Stand Fast and Hold the Traditions You have been taught - 2 Thes 2

Paul's Epistles

Join us for this excellent video Sermon on the study of 2nd Thessalonians chapter 2. This chapter in Thessalonians is extremely relevant in today's world. We need to be aware of false doctrine and the danger of departing from the truth.

Transcript

This transcript was generated by AI and may contain errors. It is provided to assist those who may not be able to listen to the message.

But Paul, during his second journey, one year after the Jerusalem Conference in 49 A.D., he stopped in Corinth after founding under God's instructions and blessing the church in Thessalonika. Then, from Corinth, he wrote of the first Thessalonians to encourage the brethren and to address some misunderstandings about Christ's return. But what is new? When you try and address a misunderstanding, you create more misunderstandings. And so, they had some more misunderstandings and Paul immediately then, and that's regarding Christ's coming. And therefore, Paul immediately wrote Second Thessalonians to address some of those misunderstandings. And so, in chapter 1 of Second Thessalonians, which we covered previously, Paul basically thanked God for their faith, for their patience, in persecutions and tribulations. And he also highlighted how God is righteous, giving people time to repent. And then, he also showed them that the people needed to, and that was the thing that he was praying for them, that they needed to remain faithful to the end and use the expression that you may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God by remaining faithful to the end. And then, towards the conclusion of chapter 1, then Paul said that God might encourage them that God would give them peace and rest and said that understand that there will be a judgment. So, even though things are rough now, there will be a judgment and Christ will punish sinners.

And from that, as an introduction, he gets on to chapter 2. That's where I'm going to start reading now in verse 1, because it is an important chapter about, very important information about Christ's coming. And it is important information which is extremely relevant today, in today's age. Extremely relevant. And so, he starts. Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him.

In other words, for us to be together with Christ and His coming, we ask you not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled. In other words, there's going to be a time that Christ will come. You and I know by reading, for instance, Matthew 24, that it says, it will be like lightning and everybody will see. And it talks about, in Matthew 24, verse 27 and verse 31, says, everybody will see and you'll send angels or gather the people.

So, it will not be a hidden thing that it says, well, Christ has already come. Like, you are aware that some religious group do say that that Christ has already come. So, he says, no, that's going to be pretty visible. But the other point is not to be soon shaken. Now, I think of shaken is like if you have a tree with certain fruit or something like that and you shake the tree and then things fall down. No, or leaves fall down. Say for instance, you are trying to pick up leaves at the end of summer, beginning of autumn.

And you're picking up and you know that the moment you turn your back, a few more are going to fall down. So, what I do? I shake the tree before I pick them up just for those few to fall down, you know. And in that analogy, don't you be shaken.

You know, shaking the eyes like agitated, like the wind agitates and gets thrown down disorientated. Don't you be shaken either by spirit or by word or by letter. You know, don't be shaken by anybody that claims that they had a vision. Oh, I had this vision. I had this dream. And you know, George, you believe in dreams and I had this dream. And you know what? I saw Christ and this and that and that and man, do I get stories like that.

Maybe not from the United States, but I get to a lot of people in that area that I go to that are learning the truth. Well, you believe in dreams because I had this dream. I've had people tell me some dreams that make your head really stick out, you know. I don't want to know any more about that.

But anyway, don't let anybody come to you with stories, whether it's a spirit or a word or a letter or an email, if it was written today, or an email or Facebook or social media or whatever. Whatever you do and watch these scenes, you know. And you know these scenes and people make up stories. That's where it fits very nicely to sermon it with this ideal guess like making you slowly, subtly introducing certain ideas and making you go in the wrong path. And then it says, continuing in verse 2, as if from us, in other words, as if it's true.

And it is from one of God's medicines. It's true! It's true! As though the day of Christ had already come. All right. It's not just that deception. There's many other deceptions that people come up with. That's one example. That was the specific instance that was happening at that time. But to us, it's applicable to any other principle that we have to be careful and we're going to be watching that we don't be deceived by these emails and these Facebook things and these things that are just, you know, out of this world.

