Bedford-Rifle range practicing and re-qualifying on weapons, which is an interesting experience, if you ever get the chance, just to hang out with a group of people firing automatic rifles. It does interesting things to your mind. But one of the things that struck me is we were there and the unit was re-qualifying for the weapons, which they have to do every year. And it's a rather intense thing because the single basic qualification of a soldier is you have to be able to fire a weapon.
And then everything else you do is considered on top of that. So they take it very seriously. And then to add to it the brigade commander announced that he was going to visit and he was going to bring his brigade sergeant major. Now, if you've ever had nightmares of someone who comes and scrutinizes every single thing wrong with your life, you now know what a sergeant major does.
And this person is the senior sergeant major for the Maritimes and he was coming. And so there was a fair bit of anxiety among the troops. And so we got there at 7.30 in the morning and the first groups went through their drills and their preparations and then we went out to the range and we got the flags out and we got the ammunition passed out and I'm a chaplain so I don't do any of this stuff. I just stand there and go, you go.
And they were out and at first they're out and it's this big empty field with these mounds at every so many meters, 100 meter intervals. And so the troops are all out and they all have to lay in the ground in the prone position and they're giving their instructions and they start shooting at these targets. Well, at first the ground was hard and snowy. And so they're laying on their bellies there and some of them are talking about how cold it is because you lay there and you take your shots and you wait for them to evaluate but you lay there.
But fortunately the day warmed. And as the day warmed the ground thought and what was once frozen then became mud. And you'd see the next line would come up and they'd get the order to drop into the prone position and you'd see the ground is murky. And I saw one guy he went down and he literally made a sound.
And there he is and at one point he gets up on his knees and he is just brown. So they're there in the muck and they're doing their thing. But one of the things that caught me is I'm watching they were doing this rotation where a target comes up for five seconds and you have to fire two rounds in it and it drops down. Next one comes up two five seconds two rounds in it and you have to do so many rotations of this and of course they're being checked to make sure they can pull it off.
Well, like any mechanical device rifles have problems. They have what are known as stoppages which means that it doesn't go when you pull the trigger. And I watched one fellow they're there and the order is given in the first target pop up and he pulls the trigger and nothing happens. And he immediately rolls to his side and he starts out loud starts going naming off these things while he's unloading checking pulling.
So it's clear. It's got to get back down and he fires again. I was suitably impressed. I watched several others go through this too.
And then I remembered back to a few weeks previous. As I mentioned, as a chap in the Canadian Armed Forces we are noncombatants so we don't bear arms but we are required should it happen in the field that we encounter a soldier who for medical reasons or mental health reasons they need to be relieved of their firearm we have to be able to take their firearm and make sure it's safe. It's a simple thing. But I hadn't done it in a year and a half and somebody went, Captain Michaels, you're no longer qualified and being able to make a weapon safe.
I went, you know, I said I haven't touched one in a year and a half. I said, that's probably true. I said, so we want you to go. They're running drill tonight and we want you to go in and get back up to speed.
So it's like, okay, so we have to be in our full FFO which is our full fighting gear. So I get out and put on this tactical vest in my helmet and my gloves and everything. I go in and there's this whole line of soldiers there. And as soon as I walk in the door this person hands me a rifle and tells me to get in line.
So I take the rifle and I stand in line. And he starts to yell out commands. And everybody in the line is reciting what he says and like, slaps, you know, pull up. I look like if you're familiar with the comedian, Mr.
Bean, because I'm like, just trying to act like I'm doing something while keeping the business end of the weapon, not pointing at any human being. And all of a sudden I hear this laughter behind me because one of the master corporals who had been told why I was going down there that I simply needed to be just reviewed on how to make the weapon safe was just having the time of his life watching me try to pretend like I knew what was going on. And so eventually after they all had had a joyful time of it, they called me aside and said, okay, come out in the hallway. So here it is.
This is how you unloaded. This is how you check this. This is how you check that. Do it for me a couple of times.
Do it. Okay. Now here's the pistol. You did it wrong.
You could shot yourself a foot. Okay. You're good. We'll check the box for you.
It's like, thank you. But I tell you that because one of the things that struck me was yesterday laying flat in the mud, the soldier knew exactly what to do to get things going again. Why? Because over and over and over again in the drill hall, he had practiced his craft.
He knew exactly what to do. He even said the words as he did it because he had been taught with great intention how to be a soldier and do this job. So it didn't matter whether the brigade standing, Sergeant Major was standing behind him, which he was, or that he was now in a couple inches of nice, chilly mud, which he was. And that his rifle was showing its own particular personality, which it did.
He knew exactly what to do. If you have a Bible with you, I would encourage you to turn to the book of 2 Timothy. We're going to take a look at a few passages in this book where Paul is writing to Timothy and then through Timothy to the church of his day telling them how to prepare to live in the context in which they live. Looking at a very familiar verse.
