Falling Away from The Faith

Falling Away from The Faith
1 Timothy 4:1-5
May 31, 2026

Timothy is in Ephesus leading the churches that experienced a great revival several years earlier. Paul can’t be there with Timothy, so he writes these letters, giving Timothy instruction to confront certain men that were teaching strange doctrines to keep the church out of the weeds and to keep the church growing spiritually.

In the section we are in tonight, Paul specifically addresses the apostasy that would be coming. Already in Acts 20, we see that Paul warned the leaders of the Church in Ephesus.

Acts 20:28-30, Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.

Now, that warning has come to fulfillment. The false teachers arrived and, we will see, they are still here today. Satan is the father of lies, but he is a very cunning liar. His lies are not openly deceitful, but they are disguised as the truth. His lies are so close to the truth that many are and will be misled.

The  deceit, though, may be different than we think as falling away can be viewed from different perspectives, as we will see.

And this is Paul’s warning to the church and it still rings true today as we see many of the things Paul addressed in our day and age as well.

I. Beware Deceitful Spirits

• In Paul’s time there were many deceitful spirits. Paul made it very clear that worship of idols was worship of demonic spirits.

1 Corinthians 10:19, … but I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God; and I do not want you to become sharers in demons. 

• In Paul’s time worship of idols was at the order of the day. The worship of many different gods, spiritism, mediums, and all that that entail was the bedrock of civilization, as all cultures firmly believed and recognized as a fact that the spirit world has a profound impact on the natural.

Illus – There was a very well-known Oracle who operated in the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. The Greeks considered this spot the absolute center of the universe, calling it the Naval of the world. With every great battle or city state decisions, this oracle was consulted. Noteworthy examples were when king Leonidas of the Spartans consulted the oracle, and also Alexander the Great, just to name a few.

          It didn’t stop there. This was also the central place for Greek City-State government meetings, and a central hub for intellectual discovery and inquiry, all influenced by the spiritual occult entity.

• Idol worship is not something we are focused on not doing today. Idolatry is such an “old”, ancient word that doesn’t seem relevant today. We are in the modern, enlightened culture and there is no idolatry around, they say. There are no physical altars built to gods or statues of deities around. Well think again.

A. Beware of modern Idolatry

• Then came the ‘modern’ era of reason and enlightenment, where science dictates the world and such ‘silly notions’ as God and Christianity are scoffed at by the post-modern culture.
• What actually happened, was that the doctrines of demons were just cleverly cloaked and many times taken as a fact of science. Beliefs like the theory of evolution, that at its foundation believe that the origin of the species was planted on earth by aliens, other worldly beings, which science doesn’t have a problem with, as long as the origin is not God. By the way, this is a belief system because there is no concrete evidence for this.
• Or the post-modern culture that has no problem with positive thinking, spiritually aligning with the universe, mother earth, or the energies of the planets and the stars. People look to astrology, eastern meditation, Buddhism ( which actually have physical little idols), Taoism, even mediums, fortunetellers, tarot cards, and many other spiritual practices, but they shun God. This is the definition of the doctrine of demons.
• Just like at Delphi, we see these spiritual occult philosophy even deeply impacting modern philosophy and higher learning academia. For example, the root of Marxist and Nazi ideology is grounded, by Hitler’s own admission, on the Theory of Evolution written by Darwin.
• We have also looked at this extensively in the past, but it is worth mentioning the original sin, man wanting to be like God, graphically portrayed at the tower of Babel.
• We see this as ancient history and not relevant to today at all, but it is more relevant than we think as it is happening again through the advancement of technology.

Illus – There is a recent podcast where a Hollywood producer was speaking about a documentary he is working on. He was studying the impact and effect of psychedelics on rock music. In his research, he discovered that the psychedelics were taken by artists in occult ceremonies to connect them to spiritual beings who would empower them and impart skills, abilities, knowledge and lyrics so they could become masters of their craft and become famous. Although this is quite a well-known fact, he was shocked to discover while researching this, that the same thing was happening in silicone valley. Many great influencers in the IT world and specifically AI development would use psychedelics to encounter ‘advanced beings’ who would impart hidden knowledge to them. The most bizarre part of it is that people taking the same type of psychedelics while not together, and not using it even at the same time, would encounter the same being tied to that psychedelic at different instances. Even philosophy  and technology professors at well-known universities heavily influential in development of IT and AI openly discuss using psychedelics and occult practices to gain knowledge and enlightenment.

• The doctrine of demons is alive and well today and leading the world away from Christ, building the next Babel, to be like God.
• We are warned to be vigilant against this, not to be deceived and drawn into the world of humanism so easily disguised as modern pop-culture, falling away from the faith.

B. Have a tender conscience

• Verse 2- The conscience can become calloused. It can become hardened against the nudging and prompting of the Spirit of God. It can become seared.

Iluss – It makes me think of searing a steak. If you put it on a hot fire or in a hot pan you get the hardened layer.

