Scripture Series

Scripture

Jeffery Anselmi / General

Core 52 / Inspiration of the Bible / 2 Timothy 3:16–17

It is time that we look back to the Scriptures.

INTRODUCTION

- As kids, we learn a lot from songs and sayings.

- We learned our ABCs.

- We learned that, yes, Jesus loves me.

- There are now two generations of children who learned to pick up after themselves from Barney the Dinosaur.

- Clean up, clean up. Everybody everywhere. Clean up, clean up, everybody do your share.

- Some of the songs and nursery rhymes we were taught as children are downright creepy.

- “Ring around the rosy pocket full of posies. Ashes, ashes, we all fall down.”

- One theory says that this song was originally about people dying in the black plague.

- Well, that is encouraging.

- Hey, everybody, join hands.

- Let’s sing.

- “Rockabye baby, in the treetop. When the wind blows, the cradle will rock.

- If the bough breaks, the cradle will fall, and down will come baby, cradle and all.”

- What kind of sick, twisted parent puts their baby in a tree top?

- Someone needs to be arrested. (Dan Raymond- Core 52, Sermon 50)

- As Paul seeks to encourage his young protege, Timothy, Paul encourages him to anchor himself to what he has learned in his youth from his mother and grandmother to help him combat and be prepared for the difficult times coming ahead.

2 Timothy 3:14–15 (NET 2nd ed.)

14 You, however, must continue in the things you have learned and are confident about. You know who taught you

15 and how from infancy you have known the holy writings, which are able to give you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.

- Why does Paul bring up the fact that Timothy was taught from the Holy Writings, the Scriptures, from infancy?

- Why point this out to Timothy?

- Paul has just finished telling Timothy that the times they live in are difficult and will likely get worse.

- People will become more selfish, arrogant, greedier, more brutal, and less interested in God and his ways.

- They will pretend to be godly but instead do what they want, led by their own desires (2 Timothy 3:1–9).

- Paul tells Timothy that he is different.

- Timothy has watched Paul's life, faith, love, and struggles.

- Timothy recognizes that a life of faith will be difficult, but God is good (vv. 10–13).

- Timothy is encouraged to look back at the Scriptures he was taught so he will have the strength to be a light shining in the dark world.

- Let’s see why Paul placed so much value on the Bible.

2 Timothy 3:16–17 (NET 2nd ed.)

16 Every scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

17 that the person dedicated to God may be capable and equipped for every good work.

SERMON

We need to look back at the Scriptures because…

I. The Scriptures are inspired by God.

- When we open the Bible, what are we looking at?

- What are we reading?

- If we go into it thinking it is anything other than the inspired Word of God, it will not do much for us.

- Books are written from the mind of and by the hand of man.

- The Bible is unique in that it is inspired by God and written through the hand of man.

- In verse 16, Paul gives Timothy the first reason he should look back to God’s Word.

- In verse 16, we are told that EVERY SCRIPTURE is inspired by God.

- What does the word INSPIRED mean?

- Does it mean that the writers of the Bible pondered God and were moved to write, much like someone would look at a sunset and be inspired to paint it, or is there something more to it?

- The Scriptures are of divine origin.

- Inspired by God translates a term that occurs nowhere else in the New Testament.

- Its literal translation is “God-breathed,” which means that Scripture is produced by God’s breath (or spirit, which is also his power) and is, therefore, of divine origin.

Daniel C. Arichea and Howard Hatton, A Handbook on Paul’s Letters to Timothy and to Titus, UBS Handbook Series (New York: United Bible Societies, 1995), 235.

- All scriptures are inspired by God and are, therefore, absolutely trustworthy.

- The great prophecies of the New Testament have been and are being fulfilled.

- Every line of it has stood the test of centuries, shattered every attack of evil men, and yet stands enshrined in the hearts of millions as God’s saving word for lost men.

James B. Coffman, Commentary on 1 & 2 Thessalonians, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, Revised Edition., The James Burton Coffman Commentaries (A. C. U. Press, 1986), 2 Ti 3:16.