So today, brethren, today, society is changing rapidly. I think that if you were going to go back three months back from today, you would not recognize some of the things and you would not believe that's what's happening today. Much more than a year from today. Society is changing rapidly. Rapidly. And what does create is a great degree of anxiety. You know, it creates anxiety in people, in young people, in young people, particularly. Because even though maybe you're not allowing them to watch too much TV or whatever it is, this is a fair thing. And there is anxiety out there. When I was a company I used to work for in South Africa, we had a workshop called Change Management.

And one of the things they taught us was that they use a natural resistance to change. And we've got to manage that as managers. Now there are some changes that are good. And there will be one change which will be excellent, which is Christ coming and bringing the kingdom of God. That is a change we need. And that's good. But there are a lot of subtle changes. And now they're growing at an exponential rate, getting out of hand.

And you and I know they are changes against God's laws. And that creates a lot of anxiety. And you and I know that these things are going to get worse. Evil men are going to get worse and worse. And this is like that example of the light getting slowly darker and darker.

And saying, no, it's just a figment of your imagination. Or you know the story about the temperature getting hotter and hotter in the water and the frog doesn't notice it. And you may think, oh well, there are certain things that you are pretty aware of. But you know where the danger is? You know where the danger is? The danger is when you know the truth. And you start listening to things that are messages or sermons from people that might not even, that the Christians are not in the church, but they are good speakers. They are good speakers.

They are good Christians. But you know what? They've got a little bit of untruth here. And then you say, well, he's a good speaker. I like to listen to him. You know, it's okay. And I know, okay, that's it. But subtly, as you listen to it, another little untruth comes there and another little untruth comes there. Some of them you don't pick them up.

And you know what happens? All that is done is planted a seed in your mind with a little thing and that seed is going to grow. And with time, you start unbeknown deviating from the truth. That is the danger. That is the real danger that we encounter. And so that's why, Paul here in Thessalonians, let's read in verse 3.

Let no one deceive you by any means. Don't let anybody deceive you. And he was specifically addressing the issue about the day of Christ's coming. And he was saying that that day will not come unless two important things happen. Two important things happen. The falling away comes first and the man of sin is revealed. Two important things happen. The falling away is basically apostasy. Really, it's apostasy. Until before Christ's coming, he's saying there's going to be apostasy. Now, apostasy is deviation from the truth. That's what it is. You've got the truth and apostasy is deviation from the truth.

Like Mr. Neat was referring to gaslighting. Is that ever so subtle deviation from the full light and slowly making it darker? And then say, no, there's nothing wrong. Nothing has changed. Nothing has changed. Wow, haven't we heard that before? We've been in the church for a while. You know that what was happening in the early 90s. You know, there was this ever slowly changing of doctrine and the minister was saying, the minister was saying, nothing has changed.

Everything is the same. Until one day they came, well, you don't have to keep God's laws. You don't have to keep the Sabbath. And he says, hey! And then they said, no, no, no. What it is is Christ is loving and this and that. So really what it was was this liberalism. Think of it. It was this liberalism, this apostasy based on liberalism of diluting the truth. And meet on saying, nothing has changed.

You know, brethren, that's what was happening at the days of Paul and the apostles. You read Paul when he is saying goodbye to the ministry in Ephesus. I think it's run about X-20. But he is saying goodbye to the ministry in Ephesus and he is saying, beware, because some will come from among you and will deceive you. And that's what happened to the church in the early 1990s.

There is nothing new. In fact, think about it. There is duality. There is duality. What happened in the early days? It's what's happening today. There is a really duality, so apostasy. Now, what happened in the early days? I'm going to cite a quote here from a book entitled, Story of the Christian Church by Jesse Lyman Hurlbert, page 41. And it says, quote, For fifty years after St. Paul's life, a curtain hangs over the church through which we strive vainly to look.

Okay, now I'll continue citing that in a moment, but let me just interrupt you briefly. What he's saying is, as you look through history, there is a gap in time where we can't see what happened, because there's like this curtain. That we can't see those details in history. And then he says, continue, through which we strive vainly to look. And when at last it rises, so when this curtain kind of lifts up, about 18-120.

