Good morning, Bereans. I have a question for you this morning. Does truth matter? Absolutely! Truth matters! I believe that it matters to you, or you wouldn't be here, or you wouldn't be watching us. But we live in a day when the whole idea of truth is minimized. We are told today that doctrine divides. People want to set aside doctrinal differences and find fellowship around the things upon which there is agreement. This is justified by another popular mantra: Yeshua said that they will know that we are His disciples by our love, not by our doctrine. The implication of this by some is that we should set aside our doctrinal views and accept everyone—no matter what they believe about Yeshua. Tolerance, unity, and love are viewed as much more important than doctrinal truth. The church is not in the entertainment business. We are ambassadors for Christ who are to faithfully represent Him and His truth.
In the study of Systematic Theology, we see that there are many different doctrines. There is Theology Proper which deals with the existence of and attributes of God. There is Anthropology or the doctrine of man. Another is Christology or the doctrine of Christ. Soteriology is the doctrine of salvation. Ecclesiology provides the doctrine of the church. Eschatology gives us the doctrine of end times. And Bibliology is the doctrine of the Bible.
Do all these areas of theology carry the same level of importance? What would you say was the most important doctrine—Theology Proper, Christology, Soteriology? I think that there is a danger within Preterism of elevating eschatology to prime importance. Eschatology it is not a denomination, but it seems to have become that. To me the danger within Preterism is that many have put eschatology above all other doctrines.
I think that Preterism has become an umbrella under which many false doctrines are gathering. Too many people, when they join the Preterist movement, bring their doctrinal errors with them. And because they say they are Preterists, they discredit the eschatological view by their doctrinal errors. We need to be careful about embracing someone just because he says that his eschatology is Preterist. We cannot line up and associate with people based strictly on their eschatology. There are other doctrines that are much more important.
In Matthew's Gospel we find the most important question you will ever face. It is the question that Yeshua asked His disciples.
Now when Yeshua came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" And they said, "Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Matthew 16:13-15 ESV
How would you answer that question? I believe your eternal destiny depends on how you answer that question. A correct belief in Yeshua is what separates the saved from the damned. To deny the deity of Christ is to have no savior. To deny the deity of Christ, that is, to deny that He is in fact Yahweh in the flesh, is to die in your sins. Is that too strong? This is exactly what Yeshua teaches in this text in John 8. Let's look at it.
Having been rejected by many as the true light, Yeshua issued a strong word of warning.
So he said to them again, "I am going away, and you will seek me, and you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come." John 8:21 ESV
When Yeshua said, "I am going away," He was speaking of His death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven. Yeshua was saying: "I came down from heaven. I'm going back to heaven." They could "not come" where He was going because of their present, unsaved condition.
"And you will die in your sin"—whom is He talking to? Yeshua is talking to the Jewish leaders—those who thought they were the representatives of God. Three times He tells them that they will die in their sins. The word "sin" here is singular. For John there is ultimately only one sin—not believing in Yeshua.
So the Jews said, "Will he kill himself, since he says, 'Where I am going, you cannot come'?" John 8:22 ESV
When you see the word "Jew" in this Gospel, it's primarily referring to the leaders—the scribes and the Pharisees. But it also embraces all the people who followed in their pattern, in their religious system.
Yeshua's adversaries presumed that they were going to heaven. They reasoned, then, that if those bound for heaven could not come with Yeshua to where he was going, He must be going to Hades. They jumped to the conclusion that He was speaking of killing Himself. From Josephus, we learn that suicide condemned one to the lowest parts of Hades. Their question apparently indicated that this is where they thought Yeshua should be.
He said to them, "You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. John 8:23 ESV
Yeshua explained their reason for misunderstanding Him as being traceable to their origin. Yeshua was from God "above," whereas they came from "below." The contrast here is between heaven, where Yeshua is from, and earth, where His opponents are from. The Jews cannot follow Him because they and He belong to two fundamentally different worlds. To understand Yeshua's meaning, His hearers needed a birth from above (3:3, 5).
I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins." John 8:24 ESV
The word "sin" is used in the singular in verse 21 and in its first use in verse 24. But it is in the plural form in its second use in. Sin is to refuse to believe in Yeshua and therefore to refuse life itself.
The pronoun "He" is not in the text; it is added by the translators. The text says, "Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins"—what are they to believe? What is He saying that people have to believe so that they don't die in their sins? The conditional clause provides the proper object of faith: "If you do not believe that ego eimi.
