Titus 3:1-15
Welcome! Today we have are going to finish our series on
Titus by looking at Chapter 3, the final chapter of the book. This is a bit of
a change from our previous plans, in which we were going to spend two weeks on
Titus 3, because we will have a special guest speaker next week, Timmy Powers.
Timmy was a pastor here at CCC for many years, and then he became a missionary
in Eastern Europe, based in Kiev ,
Ukraine
Anyway, when we opened the Titus series, we talked about how God desires to build us into a people that are mature in Christ, people who are completely transformed by Christ’s love and who reflect the goodness and love of Christ in all that they say and do. I gave the analogy of building skyscrapers and talked about how in many parts of the world it is common to see unfinished, abandoned building projects. Unfinished because they ran out of money, or they realized it was a bad idea, or for one of countless other reasons. Such unfinished buildings are an eyesore, and unfortunately, spiritually speaking, it is not uncommon to see people that are likewise unfinished, likewise no longer advancing in Christian maturity.
As we have gone through the first two chapters of Titus, we have seen a lot of what maturity is supposed to look like. The Apostle Paul had written Titus, who was ministering in theisland of Crete Crete to “straighten out what was left unfinished and
appoint elders in every town.” He went on to describe what elders should look
like; that is, he described what features a “completed building” in Christ
should have. You can read this description in Titus 1:6-9.
The letter went on to warn Titus about people who were stirring up trouble, teaching things contrary to the gospel of Christ. Paul in chapter 1 gives the particular example of the “circumcision group.” We know from other places that these people were teaching that you had to keep various parts of the Old Testament Law if you really wanted to be approved by God. And from multiple books in the Bible as well as other sources, we know that such people, such teachings, led many people astray.
And this is one of the ways people can become the equivalent of unfinished buildings; not just individuals but entire churches, entire bodies of believers. I have met so many people who have gotten off track through getting sucked into strange teachings, whether through in-person conversations or through what they read on the internet, and then either stop going to church or get involved only with people who think exactly like them, and as time goes on, their faith cools, and they become indistinguishable from the culture at large.
And TV is filled with charlatans, people who really just want your money, but tell you God will give you a special blessing, or heal you, or fix whatever your problem is, if you just send them a “faith offering.” Many non-Christians can see right through this stuff, and it turns them off of Christianity as a whole, so that they refuse to even consider the claims of Christ. And those who fall for these people’s schemes are also hurt, and they sometimes give up on faith altogether.
There is nothing new under the sun; such people were around inCrete nearly 2000 years ago, and Paul
warned Titus to not let their lies and influence spread among the true
believers. And so I, likewise warn you; hold up every teaching, every claim,
every argument to Scripture, and don’t needlessly expose yourself to material
from questionable sources and questionable people to begin with.
In Titus chapter 2, Paul gives instruction on what Titus should teach to various groups within the church, instructions for older men, for older women, for young men, and to servants. These are not matters of law, or of outward obedience, but are matters of the heart, of one’s fundamental character, of who a person is in their innermost being. If I were to summarize the various specific instructions of Chapter 2, it would be that we are to be good people, characterized by our kindness towards others, characterized by the depth of our love towards others, and characterized by our humility and the way we sacrificially serve others. It’s not so much that these are what we should do, but that these are what we should be. And people like this, and local assemblies of people like this (that is churches), are becoming tall skyscrapers, beautiful works in Christ.
This brings us to Chapter 3, the final chapter in Paul’s book to Titus inCrete . Here is how it
begins:
Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men. – Titus 3:1-2
These verses are specifically talking about how a mature believer should behave in their relationships with people in the “outside world.” Notice that the verse begins with “Remind the people...” Remind them. That is, they know it already, they have heard it already; these instructions are nothing new. Don’t rise up and be belligerent to those over you, but put yourself under them. Don’t go out and take revenge, or be mean, or demeaning, or hostile, or think only of yourself and your needs, but do the opposite – being good to others, thinking of them first, seeking to make peace, and demonstrating true humility; that is, treating them as above you. Titus’ listeners knew these things were right, they had heard it before. But they, and we, need to be reminded of them, for two reasons. First, we are a forgetful people. We need to hear things again and again because we forget. And second, we need to be reminded of these things because our sin nature causes there to be a disconnect from our brains and our hearts. If this knowledge stays only in our brains, then it doesn’t tend to change our behavior. It is only as it moves to our hearts that we begin to actually do what we ought.
