“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for four things:
1. Teaching – knowing truth
2. Rebuking – knowing when and where we err
3. Correcting – knowing how to live correctly
4. Training in righteousness

How does the Bible train us in righteousness?

Growth happens over time. Maturing happens only when we are intentional about taking the steps to grow.

Here’s the thing about faith, growing up and maturing – it doesn’t happen by itself, nor overnight.

The main requirement in training in righteousness is obedience. It’s doing what the Bible says. God doesn’t give us his word to make us smarter sinners. God gives us his inspired word to transform us. Transformation happens over time as we obey God’s word.

God’s word is not for us to edit and tinker with. God’s word is to be obeyed.

When we obey God’s word, God’s truth transforms us.

That’s training in righteousness.

Like many other kinds of training, the key is consistency. You keep at it whether you feel like it or not. You keep working out. You keep exercising. You keep obeying even when you don’t feel like it.

Going to the gym one day and working your butt off is not training. That’s a start. And, if you don’t keep going to gym, it’s just a waste of time. But that’s not training.

Training is when you get your butt into the gym day in and day out, whether you feel like it or not. The same is true for training in righteousness.

The more we obey, the more God’s truth changes us.

That’s training in righteousness.

“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching us what is true, and rebuking us when we are wrong.

If that’s all that the Bible did – tell us how we messed up, how terrible we are, how we are repeat sinners, etc. – the Bible would be a terrible book!

How would you like to be around someone who only told you how terrible and messed up you were all the time! Eventually, we would get to the point where we couldn’t stand to be around them. We would avoid them at all cost.

That would be terrible if we were that way with God and his word!

Thank God that the Bible does more than telling us what is wrong with us. After letting us know where we are wrong, the Bible tells us how to correct it.

“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, and correcting,” and thank God for that!

Not only does the Bible tell us, “Boy, James. That was a dumb thing to say to your wife. Now go apologize to her, and here’s how you honor her and love her as Christ loves the church.”

We don’t make up our own way to fix our problems. God shows us how to do so through the Bible.

A. W. Pink says, “We cannot know God’s will if we are ignorant of God’s word.”

That’s correction.

“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

I rebuke you!

Doesn’t sound pleasant, does it?

Rebuke.

It’s not a very common word in our politically correct world. In fact, rebuke is very much not “pc”.

But, there it is. Right there in God’s word. Remember from yesterday? The bible is our guide to truth – not our “pc” world, but the bible.

Our problem with this world is our arrogance. We don’t think we need rebuke.

“Who gave _____ the right to tell me what is right or wrong for me? Who do you think you are?”

But the reality is that every one of us is a repeat sinner. We’re messed up. And because we are messed up, one of the things that the truth of God’s word does is that God’s truth rebukes us. God’s truth rebukes us because we’re messed up. And that’s a good thing. We need to know what the truth is.

One of the sayings I say to our staff and session is, “Facts/truth is our friend. You cannot build a desirable future based on wishful thinking. You can only build on the foundation of truth.”

John Stott says, “We must allow the Word of God to confront us, to disturb our security, to undermine our complacency, and to overthrow our pattern of thought and behavior.”

That’s rebuke.

And that’s a good thing for repeat sinners who long to grow and mature in their faith.