TOMS: Titus 3

For an introduction to this series, click here.

November 1, 2007

Paul tends to throw a lot of disparate thoughts into the end of his epistles.

"Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people." (3:1-2)

Every once in a while (thankfully not very often) I run into a Christian who is obsessed with politics. And you can't be an honest Christian and not be frustrated by politicians. So they come to all kinds of crazy conclusions, like they shouldn't pay their taxes or they need to arm themselves in order to protect themselves from government persecution or intrusion they seem to know is coming. This is not the attitude Paul wants us to have. As Christians we are to live as best we can with the authorities. Some people develop a complex. They think that if the fire marshal tells them they need to put lighted "Exit" signs over the church doors then they are being persecuted. This is not persecution. It may be a hassle, but the fire marshal is not telling you what you are to teach or not teach.

"For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life." (3:3-7)

This passage is the testimony of every Christian. We were lost in sin, living depraved lives. But God saved us from all of that.

"The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things, so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works. These things are excellent and profitable for people. But avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable and worthless. As for a person who stirs up division, after warning him once and then twice, have nothing more to do with him, knowing that such a person is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned." (3:8-11, ESV)

It should be self-explanatory, as Paul says here, that Christians should lead lives characterized by good works. But some people, even some who claim to be evangelicals, say it is not reasonable to expect Christians to follow up their salvation with good works. Most of these people take the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints to an extreme. Certainly we cannot fall from grace by our actions, but there are too many scriptures that tell us to make our salvation sure for us to assume that just because someone made a profession and joined the church they are a Christian and on their way to heaven.

The last part is a solemn warning. Doctrinal purity is essential to the church, and we need to take all steps necessary (within reason) to make sure that our churches are preaching the truth. While no two people will agree perfectly on every issue, there are some things that are absolute. It's not OK if we have people in our church, especially in positions of spiritual authority, who, for example, teach that the Bible has fables in it that were never intended to be taught as absolute fact, but they became fact because of misguided tradition.

TOMS: Titus 2

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 31, 2007

Paul has a lot of practical advice for Titus and for all of us in this book.

"But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled." (2:1-6)

I'm not sure the best way to say this, but the first century church was very different from our churches today. They were together probably every night. There were more informal opportunities to teach and to learn than we have in our churches today. I am not suggesting that we go back to this model, but providing more opportunities for informal learning in our churches would be a good thing. Many churches are so hyper-organized that as soon as a new member joins or someone gets saved, somebody in an office assigns a mentor to them. Now of course that is not completely bad either. But I get the feeling from passages like this that allowing mentoring relationships to develop more naturally is more the Biblical model. I don't know, I'm kind of rambling. Certainly assigning someone is better than letting people falling through the cracks without any sort of mentoring.

"Bondservants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything; they are to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior." (2:9-10)

This is another of Paul's exhortations to slaves. Most of these, of course, can apply to the relationship between a boss and a worker. Notice that Paul says that a servant can glorify God through their work. This definitely needs to be our goal as employees.

"For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you." (2:11-15, ESV)

God's grace is more than a ticket to heaven. His grace continues to work in us, causing us to become more and more what God wants us to be. A good parallel passage to this is 2 Corinthians 3:17-18, which is one of my very favorite passages in all the Bible. Notice it says that God's grace trains us to leave some things behind and to add some new things to our lives. We are no more able to make ourselves Christ-like after we are born again than we were to make ourselves born again in the first place. Thankfully God takes care of both of those, and He will take care of us all the way into eternity.

TOMS: Titus 1

For an introduction to this series, click here.

October 30, 2007

Titus was another of Paul's proteges. We know from the book that at the time of this writing Titus was working in Crete. 
"Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness, in hope of eternal life, which God, who never lies, promised before the ages began and at the proper time manifested in his word through the preaching with which I have been entrusted by the command of God our Savior; To Titus, my true child in a common faith: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior." (1:1-4)

I usually don't comment on the greeting, but this one is too good to pass up. Notice Paul's three-fold message in verses 1 and 2: 1) the faith of God's elect; 2) acknowledging the truth which accords with godliness; 3) hope of eternal life. If you notice, these correspond to the three aspects of salvation: justification, sanctification and glorification. These were the three things that Paul preached: that is, the Gospel.

"This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order, and appoint elders in every town as I directed you— if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife, and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination. For an overseer, as God's steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined. He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it." (1:5-9)

It's interesting that one of the qualifications for an elder is that his children be believers. I'm not sure I've ever heard that taught before. Other translations do not render it this way: the KJV, NKJV and the HCSB all read, "faithful children." Not that there is much of a difference, but the way the ESV reads is certainly hard-hitting. Personally I don't think these qualifications preclude a single elder, for example. I think the stipulation is that if the man is married he should be a one-woman man and if he has children they should be faithful to the Lord.  

"For there are many who are insubordinate, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision party. They must be silenced, since they are upsetting whole families by teaching for shameful gain what they ought not to teach. One of the Cretans, a prophet of their own, said, 'Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.' This testimony is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith, not devoting themselves to Jewish myths and the commands of people who turn away from the truth. To the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their minds and their consciences are defiled." (1:10-15, ESV)

Once again we have a warning against false teachers. Apparently the Judaizers had found their way to Crete and were leading many people astray. These teachers were not motivated by the Lord or by their love for the people. They were motivated by money. Be careful about any preacher who seems inordinately concerned about money. 

Paul quotes Epimenides, a Greek poet, when he describes the Cretans. Paul was not uninformed about the world around him. Obviously he wasn't obsessed with it, like it is easy to do. But the fact remains that he apparently was well-read in secular literature and was familiar with the aspects of the popular culture of his day. Of course it is wrong to let your mind think about nothing but worldly things, but never are we commanded to pull ourselves away from society and not know anything.

I can remember as a young kid walking into Sunday School one time singing a song I had heard in a TV commercial (I don't remember what the song was now, I wish I could). One of the other kids said, "That's a bad song! You shouldn't be singing that!" And then the teacher scolded me a little bit, thankfully not too much. That's what Paul means that to the pure all things are pure. I didn't know it was a "bad" song (it probably wasn't, anyway, at least not sinful). We should be very careful to criticize the motives of someone doing something that is not clearly sin. Sometimes we Christians can impose our dirty consciences on others and ruin someone else's liberty. There's plenty of other examples, of course, but you get the idea.