So this is from year 70, about year 120. So it's half a century, about 50 years. About 120 with the writings of the early church fathers. Which, you know, basically were the beginning roots of the Catholic Church. We find a church in many aspects very different from that in the days of St. Peter and St. Paul. So basically what we have here is, Satan in his great capabilities, kind of put a blinders over that period of history for about 50 years. And during those 50 years, the people that were living through it, there was this, let's call it, gaslighting, slowly diluting the truth.

And then at the end of 150 years, or the year 120, it already changed enough that then we see a church being different than one of the days of Peter and Paul. A false Christian church already, raising up. So, and you read scriptures like that in Revelation chapter 2, when he's talking about the letter to the church in Ephesus, and he says that some people abandoned the first love. In other words, there was an apostasy of falling away. You read, for instance, in Jude, verse 3 and 4. In Jude, verse 3 and 4. So keep your fingers there, or a marker in the psalm is going to come back to it.

But in Jude, verse 3 and 4, he says, for certain men have crept and away. Now Jude was wrote about the year 80 or 90. So it's during that period of that, we'll recall it, the age of the shadows, age of shadows. And a lot of things are shadows during that period. A lot of things.

But it says, certain men have crept in unnoticed. In other words, gaslighting. In other words, just creeping in, slowly, very subtle. Like you have these aircraft now that radar can't pick them up. I don't remember now the name of it, but it's stealth. Stealth. Stealth aircraft. Stealth. That you can't pick them up. These people are stealth. Basically like gaslighting. Suddenly, green distortions ever so subtle.

But they did. And it says, men have crept in unnoticed. Who long ago were marked out for this condemnation. Ungodly men who do what? Who turn the grace of our God into goodness. In other words, into licentiousness. In other words, God's kindness and mercy becomes an excuse of saying, oh well, you can do it. Now, God is merciful. But it does not mean you don't need to repent and you don't need to change. You need to change. I have a road with me a coin.

And you and I know that a coin has two sides. On one side, it's got a head or something like that. And the other side's got another picture. And you can't have a coin with just one side. Can you? It's got to be, it's got to have two sides.

One side, now looking at it from a public point of view, from an analogy point of view. One side is the sacrifice of Christ. It's His grace, God's grace. His mercy, His loving kindness, His forgiveness, His redemption. The blood that He gives to us freely, that justifies us freely. That's one side of the coin. Symbolized by what? The Passover, right? The Passover. Then you've got the other side of the coin, which is what? Our response that you and I need to have by saying, because Christ has done this, I now, in gratitude, I need to respond and I need to become a new man or a new woman, a new person. And I need God's Holy Spirit to help me, but I need to be different. This other side is a lemon bread. That's why they tied together. Immediately after the Passover, you've got a lemon bread. It's like two sides to a coin. So, what people were doing here, we read in June 4, is turning the grace of God into licentiousness, into lewdness. Not using the other side of the coin, which says, yes, there's God's grace. Our response must be, we need to obey God. Now, our obedience to God is not going to justify us. We're justified by the blood of Christ. But at the end of the run, at the end of the race, if we don't have both sides, we'll not be justified in the end. That's what we read in Romans 2. It's not just the leaders of the Lord, but the doers that will be justified. But we are not given that grace because of our goodness. We're given it freely, gratis, by grace, gratis, grace. But our response must be obedience. And that ties in beautifully with Passover and lemon bread. The two go hand in hand together, one and the other side of the coin. And so, these people, they turn the grace of our God into lewdness, denied only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, they deny the sacrifice that Christ has done for us and say, Oh well, I can continue sinning. It's like the example I've mentioned before, like the man in jail, that another person comes in and says, All right, you can get out, you're scot-free, you can get out, I'll stay in jail for you. Symbolic of Christ takes it for us. And now that you are free, you can go back and do things wrong and get back into jail. And the other person says, Why have I done it in vain? You deny the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what it is. So, we need to be careful. And I meant to have read verse 3 as well of Jude. And in Jude says, Beloved, While I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you, exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith that was once delivered. You know, brethren, there are many sins that are horrible. There are many sins that the Bible chastises horrible. But you know which one is kind of identified that sticks out over the others? It's the one where it says Babylon, the mother of Hollis.

