in the church Bible. I was tempted to preach on baptism, but we had an excellent sermon by Pastor Tony last week on baptism, so I thought I would go back to my sermon series through 2nd. Peter. We're talking here about false teachers. Peter had been writing about false teachers at the beginning of this chapter, and we're getting down now to Peter's explanation about how dangerous spiritual false teachers are. This is God's Word, 2 Peter 2, verse 10, second half of the verse. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones, whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction, suffering wrong as the wage for their wrongdoing, They count it pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions while they feast with you. They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed, accursed children. Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing, but was rebuked for his own transgression, a speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet's madness." This is how we read from God's eternal word. This book of 2 Peter is about knowing Jesus Christ. And this chapter, as I've said, is about imposters, fake teachers, false teachers, those who present themselves as if they'll teach you how to know Christ, but they themselves don't even know Christ. And how do we get to know Christ and the truth of God? It's not through people who don't even know Jesus Christ. not through teachers who don't know the truth of God. And that is so silly to think that we could come to know God through people who don't know God, come to know Christ through people who don't know Christ, that Peter decided to refer here to the account from the Old Testament of that donkey that spoke in order to make his point. We cannot get to know God through false teachers, is Peter's main point. In fact, to put it very strongly, I have this as the main point of my sermon. We are more likely to get to know God's truth through a donkey speaking than through a false pastor. What are the wrongs and dangers surrounding false pastors? Number one, dishonoring the Lord without the wisdom to tremble. Number two, wrong in heart desires and actions and suffering for it. Number three, on such a bad path that they miss what even a donkey knows. So number one, what are the dangers of false pastors or false prophets? Dishonoring to the Lord without the wisdom to tremble. Here we read verse 10b again. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones, whereas angels, though greater in power and might, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. So what Peter's saying here is false teachers are foolishly bold. in daring and in a presumptuous manner to speak. They are stubborn and self-confident enough to do whatever pleases them. No one says no to them. No one stops them. There's no rules. There's no limits. What problems does this cause? Well, they're not afraid of slandering others. Who are they slandering? If you look at verse 10, the glorious ones. What does that mean? Well, they're slandering angels. Or it could mean that they're slandering God's faithful preachers on earth who are speaking his gospel. Either way, they're speaking against the Lord's messengers, whether it's angelic messengers or human messengers, the glorious ones, if you put it that way. And therefore, they are audaciously speaking against the Lord himself. The word used by Peter here is blaspheme. Blaspheme is to speak against God, to speak injuriously, to insult or to defame, to speak evil about. And then in verse 11, Peter continues by drawing a contrast here between the trembling of the good angels on the one hand and the failure of the trembling of the bad angels on the other hand. So there's angels that tremble and angels that don't. And so he's drawing that contrast. So try to follow this. On the one hand, fallen angels are bold enough to blaspheme others. And on the other hand, the good angels are greater in might and power, but they would not dare to speak with such foolish boldness. And the good angels do not take it upon themselves to pronounce blasphemous judgment against the bad angels and against the false teachers before the Lord. Why? Because they're cautious enough to leave it to the Lord and to the Lord himself and to the Lord alone to determine who gets a pronunciation of a blasphemy against them and how and when to judge that blasphemy. In other words, if you've lost in everything I just said, it's really simple. The false teachers take the place of God. the highest of bold moves and they don't tremble to do so. They're glad to speak on behalf of God as if they're God. Wouldn't you tremble to want to speak on behalf of God and pronounce God's judgment on someone else? That's one of the reasons we don't swear. We don't say things like, God's damnation be upon you. That's taking the place of God. How dare we say such a thing, right? Because the submissive angels always remember this, that only God is in the place of God. That sounds simple, but break it down. Only God accuses. Only God renders verdict. Only God gives final judgment. We all stand before the ultimate evaluation of God. And so the good angels always remember that. They don't overstep that. Whereas the false angels and the false teachers