Lesson 9 begin
2 Timothy 2:16-19 · JD McCulley · Oct 4, 2026
2 Timothy, No. 22
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/10426191914335

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

All right, we're kicking off lesson nine this morning. So let's do a little quick round through where we got through with the four weeks of lesson eight. So we spent five, well I guess five Sundays on lesson eight, four with me. We went through 2 Timothy 2, 11 through 15, and we ended up with a workman.

And we're told, Timothy is to be diligent to present yourself approved to God, accurately handling the word of truth. And we said that that meant cutting it straight, accurately handling, meaning cut it straight. Don't mince it, don't be haphazard with it, cut straight. That was the word that we looked at last week. And the whole back half of that ran on the contrast.

Verse 14 is a man using words to win. Verse 15 is a man using the word to serve. You see the difference there? Using words to win, and then 15, a man using the word to serve. So wrangling on one side with words, the word battles, and on the other side, it's cutting straight. Cutting straight on the word.

So Paul does something we should expect at this point in the chapter. He's told us what the cut straight looks like. And now we're moving to verse 16 through 18, and that shows us what the crooked one looks like. What does the crooked cut look like? And he gives two names that he attaches to it. So somebody could read 2 Timothy 2, 16 through 18 out loud for us. But avoid worldly and empty chatter, for it will lead to further ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene.

Among them are... Mm-hmm. Yep. Yeah. Go ahead and try it. Aeneas and... Philetus? Mm-hmm. Oh, sorry, 18. Men who have gone astray from the truth, saying the resurrection has already taken place, and they upset the faith of some. Okay, so let's look at verse 16. But avoid worldly chatter, worldly and empty chatter, for it will lead to further ungodliness. Let's look at that. Question number one. Does everybody have their lesson for nine? Yeah, okay. Question one. The word but points to a contrast. From what to what? What's the contrast here? Okay, let's look at the word but. Because it does point to this contrast.

And Doyle's note says... Yeah, you've got... That's right, be diligent previously, but... shun the profane, or that's what the King James says, but avoid worldly and empty chatter. So be diligent, but avoid worldly and empty chatter, and so forth. So let's look at this word, but. It's day, points to contrast, not only to the last injunction, expounding soundly the word of truth, like you said, Wayne, but to the exhortation. to bend your every effort to present yourself to God approved.

That's where we're headed here. So the first word of the verse reaches back and grabs the one we just finished. Verse 15 was the positive. Verse 16 is the negative of that same command. And notice it reaches back twice. It doesn't just reach back, it says, or twice rather, not just to cut it straight, but to also be diligent to present yourself approved. So the diligence and the avoiding are the same instruction facing two different directions.

A man cannot give himself to one and keep flirting around with the other. See that? You can't be diligent in the Word of God and cut straight, and then get caught up in worldly chatter because it leads to ungodliness. Well, that comes from those that aren't handling the Word of Truth.

That's right. I always felt that King James says rightly dividing the Word of Truth, and I always thought that was in as far as that's where Dispensations. And that's where you go to a lot of places that don't believe in dispensations and they're chattering about other things. Yeah, that's right. I think the same concept here applies, right? You're dividing the way that you handle the Word of God.

You handle it this way, but don't handle it this way. And it means that, so Paul's not really changing the subject here. He's finishing the sentence that he started with, being diligent and so forth, so that it may be approved. So he's finishing the sentence, just handle the word carefully, and here's what this is gonna get us to, and turn around and walk away from the other thing. Walk away from it. Let's look at question two. That was an easy one. This one's gonna take us into a little bit deeper. Discuss what shun or avoid means. What do you think shun means? You ever been shunned? Have you ever shunned something? We don't use that word very often.

Prostime. So in the verse, it's the word avoid, but avoid, that's what it is in the King James Version, is shun. In the New American Standard, it's but avoid worldly and empty chatter. And that word means to place around, to stand around, and in the form Paul uses, literally to turn oneself about, as you would to get away from something. So, to avoid, to shun. So when you read avoid in verse 16, you could read, turn around and walk away. Don't argue, in other words.

That's right. That's right. The expositors translate it, give them a wide berth. B-E-R-T-H, berth. I was like, I don't use that word very often. It's a sailor's term. It's a sailor's word for a wide open water that a ship can move between the rocks far away enough from the rocks on either side, right? Give yourself a berth or give them a wide berth, meaning get away from the rocks. Or the icebergs. Or icebergs, that's right. Titanic kind of comes to mind. Yeah. Give them a wide berth.