Because she has made many sins drunk with... with what?

With false doctrine. And therefore many have died for that. And you read about, in Old Testament, how the Israelites, God brought them out. And he said, I've married you. And you know what you've done? You've committed adultery, spiritual adultery, of course. In other words, you, instead of being faithful and loyal to the husband that you married, God, and being faithful to God, you have been unloyal and un-fifle. You've committed spiritual adultery. And therefore I have to divorce you. You read that throughout. But it's the whole book of Isaiah is about that. The whole book of Isaiah is about that. But in the end, it says, I'll be merciful.

And you read, I think it's in Ezekiel, I think it's about chapter 36 or so. And it says, in the end, when you return back to the former state, in other words, when I resurrect you in the Second Resurrection, you will then be ashamed of yourself for what you did. But the point here is that there is a great chastisement on the false prophet, on the false church, because it made the people drunk. Drunk. And they were completely drunk. And what was that drunkenness? False doctrine. False doctrine. And the Bible is not talking about people that in the world that didn't know the truth, never knew anything, and whatever it is, and they were pagan nations or whatever it is, and they just didn't know. No, it's talking about those that knew better.

And through this so-called infiltration, every so slowly and every so slightly and slowly, through the seat of the threshold, they left the truth because they got drunk with false doctrine. And many of those people killed the saints because they would not follow the same ideas. That is something the Bible is very strong about, against it, and that's why it says, it's a mystery. It's a mystery. This Bible on the right is a mystery. And how come it's a mystery? Because it's this subtle, this stealth, faltering into the church, false doctrine. And God hates that. That is going to be destroyed. And that leader of the religion that is going to bring it in is going to be utterly destroyed in the lake of fire when Christ comes, as you know. And also, a psycho will be there and be put away as he reads that. And I don't want to go into that because that's some very interesting bits of scripture. But the point is, people deviate from the truth. Whilst we are in Jude, look at verse 19. It says, These are essential persons who cause divisions, not having God's holy Spirit.

This is powerful, brethren. This is powerful. Verse 19, These are essential people who cause divisions, not having the Spirit. People are causing divisions in the church. They've been in the church for many years. And they are faltering in these little ideas here and little ideas there and there. Be careful because the Bible says it's very serious stuff. Look at 2 John, 2 John, verse 9-11.

Well, let's start in verse 7. For many deceivers have gone out into the world who do not confess Christ is coming into flesh. And indeed, brethren, people in these churches don't understand that Christ was really a human being and He did die. He did die. The doctrine of Trinity denies that. The doctrine of Trinity denies that Christ really came into flesh.

This is a deceiver and an antichrist. The doctrine of Trinity is antichrist. Oh yeah, it's dressed up in a different way. Look to yourselves that we do not lose those things we worked for. In other words, hey, you and I, we've worked. We have for years been faithful in the church. Don't open your hand and allow to be deceived ever so subtly by the stealth of false doctrines and deviate from the truth. But then we may receive a full reward. In other words, hold on. Look at what's not. You may have never noticed this, but look at what's not. Whoever transgresses and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ. What do you mean transgresses?

What does it mean transgresses? In my Bible, it's got a little one next to it. And then on the margin says, goes ahead.

You know, transgress means goes beyond, goes ahead, goes further. So you got the doctrine of Christ. If you now add a little bit more to it and you modify it a little bit, you are transgressing. You're not abiding in the doctrine of Christ.

That is the danger. That is the danger. You are ever so slowly creating this little thing, deviating from the truth, not holding on to the faith once delivered and going in. Oh, well, you know, we need to verse because it's kind of we need to make it more pleasing now, pleasing there, or whatever. Oh, we need more of this, so we need more of that. We've got to be careful, brethren, that does not become an excuse to deviate from the truth.

That's a danger. And brethren, it happened in the days of Paul and them, and it happened for a period, many years later I was referring to it, and I believe it's happening today again. It's happening today again. Members in the Church are being affected through social media, through these ideas, through whatever, by listening to different sermons and different readings. Oh, these are very good creatures, and this and that, but they bring a little thing wrong there, and then bring two little things wrong there.