We'll start to read for context, say, in 2 Timothy 2, starting at verse 14. Keep reminding them of these things. Warn them before God against quarreling about words. It is of no value and only ruins those who listen.
Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed, and who correctly handles the word of truth. Avoid godless chatter because those who indulge in it will become more and more ungodly. Their teaching will spread like gangrene. Among them are hymenious and felidus, who have wandered away from the truth.
They say the resurrection has already taken place, and they destroy the faith of some. Nevertheless, God's solid foundation stands firm, sealed with this inscription. The Lord knows those who are his, and everyone who confesses the name of the Lord must turn away from wickedness. Now draw your attention first to verse 15.
Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth. When I was a boy here for a season we had a club which was known as the Awana Club. It was a club created with the intention by a group of men in the United States. When they looked at children and youth, they found that children and youth, one of the things they noticed about them is they were not literate in the truths of the word of God.
That they did not have a clear understanding of what the Bible taught on any number of subjects, and as they grew from children to become teenagers to be young adults, they would encounter the philosophies of this world and they would be overwhelmed by them. So these men, as they were praying, and as they felt led by the spirit, they created a club for children whose focus was specifically to impart as much of scripture into the lives of children and youth. So they would have memory verses, and they created this club, and there would be activities, and they would be teaching, but one of the main focuses of the club was they had children memorize the word of God. As an adult, I had the privilege of being part of one of these clubs in one of the churches where I was doing ministry, and one day we sat down and we started to count the number of verses that children learned.
We realized that by the time children had gone through the basic part of the program, they had committed to memory over a thousand passages of scripture, and that number increased as you went up. So that when these children encountered things as young adults, they would know what scripture says. I'm always struck when I read the stories in the Old Testament. Recently, I read again the story of Naaman the leper.
If you're familiar with the story, if you're not, I encourage you to go and read about it in 2 Kings. We have the story of this man. He's a pagan man, and his country is basically in conflict with Israel, and at one point, Naaman, who's a commander, goes, and he captures slaves out of Israel, and one of the slaves he takes is this little girl. And the little girl becomes the servant, the slave of his wife.
What we're told in the passage that Naaman contracts leprosy. And the little girl, when she hears about it, says to her mistress that if he could go to Israel that the prophet in Israel could cure him. And one of the things that strikes me about that is this little girl apparently knows enough about her faith to be able to testify in the context of a total foreign culture. We love the stories of Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, those young men who stand against an entire culture that's contrary to them.
But they stood, first of all, because they knew what they were supposed to believe. Nowhere in scripture does it say that God will put into your head his truth. What he says is teach this. In the great Shema, in Deuteronomy 6, we are told teach this to your children.
So as we look at this verse, and this verse in verse 15 was the key verse of Awana. The word Awana, oftentimes when new people would join our club, they'd go, is that like a Mi'gma word? Awana. It's like, actually no.
And that member is saying, is it African? Is it Asian? No. It's like an acronym.
Approved workmen are not ashamed. So we want every child to be an approved workman who is not ashamed. And how do you do that? Well, I can tell you as far as my soldiers are concerned, when they've learned they're training well, the RSM goes, good job, and walks on.
But when we who profess Christ but can actually give a reasonable answer for the hope that lies within us, how can we then be an effective workman for Christ? Recently, I had the opportunity to participate in a virtual government workshop looking at the issue of virtue in the Canadian civil service. And there were some interesting things that came out of listening to this workshop. One of the things that I appreciated was for the first time, I actually heard someone involved in sociology make the statement, people do not appear to be naturally bent towards virtuous living.
And I was sitting with a good friend and other chaplain, and we were both watching it together, and we looked at each other and went, wow, you don't say. Because I would of course open up the Word of God and it says there are none that are righteous, no not one. But for 200 years, it has been a mainstay of psychology and sociology to say that people are inherently good and that society corrupts them. But suddenly this person was saying, well, actually what we're noticing now is we look at people is that people don't seem to be naturally virtuous.
They also came up with a list of 73 virtues that people should have. And my friend said, you know, we could have boiled that down for them and called it the fruit of the spirit. And it would have covered it too. It was interesting because they were struggling with it.
But how do you teach these virtues? How do you get people to actually live them out? And we were saying, well, first of all, there has to be something changed inside to make you desire to be virtuous. If we don't naturally virtuous, then somebody giving you a new list of virtues is not going to suddenly make you virtuous.
And that's of course where the conversation began to break down because no one was willing to say that they needed something. Actually, they need someone to come in and make us desire virtue. But one of the things that also came out that struck me, it was sort of a passing thing because this was a government workshop. At one point, they brought up the issue of belief.