Yeshua, in claiming to be "I Am," was asserting equality with Yahweh Himself, who was revealed as the "I Am That I Am" —the self-existent, eternal God.
God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." And he said, "Say this to the people of Israel: 'I AM has sent me to you.'" Exodus 3:14 ESV
"I AM WHO I AM" is "Ehyeh; asher ehyeh" and means: "I am that which exists." The root of Ehyeh is hiya, which means "to be" or "I exist." So here Elohim tells Moses His name is Ehyeh. But look at the next verse.
God also said to Moses, "Say this to the people of Israel: 'The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. Exodus 3:15 ESV
Elohim again gives His name to Moses, but this time it is Yahweh. The two names, Yahweh and Ehyeh, are related. Yahweh is, and Ehyeh is. Ehyeh means "I exist, I will exist, I am." And Yahweh means "He exists, He will exist, He is." And both of these names are related to each other. They are both conveying the idea that Yahweh is the self-existing One.
The prophets, guided by the Holy Spirit, picked up that phrase and used it. Several Isaiah speaks about the God who has called him to minister as "I am."
Who has performed and done this, calling the generations from the beginning? I, the LORD, the first, and with the last; I am he. Isaiah 41:4 ESV
In the Hebrew original, Yahweh discloses Himself in the repeated declaration, "I am He"; it is this expression that the LXX consistently renders by ego eimi, formally 'I am.' Isaiah 43:10 is especially close to what Scholars call Johannine language:
"You are my witnesses," declares the LORD, "and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me. Isaiah 43:10 ESV
The Greek Old Testament contains this purpose clause, "In order that you know and believe and understand that I AM [ego eim]." It is the combination of the verb "believe" and the use of I AM [ego eimi] in Isaiah 43:10 that causes scholars to believe that it was on Yeshua's mind at this point.
The last part of Isaiah 43:10 seems to be based on Exodus 3:14. The unique (and here important) part of Isaiah 43 comes in verse 11 where the speaker says":
I, I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior. Isaiah 43:11 ESV
Here we see there is no savior besides Yahweh. And yet Yeshua says, "Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins." What is Yeshua saying? He is saying, "I am Yahweh, there is not savior besides me.
I declared and saved and proclaimed, when there was no strange god among you; and you are my witnesses," declares the LORD, "and I am God. Isaiah 43:12 ESV
The point of Isaiah 43:10-12 is that I AM is a God of salvation. This appears to be Yeshua's point in verse 24. As long as the Jews refused to come to faith in I AM (the one who saves His people), they will die in their sins.
In Isaiah, the contexts demand that "I am He" means "I am the same," "I am forever the same," and even "I am Yahweh," with a direct allusion to Exodus 3:14. For others to apply this title to themselves was blasphemous and an invitation to face the wrath of God.
Now therefore hear this, you lover of pleasures, who sit securely, who say in your heart, "I am, and there is no one besides me; I shall not sit as a widow or know the loss of children": Isaiah 47:8 ESV
Verse 11 tells us what happens to the one who claims to be "I am."
But evil shall come upon you, which you will not know how to charm away; disaster shall fall upon you, for which you will not be able to atone; and ruin shall come upon you suddenly, of which you know nothing. Isaiah 47:11 ESV
For Yeshua to apply such words to Himself is to say, "I am Yahweh, the only savior." So, when Yeshua tells the Pharisees, who knew Isaiah well, "I am He," using the same phrase that Yahweh repeatedly uses in Isaiah, He was claiming to be the eternal God.
Listen to me, people, Yeshua is Yahweh. To deny the deity of Christ, to deny that He is in fact Yahweh in the flesh, is to die in your sins. Is that too strong? This is what Yeshua is saying, "Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins."
This truth that Yeshua is Yahweh is taught from the very first verse of this Gospel.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. John 1:1 ESV
"The Word was God"—this statement could not be much clearer! In fact, these four Greek words may be the clearest declaration of the deity of Yeshua in all the Scriptures. The Greek verb eimi, (was) means "to be" or "to exist," and suggests continued existence. So, the Word always existed as Yahweh.
John does not say, "and the Word was divine" or "the Word was like God." He makes the bold statement, "the Word was God." He here leaves no room for anyone to see Yeshua as less than God in some way or to some degree.
John Phillips writes: "That is, in His essence, in what He actually is, in His nature, person, and personality, in His attributes and character, Jesus is all that God is. All the essential characteristics of deity are His." (Exploring the Gospel of John)
The Word literally was Yahweh. Yeshua is God in a body. Nothing less. He is God in a body, the full mysterious deity of Christ exemplified in humility, and unbelievable condescension. And so, at the very beginning John lays it down that Yeshua is the living Word, and He alone is the perfect revelation of Yahweh.
