When Wickedness Reaches Full Potential

One of the greatest problems in the church is a wholesale turning away from the ways of holiness and righteousness. There is a tendency to leave the ways of God that have been passed down from the time of the early church. Today's church has been deluded and deceived into believing that "anything goes." Our fear of God's judgment for sin has been dulled by teachings on self-esteem, man centered worship, and social gatherings in the name of Christ. We have compromised our convictions for holiness and lowered our standards of righteousness before God so that we might be more acceptable to man.

We have taken the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians 9:22, "I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some," and have interpreted them to mean that we should become like everyone else to be accepted, so that we can reach them for Jesus. We have taken those words of Paul and used them for an excuse to become a church that has no power, no testimony, and very little ability to see the hearts of people changed through the power of Christ.

That statement by Paul does not mean that we are to see just how far into the world we can go, or how much we can become like the world, and still call ourselves Christian. Nor does it mean that we can get so close to being like the world that we are walking a tight-rope between godliness and ungodliness.

What Paul's statement does mean is that we must pray and seek the face of God to know how far from the world we can get and how much different we can become from the world and still be able to call out to the sinner so that he will hear us. We are to lift the sinner out of the miry clay of sin and call him to a higher level of righteousness in Christ. If our life is no different than his, then why would he need to be delivered from what he is doing right now?

We are to raise the standards of holiness and righteousness so that sinners will see a better way and seek Christ. That is why God calls us to come out of the world and be separate from the world. We are to be different; not the same as everyone else. God calls us to live by His standards of righteousness, not to lower them to the level of the world. He calls us to be more committed to Him and more like Him every day, so that others will be drawn to Him.

Proverbs 16:25 says, "There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." That is the lies and deceitful doctrines of the false teachers. What they teach often sounds good and even seems right, but it is not. False teaching leads us away from God, not toward Him. Such doctrine is "is the way of death."

When wickedness reaches its full potential, false teachers are exposed. Their true character shows up and their disregard for everything upright appears. Timothy says simply, "From such withdraw yourself" (1 Tim. 6:5b). In other words, simply walk away. Don't argue with them; simply avoid them. Amen.