All these books repeatedly and gravely emphasize a single piece of spiritual counsel for success in this great test:  hold fast to the Truth “once for all delivered”—the Truth God gave you through a proven apostle before the great test of apostate teaching began. The King James translation of this passage from Jude 3 is clear enough, but the literal Greek yields an even more precise translation:  “the absolutely reliable and complete truth you were authoritatively taught before.” In II Timothy 3:13-14 God's people today are prophetically commanded, “Imposters will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived.  But as for you, continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them [the genuine apostle] ….”  In II Pet. 2:10 (repeated in Jude 8) Christ prophesies of the same end time imposters, revealing their hallmark is that they “despise authority” and “are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries”—i.e. they take to themselves authority to criticize and disdain the genuine apostle's office, work and doctrine.

 

In II John 6 Christ commands, “This is the commandment, that as you have heard from the beginning, you should walk in it.”  Verse 10 warns, “If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine [what you “heard from the beginning”], do not receive him into your house nor greet him….”  I John 2:24 promises us we will pass the great test if we keep this commandment, “If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son and the Father.”

 

Christ's very message to the Philadelphia Church in Revelation 3 tells us the test requires us to, “Hold fast what you have [possess], that no one may take your crown” (verse 11).  By definition, both of the Greek and the English, you can only “hold fast” what is already in your possession; the word does not apply if part of what is in your possession must be cast away and replaced. Consider the following additional passages which underscore the same command:  II Thessalonians 2:15 (“traditions” here is better translated “precepts” or “ordinances,” and the same Greek word is so translated elsewhere in the N.T.); II Timothy 1:13-14; 2:2; 4:3-4; II Peter 1:12-15; 2:1, 10 and 21; 3:1-2.  Old Testament prophecies in Isaiah 51:1 and Jeremiah 6:16 also speak to God's people today and give them the same counsel for success.

 

God is the perfect teacher.  No good teacher would give the class a final examination until he had taught them all the correct information to be tested, answered questions fully, given preliminary tests on the information as the students progressed to help cement their understanding, reviewed all the correct information before the final, and clarified any earlier misunderstandings. No teacher would announce at the final exam:  1) that a significant part of the information taught during the class, and even counted as right on preliminary tests, was in fact erroneous; 2) that he would not tell them what specifically or even how much was erroneous; and 3) that the students were on their own to figure out themselves what was wrong, what was right, and what the correct answer is regarding any false information they were given.  This is precisely the type of teacher a Christian effectively accuses God of being who says the test today is not to “hold fast,” but to “change, discard and replace”:  every man judge “whatever is right in his own eyes” and even find a significant part of the new “accurate” material within the otherwise heretical teaching of the Tkach ministry.