name. And all God's people said. In thinking about the, the word of God, let's, let's, let's sing together. I will meditate on your law.

Here we go. I will meditate on your law. And my heart would not. Your testimonies will be the lies.

Which will guide and keep me pure. As a treasure of all your words, Lord. you They are perfect, they are precious, for they come alone. Thank you for your.

I will listen. Thank you. Oh I will I will meditate on your love. I'm my heart.

The testimonies will be the light. Which will God keep me pure. As a treasure up all your words, Lord. This will pass in view.

They are They are precious. Oh, they come. Thank you for your I will listen. Thank you.

off. I will obey. Thank you for your I