• At first sin hurts the conscience. It is like putting your hand on a warm plate. But if you continue sinning, your conscience becomes seared.
• Now we naturally think of sin as doing the flesh driven wrong things, like sleeping around, smoking, drinking, taking drugs, but is more than that. Sin, in essence, is missing the mark, the goal, that which is God’s plan, following Christ and being in relationship with Him.
• With this definition, the scope becomes much wider.
• Verse 2 says ‘seared their conscience as with a branding iron’. A branding iron would mark an animal with a symbol denoting the owner or who controls the animal.
• What or who controls you? What ideology opposed to the word has branded and seared your conscience? How do you see marriage, sexuality, family, the position of work and sport in your value ranking, money, power, technology, human rights?
• See, it is more than just the sin of the moment, it is the mindset that has been branded into you opposed to the truth of the word. Eventually will start to not only disagree with the word, but actively oppose the word.
• We are called to keep to the faith and a good conscience.

1 Tim 1:19, keeping faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith.

• Eventually wrong beliefs, aligning with sinful (missing the mark) doctrine, shipwrecks your faith. 

C. Have your conscience cleansed 

• The question is, if your conscience is seared and defiled, how can it be cleansed?

Hebrews 9:14, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

• The blood of Jesus, when applied to our lives, makes us alive to God and to the prompting of His Spirit. It makes your conscience tender again.

Is 53:5, But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed.

• When you see and have revelation of the punishment your sin deserved, that it brings death, it stings your heart. Moreso if you see the punishment Jesus endured in your place on the cross for your sin, when He took it upon himself, paying the debt he did not owe, the debt we could not pay.
• Instead of us having to be punished and feeling the destruction and eternal sting of death, our hearts are made tender by Christ through His spirit cutting away the fleshly nature and applying the blood to our lives which makes our hearts tender.

Colossians 2:11, and in Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; 

D. Renew your mind

• Then, our minds need to be aligned by the continual washing of the word.

Ephesians 5:25, Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.

• It is important to see though, that God does not renew your mind. You renew your mind in partnership with the Holy Spirit. The wrong mindsets get washed out as you get washed by the word of God, the Holy Spirit brings revelation and truth, and you repent and align your mind with the truth.

Illus – What a leader, and by extension, a believer should look like…

II. Falling into works

• There is also another side of falling away from faith, which Paul warns of; that leaders will come that will teach things that are not according to what Paul preached. What did Paul teach them at Ephesus? What ministry did God give him to fulfill?

Acts 20:24, But I do not consider my life of any account as dear to myself, so that I may finish my course and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify solemnly of the gospel of the grace of God.

• The core of our faith is that we stand under the new covenant of grace which Jesus ratified by His blood when dying on the cross.
• This is what was attacked by those coming after Paul at most of the churches. Those who want to lead the church back under works instead of living under grace with the transforming power of the Holy Spirit changing them from the inside out.
• Paul singles out a few things that the wrong teachers were focused on.

A. Protect the marriage covenant

• Verse 3- There were those who taught that marriage is forbidden. Be very weary of any teaching that forbids marriage.
• God blessed and instituted marriage. It was part of His initial design.

Genesis 2:24, For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. 

• The reason was that it had a deeper, hidden meaning. It became a picture of Christ and the church.

Eph 5:31-32, For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.

• The enemy will use any means to destroy what God has purposed and blessed. He will use ‘church’ decrees that say marriage is not allowed, like some churches in the Middle Ages and some still today. He will use sects that teach it to keep people from getting married. He will use movements like feminism, he will use gender confusion, he will use addiction to technology, he will even use AI, as people now go so far that they marry their AI companion.
• Next, they would teach to abstain from certain foods. This is not referencing if you stop eating something for health reasons, but if you are in a religion that strongly suggests, so strong that it is almost a law, or it is a law, that you should not eat certain foods, it is not from God.
• Why? Because it points to self-righteousness. There were those who were trying to bring people under the mosaic law of abstaining from certain foods. It was a law/own works based “righteousness”, not a Christ centered faith-based righteousness.
• Paul addresses this head on.

Verse 4 – For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with gratitude.

• Now there are some bugs people eat in some places in the world that I think are gross, but it is not unlawful. For a follower of Christ, everything is sanctified by the word (the command of God) and prayer, thanking God as the provider and creator of everything.
• God revealed this to Peter in Acts when he had the vision of the tablecloth with all the animals, including those who were unclean, and God told him to take and eat.
• We also see that the Jerusalem council strongly addressed this in Acts as we studied before.

Acts 15:19-20, Therefore it is my judgment that we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles, but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood.

• This is about a deeper principle than meets the eye. The core aim of the enemy, whether drawing away from faith through worldliness and idolatry, or drawing away from true faith by religion, is to draw away from total dependence on the finished work of Christ, receiving grace through faith.
• He wants to take you back under the law so you can stand under condemnation, or draw you into the world and the dictates of the flesh so you can stand under condemnation.

Galatians 5:1, IN [this] freedom Christ has made us free [and completely liberated us]; stand fast then, and do not be hampered and held ensnared and submit again to a yoke of slavery [which you have once put off]. AMP

• It speaks of sin, but even more so in the context of Galatians, the yoke of religion, because as soon as you stand under religion, you are no longer standing under the freedom Christ bought for you. His yoke is light.
• He doesn’t want your conscience to even stand under condemnation. The Holy Spirit will convict, nudge, persuade, but never condemn. Thank God that you are free.
• Keep thanking Him for your freedom. Don’t let the enemy steal your joy and peace. Christ has done it all. Look to Jesus. Stay in the faith.
• Growing in faith is growing more and more dependent on Christ, His strength in You, His provision, He is changing you. Keep growing in faith in CHRIST!

2 Corinthians 12:9, And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.