This is one reason why there is nothing like spending some time daily in the Word; we are forgetful, and no matter how many times we have read the Bible, it will help us tremendously to read it again, because it will remind us of everything that is good and profitable for our lives in Christ.
By the way, notice how it says to remind them to be ready to do what is good? It doesn’t say to just do good, but to be ready to do it. What does this mean? The Greek word has at its root a word that means fitness, as in to be physically fit. It is my experience that it does in fact take readiness for me to do good. Readiness is, as much as anything, an attitude.
Readiness means that I am aware of what is going on around me; more, that I am being purposely aware, asking questions, paying attention, and so on. My brain needs to be others-focused or I will completely miss any opportunities the Holy Spirit may gently suggest in my inner being.
One other thing I want to elaborate on, simply because it is fun, is the term peaceable. In Greek this is amachos; the a in front means “not,” like how an atheist is a person who doesn’t believe in God (a theist does believe in God). So amachos means not machos, or to use our closest Greek derivative, not macho. When someone does something that is upsetting to you, you are not supposed to go Rambo on them.
And so I remind you of these things – be subject to those under you, obedient, be fit and ready to do good, don’t slander anyone, don’t be macho, but be humble towards everyone. Everyone. You don’t put on your kind-guy face when you go to church and your mean face when you go to work, or to school, or at home. Forbearance, humility and so on is to be part of our nature at all times, most especially when it is being tested.
At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. – Titus 3:3
There is a tendency when someone from outside Christianity looks and sees genuinely mature believers, people who exemplify the character qualities we have been talking about, to say, well, that person is just a good person; I’m not like that. Many people who don’t understand Christianity think they need to clean up their act before they can even set foot in a church. How wrong they are! This is Paul talking about himself and his fellow laborers. He is probably thinking as well of the original disciples. And so, in saying these true things about himself, Paul is setting the stage for explaining how we go from being people like this to being people that are mature in Christ.
But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of His mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by His grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. This is a trustworthy saying. – Titus 3:4-8a
The phrase “this is a trustworthy saying” really grabs me. Sometimes in my lectures on campus I will say, “This is really important,” or “this is the most important thing I am telling you today” or “if I were you, I would write this down.” Paul is saying something like this. Here are some ways we might take this to heart: “You should think a lot about what these verses are saying.” “You might want to memorize these verses.” “If you are a song writer, maybe you should make these verses into a song.” (And it is likely they did at least the first two of these three things, maybe all three.) So what are these verses saying? The gospel!
There is no path to growing in Christlikeness apart from being firmly and soundly rooted in the gospel. God came to save us because of his loving kindness, certainly not because we were special or good. It’s all God’s mercy; it’s all God’s grace. He chose to save us because, well, that’s the kind of God He is. He loves His creation; He is kind; He wants His creation to be in fellowship with Him, eternal, intimate fellowship. But He is also holy, and as long as we were “just us,” our old selves, there was no way for Him to give us this intimate fellowship that He desired to give us. And there was nothing we could do to fix our plight. We were powerless to even fix ourselves going forward, and nothing of that could rectify the past. And so God sent His Son to die on the cross for our sins, and by taking our punishment, God was able to declare us forgiven because the penalty had been paid.