I heard a lot of empty chatter. We went to the Tech and CU game last night, college football. And I wasn't engaged in this conversation, but had I been, It would have been potentially a situation for me to completely avoid what was going on. But I sat on the bus, and I was listening to these folks talk about their life, and this gal was talking about it. And these were some of the words I wrote down, because I was sitting by myself. Addie and, I'm sorry, Les and Aiden were sitting up front in the bus, and I was stuck in the back next to these folks.

I've been through the universe, anxiety buckets, astrology, doormat mentality, layers of personality, but don't let them steal your light. Know your boundaries. All of these kinds of really empty chatter with no basis in the word of God whatsoever. It doesn't mean that I couldn't have had a conversation had they talked to me, but had it got to a point where they were relying on their worldview of Literally, I'm the center of the universe. There might have been a point, and there's probably been points in your life where you've had conversations with someone that it got to a point where it became a word battle. And then it moved into empty chatter where it just went on and on and on. We had a bunch of hecklers behind us last night, too, that wanted to engage us.

We were, Texas Tech's colors are red and black. And of course, CU is all black and gold. And we were in a sea of black and gold. We were just three little dots of red in a sea of black and gold. And boy, did they want to pick on us. We heard some really nasty things. And, you know, there was a real desire to turn around and say something. You know, and I asked one guy to kind of simmer down. We're here for a family event type of deal, but I didn't engage. It would have been empty and worthless chatter. It wasn't the environment for it either. Now, this can happen in church, too. I mean, it's easier to see it out in the world, but this can happen in a church environment, too.

And I think expositors reach for the sea here as the picture, because the picture's right. You don't argue with rocks. You keep your distance. See? But Paul's word here is even more than shun. It really means to turn yourself about. Have you ever had to walk away from a conversation because it became empty, worldly? Well, that's what he's talking about here. Paul, don't engage in that. Turn yourself about. And that subject verb is you. Paul is not asking Timothy to shut the conversation down or win it. He's asking him to turn around and walk. There comes a time when you turn around and you walk.

My daughter deals with that sometimes in the youth groups. Sometimes those kids get into all kinds of gossipy, worldly chatter. And she has to just dismiss herself. And it happens a lot at camp too. Sometimes it just, Kids get excited and they start getting in their heads about stuff and it starts getting very gossipy.

So when was the last time you turned around and walked away from a conversation like that? Maybe it's been a while. Think back to it if there's been a time. You might ask yourself, what did it cost you to do it? Were you embarrassed? Were you, did you feel pious, mighty, better than thou? I'm too good for this conversation?

Well, that's not the nature of walking away. Now that may be the way that you're interpreted, and you may be called names for it, like, oh, what's wrong with that guy? You know? The word worldly, vivilos, It's from two different words, Beino, to go, and Belos, a threshold, particularly the threshold of a temple. So there's a picture here. Belos described the person who was or should have been kept outside of the temple door, unhallowed.

And it's the opposite of Eros, that's the sacred. So, Zodiates has vebulos, lacks all relationship or affinity to God. So when you read worldly in verse 16, read outside the door. Avoid those conversations that should live outside the door. Or not in the, not in, the conversations that Paul is encouraging Timothy to have, where he's to hold diligent so that he may be approved. That's sacred. Don't let that worldly chatter, that street walk, talk. Come in, avoid it, shun it, walk away from it, because it doesn't belong there. It doesn't belong in those conversations. It's like saying that worldly chatter has no place alongside God's word.

I was reading in Fox News this morning about the head of the Southern Baptist Church saying that they need to be involved more in politics. And I thought, no, I don't think so. That's a really good point, Wayne, because politics is needed. But when you mix politics and you mix the word of God, without a foundation on God's word, and you throw them together, I think this could be a very likely picture of exactly what we're talking about here.

A better word than profane, we've got worldly, and then we said we could use that word profane in the King James. It doesn't mean it's filthy. It means it's outside the door. It belongs out there. Potentially politics, right? Doesn't mean it's filthy. Just means it's outside the door. Picture the temple. Inside, everything is set apart for God. You step back across the threshold, and you're in the street.