do overstep that. And that's a fundamental difference that Peter's pointing out for us. So I've explained enough. I hope you caught it there. But God's angels, his faithful angels, carefully avoid raising accusations against Satan and his demons. You think, well, they're the good guys, right? They're on the good side. Go ahead and let Satan have it. Blast them. But that's not what they ever say. Consider Zechariah 3, verse 2. And then we pick this up in Jude, where the archangel Michael, if there's anyone who could just say, blasted things against the devil, you'd think it would be the archangel Michael. But listen, in Jude verse 9, when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, Michael did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, the Lord rebuke you. Now I'll explain this. That was Jude, verse 9. Because it's right along with Peter's point here. 2 Peter and the book of Jude are very similar. So the great and upright angel, Michael, was disputing with the devil about Moses' body. Why would that be? You remember, the devil's probably building a case because, A, Moses killed a man. Okay, that's a problem. And B, because the bodies of murderers are under the jurisdiction of Satan, you would think, right? So therefore the body of Moses should belong to me, would say Satan. You see how the argument would go. There's a contention happening between Satan and the great Archangel Michael. Meanwhile, the Archangel Michael knew that A, because Jesus' death and resurrection, God had forgiven Moses for killing a man, and B, that therefore the body of Moses belongs to heaven, but the Archangel Michael did not take it upon himself to rebuke Satan in that case. That's the difference. The angel Michael did not say to Satan, I rebuke you. How dare you say such a thing? There's nothing like that coming out of Michael. Instead, the angel Michael says to Satan, the Lord rebuke you. I want you to see the self-restraint that's there. that's missing in false teachers. That's a fundamental sign for false teachers that Peter's helping us to see. It was not Michael's place to pronounce a judgment on the devil. Whose place is it if it's not Michael? It's God's and God's alone. Likewise, it's not our place to pronounce judgment on false teachers, it's God's place alone. But false teachers pronounce judgments on other people, and you see them overstepping. Just as the angel Michael must leave the matter of judging the devil in the hands of God, so we also must leave the matter of judging false teachers in the hands of God. We have to defend the Christian faith. We can point out and expose false teaching, But we don't actually rebuke the person of the false teachers, false pastors. Just because false pastors dishonor God doesn't mean we can allow ourselves to dishonor God in our response to them. Which brings us to our second point. What have we seen dishonoring the Lord without the wisdom to tremble? And now we're moving on to number two. wrong in heart desires and in actions and suffering for it. Listen to his argumentation in this set of verses 12 through 14. It just means they don't know. Wow. That's pretty strong language from the Apostle Peter for false teachers, right? We say, oh yeah, everybody should just have a right to believe what they want to believe and publish what they want to publish and people say what they want to say. We're very accommodating. We're very open. We're very forgiving, aren't we, as modern, genteel, Christian people. But maybe we ought to consider what the Apostles had as their stance toward false teachers and how strong it was. Not that we go so far as the error from point one and pronounce God's judgment on them, but we need to be clear about what we're saying about false teachers. Here, Peter's again describing false teachers as heretics. He compares them to animals. These false teachers claim to have knowledge of Christ, but they don't. They teach without knowledge of Christ. They want to claim moral high road and tell us what's right and wrong and tell us what's dirty and clean, but they don't even know God. In verse 12, we're told the false teachers speak against God because they are like animals. They live their lives against God. Their behavior is like animals. They're destroyed because of their lack of faith in God, lack of knowledge of God, the way they're speaking against God, the way they're living their lives against Him, like irrational animals. All he means by this is they don't have the ability to think. like humans do. The ration, the rationing, reasoning capacity of the minds of men and women is what he's referring to as over against animals who just follow instinct. And verse 13 tells us that they are already suffering for their wrong desires and wrong actions. Why? Because we live in a world created by God and upheld by God and you get what you do, right? You reap what you sow. If you kick the wall, You could try it later. If you kick the wall, your toes will hurt. If you plant tomatoes, you get tomatoes, not asparagus. You live in a world where God has set things up the way that they're supposed to be. You paint the wall, it ends up the color that you painted it. You work for a year, you get a year's wages. In God's world, we get