Not only that, but upon any one of us coming to Him, humbly, repentant, and in faith in Him, He would apply that offer of forgiveness available through belief in Christ, through acceptance of His gift of grace, we would find ourselves what Scripture calls reborn in Him. And this is what baptism symbolizes. And not only reborn but renewed by the Holy Spirit, who lives in every believer and gently leads those who will follow His promptings towards maturity in Christ. This is the great truth: we do not build ourselves into completed buildings; we build but we take every step in Him, led by Him, empowered by Him, encouraged by Him, at times corrected by Him, at times even rebuked by Him, but step by step in Him. Jesus is the Master builder, and if we let Him, He will build us. Somehow we use our muscles, but He uses them and builds us through them. The exact nature of this is mysterious, but the fact that it is mysterious makes it no less real. Talk to anyone who has really grown spiritually, and they will tell you that it wasn’t really them. Yes, they made an effort, but it was Christ who made it happen. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by His grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.
Now remember the context of these marvelous words:
Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men. – Titus 3:1-2
This is what God wants to build with us. He wants us to become a people characterized by kindness, goodness, and a heart for others. He wants that of us individually, and he wants that of us collectively, as this local body of believers. You can become like this. You can become mature in Christ. But there is no path, no way of doing this apart from Him. Totally by His grace, He saved us. And totally by His grace, He pours out His Spirit on us. But He doesn’t force us. He doesn’t turn us into robots. Every minute of every day, we can choose to be led by the Spirit or be led by our own old, deceptive, selfish, wicked hearts. Clinging to Him – not to a concept or an ideal or a theory but to Him, to the Person of Christ, we will become changed; we will grow; we will discover in us a new, much greater capacity to love, to care, and to serve.
And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone. – Titus 3:8b
People whose faith stagnates, who stop growing, are people who do not regularly really deeply reflect on the amazing love and grace of God. They are people who don’t worship Him. Our love for God is not supposed to grow old. It’s supposed to grow! The more we get glimpses of who He is, how wonderful, how holy, how perfect, how loving God is, the more our hearts should be stirred and the more we respond to the gentle promptings of the Holy Spirit as God continues to remake us. And so we as a church and we as individuals should keep on stressing the gospel. We should continue to remember Him with the bread and the cup. We should continue to seek to know Him more and more, and God will take those embers in our hearts and fan into flame the people He desires to make us become.
My daughter Sarah likes to sometimes spring personally challenging questions on me and on the rest of our family. Today I want to spring one on you: Who are you? I have been intrigued by this question for a long time. There was a TV show in which one group of beings liked to ask the question “Who are you” and a second group of beings liked to instead ask “What do you want?” By the second question they were basically looking to entrap people much like how, in the Faustian story, the devil seeks to make a deal with Faust. The second question does tend to get people focused on self, whereas, at least for me, the first question gets me wondering about why I exist, what my purpose is, why I am here – questions that tend to lead me to God rather than to self.
Who are you? According to these verses in Titus, who you are is saved. Who you are is recipient of grace. Who you are is new creation made to be an heir, made for eternity. That is who we are. That matters infinitely more than who our parents were, or what our talents are, or what we like to do, or anything else. And really reflecting on these things does transform us. It makes us want to worship God. It makes us want to follow the Spirit. It makes us answer the “What do you want” question in a non-selfish way, to say, I only want to know Christ more, to be closer to Him, to love Him more. That is all I want. And from there God can really start building.
But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless. Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him. You may be sure that such a man is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned. – Titus 3:9-11
I almost hate to go on to these verses; after scaling the heights, Paul warns us of what can drag us down. It is so easy to wander into the grey, into the controversies, into the questions that have no definitive answers, not on this side of eternity. I don’t think this means we cannot explore these questions, but there is a world of difference between exploration and full-out debate. It is possible for our hunger for answers to replace our hunger for Christ. Paul warns Titus, and warns us, don’t go there. And avoid those who, it seems, have little spiritual interest, little spiritual temperature apart from these inconclusive or controversial matters. If you are a leader, and you see someone doing this repeatedly, it says to warn him, once, and then twice, and then, to separate yourself from him.
