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Speaker 1I think we're gonna jump out of sequence for those of you who are in the sequence of the Bible study, but am looking forward to it. And this is where it's gonna be. Last year, was over here at this tent. It's not there on that side of Snow King Avenue. It's right there where we wanna set you up to win.
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So there are Bible studies that are starting, and we know about them. There are groups that are continuous ongoing, but we'd like to see that happening this fall. So intentional Bible studies are starting this fall. Kinda health care, I guess you'd call it. She's a part of the family, so she's been with us the past three summers, and she makes it a habit of singing on the last Sunday she's here.
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So she's here just till Thursday. We appreciate and love you. Thank you for giving what you have to to come. God. And now now I'm Titus two is where we are in our chronological study.
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We're going forward. I I tried to preach 15 verses last late last week. I made it through seven. I knew it was gonna be long, but I didn't think y'all wanna sit here for another forty five minutes. So, we are going on to finish up.
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We we broke it off, and, I will go through quickly some of what I said last week, and it's this. He starts off in chapter two. This is Paul writing to Titus. Paul, he described himself as a servant of God. Paul, to Titus, said, but as for you, Titus, teach what accords with sound doctrine.
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And I hit sound last week, and I said sound is the same root as hygiene. It means healthy. Teach what accords with healthy doctrine, balanced good doctrine. And I I hit that, and I said that, but I didn't hit teach so hard. Teach.
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This is it. He knows that people will give audience, but he wants them to teach it continually. That's something that goes forward. Teach this. I know not everybody's gonna live up to it, but stick with what it says.
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He's been saying that for the whole first chapter. And then he says, teach this. It matters. It makes a difference. So we're gonna keep on teaching it.
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But after you teach what accords with healthy doctrine. I talked a little while last week about the power of Familius. There were a couple of grandpa's in the audience that were very happy about the power of Familius and all the power that they had under the Roman Empire. But this is the context into which this letter was written, and the father of the family, paterfamilus or paterfotestis de la, a power of the father, the oldest male in the family had the power to say what happened. Right?
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And so this was the context into which it's written. Now we're reading it in a very, very different context. Individuality is amazingly a part of American life. Everybody self expression and self actualization is the highest goal in America. Right?
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It's that individuality is so huge. But this was very much father was in charge, and it was a part of the governance of the Roman Empire that the father of the oldest male in the family be in charge of. The rest of it was an honor shame based thing. So we talked about that for a little while. But as for you, Titus, teach what accords with healthy doctrine.
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Older men are to be sober minded, dignified. Likewise, urge the younger men to be self controlled. There it is. That's all it says about the younger men. We were reminded that Titus is a younger man, probably in his thirties or at least thirty minutes.
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Show yourself, Titus, in all respects, to be a model. What is the best way to teach? Modeling. Showing people how it is. So be a model of good works, and in your teaching, it matters what we listen to.
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It matters who we're listening to. It matters what they're saying. It matters what they are teaching. Show integrity. Integrity there cannot be corrupted.
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Don't go aside to the right or to the left, but straight down to middle dignity. Sound speech that cannot be condemned. So that. Again, so that. An opponent may be put to shame having nothing evil to say about us.
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Don't let any evil in so that they won't have any evil to say. Walked out right. So I asked last week, why then should we be living out this household household code? Code? And I skipped ahead in the text of verse 11.
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Now verse 11 was about letting Paul answer the question, why is it we wanna live a self controlled life? For the fourth time in 11 verses, he says, to live self control. So I read this and left this as our closing thought. For the grace of God has appeared. Your grace is enough.
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We're saying this morning. Your grace is enough. Your grace is enough. Your grace is enough for me. It's not just your grace is enough for salvation, but your grace is enough for my sanctification too.
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As I am walking on the upward way, you are sanctifying and cleansing me. Mhmm. For the grace of God has appeared. Jesus has come. He has had his perfect life, his sacrificial death, buried, and raised from the dead.
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The grace of God has appeared for all people and to live self control. I know that on a Sunday morning, the folks who show up, especially on the way on vacation. Jesus. You're coming to church on vacation. There you go.
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There you go. The grace of God has appeared for all people to live self controlled. So I know that a lot of y'all in here come on Sundays somewhere. You're always in here. You're Christian, and you're leaning towards God.
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It works itself out in your sanctification and in the way that you live your life. So I left us seeing that it was self controlled for everybody, basically, in that list. And then I stopped right here. Number person number nine starts with bond servants. And I stopped right here for a reason.
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So I'm from Georgia. A lot of y'all are from the South. I mean, it's crazy. I don't know if it's the accent or what, but there are a lot of you that are here. When I hit bond servants, I know that the word actually, the word means bond servant.
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It means servant or it means slave, and our own cultural history with slavery takes over when I hit slave in the text. Now pond serpent is not as much, but when I hit slave, it immediately kinda jars me. And I go into all this kind of American civil war cultural differences, regional differences, all kinds of stuff, how I was raised, all sorts of things start clashing, and it gets confused and the message gets lost. I know slavery is bad. I get that.
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It is the most detestable of human institutions, and it is a human institution. It is the way that the world is. It is. Now we can judge it from our standpoint and go, oh, why didn't Paul just lambaste the whole practice and rid us of it? No institutionalized slavery has ever stopped outside of the Christian women.