what we get. You get what you deserve for the actions we take. So what about these false teachers? They're living in God's world and they're railing against God. They're teaching wrong things. They're living wrong. When are they going to suffer for their wrongdoing? Peter's addressing that here in verse 13. They're dirty, they're doing dirty things. Verse 13 tells us they count it pleasure to revel in the daytime. To revel is to wrongly and openly indulge in something against God's rules, such as intemperate feasting, intemperate drinking, or carousing, and you know exactly what I mean. And Peter went on to call them blots and blemishes. It's a reference to immoral people who are attached to the godly community. They want to keep saying that they're spiritual teachers. They want to keep saying that they're representing Christianity. And they want to attach themselves to the religious community, and yet they behave in ways that are blots and blemishes, constant scandals. They say they're Christians, but they just bring shame and disgrace on the movement of Christianity. The word blemish is a word to refer the marring of a group of people. It's done by false teachers. They have deceitful pleasure or evil fun. They waste resources on themselves with elaborate feasting. They pursue personal pleasure, call it love, but it's not love. Peter says it's lust. These false teachers are among and mixed in with the people of God. They want to be called Christians. In the Christian movement, they're always talking about the Bible. Peter wrote to his audience in verse 13 that these false teachers are feasting with you. That means you look up at your fellowship meal and they're right there. They're right in the mix with the church that Peter's writing to. And in verse 14, they have eyes full of adultery. Insatiable, which means you can't get enough. Never satisfied, never full, never done. Constantly on the lookout for adulterous partners. We know that they set out to harm other people because Peter wrote, It means they lead others astray. Entice is the word for bait. You know, you put bait on the end of the hook when you go fishing. They draw people towards themselves. They entice or bait people. They lure people down a wrong pathway. In addition, they have another problem. A problem with an intense desire for money. They keep wanting more of it. More and more of it. And we have a word for that. Greed. They have greed at the core of their being. They have a steady disposition to have more than their share. We can call them hogs. They have a strong desire to acquire more, irrespective of their own need. And in their very hearts, they're trained in greed. Look at the phrase Peter uses here. Their hearts are trained in greed. The word train is to exercise, you know, to go to the gym and work out and to run and to use the machines. Gymnazo is the Greek word from which we get our word gymnasium. To exercise with discipline. They are training themselves intentionally to become more greedy in their own hearts. That is what we're dealing with, says Peter. To control themselves in a way to become more greedy. And so here's Peter's summary statement at the end of this amazing set of verses. End of verse 14. They are accursed children. Wow. That's pretty strong language that Peter's writing against the false teachers. And listen to the confronting words of our Lord Jesus. John 10, 10. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep." So you see the divide? The difference that Peter's drawing? One is Christ-like, like Jesus the Good Shepherd laying down his life for us, and the other is insatiable, hurting people, constantly out for your own pleasure, never get enough adultery, never get enough money. You see the divide, the difference? You ought to be able to spot a false teacher, says Peter, if you're looking for these things. So they're wrong in heart desires and actions and they suffer for it. Point two. Moving on to number three. On such a bad path, they miss what even a donkey knows. I know you were waiting for this. Verses 15 and 16, "...forsaking the right way, they've gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing, but was rebuked for his own transgression. A speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet's madness." Now understand the scene. The false teachers have, they used to follow the straight path. Back in verse 15, it says, "...forsaking the right way, they've gone astray." They've gone astray. They've begun to wander. They veered off into darkness. They forsook the right way and instead chose a path that leads to destruction. That's the scene. That's what's happening. And then in verse 16, Peter brings up this picture that it reminds him of. This is the authoritative word of God. So it's not just Peter's thought. It's also carried along by the Holy Spirit. We know this is authorized. Comparison. In verse 16, there's a picture of that Old Testament speaking donkey. Remember the story? It's contained in Numbers chapter 22. God's prophet Balaam was veering off to a bad path. The prophet Balaam wanted to curse the people of God to get a big paycheck for it. But through the power of the Spirit of God, Balaam was instead forced to bless the people of God. But why