As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith. ~Paul the Apostle (1 Timothy 1:3-4, ESV)
Luther’s take on the above was spot on—false doctrine must be exposed and the gospel proclaimed in its fullness never gets old .
There are two hindrances to the gospel—the first is teaching false doctrine, driving the consciences into the Law and works. And the second is this trick of the devil, when he finds that he cannot subvert the faith by directly denying the gospel, he sneaks in from the rear and raises useless questions and gets men to contend about them and meanwhile to forget the chief thing… Thus Satan comes in the back way, people gape with wide-open mouth at these things and lose the chief things. A man does not need much wit to gain the popular applause, let him but preach new and strange things, and people will say that he is more learned than others—they come in droves, with eyes and ears and mouth widely opened. They do not care to have faith and love preached to them, that is too common, they heard and know enough about that—it irks them always to hear the same thing. ~Martin Luther, (Saint Louis Edition of the Works of Luther IX:863 f. on 1 Tim. 1:3–4)
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