Isaiah 29:13 The Lord says: “These people come near to me with their mouth and honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught.

It is certainly not a new thing where people talk the talk but do not walk the walk – God warned people through Isaiah about how they were saying things without doing the things they talked about.

People have done this throughout the ages – and still we do not learn from other people’s mistakes.

God can see right through us when we are not genuine – we need to stop the pretence and get on and have a proper and right relationship with Christ, just as He wants us to!

2 Timothy 3:5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.

If you read the first four verses in this chapter you will find an amazing array of excuses people have in their lives so they can do what they want instead of the right thing…

But then there are also the people who will portray themselves as being good people, but they will continue to use these same ways in their lives to gain self-worth in some form or another!

We need to be aware of not falling into the trap of following such people and certainly not getting involved with what they are doing!

Continue to follow God and His ways at all times.

2 Timothy 3:12 In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted

One of the things we don’t often get told about is reflected by Timothy in this verse: we are all going to face persecution from all fronts when we live our lives for God.

Timothy was under no illusion about the hardships he had to face, but he also knew God was there and brought him through all of those times.

Yes, we will face hard times, but we will survive because God is looking out for us – keep your faith in the one who can look after you!