It is at this point (that Yeshua is Yahweh), that the Arian controversy of the early church and some contemporary pseudo-Christian cults deviate from the biblical perspective. The heretic Arius and his modern disciples, the Jehovah's Witnesses, argue that Yeshua was not eternal; rather, He was the first created being. On the basis of a flawed and inconsistent interpretation of the Greek text this last phrase in verse 1 is translated "the Word was a god," reducing Christ to a being less than and different from God.
Let's drop down to verse 14.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14 ESV
"Became"—is from the Greek egeneto which does not mean that the Word ceased to be what He was before. Rather, to His eternal Deity, He added perfect humanity. Prior to this, the Second Person of the Trinity was the eternal Word. But at a point in time, He added humanity to His divine being. He became the God-Man. This joining together has been designated as the hypostatic union.
The term hypostatic is derived from the Greek word hypostasis meaning "personal." Thus, the hypostatic union is the "personal union" or joining of the two natures of Yeshua, (divine and human). Theologian Louis Berkhof helps shed some further light on the terms nature and person as they relate to the doctrine of the hypostatic union. He aptly comments that the "term nature denotes the sum-total of all the essential qualities of a thing, that which makes it what it is…The term person denotes a complete substance endowed with reason, and, consequently, a responsible subject of its own actions." [Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1996), 321].
Let's talk about what happened in the hypostatic union. Christ did not have two personalities because of His two natures. He was one Person with two natures, divine and human. Because He is a man does not make Him less than God. Nor, does His being God prevent Him from being truly a man.
The integrity of the attributes of His divine nature were not corrupted or compromised or diminished by the fact that His divine nature was united permanently with a human nature. Nor was the integrity of the attributes of His human nature corrupted or compromised or diminished by the fact that He was God. His two natures, though united, retain their separate identities. There was no mixture of His divine nature with that of His human nature. His divine attributes are always united to His divine nature and His human attributes are always united to His human nature. Deity remains deity and humanity remains humanity.
The infinite cannot become finite and the immutable cannot be changed. No attribute of deity was altered when our Lord became a man through the incarnation and the same holds true when He died on the cross. To take away a single attribute from His divine nature would destroy His deity and to take away a singled attribute from His perfect human nature would destroy His humanity. The two natures of Christ are not only united without affecting the attributes of the two natures, but they are also combined in one person.
Shedd in his Dogmatic Theology writes the following:
Previous to the assumption of a human nature, the Logos could not experience a human feeling because he had no human heart, but after this assumption he could; previous to the incarnation, he could not have a finite perception because he had no finite intellect, but after this event he could; previous to the incarnation, the self-consciousness of the Logos was eternal only, that is, without succession, but subsequent to the incarnation it was both eternal and temporal, with and without succession. Prior to the incarnation, the second person of the Trinity could not have human sensations and-experiences; but after it he could.
The unincarnate Logos could think and feel only like God; he had only one form of consciousness. The incarnate Logos can think and feel either like God, or like man. [Dr. Shedd's, Dogmatic Theology, vol. 2, pp. 261-308].
I want to add a word of caution here. We need to be careful when we talk about things like this because the hypostatic union ultimately transcends human reason. We are talking about an incomprehensible mystery because we are talking about Yahweh, the God-Man. We don't have any human analogy that we can use to enable us to accurately understand what it means for a divine person to possess not only a divine nature but a human nature, and for a union to exist between them, so that we have one person with these two natures.
A key text for those who deny and attack the deity of Christ is easily explained if you understand the hypostatic union.
You heard me say to you, 'I am going away, and I will come to you.' If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. John 14:28 ESV
I would hope that in light of all we have seen thus far that we would realize that when Yeshua said, "for the Father is greater than I"—He did not mean He was less than God, or an inferior god. This phrase has caused much christological and trinitarian debate throughout church history. And it is this phrase that was used as a proof text for those who held to Arianism.
By applying the hermeneutical law of the Analogy of Faith to what has been taught this far in this Gospel we know that, "for the Father is greater than I" CANNOT mean that Yeshua was less than God as the Arians, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Unitarians proclaim. So, what does Yeshua mean by this statement? If Yeshua and the Father are one, how can the Father be greater than the Son?