And in this issue of belief, they made the comment that we should always remember that freedom of belief is protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. You are allowed to believe whatever you choose. However, they put a caveat on it. They said, you can believe whatever you choose.
But if your belief should become manifest in your words or actions and it goes against Canadian values, you are no longer allowed to believe it. Which immediately causes me a struggle because I believe that you only believe what motivates you. So someone cannot say, I believe this, but it will never come out of my mouth and it will never be visible in my actions. That's not a belief.
That's a piece of intellectual assent. Belief moves us. Belief drives us. If I sincerely believe that every person is naturally born in sin and that we are dead and our trespasses and sins, and I am not surprised when I see people act out their sin.
But I also know that that person needs Christ in order to change their life. They then put up a list, a common list of beliefs that are contrary to Canadian values. And it had all the phobias, which if we take those by strict definition, I have no problem with that because we, as believers in Christ, should hate no one, should desire the best for everyone. But it was interesting because there was a new word on the list that neither I nor my friend had ever seen on this list of values, which are contrary to Canadian values, and the word was heteronormativity.
I didn't know what that meant. I had to look it up. And the definition is a sincere belief that there are in fact two genders with specific qualities and roles and that they are intended to interact together as two genders. That is heteronormativity.
When I looked it up, I also found on an American psychological site saying that this is one of the greatest dangers of our society. Now I bring that up as an example because when I hear heteronormativity, my brain immediately goes to Genesis chapter 1, where God creates humanity as a man and a woman. And as God lays out, this is how human beings will interact. And he tells us in Genesis 3 how because of sin, that relationship between men and women will be fractured because of sin.
But as I listened and as that was referenced, I saw hundreds of people online go, yeah, that's a problem. And I say to you, if your children are in school, in university, if you're in the workplace, if you're involved in schools or university, and someone stands up and says that's against Canadian values to believe that there are distinct men and women, can you speak to that based on the word of God? Do you know where you stand? Are you tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine that comes?
So what does this look like if you would turn over to 2 Timothy 3, Paul continues to speak on this, starting at verse 10. You however know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, persecution, sufferings, what kinds of things happen to me in Antioch and Iconium and Listra, the persecutions I endured, yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted while evil men and imposters will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you've learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
I'm going to hop on my hobby horse for a second. Speaking of someone who's been involved in children's ministry, your best teachers within the assembly should be teaching downstairs as well as upstairs. Because it is as important that the Word of God is handled well and communicated well to children, to teenagers as it is to you as adults. I have always pushed against in any opportunity I've had when someone came and said, oh, here's someone, they're brand new in the Lord, they'd like to serve, sort of have them serve in Sunday school.
I always said, no. As a helper, as someone setting things up and such, but I'm not going to have a babe in the Lord teach the Word of God because they don't know it yet. And children are going to ask questions, and they're going to need good answers. There should be as much preparation happening to teach a child or a youth as is happening to teach an adult.
And we've not been good at that. I'm talking not, this assembly, I'm talking just in general in Western churches that we keep it incredibly simple for the kids. And they say, well, when they're adults, then we'll dig into it. The kids want to dig into it now.
As principal at the Christian school, I often have elementary teachers come to me and they go, so Stephen, we were doing Bible class today. And this question came up. And it's like, oh, that's a fun one. They'll say, yes, we thought so too.
So when you come by to tell them, and it's like, okay. And because they also desire to know. And they need to have real answers of what the Word of God teaches. They need to be shown where it's found in the Word of God.
So that they can look at it themselves so that when that day comes and they are figuratively laying flat in the mud and stuff is going wrong, they know what the truth is. They know what God calls them to do. They know how to respond in love and in truth to the things around them. All scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
How do we prepare ourselves? We get into all the Word of God. I cringe when I hear people say, well, we just focus on a new Testament because the Old Testament is awkward. If it wasn't necessary, it wouldn't be there.
If you believe that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, they're from Genesis to Revelation. God intended it to be together, kept it together, preserved it, and gave it to us, then we should be studying all of it, including the hard bits, including the bits where you sit and go, I don't understand this at all. But I trust you, God, that it's your word. I had a parent come to me at school and say, the teacher is spending too much time in Genesis.
I'd like them to go and do some other, do some New Testament stuff. Teach them about Jesus. And I said to the parent, said, the teacher will, but the children will understand a whole lot more who Jesus is when they understand Jesus as he created the universe, as he laid out what holiness looks like, as he showed his promise. And that we learn through the Old Testament.
And we need to learn that all of scripture. And it's all useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. And those are three, four different aspects of how we learn. Teaching is giving us knowledge.
So we understand things about God, how big God is, how powerful God is, what holiness looks like. Rebuking deals with addressing issues of sin. So as I know the word of God, I can address issues of sin first in me, as the Holy Spirit convicts me, always first in me, and then in someone else. Correcting is dealing with error where someone may think, well, I thought that it's this.
