It Will Look Like Godliness
These are the lines that captivated me so much in Portugal and throughout our time on the Iberian Peninsula. The words carry an enigmatic aroma to them even though the actual translation of these verses was straightforward and among the easiest in II Timothy.
II Timothy 3:1-9
1. You should know this, that in the last days hard times will be imminent
2. because people will be selfish, greedy, self-promoters, arrogant, blasphemous, rebellious to their parents, ungrateful, and without religion.
3. They will be the kind of people who don’t care about doing what is good, callous, always unsatisfied, slanderous, violent, vicious,
4. traitors, reckless, conceited people who love pleasure more than they love God.
5. It will look like godliness, but they will deny its power. You must reject this.
6. For among them are people so covered in sins they slip into the homes of young women and lead them away with various desires.
7. Always learning, yet a knowledge of the truth is never able to come to them.
8. They are the same as Jannes and Jambres, who stood against Moses; these people stand against the truth and their corrupted minds fail to measure put up to faith.
9. But they will not get very far. Their stupidity will be evident to everyone, just as it happened to others.
Throughout most of my life I’ve understood the idea of things getting worse being the sign of all things come to a close as inevitably linked to a certain time that has already been pre-set. However, reading through this passage, and others, I’m coming more to sense less about a certain time and more about a certain disposition humanity will someday come to. It might not be now, and there is no set time we will arrive at, but it is inevitably coming as we will become the authors of our own destruction. Our rotten behavior will usher in the end.
It is the day, to summarize all of these horrific descriptions of Paul, that we completely abandon human affection and care and totally and completely pursue only what makes us happy in the moment.
A man or a woman does not have to be a very good preacher at all to draw lines here to every day life right now. From the blasphemous self-promoting politicians who lead us to the vicious and violent celebrities who entertain us to the godless intellectuals who claim to always pursue knowledge but they can’t affirm the truth right in front of them – ultimate truth like Jesus is Lord but also inherent truth like male is not female. Blinded by power, pleasure, and the praise of people we’ve become violent, blithering idiots.
Paul says, rather comforting though, in verse 9 these people, especially those who prey upon young girls (v. 6 might be the Epstein list, no?) will not get very far because people will see their stupidity. Stupidity is my word, the New Testament here is ‘anoia’, which is the negative prefix ‘a’ with the noun ‘noia, nous’ which means mind. You might recognize ‘noia’ from words like ‘metanoia’ which means to change your mind and is often rendered as repent. You might also see it in the word ‘paranoia’ which is ‘other minded.’ Here, then, ‘anoia’ could then be translated as mindless, or without a mind, or brainless. I chose stupid. Their stupidity will be revealed and people will recognize them for what they are.
O Lord, open our eyes before it is too late.
It was verse 5, though, that sent me toward the world of II Timothy back in late April as we toured the beautiful European nation of Portugal. It was Sunday morning and we were in the town of Porto, scheduled to fly out that afternoon to Madrid. As is my custom, I went to church. I always go to church somehow some way. I found one within walking distance, and off I went in the rain.
To make a long story short, it was not a worship service, but an exhibit and before I knew what had happened I had been charged ten euros and was walking up toward the bell tower. I got lost, and, alone, I panicked. I couldn’t quite figure out the panic attack, for I am not prone to those. I could see below me the sanctuary, ornate, golden, pews, and artwork but I couldn’t reach it. Eventually I found my way down. But I was far from okay. Something was stirring within me.
It was Sunday. This was a church. There was a pulpit but no preacher. There was a choir but no singers. There was an altar but no chalice or wafer. There were people but no worshipers.
I found a pew and sat in it, alone except for one man with a camera taking pictures. After a few minutes a Korean man walked into the chapel and found a pew and I could see a kindred spirit. He too was looking for something more here on this Lord’s Day.
I sat and prayed and tried to focus. The Lord took my my mind to two thoughts. The first the farce of someone coming into a church seeking, but then panicked and unable to figure out what to do or where to go, confused. That is what has happened in American Christianity. The church is like that basilica in which people enter hungry for something meaningful but they get lost and panicked in our endless ‘corridors’ and ‘passageways’ and ‘o look at this neat thing’ that they eventually just get tired of it and find an exit.
We have let the world down by choosing to entertain them rather than feed them.
The second important thing that came to me was the deep impression of this verse, II Timothy 3:5. There as I sat in the chapel looking at the trappings of faith — even a giant crucifix — But he power was gone. The Holy Spirit had long removed the candlestick from this place (Revelation 2:5).
Again, I thought of projection screens, people singing songs they didn’t understand, and preachers peddling political movements and cliches rather than calls to repentance and justice. I committed there, in that place to do whatever I could to never settle for forms or appearances of godliness. It is the power of Jesus Christ, and him crucified, which I pursue. Anything less than that and the church will become a museum exhibit for people to take pictures on Sunday morning.
