A fellow went shopping for his wife's birthday. He happened to pass by a pawn shop. As he passed by the window, he couldn't believe his eyes. Beautiful name-brand watches were selling for a fraction of their retail cost. With his wife's birthday in his mind's eye, he entered and made his selection. What normally cost several hundred dollars, he was able to purchase for a mere fifteen dollars. He rushed home and proudly presented it to her.
Later that evening during dinner, his wife looked at her new watch to check the time and discovered the second hand going berserk. Then it stopped dead in its tracks. Although the watch looked like the real thing…in every respect, it was a fake. It did not stand up under pressure.
The Parable of the Sower
Such is true of the apostate. This is the point Jesus was making when He told the parable of the sower in Luke 8. The apostate is like the seed sown on rocky ground. This person, when he hears, receives the word with joy but has no roots. For a while he believes, but soon temptation wins out and he "falls away." The phrase "fall away" in Luke 8:13 is the verb form of "apostasy."
Luke's choice of words in the original Greek language is interesting. Referring to stony ground hearers who "receive the word" in Luke 8:13, the word is dekomai. He uses a different word to describe the good ground hearers who also receive the word. The word for "receive" found in Mark 4:20, which is used of the good ground hearers, is the word paradekomai. It is a much stronger word that dekomai and indicates that these people truly welcome the word into their hearts, whereas the stony ground hearers do so superficially.
Stony ground hearers fall away from the truth because they have no roots.
Consequently, they have no fruit. Absence of fruit is absence of evidence of the Christian life. An apostate knows the truth but does not apply it. He "accepts" God's revelation as true but does not make a sincere commitment to it. He “talks the talk,” but he doesn’t “walk the walk.”
A truly born-again person cannot become an apostate. Although he may fall into error or into indifference, he cannot fall away from the faith. Scripture is clear in assuring us that Jesus is able to keep us forever.
A knowledge of cosmetic Christians will certainly help us detect impostors. Tonight I want us to examine the activities that betray the apostate. We will discover what makes this kind of person "tick."
The Apostate "Agenda"
We can best defend against apostates by understanding the nature of their activities.
THE APOSTATES DECEITFULNESS
Apostates creep in. Jude 4 says that "certain men have crept in unnoticed." The word crept means to "slip in secretly, to steal in under cover." The word describing this action carries the idea of slipping in the back door. It is used to speak of one who slips back secretly into a country from which he was expelled. It also paints a picture of an alligator, lying on the bank of a river, and then slithering into the river so subtly, secretly, and silently that he is unnoticed.
These synthetic saints creep into denominations, churches, schools, and organizations. They are in our Sunday school classes, choirs, pews, classrooms, and pulpits. And they are deceitful. Jesus warned us about them and how they deceive when He said, "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves" (Matt. 7:15).
The result of an apostate's deceitfulness is destruction. Consider the field of higher education. Of the first one hundred colleges founded in America, eighty-eight were founded for the propagation of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today, few, if any, of those schools still carry that mission.
Harvard University celebrated its 350th birthday not too long ago. When Harvard was founded in 1636, all its students held to three basic rules. First, everyone was to consider it the main end of his studies to know God and eternal life through the Lord Jesus Christ. Second, because according to Scripture the Lord gives wisdom, every student was to seek the wisdom of God. Third, every student was to exercise himself in the reading of the Scriptures twice a day so that he could give an account of his profession. That was the aim of the school in its beginning days. That aim has since been abandoned.
What has happened to our schools that were founded on the fundamentals of the faith? Some denominations that founded them have gone the way of apostasy. Jude says that happens because impostors creep in unnoticed and destroy them. That is why we need to contend for the faith today. What were once great, strong schools producing missionaries who went around the world are now dead or dying. And the destruction continues.
Who would have dreamed even a few years ago that Darwinian evolution would be taught in the classrooms of some of our institutions of higher learning? Who would have believed that "conservative" theologians would deny the miracles of the Old Testament?
It will not be long before they will deny the miracles of the New Testament, which include the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Dr. L. R. Scarborough was the second president of what is now the largest theological seminary in the world: Southwestern Baptist Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Scarborough relates one of his conversations with the founding president, Dr. B. H. Carroll. In his book, Gospel Message, Scarborough tells of going to Dr. Carroll's room a few days before Carroll's death. As they talked Carroll pulled himself up from his pillow and looked into Scarborough's face and said, "My boy, on this seminary hill, orthodoxy, the old truth, is making one of its last stands. I want to deliver you a charge and I do it in the blood of Jesus Christ. I want you, if there ever comes heresy in your faculty, to take it to your faculty. If they don't hear you, take it to the trustees. If they don't hear you, take it to the conventions that appointed them. If they don't hear you, take it to the common Baptists. They will hear you."
And he concluded, "I charge you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to keep it lashed to the old Gospel of Jesus Christ. As long as I have influence in that institution, by the grace of God, I will stand by the old book."
These are our roots.