You have a little seed there, and you deviate from the truth, and at the end of all, period, you're on a different planet. Be careful. Be careful. There is, in fact, it's an interesting study or analysis to see what happened to the early Christianity, to primitive Christianity. I have an interesting book that a broader gal of me that you can do. I've studied it very, very extensively, and it's called, Primitive Christianity in a Crisis by Ellen Knight.

And it is really an interesting book, because it goes into a lot of factual and Biblical stuff. How this stealth teaching came into the Church, and one thing it says, which is very interesting, it says it comes into waves. It comes into waves. Now, this is interesting. This is just history, and basically, the first wave was Gnostic Christianity.

I'll just label it simply as libertarian. This is what happened in the 1995 libertarian Gnostic Christianity. Well, we now understand a little bit more about Jesus. We're now going beyond, transgressing the doctrine of Christ. We are now, and we just understand this bit more, and you don't have to keep the Sabbath. And, you know, you don't even have the time. You can keep it even more.

You know, if you've been there, you'll remember what I said. I'm not fabricating. You know, you'll remember. That happened. So, that is the first wave. Now, you look at that wave, it continued, as you know, that was in the days of Paul. And we read about the days of Jude, which was like 40 or so years later than Paul. And then, even John wrote his epistle, first and second John, that we talked about, which is like in the year 90, saying, you transgress, you're going beyond what the basic doctrine of Christ is. But there is a second wave.

And you think about it. The first wave, I'm labeling it just as libertarian. The second wave is after authoritarian. Did you know what happened? When the Catholic Church got established after the Council of Nisaya in 325, they imposed by law that people had to keep Sunday. And people had to keep the Passover on Sunday, which we today call Easter. That was authoritarian. So, the first wave is libertarian. Well, it's kind of this, as we heard in the sermon, this gaslighting type of approach.

Later on comes the wave that says, you will do this! Or else, you kill. And whatever, that's going to happen. When the East Power and the false prophet get into power, that's what they will do, authoritarian. So, it is very interesting. I mean, as I said, this is explained in this book. It's historical. It's just interesting to look at those waves initially, what happened. And it is prophetic, because going back to 2 Thessalonians, it says in verse 3, Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day Christ coming will not come until the falling away comes first.

And we've seen it's by stealth, by deception, but then that falling away will come further imposed by the man of sin, which is revealed. Because when that false prophet is revealed, that will be imposed by a second wave of authoritarian. You will do it, or else. And you can see, they will have the means of controlling people, because those means of controlling people seem to be, today, being established in the very least. Not saying that those means of controlling people are the mock of the beast.

No. Mock of the beast is the sublegiance to God, and most specifically to God's commandments, and most specifically the Sabbath, which is measurable and noticeable and identifiable, and God's only days. Just like in the castle in the Seyid, they did for Sunday and Passover. So, that is the mock of the beast. The technology they will use to implement it, that's a different story.

That's not the mock of the beast. It's simply the ways and means to achieve an end. But the mock of the beast is breaking God's laws. That's what it is. It's breaking God's laws. And so it says, and a man of sin is revealed. Revealed means uncovered. Again, duality. Because the Catholic Church came out to exist in 325 A.D. and that then imposed that authoritarian. And UNI is a well-documented historical fact that many Christians died because they were keeping the Sabbath.

And by the way, brethren, that hasn't gone away. That still exists today in some countries more than others. But all you need is to remove the Constitution of the United States to say, well, you don't have that protection. What do you think will happen next? Forcing people to not obey God.

Because that says, the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition. That is the one that is going to bring desolation and destruction. And by saying why? Because of religious deception. Religious deception. In other words, spiritual adultery. And this one in verse 4, it says, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped. Now, UNI know that you may know or may not know, but the Pope calls himself the Vicar of Christ. And the Vicar means the one that is represented of Christ. And what it says here, it doesn't say that he represents God or Christ. It says, he opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God.

In other words, he won't just be the Vicar, but he will say, I am God. And you know what? Because of miracles, because of miracles that will happen, people believe it. Mankind will flock like him. Like him. Completely. You know, it will just completely be taken. He says that he is called God or that he is worshipped. So that he sits. He sits as God in the temple of God. Some people say, well, that means therefore there is going to have to be a temple of God. But you could read it there. He sits as God sits in the temple of God.