Yeshua is speaking of Himself in His humanity and in His limited capacity as a human being. He is not speaking ontologically (dealing with His essential being, His nature), since He had stated repeatedly that He and the Father were one ontologically. He is speaking of the Father's relative glory compared to His glory. Yeshua had laid His heavenly glory aside in the Incarnation and so the Father had greater glory than the Son during Yeshua's earthly ministry.
Paul understood that Yeshua was Yahweh.
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Yeshua, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, Philippians 2:5-6 ESV
The word "was" is the Greek word huparcho. It is a verb that stresses the essence of a person's nature. It is to express the continued state of a thing, and it is unalterable and unchangeable. Paul said, "Yeshua unalterably and unchangeably exists in the form of God." This speaks of His pre-existence. Let me show you this.
In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: "Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!" Isaiah 6:1-3 ESV
Who was it that Isaiah saw? Which member of the trinity was this? Can we know with certainty? Yes, we can. The New Testament tells us.
While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light." When Yeshua had said these things, he departed and hid himself from them. Though he had done so many signs before them, they still did not believe in him, so that the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: "Lord, who has believed what he heard from us, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?" Therefore they could not believe. For again Isaiah said, "He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, lest they see with their eyes, and understand with their heart, and turn, and I would heal them." Isaiah said these things because he saw his glory and spoke of him. John 12:36-41 ESV
John tells us that Isaiah saw Yeshua the Christ. Yeshua is the brightness of God's essence manifested to men. If you want to know the glory and the moral beauty of the Father, read the gospel and behold the person of Yeshua. He's the radiance (the streaming out, the effulgence) of the glory of God. Back to Philippians.
who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, Philippians 2:6 ESV
The word "form" is morphe. It has nothing to do with shape or size. Moulton and Milligan say that "morphe" is a form which truly and fully expresses the being which underlies it. It refers to the essence or essential being. Yeshua pre-existed in the essence of God.
but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. Philippians 2:7 ESV
The word "but" here is a contrastive—"not this but this." The word "emptied" is the Greek word kenoo, it means "to make empty." Figuratively, it means: "to abase, naturalize, to make of none effect, of no reputation."
What did Yeshua empty Himself of?
And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. John 17:5 ESV
He is asking to have His glory restored because His glory was put aside when He became man. Yeshua shared to the full the Divine nature, and He was clothed with splendor that had always surrounded God's person. During the incarnation, Yeshua laid aside the outward glory.
Laying aside His glory involved the surrender of the voluntary use of the divine attributes. He laid aside the prerogatives of His deity. Christ veiled His pre-incarnate glory by taking on humanity, but He did not destroy or diminish any part of it.
Let's compare two Greek words for "form" that we find in this text.
who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, Philippians 2:6 ESV
And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Philippians 2:8 ESV
In verse 6, it is morphe which is the essential character of something. Verse 8 is schema which expresses the outward form it takes. Morphe is the essential form which never alters; schema is the outward form which changes from time to time and from circumstance to circumstance.
The morphe of any human being is humanity, and this never changes (when this body dies and you receive your heavenly body, you will still be human); but his schema is continually changing. We all started out at conception as a clump of cells, then we became a baby, a child, a youth, a teenager, an adult; and someday we will be elderly. Our morphe is unchangeable humanity, but our schema changes. Roses, daffodils, tulips, and primroses all have one morphe of flowers, but their schema is different.
It is saying this, who, though he was in the form [morphe the essential character] of God. And being found in human form [schema is the outward form].
So, when Paul in verse 6 uses hupareco (was) and morphe (form), he is saying something very specific, that is, that Yeshua has always existed in the unchangeable essence of the being of Yahweh. Yeshua is Yahweh and always was. This is the heart and soul of the Christian faith—Yeshua is Yahweh the Son. This is where the incarnation begins; this is the point from which He descends, and God becomes man.
In his letter to the Colossians Paul writes,
For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, Colossians 2:9 ESV
The word "dwells" comes from the Greek word katoikeo, which means "to settle down and be at home." The present tense indicates that the essence of Deity continually abides at home in Christ. He is fully God forever.
The Greek word translated "Deity" is theotetos, an ontological word. What that means is that "it has the idea of essential nature or essential being." The essential ontological nature of Yeshua is what? Deity. He is Yahweh.
John Eleazar, aka Lazarus, also writes:
And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Yeshua the Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. 1 John 5:20 ESV
Who is the true God? Does the statement, "He is the true God," refer to the Father or to Yeshua. Well, "Yeshua the Christ" is the closest antecedent for "he" in the context. The immediately preceding words are "Yeshua the Christ," so proximity alone would suggest that as the preferred antecedent.