Right? That's where he's saying, that stuff, that goes out there. When we're dealing with the Word of God, that's what happens here. Everything is set apart for God, right? It's sanctified. That's the word we use. So here, Paul is giving Timothy a charge. And it has to do with this talk. This talk treats holy things as though they belonged out in the street. It's the same word, same doctrine, same Bible, handled as though they were nothing in particular. It's the opposite of set apart, this word bevelos. And Zodiates puts it pretty plainly. It lacks all relationship to God.

So when you're handling the word of God, we're being diligent with the word of God, in order to be approved by God, keep that empty, worldly chatter outside of that conversation, because it lacks all relationship to God. That's how Zoriades puts it. And we need to hold on to that, because it's exactly where this verse says the talk ends up. Where does it end up at the end of this verse?

16. It ends up in ungodliness. I think he's talking to believers individually, don't you? I think it applies to us absolutely. And not as a church organization, especially because the individuals are the ones that do the voting and all that. They're kind of involved, but they need to be taught the Word, and then they can understand the other things. Well, there's a lot of times where you may have a conversation with a co-worker or a friend, and you're having a spiritual conversation, and you're handling the Word of God diligently, and then they turn it on you, and they make it about politics. We'll use that because that's a very common one.

And all of a sudden, well, I just really don't like the way this is happening with this guy and that guy, and goodness, I sure don't like those kinds of people, and whatever. Well, what has that done to the conversation? It's changed it completely, because what belonged in a different type of conversation, in this case, Paul's saying, on the street, has now entered what was the sacred handling of God's Word.

When you engage in that, and you get wrapped up in that, and you don't walk away from that, it leads to ungodliness. Why does it lead to ungodliness, you think? I think there's kind of an anger that comes up sometimes. Sometimes you get frustrated, don't you? You're a little bit out of shape about it. I can't convince this guy. Or why does he keep talking about the flat earth?

Timothy's heard this exact phrase before. The first letter, last chapter of Timothy. Oh Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to you, avoiding worldly and empty chatter. That was 1 Timothy 6.20. So that's the same pair here. Guard the deposit and avoid the street talk. Verse 16 isn't new instruction. Paul's saying it twice. He's repeating the same concepts here, same truths. And it goes all the way back to the time of the priests, looking and pulling out of Leviticus. That's the book that... You know, it's rarely taught. It's got all the rules and the laws, right? And many of it is very specific.

But the priests, their job was, and I quote Leviticus 10.10, to make a distinction between the holy and the profane. So this was a truth that went all the way back to Leviticus, and by Ezekiel's day, and another example, Ezekiel 22, 26, by Ezekiel's day, they'd stopped, and it says that they have made no distinction between the holy and the profane. So in Ezekiel's day, they mixed it all up, and they have not taught the difference, is what it says, all the way back then. So Ezekiel was dealing with a bunch of many situations where they made no distinction between the holy of God's word, the law in that case, and the profane. So verse 14 was a charge to the teachers. A teacher's job We're back in 2 Timothy here. Verse 14 was a charge to the teachers. A teacher's job is to know which side of the door he's standing on and to teach the difference.

Any thoughts before we move on to question three? What benefit is there from vain babblings or worldly or empty chatter? What benefit? I want to look at this word empty chatter. How can you have empty chatter? If the chatter is like you hear stuff, how is it empty? King James calls them vain babblings.

There's two words that are kind of welded together here. The first is kenos, which is empty or hollow. And then phoné, I think, is what you might think it is. Phone, right? A sound, voice. So you've got empty and hollow and a sound and a voice. So that word kénophoné, kénophoné, that's the two words welded together, and it's empty sound is what that's meaning. Empty sound. And go ahead.

I've been just thinking, not mentioning any names, but word salad came to my mind. Word salad? You know, you guys know that term, word salad? You ever heard it? Yeah, you know what a salad looks like, right? You take a bunch of concepts and a bunch of words and you just throw it into a big salad and you mix it up and you're like, what are we even talking about right now? You ever been in a conversation where you're like, you're going everywhere. You're over there, you're over there, you're over there, you're over there.

That's an example of empty sound. That's what this word has in mind. And Thayer says, he says, empty discussion, discussion of vain and useless matters. Does that mean we don't talk to one another about our health or about the game later today? You can still have conversations.

It's when you start to go word salad with God's word. that things get specific here. Now if I were to start using football illustrations for every single thing that I ever taught and then get off into the, you know, the odds of the game later today and just start really engaging. And then I bounced over to politics and then I came back to Second Timothy and then I started talking about, you know, the latest thing from Elon Musk or, you know, it's like a Twitter feed. or an X feed or any kind of social media feed. Those are examples.

