Pentecost 17 2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:5
September 11, 2016
Do you know what I mean by an “earwig”? The first time I ever saw one was when we lived in Wisconsin. One year there was a big infestation in our area. Earwigs like cool, damp, dark places, so we’d find a bunch of them in our mailbox after a rainy morning and in our bathroom towels. They crawled across the ceiling at night and sometimes fall down onto the blankets. Our next door neighbor even had to disinfect his well after hundreds of them clogged the opening. I wondered how they got such a strange name so I read about it. It seems that centuries ago people believed that these “wigs”, or beetles, would crawl into people’s ears when they were sleeping and bore into their brains. Now that was creepy! But I also found out that it wasn’t true so. Earwigs don’t crawl into your ears when you’re sleeping. The only thing that goes into your ears is the legend about them. But it still freaked me out every time I saw one in the house.
Earwigs may not be a problem, but there are lots of other things that go into our ears that really are dangerous. Doctors and nurses warn us not to put any smaller than our elbow in our ears. Loud noises can damage our hearing, so they warn us to wear ear protection when we’re exposed to loud noises for prolonged periods of time.
God cautions us about what goes into our ears, too, but he isn’t talking about small objects or volume control. Our Savior warns us about words. There are words that have the power to save and there are words that are aimed at deceiving us. So beware what goes into your ears.
1. Words that save
Paul wrote this letter to his young Christian friend and fellow pastor, Timothy. It was the last time Timothy would hear from his friend, teacher ,and coworker. “I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure” he wrote. (1 Timothy 4:6) Paul was about to die for his faith in Jesus, but he had trained Timothy to continue preaching and teaching the same gospel that Paul preached, the same message that had made Timothy wise for salvation and brought him to faith in Jesus. Those words had power to save.
He urged Timothy to “continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it.” “Continue” means it started somewhere. It started in the home where Timothy grew up. His mother, Eunice, and grandmother, Lois, had been the main influence on him from the time he was a baby. They were believers in the coming Savior, and more than anything else they wanted little Timothy to learn about Jesus, too. From little on these ladies had put God’s Word in his ears. After Timothy grew up he met the apostle Paul, and he was ready for Paul to teach him much more. Paul even trained him to be a pastor and missionary. Timothy could do what Lois, Eunice, and Paul had done for him. He could teach God’s Word to others so the message about Jesus would go into their ears, touch their hearts, and save them, too.
God has the only one who has the answers to the big questions of life: ” Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? How do I know what’s right and wrong? What do I do with my guilt when I’ve done wrong? I know there must be a God. Who is he? What does he think of me? What happens when I die? How can I be saved?” God answers all those questions in the Bible. In fact, that’s where we meet God himself! “All Scripture is God-breathed,” he said through Paul’s pen. This means that all the words in the Bible are God’s own words. The Old Testament is God’s Word: “No prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation,” he said through the Apostle Peter. “For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Peter 1:20,21) The New Testament is God’s Word. “We have not received the spirit of the world,” he said through the Apostle Paul, “but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.” (1 Corinthians 2:13)
God is speaking directly to your heart when you hear and read the Bible. He is the judge of right and wrong and he is clear and honest about what happens to everyone who disobeys him. He must and will punish every single sinner forever in hell. And there isn’t a thing any of us can do to stop that from happening. He wants us to hear that. We need to hear that. But that isn’t all that God has to say. More than anything else he wants us to hear how much he loves us and doesn’t want anyone to go to hell. He wants us to hear about Jesus and how he came to earth to suffer for our sins in our place so we could have everlasting life when this short life is over. This message can be found nowhere else on earth. He calls it the gospel, which he describes as “the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes.” (Romans 16:17) This is what God wants to put into our ears, because only these words have the power to save.
Throughout life the Holy Spirit uses his Word like a lamp to keep showing us the path through life to heaven. He keeps us focused on Jesus until we are safe and secure in his home. He calls us back to him when we are distracted by the cares, worries, wants, and desires of this life. He whispers words of forgiveness when we are troubled by the guilt of our sins. He keeps telling us that God is for us, not against us. These are the words God wants to put in our ears. These are the words that save.
2. Words that deceive
Timothy learned all this in his home, so why does Paul spend so much time telling him what he already knows? Because there are words that save, but there also are words that deceive. Paul warned, “For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”
Sound teaching doesn’t sound good to sinful ears. It stings when God tells us what is right and what is wrong and points out our sin. It irritate us when God tells us how to live our lives. It wounds our pride when God tells us we can’t handle it on our own. It insults us to hear that we need to be saved from our sins and can’t do a thing to save ourselves. So people turn away from God’s Word. That doesn’t mean they now believe in nothing. Rather, when people turn away from God’s Word it means they are willing to believe in anything! Satan convinced Adam and Eve that a lie is better than the truth, and he’s been doing it ever since. Ears are itching to hear that we can solve to all our problems if we just give science and medicine enough time to do it. People want to hear that your life is your own to do with as you please; that you can decide when life begins and when it should end; that you have the final say in your sexual choices; that we must bring the Bible’s teachings up to date for a changing world so it is easier to accept; that all religions are true. Many of those myths come from teachers who call themselves Christian, making their deception all the more deadly.
There are words that deceive and lead people away from the safety of God’s love, so God warns us to “keep your head in all situations.” Beware what goes into your ears. Beware what goes into our children’s ears.
One day Jesus tearfully watched crowds of people walk away after he had given them the words that save. They preferred the words that deceive, so they went off to join the rest of the world on the way to destruction. Jesus then turned to his disciples and asked, “You aren’t going , too, are you?” Peter replied, “Where else can we go? You – yes only you, Jesus – have the words of eternal life.”
The world is always going to turn away from Jesus, but there will be some whom the gospel calls to faith and are saved. But it won’t happen unless his words are heard. That’s why you and I are hear today. Jesus has put his words in our ears. Now we need to put them in our children’s ears.
That’s what happened in Timothy’s home…
Amen