did Peter bring up the donkey story here? Because the similarity is clear with the false teachers. The false teachers of Peter's day were trying to lure the believers into immorality and greed. The New Testament false prophets loved the way of wickedness, just like that Old Testament prophet Balaam did. Balaam loved money. We have a word for that. It's greed. It's the same kind of characteristics that we'll see in false teachers. They'll use their position as a spiritual teacher to make money. You see? Does that sound familiar at all? Use their position as a spiritual teacher to make money. Balaam did it in the Old Testament. The false teachers did it in the New Testament. This is not a new problem for Christians today, okay? Balaam loved money instead of God. He loved money instead of the people of God. He was willing to say a curse on the people of God to get money. Is that loving the people of God? And the same for the false teachers. They're willing to teach false things to make money and to get pleasure and power. Balaam is the perfect example. He wrote that these false teachers were following the bad way of Balaam. Remember how we learned from verse nine of this chapter that the Lord knows how to rescue us from trials? Consider how the Lord sent a rescue for ancient Balaam on his bad pathway, and that's where the donkey comes up, right? The Lord used the donkey of Balaam to rebuke Balaam. It's basically a funny story with a mocking point from God to Balaam. He's mocking him because he's saying, even a donkey knows when to stop. Even a donkey knows you're on the bad, wrong path. And if you don't understand this, I'm gonna have the donkey tell you. In human words, I'm gonna give that donkey the ability to speak, and the donkey's gonna tell you what you really ought to know by now. You're being that much of a blockhead, like my mom used to say, that you don't get it, right? Going down the wrong path. False teachers are more stubborn than a donkey, more blind and set in their ways than an animal. And even when God gave the donkey the ability to speak, which really happened, Still, the prophet Balaam did not realize the danger of the path he was on. And do you remember what happened then? Do you remember the rest of the story? This is surely what Peter has in mind as he references this. That God was even more merciful to the prophet Balaam because of what happened next. God opened Balaam's eyes so that he saw the angel of the Lord standing with a sword on that pathway, ready to kill Balaam if he proceeded. That's how you know it's a bad pathway. So why did Peter bring up this account? He compares the insensitivity of Balaam to the insensitivity of the false prophets. It shows that Balaam kept going on a path blindly just like heretics today do. And it showed God intervened to restrain Balaam and to rescue his people from Balaam's attempt at cursing them. And it gave us comfort with a reminder of God's protection. Ultimately we are comforted because God will protect us from false teachers and false pastors by giving us his word and spirit and servants who serve him. What have we seen today? We're more likely to know God's truth through a donkey speaking than through false teachers, false spiritual teachers today. What are the dangers? They dishonor God without wisdom to tremble. When you tremble before God. Number two, they're wrong in heart and desires and actions and they suffer for it. And number three, we saw that on such a bad path, they miss the obvious. What even a donkey knows, that this is not the right path. It's a path of danger and death. Okay, I have three concluding lessons for you from this complicated passage. Number one, stay within the limits God has set for us. Leave the matter of judging false teachers in God's hands. Chances are, if you're anything like me, you hear about false teachers and how they hurt people and people get fooled and people give all of their money to these people. It makes you really mad. I'm tempted to come up here and say something about them by name and so on. Stay within the limits God has set for us. Don't rebuke them. Let the Lord rebuke them. Don't slander them. Don't pronounce judgment on them. Now we have to answer them. And the best way we do that is preach the gospel. Preach the gospel of grace. Preach Christ was dead and he's alive. Right? The death and resurrection of Christ. We can also state explicitly what they're teaching and what that means and the path that it's on. the logical conclusions. We have to defend Christian truth in a state where they're dirty in their lives, where the Bible is clean and healthy and commands us to be so and gives us the grace to do so. Expose their beliefs and their dirty lifestyles. We can do a lot of stuff. However, we can't take the place of God and declare what therefore must be done to them. That's not our place at all. It's not our place for God to decide, for God to pronounce, for God to do. If it's true for our words, how much more for our actions? You'd hold the door for them. You could show kindness to them, bring them a cup of cold water. There's no reason we not kick them in the shins or something worse, right? We're not to take actions to hurt people just because they hurt God's people. You must not even speak slander against them. You have to be careful what you say and what you don't say. Boy, we need some of that, right? We're not quiet about it, but remember God's place is to judge, God's place is to pronounce judgment. 