That's what it's like to experience empty noise when you're trying to focus on being diligent with God's words. You're just going from topic to topic to topic to topic to topic. Word salad, that's a good way of putting it. So notice that It is not aimed at words as such, but at the noise. That's what Thayer says. Empty discussion, discussion of vain and useless matters. And it's not aimed at words as such, but at the noise. Not necessarily the words, but the noise, the babbling, the chatter.

So empty chatter is what it says, noise with nothing in it. It's almost like God's hearing like a white noise. You know what white noise is? Just like... You know, you guys don't have TVs, maybe, or don't have TVs that have channels that you can't get to anymore, but the rest of us in here are used to turning on channel 8 and getting, what do we call that, static?

That's the picture that I got when I read this empty chatter. And how do you detect this? I think the Spirit of God will put upon your heart, this is not going anywhere. Does it make sense? Does this make sense? Does it line up with God's word? Is it reasonably understandable? The way that I heard this gal talking in the bus sounded like noise to me.

At one point, she was like, I just want to win. And this older gentleman, who apparently was not her father, was saying, well, what does win mean? She's like, well, and in a previous statement, she said, I choose kindness. And she's like, but I just want to win sometimes. And he goes, well, what does win mean?

And she goes, I just want to put them in their place. And he's like, well, is that kindness? And she's like, no, but I want it. And he was like, so you want evil? She's like, sometimes I do. And I was like, wow. And he's like, do you think the universe wants that for you? She's like, well. I sure hope so, but I don't know, you tell me. So the question, what benefit is there from vain babblings or worldly or empty chatter? What's the value? Zero, zilch, nada, nothing. There's none.

And that's the whole point of the word. this particular word. But don't stop because the note takes it somewhere that should make us sit up and pay attention. Where does, where else does the word keno show up? In First Corinthians 1558, it says labor and vein. So not only can you have words that are empty and vein babblings, you can have labor that's vein too. Labor that yields no return.

And then Philippians 2.3 calls it vainglory. Vainglory, that's not a word we use very often. But what do you think vainglory means? Empty glory.

First Thessalonians 2.1, Paul's coming to them was not empty. It came with the spirit and with power. So that word is used elsewhere with labor, with the word glory, and even with the way in which Paul came to the Thessalonians. So Trench, one of the expositors might quote here, says, when not used of things but persons, Kenos predicates not merely an absence and emptiness of good, but, since the moral nature of man endures no vacuum, the presence of evil.

Okay, that's a little bit hard to understand. We're going to go back. Read that one more time. We're not used of things but persons. So we're not talking about things, we're talking about persons. We're not used of things but persons. This word predicates not merely an absence of emptiness of good, but since the moral nature of man endures no vacuum, the presence of evil. Meaning, we're not a vacuum. Meaning nothing exists in us. So, Evil will take the place of good. You don't just sit neutrally. You're not a vacuum. It just sucks everything away and it's a nothing, right?

He says, it is thus employed only once in the New Testament, namely at James 2.20. where the Anthropos Kainos, the empty man, is one in whom the higher wisdom has found no entrance, but who is puffed up with a vain conceit of his own spiritual insight. And I think that's where it is. That's the answer to the question.

The moral nature of a man will not hold a vacuum. So empty words do not stay empty. You see, so when I sit there and if I engage in these kinds of conversations, they're going to become a part of my thinking. It doesn't mean that I believe them, but I can't just unhear them. I'm not a vacuum. Vain babblings are not merely empty words. They're empty in that they don't have value, but they're not empty in the sense that they don't have an effect.

But because empty evil words can take that place. That's the idea. Empty means it's contrary to God's word, so it becomes a part of your mindset. It could, and if it does, if it takes root, it leads to ungodliness. That's the end of this verse. So empty words do not stay empty, is what Trench's perspective is on that one. Vain babblings are not merely empty words. So the benefit is literally zero. In the last chapter, we said that the word fight was fit for nothing. We said that that was useless. And this is a step past useless. An empty vessel does not stay empty.