By the way, the “genealogies” mentioned here does not mean we should not read Genesis, or the lists in Matthew or Luke. There were many non-Biblical theories and accounts that were legends and myths. A fair amount of the rabbinic writings of later centuries is like this. There was a book called The Book of Jubilees that went on and on in this way, revealing supposed “hidden truths” when it was in reality just a bunch of nonsense. The latest evidence implies that this book and others like it were around at the time of the early New Testament church. I’m not going to give any examples of what it says because I just don’t see how it can be, as the passage says, profitable. Today, if a Mormon began regularly coming to our church and then tried to get everyone to read the Book of Mormon, saying they were sinners if they didn’t read and discuss it with him, we would have a situation where these instructions of Paul would apply. That’s not to say that a person from a different faith cannot come join us; they are totally welcome. But if they are simply coming to try to get converts to what they believe, that is where we are going to have a problem, Biblically quite similar to what was going on in Crete (and many other places) when Paul wrote Titus.
Note that the context here is people within the church. That doesn’t necessarily mean they are saved, but they are in the church, a part of a body of believers. And yet they are espousing false teachings of some kind with an intensity that is causing significant division within the body. Paul’s instructions on how to respond is similar to the process of church discipline given in Matthew 18: multiple warnings, but then, finally, a cutting off, a separation from the divisive person. Such a process is no doubt quite difficult, but it protects the body; it prevents much more difficult situations affecting many more people later down the road. Again, we are not talking about minor doctrinal differences; we are talking about fundamental things that threaten the gospel and things that are spoken with such fervency that people who do not agree with them are made to feel shunned or like they are sinning, things that are at least in some way in direct contradiction to the clear teachings of Scripture.
Paul then begins to close his letter:
As soon as I send Artemas or Tychicus to you, do your best to come to me at Nicopolis, because I have decided to winter there. Do everything you can to help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way and see that they have everything they need. Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives. – Titus 3:12-14
I don’t want to spend an excessive amount of time on this, but note Paul’s level of leadership here – I do think this is interesting. Paul was not a one-man show, or even a two-man show. He had put together a team of people who were working together to strengthen churches were the gospel had already established groups of believers as well as sending more people on various journeys, some of which were certainly for spreading the gospel even further into territories that had not heard the good news.
In this little glimpse into this process you see Paul planning to send one of two people to Crete, Artemas or Tychicus, Paul didn’t know which one yet, and this person would, at least temporarily, seemingly replace Titus so that Titus could visit Paul in person. In addition, two other people, Zenas and Apollos will be passing through (quite possibly the same Apollos mentioned in Acts 18 as from Alexandra and who had a powerful command of the Scriptures, the one who came to Ephesus where Aquila and Priscilla were, and where he was taught the “rest” of the gospel, having only known the teachings of John the Baptist – the Apollos who later worked at Corinth and partnered with Paul there.). Paul instructs Titus to give these men anything they need and help them with their travels any way he could. You see here interdependence, working together in an organized fashion for the sake of the gospel.
And so, just as believers were gathering in groups, not meant to be “Lone Ranger” Christians, not gathering in fellowship, the churches were also working together, being led together. And I would conclude that churches were never meant to be “Lone Ranger” churches either, but were meant to work together for the sake of the gospel. The whole point of this entire letter was that Paul was helping Titus, a non-Cretan, non-local person, to help the Cretan churches grow to maturity, to help select appropriate local leaders with sufficient maturity for the task.
Well, I think this is a good place to remind you that we too, are not a “Lone Ranger” church, but work together with other churches. We are a part of Great Commission Churches, an organization of churches inAmerica
We also partner with otherGreat Commission
Churches India Ukraine
and Mongolia
And then, verse 14: Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives.
In the past when I have read this verse, I think I have taken it out of context. I think I have also seen others use it out of context. It can be used as a verse to say that people should work and not be dependent on handouts. There are other valid verses that speak to the role of work, especially that the father in a family should provide for his own household, or he is “worse than an unbeliever.” (I Timothy 5:8). But the context here is helping Zenas and Apollos with whatever they need, with their daily necessities. The focus of this verse is not on working to provide for yourself and your family, but on helping others. If you work and provide for yourself, our culture likes to define this as a productive life. But I think the Bible disagrees with this. A productive life is one poured out to help other people. This is part of maturity in Christ. If you want God to build you into a skyscraper for Christ, you must have a heart that seeks to bless and help and encourage and equip and love others.