1 John 4, 4, greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world. Christ is in us by his spirit and he's greater than the devil, but don't be emboldened falsely to conclude that you are greater than the devil. Be careful. It says, greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world. And so we're relying on the spirit of Christ to keep our place. Stay within the limits God has set for us is application number one. Application number two, be careful of false moral leaders. Be careful of false moral leaders. We have people rising up in our culture today, telling us what's right and wrong, telling us what things we ought to stand behind, what things we ought to represent, right? Moral leaders, they want to tell us what's dirty, what's clean. But the ones who are not following God, spiritually, Peter says, are like animals enticing unsteady souls. Spiritually, they're wolves eating up sheep. Be careful, because they'll hurt you. How could you avoid becoming one of their victims? Well, let's be honest. There's a part of you in your sinful nature that wants what they're offering. James 1.14, each person is tempted when he's lured and enticed by his own desires. The false teachers appeal to your desire for personal pleasure. You like pleasure, don't you? I won't ask for a show of hands, but I think you like pleasure, right? It's in us. The false moral leaders also appeal to your desire to rebel against authority. You want to get over on the authority, don't you? You don't always want to obey. That's in our sinful nature. And you like money? I won't ask for a show of hands. You like money? They also appeal to your desire for money, because if they get rich, they can offer you to be rich, right? It seems attractive to cover up your problems with deception, cover up your problems with money, cover up your problems with pleasure. You don't have to face the problems, you don't have to incur the cost. The false teachers even call out to your animal appetites, don't fall for it, because you're not an animal. You're a human made in the image of God, and on top of that, you're a child of God, redeemed by his blood. You belong to Christ, and you have his spirit within you, his Holy Spirit in you, and you ought not to respond with just animal instinct. You have a mind, as well as you have a body. And Paul, as we've learned all along in our study of 1 and 2 Peter, Paul supports what Peter's writing, because the apostles all agree. Listen to Paul on this topic, 1 Thessalonians 4, verse 3, this is the will of God, your sanctification. that you abstain from sexual immorality, that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God. Somehow, false teachers present their ideas in a way that seems pure, but you know what's pure. because the Spirit is in you and the Word is in front of you. By the Spirit and the Word, you know what's pure. So be careful of false moral teachers. That was number two. The last one, number three. Keep on walking as one who knows Christ and hears His voice. There's a lot of false teachers out there. Everything from QAnon to the fancy guy in Texas. There's a lot of false teachers on the internet. Publications. You get a lot of voices coming at you. In John 10, four, the sheep follow Christ for they know his voice. You're a sheep of Christ, you know his voice? What does Christ say to you about your life? What does he say about your other voices calling out to you? Is the path of false teachers really a bad path? Yes. Did the donkey really speak? Yes. That's how serious God says this matter is. And that's why Peter brought it up. Did the whale really swallow Jonah and spit him up again? Yes. This Bible tells some crazy things and they really happened. Did Jesus really rise again from the dead? Yes, he did. In 1 Corinthians 15, 14, Peter builds a case on how important the resurrection is. The most important miracle is a resurrection. If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain and our faith is in vain. But he goes on to say in verse 20, 1 Corinthians 15, 20, in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first roots of those who have fallen asleep. And he goes on to say in verse 32, 1 Corinthians 15, 32, if the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Do not be deceived. Bad company corrupts good morals. What he's saying is, because Christ rose from the dead, we know all of this is true. And therefore, the donkey really spoke, and the whale really swallowed a prophet, These things are for real. When the voices of false teachers surround you, keep on walking as one who knows Christ, risen from the dead, and hears his voice." So the things that we've seen, stay within the limits God has set for us, be careful of false moral leaders, and keep on walking as one who knows Christ and hears his voice. Let's pray. Lord, give us ears to hear the voice of Christ in the midst of all the other voices, and to follow you in faith and obedience. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.