Okay? Can you relate that to, say, Romans chapter 1? Romans chapter 1. Go for it. Even though they knew God, they did not honor Him. As God, so there's a knowledge there, but there's a choice. And it becomes, you know, professing to be wise, they became fools. Yep. And I think that that's where empty chatter comes from, is from that exact attitude towards God. They knew him, they did not honor him. They trade it in the truth for a lie. And that's where those lies can take root in our minds if we don't avoid the empty or vain babblings, empty chatter, vain babblings. So let's look at this word will lead to further in the verse. Procopto. Procopto. Go with that.

This word will lead to further, that's the full word, that's how it's translated in the American Standard, in the King James, will increase. Okay, so it says to cut or beat forward, to lengthen out by hammering. the way a blacksmith forges metal, driving it longer, stroke by stroke. You know, you see blacksmiths take a big blob of molten metal, or whatever, and plop it on a thing, and then they just start hammering it. What does it do? Spreads out, spreads out, spreads out, lengthens out, right? That's the picture.

And so this will lead to further, or will increase, means to advance, to progress, to go forward. So when you read, will lead to further, picture it being hammered out longer. So empty talk doesn't sit still like that molten blob. it gets hammered out longer and longer and longer, and every stroke of engaging in it extends it and extends it and extends it. And this word, progetto, it's a good word in most places. It's the word for progress, for growth.

But this is progress running in the wrong direction completely. The man is advancing, but is he advancing towards God? No. No, he's not. All right, question four. We're gonna get through an entire verse today. See what happens when Mike's not here. Just kidding. I'm just kidding. What does ungodliness mean? Asevia. It's my best attempt. For it will lead to further ungodliness. This Greek word is the exact opposite of efsevia. which is a holy reverence and respect toward God. It's piety. This is the exact opposite of that.

You put an A on it, it's a front, and it flips it, right? So it's important here. It does not describe a man's character. Now wait a minute, doesn't it? This word doesn't describe a man's character. I found this interesting. It describes his attitude toward God.

So when you read ungodliness, read no reverence for God himself. It leads, this whole engaging in this type of conversations and empty chatter, vain babblings and so forth, lead to ungodliness. lead to no reverence for God himself. Go back to the temple. That stuff does not belong in the temple.

So, another synonym for this is anomia, is disregard for, this is vine, is disregard for a defiance of God's laws. This is, I don't know, I get into Spanish pronunciations. I try to do the Greek sounds, and then I end up inevitably trying to roll my R's in Spanish. I don't know why that's the case, but the word here, so the word anomia is a disregard or defiance of God's laws.

So hear that. This word is the same attitude towards God's person. That's what Vine is comparing there. One is laws and one is persons. You could be defiant against both. And I think that distinction is really the answer to this question of what does ungodliness mean? And it's worth saying really kind of slowly here. One, anomia, is an attitude toward the rules. This word here is an attitude toward him.

So Paul's not warning that empty talk makes men break commandments. That's not what he's talking about. He's warning that it changes how a man holds God in his heart. He's talking about how it changes a man's reverence toward him, towards the Lord. And he's warning that it changes this attitude completely toward God and the reverence of that man drains out.

And a man can't, a man can lose that while his behavior still looks fine from the outside. You can get hammered out. extended out, progressed out into ungodliness, and still not even look that much different on the outside, but on the inside, the reverence towards God has changed.

Tie it back to that verilas, the very first word we looked at, in the same verse, and watch how this runs through. Treat holy things as common ground, and before long, you hold the Holy One as common too. I'll read that again for you. You treat holy things as common ground, and before long you hold the Holy One, the Lord, as common too.

And that's the progress that's being hammered out that Paul is warning Timothy against. So remember this, verse 16 is not a list of bad words. It's about what happens to a man's reverence, not his vocabulary, And this whole word that we just looked at most recently here is an attitude toward a person. Ungodliness is attitude towards God.

All right, we're at time. Let's pray. Father, how we thank you that you worked this out with Paul, and then Paul worked it out with Timothy, and that there was sound doctrine that he was to hold on to. And Lord, we just pray that we would hold on to these truths as well, and that we would avoid empty chatter for knowing that it extends our thoughts into common ground with the world and that leads to a commonness, a view of you and Lord you are holy, you are set apart, you are unique, one of a kind and your word does not belong in those spaces and so Lord we just Pray that we would be mindful of how we think about these things and that we do have the joy of your Holy Spirit to guide and convict and to convince us of how to manage those things and to know when to turn around and walk away in order to preserve what is holy about your word. And we thank you that we have it. And we pray for the next hour here, just that you would teach us and that we would learn more about your grace. And it's in your name we pray, amen.