Finally, Paul ends his letter with the following:
Everyone with me sends you greetings. Greet those who love us in the faith. Grace be with you all. – Titus 3:15
Grace. Without it, we would not be saved. And without it, we would never grow. Praise God for the grace He gives us not only at the moment of salvation, but every minute of our lives!
Anyway, when we opened the Titus series, we talked about how God desires to build us into a people that are mature in Christ, people who are completely transformed by Christ’s love and who reflect the goodness and love of Christ in all that they say and do. I gave the analogy of building skyscrapers and talked about how in many parts of the world it is common to see unfinished, abandoned building projects. Unfinished because they ran out of money, or they realized it was a bad idea, or for one of countless other reasons. Such unfinished buildings are an eyesore, and unfortunately, spiritually speaking, it is not uncommon to see people that are likewise unfinished, likewise no longer advancing in Christian maturity.
As we have gone through the first two chapters of Titus, we have seen a lot of what maturity is supposed to look like. The Apostle Paul had written Titus, who was ministering in the
The letter went on to warn Titus about people who were stirring up trouble, teaching things contrary to the gospel of Christ. Paul in chapter 1 gives the particular example of the “circumcision group.” We know from other places that these people were teaching that you had to keep various parts of the Old Testament Law if you really wanted to be approved by God. And from multiple books in the Bible as well as other sources, we know that such people, such teachings, led many people astray.
And this is one of the ways people can become the equivalent of unfinished buildings; not just individuals but entire churches, entire bodies of believers. I have met so many people who have gotten off track through getting sucked into strange teachings, whether through in-person conversations or through what they read on the internet, and then either stop going to church or get involved only with people who think exactly like them, and as time goes on, their faith cools, and they become indistinguishable from the culture at large.
And TV is filled with charlatans, people who really just want your money, but tell you God will give you a special blessing, or heal you, or fix whatever your problem is, if you just send them a “faith offering.” Many non-Christians can see right through this stuff, and it turns them off of Christianity as a whole, so that they refuse to even consider the claims of Christ. And those who fall for these people’s schemes are also hurt, and they sometimes give up on faith altogether.
There is nothing new under the sun; such people were around in
In Titus chapter 2, Paul gives instruction on what Titus should teach to various groups within the church, instructions for older men, for older women, for young men, and to servants. These are not matters of law, or of outward obedience, but are matters of the heart, of one’s fundamental character, of who a person is in their innermost being. If I were to summarize the various specific instructions of Chapter 2, it would be that we are to be good people, characterized by our kindness towards others, characterized by the depth of our love towards others, and characterized by our humility and the way we sacrificially serve others. It’s not so much that these are what we should do, but that these are what we should be. And people like this, and local assemblies of people like this (that is churches), are becoming tall skyscrapers, beautiful works in Christ.
This brings us to Chapter 3, the final chapter in Paul’s book to Titus in
Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men. – Titus 3:1-2
These verses are specifically talking about how a mature believer should behave in their relationships with people in the “outside world.” Notice that the verse begins with “Remind the people...” Remind them. That is, they know it already, they have heard it already; these instructions are nothing new. Don’t rise up and be belligerent to those over you, but put yourself under them. Don’t go out and take revenge, or be mean, or demeaning, or hostile, or think only of yourself and your needs, but do the opposite – being good to others, thinking of them first, seeking to make peace, and demonstrating true humility; that is, treating them as above you. Titus’ listeners knew these things were right, they had heard it before. But they, and we, need to be reminded of them, for two reasons. First, we are a forgetful people. We need to hear things again and again because we forget. And second, we need to be reminded of these things because our sin nature causes there to be a disconnect from our brains and our hearts. If this knowledge stays only in our brains, then it doesn’t tend to change our behavior. It is only as it moves to our hearts that we begin to actually do what we ought.