Another reason why I see "true God" as referring to Yeshua is that it does not make sense to say that this is speaking of God the Father. To say that the true God is the true God is stating the obvious. But if this is saying that Yeshua is the true God, it comes as an amazing natural conclusion to the whole of this epistle. This Christ Yeshua is the very Son of God incarnate who has been sent in human flesh to be our Savior! God has revealed Himself in human flesh in the incarnation of His Son, Yeshua the Christ.
"He is the true God and eternal life." This is one of the strongest direct statements of the deity of Christ in the New Testament. In light of John's polemic against the false teachers, who denied Yeshua's deity, it would seem fitting at the end of the book to refer to Yeshua as "the only true God and eternal life."
Do you remember what Thomas said to Yeshua after his resurrection?
Thomas answered him, "My Lord and my God!" John 20:28 ESV
What was Yeshua's response to Thomas' calling Him God?
Yeshua said to him, "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." John 20:29 ESV
Yeshua doesn't correct him because John's words are true. He is God.
David Flusser, a devout Orthodox Jew, was an Israeli professor of Early Christianity and Judaism of the Second Temple Period at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. David was considered as a somewhat eccentric genius who translated the Dead Sea scrolls from Hebrew into Greek. David died in September of 2000.
David said, "You poor Christians, you wonder why the Bible doesn't say Jesus is God more often. It says it all the time, you just don't understand Jewish thought."
Look at what Mark says.
"What have you to do with us, Yeshua of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God." Mark 1:24 ESV
Notice that this demon recognizes both Yeshua's humanity and His deity. "Yeshua of Nazareth" speaks of His humanity; "Holy One of God" speaks of His deity. It's interesting to me that here we are 2000 years later, and we're still arguing about who Yeshua was. The demons got it right; they knew who He was. This was God in the flesh. They knew that. And they also understood that there was nothing they could do to keep Yeshua from taking authority over them.
The phrase "Holy One" is used in the Tanakh of Yahweh. Who is the Holy One of Israel:
How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert! They tested God again and again and provoked the Holy One of Israel. Psalms 78:40-41 ESV
It is Yahweh who is called the "Holy One" or the "Holy One of Israel." Calling Christ, "The Holy One" is a clear reference to the Deity, by no less than the demons themselves.
Five times in the Tanakh, Yahweh is called the "cloud rider." But Daniel 7 is an exception.
"I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed. Daniel 7:13-14 ESV
Here the rider on the cloud is the son of man, a human. Dominion is given to the son of man, the second cloud rider.
When I say that Yeshua is Yahweh, it's important to understand that I am not talking about Modalism, which denies the distinction of Persons in the Trinity, and says that God sometimes manifested Himself as the Father, sometimes as the Son, and sometimes as the Spirit. This view sees the Father, Son, and Spirit as all the same Person, just appearing or operating in different modes at different times.
This first verse in John destroys Modalism: "And the Word was with God"—the theological importance of these words is that they distinguish God the Word from God the Father. In other words, John is telling us that although the Godhead is One Holy and Eternal God, God the Word and God the Father are not the same Person.
O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. John 17:25 ESV
Here the Son in his humanity prays to the Father, both of whom are Yahweh.
The words "was with God" in John 1:1 prohibits us from seeing no distinction between the Father and the Word. This "with" infers a relationship, an interface, an interaction, between two distinct persons. There is a distinction. The Son, the Word, is distinct from the Father.
The truth is that the Father, Son, and Spirit are all three of the same essence, but they are three separate and distinct Beings. The Trinity is not three Gods, but the three persons of the one true God.
So, Yeshua is Yahweh. He is the Messiah. He is the one upon whom God has put his name. He's the second person of the divine trinity. He's the one that in the Tanakh led Israel out of the land of Egypt. He's the one who made the covenants with them. He's the one who wrestled with Jacob. He's the one who spoke to Abraham. He's one whom Daniel saw. And he's the one whom Gideon dealt with, and so on. All the theophanies of the Tanakh are theophanies of the Son of God.
I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins." John 8:24 ESV
"For unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins"—there's only one thing that prevents you from dying in your sin and being damned forever and that is belief that Yeshua is Yahweh. Belief of the truth, nothing more and nothing less, is what separates the saved from the damned.
So, if it is true that Yeshua is Yahweh, what is our response to those who deny the deity of Christ? Do we say, "It's OK. Truth doesn't really matter. As long as your eschatology is preterist, we love you. Or do we follow the teaching of John?
Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, 2 John 1:9-10 ESV
False teachers are to be called out and rejected not coddled.