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Upland Indonesian SDA Church

Eric Walsh: Road Map to Heaven

Eric Walsh

God’s Word as our Guiding Light

Staying on the Path to a Healthy Lifestyle

The Road Less Traveled

How to Avoid Pit Falls

Beware of Hitchhikers

Focusing on the Finish Line

Sex Lies and the Fight for Purity

Father God, we thank you for this opportunity to worship you.

And Lord, now we ask as we open your Holy Scripture, that Lord, you would speak to our heart.

Feed us with the bread of life, so that Father God, we would not leave this place the same way that we came.

Turn with me in your Bibles to the book of 2nd Timothy.

We begin our sermon this morning with an older gentleman in a prison.

At the bottom of a Roman dungeon laid an old man.

Roman soldiers came running down the stairs 1 day and grabbed this old man from where he was laying dungeon.

They took him and dragged him out into the streets and brought him to the central building in Rome.

When they got there, there was a crowd of dignitaries waiting.

This old man was the Apostle Paul and he was told by the soldiers that Nero wanted him to denounce Jesus and if he did not denounce Jesus he would be put to death.

Ellen White tells us that Paul was led to a podium and as he stood before this waiting congregation his life was literally on the line but Paul did not denounce Jesus that day instead Paul preached 1 of his most powerful sermons.

So much so that even some of the soldiers believed on Jesus Christ and some of the dignitaries went back to their corner of the Empire believing in Jesus.

Paul was dragged back to that dungeon and I can see them throwing him to the floor and asking him if he had 1 final request before they put him to death.

The beaten, weakened old man did not ask for pleasures or for privilege But instead the Apostle Paul asked for something to write on and to write with.

And Paul wrote the last book of the Bible he would write, the book of 2nd Timothy.

This book is important because our message this morning is entitled, Focusing on the Finish Line.

And on a day where we are recognizing our youth, this book also gives Paul's last lessons to young Timothy, Lessons that are given to us as the last generation.

So in the book of 2nd Timothy in the first chapter Paul begins by thanking God.

Even in his difficult situation Paul again praises God.

In verse 5, he speaks directly to Timothy.

And he says, When I call to remembrance the unfamed faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, I am persuaded that is in you also the first lesson to young people that Paul would want to give is that you not squander the legacy of faith that your family has given you we have a legacy of faith a heritage of holiness But so many of our young people are quick to squander the blessings given them being raised in a Christian home.

Paul says that the faith of your grandmother and your mother has been found in you, Timothy.

And I challenge young people to respect that they have been raised in a house where the spirit of God is present.

I have 1 of my friends that I had dinner with late 1 night after we went to a college football game.

This was a young man who was raised with us in the Adventist church in Miami.

My cousin was playing on the team, and we went to the game.

And afterwards, we left to go and have something to eat.

As my friend was sitting across from me, he told me that on Tuesday he had to turn himself in to the federal penitentiary in Miami.

What have you done that would cause you to have to be to spend time in federal prison?

He began to tell me the story that when I had left to go to Adventist College, he had begun to sell drugs in Miami.

He was not very good, honestly, at selling drugs and told me stories of his being robbed at gunpoint and finally caught on the I-95 by helicopters and SWAT team and caught to be sent to prison.

The police got him and he knew that he was in trouble because in his car he had 40 kilograms of cocaine and I said to him what would make you drive in your car with 40 kilograms of cocaine?

We had been both raised at the same church and I knew his parents loved the Lord, but he had gotten caught up in the things of the world and was more concerned with what he owned and what he had than with knowing Jesus.

That Tuesday, he was having to pay because he decided to follow the world rather than respect the legacy of faith that his parents had given him.

I want to let the young people know that true happiness and joy is not found in the things of the world, but is found in knowing Jesus.

So young people, do not squander your legacy of faith.

Paul then says to Timothy in verse 7, for God has not given us the spirit of fear but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

Faith and fear cannot exist in the same place.

The Christian does not go through life fearful.

Instead, the Christian is filled with God and has love and power.

1 of the main things I see patients for is fear.

We live in a time when people are anxious and afraid of many things.

And they want doctors to write them medicines to turn away their fears, or to turn off their fears.

But the correct treatment for fear on earth is having a relationship with Jesus Christ, because when he fills you, the fear will disappear.