Men like Carroll were men who earnestly contended "for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints."
THE APOSTATES DEVOTION
Jude called apostates "ungodly men." Thayer's Lexicon defines the underlying Greek word as "destitute of reverential awe toward God." It is lack of what we call "the fear of God." Such men have a form of godliness but deny its power. [See 2 Timothy 3:5] A godly man walks with God and knows God. An ungodly man is the opposite.
Jude was not speaking about outward appearances. Apostates are not openly and blatantly ungodly. They look and act like Christians. They may even appear to be good in the eyes of men. Rather, Jude was talking about the heart…the part that only God can see.
All apostates talk about God. They know the language. They may be gifted individuals. But their hearts are far from God. The apostle Paul warned us about these synthetic saints when he said, "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables" (2 Timothy 4:3-4).
Apostasy began in the Garden of Eden when Satan spoke to Eve and questioned the Word of God. Eve knew the word to be true, but Satan planted the seed of doubt when he subtly asked, "Has God said?" But Eve, knowing the truth, moved away from the truth.
That spirit of apostasy continues today through the mouths of liberal professors and preachers who question the Word of God with the same words, "Has God said?"
And folks, it's not just preachers and professors, but I've also had church members, and believe it or not deacons, who have questioned and disregarded God's Word in the same way.
Apostates are not devoted to the cause of Christ. While they may claim to love our Lord, they do not obey Him. They claim to serve Him, but work to serve their own selfish interests. They can severely damage the cause of Christ because they hold leadership positions in the church. The devotion of the apostate is summed up well in the words of Titus 1:16: "They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him, being abominable, disobedient, and disqualified for every good work."
THE APOSTATE'S DEMEANOR
An apostate turns "the grace of God into lewdness" (Jude 4). The word lewdness means "an absence of moral restraint." Jude is describing a person who arrogantly flaunts his sin. Such a person does evil deeds without shame. He believes that he can sin all he likes because God will forgive him. That is, the more he sins, the greater God's grace.
That kind of thinking turns the grace of God into lewdness because it perverts the doctrine of grace into a justification for sin.
Consider a professing Christian who believes he can do whatever he pleases and indulges in fleshly desires because he is "under" the grace of God. He rationalizes sexual promiscuity by saying, "We are just two vulnerable human beings. God's grace is big enough to cover our sin; He'll forgive us." I am afraid for anyone who thinks that way. Such a person knows nothing of the grace of God.
Paul was clear in his teaching about the grace of God. In writing to Titus he said, "For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ" (Titus 2:11-13).
God's grace is unmerited favor. It does not lead us to sin. Apostates assume that their privileges in the faith somehow puts them above the moral responsibility of the Word of God that binds true believers to life-styles of godliness and purity. The grace of God does quite the contrary. It leads us to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live righteously. When this precious truth is perverted into a license to sin, apostasy has set in.
The writer of Hebrews gives a solemn warning for those who turn the grace of God into lewdness. He says, "O, how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace?" (Hebrews 10:29). It is a dangerous thing to insult the Spirit of grace by using liberty in Christ as license to sin. Certainly, it is one of the most distinguishing characteristics of apostasy.
THE APOSTATES DOCTRINE
The apostate denies "the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ" (Jude 4). Here is the root of the problem! He does not deny our Lord with his lips; rather, he denies our Lord with his life.
The Romans had a clever way of appeasing their conquered peoples. They built the Pantheon, a temple to the gods. In it were niches for all the gods and goddesses of the peoples conquered by the Romans. For example, followers of the god Jupiter could come to the Pantheon and worship him. Niche after niche contained gods. When the Romans conquered the Christians they offered to create a niche for Jesus. But the Christians said no, because they believed in only one God.
In fact, Christians insisted that there was only one true God to the point that they would not even bow down to the image of Caesar. Many paid with their lives.
We know well the accounts of early Christians who were ripped apart by lions and burned at the stake because they insisted on the fact that there was "only one true God and our Lord Jesus Christ."
Today it is heartbreaking to hear people who advocate universalist philosophies and doctrines, many discounting a belief in hell altogether. Today people have the misguided belief that because their loved one was so good they must be in heaven even though they rejected Jesus Christ. The Bible says, "There is no other name under heaven among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). Of course, that name is Jesus.
The Challenge Before Us
God hates apostasy. The greatest sin of all is to deny the Lord Jesus Christ.
Apostates deny Him as Master. They deny Him as Mediator. They deny Him as Messiah. Notice that digression. The first step to becoming ungodly is to have no fear of God; no reverential awe. Second, the precious doctrine of grace is perverted into an excuse to sin. That leads to an outright denial of our only Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
What work the devil cannot do from without, he seeks to do from within through synthetic saints. They are deceitful. They creep in unnoticed. Their devotion is ungodly. Their demeanor gives them away. They turn the grace of God into lewdness and their doctrine is the denial of our only Lord Jesus Christ.
We must not relax our efforts to recognize these impostors among us.
