On perilous times!

Today there are more people who have a form of godliness, but they deny its power. These people are superficially religious, and they may, or do, in fact, be dangerous. So, ours are perilous times or times. In the Bible we have verses from Apostle Paul on this matter in his second epistle. Paul warned his disciple named Timothy with these words: “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.” (2 Timothy 3:1-5). In clear terms Paul forewarned his beloved disciple to be actively aware of such people so that he would not be influenced and swayed by them. To us today, the readers of the Bible, these are the exhortations against these harsh and hard words so that we can continue to walk in the right path and live a godly life of integrity and truthfulness in such difficult times.
The first greatest commandment of God for us is to be with God with our heart, mind, soul and all strength. The second greatest, which follows from the first one, is to love our neighbours as we love ourselves. These commandments were given in the Old Testament, and Jesus quoted them in the New Testament. (Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 22:37-40). The entire Old Testament is summed up in these two commandments. We love God as he loves us: we love God, and we show our love by loving God’s creation, including other people.
The Westminster Shorter Catechism says, "The chief end of human life is to love God and enjoy him forever." Enjoying God! It means that we love God and all blessings through his good gifts in creation, which are good and beneficial for our lives and existence in harmony with nature and with others. Our love for others emanates from our love for our common Creator and sustainer. And our love for God is perfected in our love for others. Then we cannot be selfish and non-caring for others.
If we say we love God or if we have a form of love for him but we deny his power in our lives, we become deceptive and hypocritical. There is a lot of heinousness and foulness in our attitudes and conduct. The very idea of self-love begins and ends this Biblical teaching we are discussing. People who are referred to in this passage love themselves above everything else and have lust for money and possessions, worldly pleasures above anything, and true religion and godliness always outnumber people of authentic faith and spirituality. Herein lies the root of their sinful way of living. Such people can kill people for trifling reasons, rape, pillage, plunder and loot the properties and possessions of other people. They create havoc for millions of people, and their lust for power, property and prejudice lies behind all problems for mankind.
God created man to be the faithful stewards or managers of his creation. But due to selfishness and lust for all those heinous attitudes, life is awfully wasted. Paul clearly teaches that the root of selfishness is opposed to love and respect for the lives of others. People are lovers of money; many have a false sense of pride and are abusive of pristine values of love, sympathy and compassion, meaninglessly ungrateful for benefits derived from other people’s sacrificial giving; they are violent without a cause, fraudulent, and lovers of sensual pleasures at the cost of innocent people's lives and hopes.
Much of what we experience today is a hedonistic culture prevailing among people in general above God-glorifying things that speaks for sacrificial love for others. A colossal moral decay lies behind all these. Our times are evil because we are more dictated by evil than we are by what is essentially good.
This letter of Paul is the last one of his letters that is found in the New Testament. He wrote this while he was imprisoned in Rome.  He was suffering all kinds of afflictions and persecution from the Roman authorities for his faith. During that time, he was awaiting his death and martyrdom. He was eventually beheaded by the Roman Emperor Nero sometime during the mid-sixties of the first century. In spite of all his unjust sufferings, St Paul remained truly committed to his faith and its values until his death. He endured untold sufferings because he wanted to leave the unblemished legacy of his genuine faith in the Lord and Master Jesus Christ, who himself died unjustly for the unjust.  He wrote in his second epistle to the Corinthian Church these remarkable words: “Therefore, if there is one in Christ, he is a new creation." (2 Corinthians 5:17a). A true follower of Christ is a “new creation” and as such should not be one that makes times perilous.

The writer is a Christian Theology teacher and Church leader