It's like, no, this is what scripture says. Correcting an error and training. And that's developing our habits. How do we live life?
How do we walk it through? One of the areas in my life where I'm praying that the Lord will help me is in the area of my order of anxious thinking and prayer. Because as I take on new jobs, too often I go through an anxiety cycle first, and then I go to the Lord in prayer. Some of you may have experienced that.
That's where you go, oh, my goodness, there's a problem. How am I going to solve this problem? I've got to figure out how to solve this problem. I'm probably not going to solve this problem.
I'm going to be a mess. And once you've totally spun around for a while, I better pray about this. But of course, scripture says, what do we do? There's a problem.
I should pray about this. And it just takes out that whole anxiety problem part. But that's a training thing. Seeing what the Word of God teaches about how we should address these issues that come and then in the power of the Spirit, living them out.
Chapter four, in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus who will judge the living and the dead and in view of his appearing in his kingdom, I give you this charge. Preach the Word. Be prepared in season and out of season. Be prepared.
I remember reading this as a younger person. and wondering how people could surround themselves with a great number of teachers who would say what they want to hear. Now, thanks to the internet, we can. I can pick any topic and I can search and I can find someone who will agree with my conception.
I said that to a group of students, they were having a debate with a teacher about just a science issue or something and one of the students said, ah, I found proof that you're wrong. And I happened to be standing there and I said, so how long did you have to search for a website that agreed with you? And I said, I've got 15, 20 minutes, but I eventually found one. And that's our challenge.
That's why it becomes so important to know how to study the word of God, to surround yourself with sound teachers. Because the fact is, you can find any belief you want or your flesh wants, you can find someone who will teach that. And it's been more accessible now than it's ever been before, which is why it's even more imperative right from this small, we need to make sure that we teach the word of God properly. So that we know when we're in the mud how to live.
Because we live in a season now. As it says in verse three, for the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine, I would be so bold to say that time is now. I have been told to my face that it is offensive to tell someone that they sin. I've been told that it's damaging to their psychological wellbeing.
But how will a person know they need a savior if they're not told their condition? You can't tell someone, everything's wonderful with you. Oh, by the way, and Jesus would like to be part of your life. That makes no sense.
It makes no sense. But if I know what the Bible says, and I look at it and through the conviction of the Spirit, I see my need because someone has been loving me enough and truthful enough to tell me my state, then I look for a savior. We live in this time. So I give you brothers and sisters in Christ, this charge.
Preach the word. Preach the word. Wherever you find yourself, preach the word. And the term here for preach means to proclaims.
If you're going, well, I'm not really qualified. He's not saying, teach it. He's saying, preach it. Say what the Bible says.
In each situation that the Lord puts you. Be prepared in season and out of season. Be prepared when it's convenient, when you're ready for it. And when you're not, because most of the greatest divine appointments happen when you're least prepared for it.
You know why? Because then you're more likely to depend on the Holy Spirit to speak through you than your eloquent discourse that you're ready to give. I can remember times where I planned to speak with someone and share truths of the Word of God with them and went in there, and it got so awkward so fast. But I've also seen times where it came totally out of left field, was not prepared for it at all.
And suddenly it's the Spirit of God's going, did you hear what they just asked you? Answer the question using the Word of God that you know, and I'll give you the words to say. Correct, rebuke, and encourage, with great patience and careful instruction. This is our time.
Keep your head and all situations in your hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry. There will be moments when you will be in the mud. And if you have studied the Word, independence on the Spirit, in the mud, you'll know what to do. And God will be glorified in the mud.
But if you think you're just gonna walk along and then one day find yourself in the mud, and supernaturally, suddenly, the scriptures you never studied will be in your head. And the truths you never wrestled with will be clear. And the habits that you've never formed will be evident. It doesn't happen that way.
Let's pray. Father, I thank you for each person here. I thank you for what you were doing in their lives, in their households. Lord, we live in this time.
Whereas your Word has said these days are evil because we live in a world that is lost. But Lord, we know you have plans that you desire to be glorified in the earth. You desire to be at work through those who have given their trust to Christ, that you desire to draw many people to repentance. So Lord, I pray right now that you would work in us, that you would prepare us and equip us, that you would move us to know what we believe, to study your Word when we have the opportunity, to train ourselves as your Spirit is at work in us, so that when the moments come, which we may not desire, but they will come, that we are able to live as lights in a dark world.
Lord, we pray for our children that we would equip them, that they would know your Word, that they would have a vibrant relationship with you through Christ. Lord, that we would be all that you have called us to be. Lord, we know that you promise that you will be our strength, that your Spirit will guide us if we walk in His ways. So Lord, do this work we pray.
For your glory in Jesus Christ, amen.