This is one reason why there is nothing like spending some time daily in the Word; we are forgetful, and no matter how many times we have read the Bible, it will help us tremendously to read it again, because it will remind us of everything that is good and profitable for our lives in Christ.
By the way, notice how it says to remind them to be ready to do what is good? It doesn’t say to just do good, but to be ready to do it. What does this mean? The Greek word has at its root a word that means fitness, as in to be physically fit. It is my experience that it does in fact take readiness for me to do good. Readiness is, as much as anything, an attitude.
Readiness means that I am aware of what is going on around me; more, that I am being purposely aware, asking questions, paying attention, and so on. My brain needs to be others-focused or I will completely miss any opportunities the Holy Spirit may gently suggest in my inner being.
One other thing I want to elaborate on, simply because it is fun, is the term peaceable. In Greek this is amachos; the a in front means “not,” like how an atheist is a person who doesn’t believe in God (a theist does believe in God). So amachos means not machos, or to use our closest Greek derivative, not macho. When someone does something that is upsetting to you, you are not supposed to go Rambo on them.
And so I remind you of these things – be subject to those under you, obedient, be fit and ready to do good, don’t slander anyone, don’t be macho, but be humble towards everyone. Everyone. You don’t put on your kind-guy face when you go to church and your mean face when you go to work, or to school, or at home. Forbearance, humility and so on is to be part of our nature at all times, most especially when it is being tested.
At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. – Titus 3:3
There is a tendency when someone from outside Christianity looks and sees genuinely mature believers, people who exemplify the character qualities we have been talking about, to say, well, that person is just a good person; I’m not like that. Many people who don’t understand Christianity think they need to clean up their act before they can even set foot in a church. How wrong they are! This is Paul talking about himself and his fellow laborers. He is probably thinking as well of the original disciples. And so, in saying these true things about himself, Paul is setting the stage for explaining how we go from being people like this to being people that are mature in Christ.
But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of His mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by His grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. This is a trustworthy saying. – Titus 3:4-8a
The phrase “this is a trustworthy saying” really grabs me. Sometimes in my lectures on campus I will say, “This is really important,” or “this is the most important thing I am telling you today” or “if I were you, I would write this down.” Paul is saying something like this. Here are some ways we might take this to heart: “You should think a lot about what these verses are saying.” “You might want to memorize these verses.” “If you are a song writer, maybe you should make these verses into a song.” (And it is likely they did at least the first two of these three things, maybe all three.) So what are these verses saying? The gospel!
There is no path to growing in Christlikeness apart from being firmly and soundly rooted in the gospel. God came to save us because of his loving kindness, certainly not because we were special or good. It’s all God’s mercy; it’s all God’s grace. He chose to save us because, well, that’s the kind of God He is. He loves His creation; He is kind; He wants His creation to be in fellowship with Him, eternal, intimate fellowship. But He is also holy, and as long as we were “just us,” our old selves, there was no way for Him to give us this intimate fellowship that He desired to give us. And there was nothing we could do to fix our plight. We were powerless to even fix ourselves going forward, and nothing of that could rectify the past. And so God sent His Son to die on the cross for our sins, and by taking our punishment, God was able to declare us forgiven because the penalty had been paid.
Not only that, but upon any one of us coming to Him, humbly, repentant, and in faith in Him, He would apply that offer of forgiveness available through belief in Christ, through acceptance of His gift of grace, we would find ourselves what Scripture calls reborn in Him. And this is what baptism symbolizes. And not only reborn but renewed by the Holy Spirit, who lives in every believer and gently leads those who will follow His promptings towards maturity in Christ. This is the great truth: we do not build ourselves into completed buildings; we build but we take every step in Him, led by Him, empowered by Him, encouraged by Him, at times corrected by Him, at times even rebuked by Him, but step by step in Him. Jesus is the Master builder, and if we let Him, He will build us. Somehow we use our muscles, but He uses them and builds us through them. The exact nature of this is mysterious, but the fact that it is mysterious makes it no less real. Talk to anyone who has really grown spiritually, and they will tell you that it wasn’t really them. Yes, they made an effort, but it was Christ who made it happen. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by His grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.