So he will sit in an area and he will be kind of make himself, I am God, so I am sitting here like God, sitting in the temple of God. So that could also be it. Whatever it will be, we will see as time gets near to him. But the point is there is this deceiver that will come showing himself that he is God. Not the Vicar of God, that he is God. This is very, very dangerous. And we see very scriptures in Daniel and others giving you certain bits of information, which I am not going to go into now.

But it is interesting to see that. So we will move on in verse 5. Do you not remember that when I was still with you, I told you these things? Paul had warned them about this.

And you know, the Church of God has been warning us about this for many years. But you know what? Many, many, many in the Church of God are going to be deceived. Unless, if it were possible, we deceived the very elect. So there will be some, there will be the very elect that will not be deceived. But it does talk that a number will be deceived. We've got to be careful. We really have to keep our eyes open and be close to God. And verse 6, and now you know what is restraining that He may be revealed in His own time. What is restraining?

This Satan wants this to happen. But he can't do it. And he can't release until God says, okay, he can do it. So God will probably have some angels, quibitins, stopping. But there will be a time when, as you know, you read Revelation 12, when Michael will stand up and will throw Satan out. Now he knows he's got a short time, and then he gets to the earth. If he's mad as anything, it appears to be, maybe, possibly that time, when that is restraining him. No more restraining. And then he will just let loose. And brethren, if he is not letting loose now, and look at what's happening, imagine when he lets loose. Imagine when he lets loose. So we better be close to God. We better be close to God. In verse 8, he says, And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth, and destroy with the brightness of his coming. That lawless one, that man of sin, that false prophet, will be revealed.

Whom the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth. Which means, when Christ comes, you will destroy, and you read that in Revelation, right at the end, I think it's about Revelation 19, where he will be thrown into the lake of fire. The beast and the false prophet, as Christ's coming, will be thrown into the lake of fire. They will be destroyed with fire. Verse 9, The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteousness, deception. Brethren, this false prophet is going to have all the power of Satan to make miracles that you and I will say, wow. You and I will say, wow. Imagine people that don't know the truth. They'll say, this guy is gone. This guy is gone. It will be an enormous deception that will happen into the world amongst those who perish because they did not receive the love of the truth. Because they did not hold on to the faith once delivered. Particularly Paul is talking out to Christians and saying, be careful. Hold fast. Hold on to the truth. The things that you've known all along. Don't let it go.

They do not receive the love of the truth that they may be saved. What is truth? That word is truth. John 17. God's word is truth. And you know, for instance, when Satan attacked Christ, he even used Scripture. But Christ always pointed him to other Scripture.

Remember about putting on the whole armor of God? The very first one that he talks about is putting on the shield. The first piece of armor is the truth. Put on the truth. Put on the truth. The helmet of... not quite remember now, but anyways. Put on and we've got to be steadfast in the truth. We really have to be steadfast in the truth. If we are not steadfast in the truth, we are going to be deceived. We really have to hold on to it.

And look now at reading in verse 11. And for this reason, God will send them strong delusion that they should believe the lie. What is the lie? Anything that is against God's way, God's truth. For instance, oh well, there's no man, no woman who can go into any restroom or whatever it is, you know. That is a lie! And people believe in the lie, as an example, and there's many others. So they'll believe lies, whatever lie you'll come up with at that time. Verse 12, that they all may be condemned who do not believe the truth, but add pleasure in unrighteousness.

So there is something about a breaking of truth which is complete, complete, unrighteous.

That's why it kind of sticks in my mind as one of the possibilities, this idea that is today, you know, you can be whatever you think you are, you know, to meet the lie. And that is unrighteousness, and people that do that, they have pleasure in that unrighteousness. They have demonstrations for that unrighteousness. They really go very strong about that unrighteousness. So which one will be? I don't know, but there will be a big unrighteousness in the world. So we're going to be hold on to the truth. And then go on in verse 13, he says, But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you. We are bound to thank God for you, brethren, beloved by the Lord, because God from the beginning chose you for salvation. Or people that say, oh, you see, this prayer is the nation.