Paul is saying to us in these last days that we ought not be fearful of what is to come on earth.

We should not be afraid that war will come, not afraid that persecution will come, but we must be confident in the power of the God that we serve.

So Christian don't be afraid, but instead trust in God and have faith.

Chapter 2 Paul turns to us, the last generation possibly of young people, and in chapter 2 and verse 3 Paul says, Thou therefore endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.

Entangleth himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who have chosen him to be a soldier.

I want to submit to you that you have not joined church simply for social reasons.

But when we become members of a church and become a part of the family of God, we are called to be soldiers in the army of God, which means then that we are now to go to battle in the name of Jesus against the world and that we are called as Paul says to endure hardness and just like many brave young Americans have gone to Iraq and Afghanistan and given up their lives at home risking their lives and their health If these young people will go to serve their country like this, how much more should those who serve God be willing to give up everything in order to serve him?

But the church functions, if we are soldiers, as the barracks.

This is where soldiers come to be strengthened.

Yet it seems sometimes that there's more fighting in here than out there.

It seems as if we are sometimes more willing to be soldiers against each other than with each other.

But understand that we are each other's keeper as soldiers.

And even when we don't fully agree, we must fully serve God together.

It's funny because it seems like the only time some of us shoot off our guns is when we are inside the house of God and we leave the world afraid to fight the forces of evil where they are.

We must be willing to give up everything to serve our God and like a soldier knows that even his life might be sacrificed we must be willing even to sacrifice our lives.

Paul then says to Timothy in chapter in verse 15 of chapter 2 he says to Timothy study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

He says in verse 16, but shun profane and vain babblings, for they will increase unto more ungodliness.

I want to say to all of the young people especially, but even to those that are older, that God has called you to study so that he is pleased.

Every time we sit in front of a television, our brains absorb the information.

And she was telling me just this morning that on the History Channel, they had ancient stories.

And they were changing the Bible stories to be something other than they are.

That the Jericho walls fell because of an earthquake.

That Herod did not order the murder of all of the children in Israel at the time of Jesus's birth.

The enemy understands that every time you're exposed to false information, you absorb it as if you were studying.

So Paul, knowing that in the last days there'd be much more information than ever before, calls the soldiers of God to be students of God's Word.

This afternoon, we'll do another presentation on music and on a popular culture.

And 1 of the things is that the music of the day has become, as Paul says, vain and profane babbling.

And I believe that 1 of the reasons that America sees her youth doing some of the things that the youth are doing is because the youth are listening to music that degrades them, where people are only swearing and cursing and speaking foul things.

The Word of God says that this will increase unto more ungodliness.

Paul says in verse 20 that in the great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver but also of wood and of earth and some to honor and some to dishonor.

Bible commentators tell us that this great house represents the church.

And Paul is saying that everyone who comes to church is not necessarily true blue.

As a matter of fact, there are those who come to church who are practicing spiritual espionage.

They are spies against God, as Israel had in the wilderness.

So we warn young people that they be careful that they don't leave the church because of something someone might say to them in church.

There are many who use being mistreated by church members as an excuse to leave, but the Bible warns us that the wheat and tear will grow together and that we cannot expect that everyone in church will be authentically working for God.

So instead we must focus on being purged ourselves and focus more on what kind of vessel am I.

Verse 21 Paul says, if a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work.

God is saying that some of us, even though we think we are on God's side, we don't even know that we still need to be purged.

But I thank God that when he begins a work in us, that he is faithful.

And just to finish the work, he starts in us.

In verse 22, Paul again speaks to the young people of the church, those who would be of the last generation.

He says, follow righteousness and faith, charity and peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

Never before have young people been more pressured to be sexually involved.

And we'll talk about that in this afternoon's program more.

But Paul tells us, like he told Timothy, that we must flee those things that are not pleasing to God.

The Bible says resist the devil and he will flee because Paul knew that in the last days these issues would be more critical than ever before.

In chapter 3 Paul turns to last day prophecy and he says this know also that in the last days, perilous times shall come.

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Series

Eric Walsh: Road Map to Heaven

Focusing on the Finish Line

Transcript

Parent Series

Sponsor

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19-The Mark of the Beast

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