Now remember the context of these marvelous words:
Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men. – Titus 3:1-2
This is what God wants to build with us. He wants us to become a people characterized by kindness, goodness, and a heart for others. He wants that of us individually, and he wants that of us collectively, as this local body of believers. You can become like this. You can become mature in Christ. But there is no path, no way of doing this apart from Him. Totally by His grace, He saved us. And totally by His grace, He pours out His Spirit on us. But He doesn’t force us. He doesn’t turn us into robots. Every minute of every day, we can choose to be led by the Spirit or be led by our own old, deceptive, selfish, wicked hearts. Clinging to Him – not to a concept or an ideal or a theory but to Him, to the Person of Christ, we will become changed; we will grow; we will discover in us a new, much greater capacity to love, to care, and to serve.
And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone. – Titus 3:8b
People whose faith stagnates, who stop growing, are people who do not regularly really deeply reflect on the amazing love and grace of God. They are people who don’t worship Him. Our love for God is not supposed to grow old. It’s supposed to grow! The more we get glimpses of who He is, how wonderful, how holy, how perfect, how loving God is, the more our hearts should be stirred and the more we respond to the gentle promptings of the Holy Spirit as God continues to remake us. And so we as a church and we as individuals should keep on stressing the gospel. We should continue to remember Him with the bread and the cup. We should continue to seek to know Him more and more, and God will take those embers in our hearts and fan into flame the people He desires to make us become.
My daughter Sarah likes to sometimes spring personally challenging questions on me and on the rest of our family. Today I want to spring one on you: Who are you? I have been intrigued by this question for a long time. There was a TV show in which one group of beings liked to ask the question “Who are you” and a second group of beings liked to instead ask “What do you want?” By the second question they were basically looking to entrap people much like how, in the Faustian story, the devil seeks to make a deal with Faust. The second question does tend to get people focused on self, whereas, at least for me, the first question gets me wondering about why I exist, what my purpose is, why I am here – questions that tend to lead me to God rather than to self.
Who are you? According to these verses in Titus, who you are is saved. Who you are is recipient of grace. Who you are is new creation made to be an heir, made for eternity. That is who we are. That matters infinitely more than who our parents were, or what our talents are, or what we like to do, or anything else. And really reflecting on these things does transform us. It makes us want to worship God. It makes us want to follow the Spirit. It makes us answer the “What do you want” question in a non-selfish way, to say, I only want to know Christ more, to be closer to Him, to love Him more. That is all I want. And from there God can really start building.
But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless. Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him. You may be sure that such a man is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned. – Titus 3:9-11
I almost hate to go on to these verses; after scaling the heights, Paul warns us of what can drag us down. It is so easy to wander into the grey, into the controversies, into the questions that have no definitive answers, not on this side of eternity. I don’t think this means we cannot explore these questions, but there is a world of difference between exploration and full-out debate. It is possible for our hunger for answers to replace our hunger for Christ. Paul warns Titus, and warns us, don’t go there. And avoid those who, it seems, have little spiritual interest, little spiritual temperature apart from these inconclusive or controversial matters. If you are a leader, and you see someone doing this repeatedly, it says to warn him, once, and then twice, and then, to separate yourself from him.
By the way, the “genealogies” mentioned here does not mean we should not read Genesis, or the lists in Matthew or Luke. There were many non-Biblical theories and accounts that were legends and myths. A fair amount of the rabbinic writings of later centuries is like this. There was a book called The Book of Jubilees that went on and on in this way, revealing supposed “hidden truths” when it was in reality just a bunch of nonsense. The latest evidence implies that this book and others like it were around at the time of the early New Testament church. I’m not going to give any examples of what it says because I just don’t see how it can be, as the passage says, profitable. Today, if a Mormon began regularly coming to our church and then tried to get everyone to read the Book of Mormon, saying they were sinners if they didn’t read and discuss it with him, we would have a situation where these instructions of Paul would apply. That’s not to say that a person from a different faith cannot come join us; they are totally welcome. But if they are simply coming to try to get converts to what they believe, that is where we are going to have a problem, Biblically quite similar to what was going on in Crete (and many other places) when Paul wrote Titus.