Brethren, God chose mankind from the beginning to be sons and daughters of God. God chose everyone to salvation.

Everyone. The brethren, the friends, the family that are not in the church today, God wants them to repent and to be saved. Okay, God is not calling them yet. God's mind is greater than mine and yours. He knows when is the right time to call them. When is the better time for them to call them? And you will call them. He has predestined everyone to salvation. He chose us, mankind, to salvation.

How? Through the sanctification by the Spirit. So, now we have. Christ died for us.

Obviously, God calls us the Father. Then, we accept Christ's sacrifice. We then recognize that. And when we see that he died and he paid for us freely, the other side of the coin, we realize now we now got to obey God.

But as we now realize we got to obey God, we also realize we can't do it by ourselves. You can't do it by yourself. I can't do it by myself. I need God's help. I need God's power. I need God's strength. I need God's help. And so, the next holiday is Pentecost. As we heard in a sermon a couple of weeks ago, counting 50 to Pentecost. So, the next holiday is Pentecost, which means the giving of God's Holy Spirit. What does God's Holy Spirit do to us? It gives us the power to be what? Science. In other words, to be different, to be a new man and a new woman, to be, to change from the old man to the new man. And that is sanctification. The sanctification. And that's why there's a three. There's the Father calls us. It's God's Holy, Jesus Christ that pays for us, sins, redeems for us. He's our advocate. He's our high priest. He's the soon coming King. And then there's God's Holy Spirit that is that power that helps us as we want to do our part that helps us to actually be sanctified so we can actually be part of that family. So, the three are many times mentioned together in the Bible. It does not mean it's a trinity. It just means that the Father works with the Son and they use their power to help us to become peace. And glorify the children of God like a resurrection. In other words, sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth. Yeah, we've got to believe the truth and we better do it. To which he called you by our Gospel. You and I are being called. We've been called to understand this truth by the Gospel of the Kingdom of God that is being preached. For what purpose? So that you and I may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Do we read this correctly? That you and I may obtain the glory of Jesus Christ.

That means that we're going to have the glory of Christ. That means, obviously, that we're going to have the same type of being, the same type of person that we are. We need to be like Christ. We need to imitate Christ. And if we suffer like he did, we will glorify like he did. That's what it is all about. So God decided to call us. We have to respond. That's why many are called, but few are chosen. Why? Because few respond. And then, as we respond, we've got to put it to practice. And we've got to be living that way. We've got to use the tool, the spiritual tool, the spiritual power that God has given us to fulfill what he wants us to be. In other words, we have to use God's Holy Spirit. That is such a wonderful meaning that God has given to us.

Therefore, verse 15, therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold to the conditions. Brethren, there's nothing wrong with traditions provided they're the right traditions. We provide the God's traditions and not man's religion. Stand fast and hold to the traditions which you were taught.

Brethren, there's no new truth. It's the same truth. We just need to understand it more clearly, more in depth. We need to live it, we need to practice it, and as we live it and as we practice it, it then becomes clearer in our minds, becomes more in focus, we become more in power. We understand better. So we hold to the truths which you were taught, whether by word or by whistle. Now, may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and our God and Father who has loved us and given us everlasting consolation and good hope by grace comfort you and establish you in every good work and work. Brethren, we need to remain faithful to Him. There's nothing new, but we just have to hold on. That's why it says many are called, but you are chosen, but those that will be called Christ are called, chosen, and faithful. Hold on to the truth, brethren, because the ride is about to start. It's not going to be a nice ride. Fasten your seat belts and hold on to the truth, because it's going to be right.

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Jorge and his wife Kathy serve the Dallas, Fort Worth (TX) and the Lawton (OK) congregations. Jorge was born in Portuguese East Africa, now Mozambique, and also lived and served the Church in South Africa. He is also responsible for God’s Work in the Portuguese language, and has been visiting Portugal, Brazil and Angola at least once a year. Kathy was born in Pennsylvania and also served for a number of years in South Africa. They are the proud parents of five children, with 12 grandchildren and live in Allen, north of Dallas (TX).