Note that the context here is people within the church. That doesn’t necessarily mean they are saved, but they are in the church, a part of a body of believers. And yet they are espousing false teachings of some kind with an intensity that is causing significant division within the body. Paul’s instructions on how to respond is similar to the process of church discipline given in Matthew 18: multiple warnings, but then, finally, a cutting off, a separation from the divisive person. Such a process is no doubt quite difficult, but it protects the body; it prevents much more difficult situations affecting many more people later down the road. Again, we are not talking about minor doctrinal differences; we are talking about fundamental things that threaten the gospel and things that are spoken with such fervency that people who do not agree with them are made to feel shunned or like they are sinning, things that are at least in some way in direct contradiction to the clear teachings of Scripture.
Paul then begins to close his letter:
As soon as I send Artemas or Tychicus to you, do your best to come to me at Nicopolis, because I have decided to winter there. Do everything you can to help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way and see that they have everything they need. Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives. – Titus 3:12-14
I don’t want to spend an excessive amount of time on this, but note Paul’s level of leadership here – I do think this is interesting. Paul was not a one-man show, or even a two-man show. He had put together a team of people who were working together to strengthen churches were the gospel had already established groups of believers as well as sending more people on various journeys, some of which were certainly for spreading the gospel even further into territories that had not heard the good news.
In this little glimpse into this process you see Paul planning to send one of two people to Crete, Artemas or Tychicus, Paul didn’t know which one yet, and this person would, at least temporarily, seemingly replace Titus so that Titus could visit Paul in person. In addition, two other people, Zenas and Apollos will be passing through (quite possibly the same Apollos mentioned in Acts 18 as from Alexandra and who had a powerful command of the Scriptures, the one who came to Ephesus where Aquila and Priscilla were, and where he was taught the “rest” of the gospel, having only known the teachings of John the Baptist – the Apollos who later worked at Corinth and partnered with Paul there.). Paul instructs Titus to give these men anything they need and help them with their travels any way he could. You see here interdependence, working together in an organized fashion for the sake of the gospel.
And so, just as believers were gathering in groups, not meant to be “Lone Ranger” Christians, not gathering in fellowship, the churches were also working together, being led together. And I would conclude that churches were never meant to be “Lone Ranger” churches either, but were meant to work together for the sake of the gospel. The whole point of this entire letter was that Paul was helping Titus, a non-Cretan, non-local person, to help the Cretan churches grow to maturity, to help select appropriate local leaders with sufficient maturity for the task.
Well, I think this is a good place to remind you that we too, are not a “Lone Ranger” church, but work together with other churches. We are a part of Great Commission Churches, an organization of churches in
We also partner with other
And then, verse 14: Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives.
In the past when I have read this verse, I think I have taken it out of context. I think I have also seen others use it out of context. It can be used as a verse to say that people should work and not be dependent on handouts. There are other valid verses that speak to the role of work, especially that the father in a family should provide for his own household, or he is “worse than an unbeliever.” (I Timothy 5:8). But the context here is helping Zenas and Apollos with whatever they need, with their daily necessities. The focus of this verse is not on working to provide for yourself and your family, but on helping others. If you work and provide for yourself, our culture likes to define this as a productive life. But I think the Bible disagrees with this. A productive life is one poured out to help other people. This is part of maturity in Christ. If you want God to build you into a skyscraper for Christ, you must have a heart that seeks to bless and help and encourage and equip and love others.
Finally, Paul ends his letter with the following:
Everyone with me sends you greetings. Greet those who love us in the faith. Grace be with you all. – Titus 3:15
Grace. Without it, we would not be saved. And without it, we would never grow. Praise God for the grace He gives us not only at the moment of salvation, but every minute of our lives!
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