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Do The you believe? Seeds of overthrow of slavery are present in this text throughout this text. Remember when you were slaves in Egypt, he said over and over. That's one of the things that the Jews were to remember. Remember when you were slaves in Egypt.
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Remember when you were the foreigner in the outside. Remember when you were the oppressed. To someone who belongs to another. Human property, oh my gosh, drives me up the wall to start thinking about it. And I go into, that's wrong, that's wrong, that's wrong, but that was the law of the land, and we're supposed to obey the law of the land.
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In Rome at this time, one out of three people were slaves. 33% in Rome and in the Roman Empire, on average, it was one out of four. 25 of the people were slaves. Does that change the text story at all? Does that change the context story at all?
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Someone who belongs to another person. What I think of is how they were born, and then the people who were born to be slaves were also slaves because of their color of their skin. And so I get angry and I think righteousness about the the institution and the way that it was practiced here. But I said last week, the father of the family had the right to sell his children into slavery up to three times. So the way that they thought about slavery and the way that we think about slavery are very different.
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Okay? We'll keep on going. I promise. Dulos means bondservant, servant, slave, properly to someone who belongs to another without any ownership rights of their home. Anything that they were to obtain would probably be theft, and it would belong to the master.
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Either they took it from the master or they took it from someone else, but it would become the property of the master. They had no ownership rights of any bondservant servant slave. Ironically, considering that doulas is used with the highest dignity in the New Testament throughout. I took this break from Thayer's last time. Namely, unbelievers who willingly live under Christ's authority as his devoted followers.
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Okay? But think about that too. All the images of righteous indignation that we've got, all these images of slavery that we have in our minds, consider this. It's always using a positive sense as long as your master is Christ. We'll keep on going in the text.
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I promise. A slave is what New Life typically means. If you had to just choose one, it would be slave, and that would be literal or figurative. So a literal slave or figurative slave, as in slaves to sin. Paul mentions that all the time.
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Literal or figurative, involuntary or voluntary. You with me? Yes. Alright. Bond servants, slaves are to be submissive to their own masters in everything.
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When I hear that, I go, no. I want to overthrow that master. All the mantle of slavery. Get away from that. That's nope.
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Bond servants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything. They are to be well pleasing. I would define it as well pleasing, but as simple as you can get. Not argumentative. Do they have a reason to be argumentative?
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It's not right for one human to own another. We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal. They didn't hold those truths to be self evident. Quarter of the people were slaves. They're to be well pleasing, not argumentative, Not pilfering, so they were not to be taking, and and they were known for taking.
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Slaves were known for taking a little bit more than they deserved. If they were in the kitchen, they might take more food than they were allowed for the family. They were known for it throughout history. They had been known for it. Not pill free, but showing all good things.
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You take what is allotted to you and no more. Showing all good things. So this is the list for bond servants. We've got our list. And this does not stop.
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This the text stopped because I ran out of time. Okay? The text just flows right through. Older women I mean, it's older men, older women, younger women, younger men, Titus, you personally, and bond servants. Does not go into masters in this particular place.
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It does go into masters in Colossians. It does go into how masters should treat slaves in other places like Philemon. Bond servant uses the list, Submissive to their own masters and everything. And sometimes, I had done this before, six weeks ago, I think it was. I said, bond service then is equatable to employee now.
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Okay? If you are an employee, you are bound by contract to serve the one that you're serving. So if I'm gonna work for MSL construction, I'm working for Matt, and I'm moving rocks from one place to another, he's a stonemason. If I'm moving rocks from one place to another, working he has paid me, and I am working for him. So that I think that that's a reasonable thing in our day because we are bound.
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We some of us are bound by our debt. We have to work because we have enslaved ourselves to our debt. Right? Bond service. And he gives us a so that here, so that in everything, they may adorn the doctrine one.
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And that adorn so the word there is cosmetto, and it sounds like cosmetic, doesn't it? It is. That's where we get it from. It's cosmos is for world, whole universe, the orderly universe that we see sun, moon, and star on the courses above. All of the order we see in the universe properly is something of beauty that has the right arrangement by ordering to adorn to make compellingly attractive.
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We have tons of people come through this valley because it is so compellingly attractive. And this creation was made by a creator, and it adorns the doctrine of God, our savior. It is to be very appealing, inviting, awesomely gorgeous. Take this one straight from the left of town too. So that in everything it may make very appealing the doctrine, which is what?
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Teaching. The teaching about God, our savior. We do stand in peril. We do. As human beings, we start off in peril.
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The gospel's good news. But God so loved the world. He gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him, have you ever seen him right now, may not perish God, our savior. Four, this is the next part of the message. Four is like, because of this, because the grace of God has appeared.
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The grace of God has appeared. Grace is unmerited favor. Unmerited favor has appeared, bringing salvation for all people. Does it say to all people? It does not.
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Universalism is a heresy, is a convenient heresy, but it is heresy. Salvation for all people. There is an invitation right there. Salvation for those who will accept it. The grace of God has appeared bringing salvation for all people.
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Salvation first, and then it says, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions. The grace of God has appeared, which is training or teaching us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions. That is about sanctification. Every time it mentions salvation in these verses to Titus. Well, probably, but I know in chapter two.
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Every time it mentions salvation, get them saved. It also mentions our sanctification to be able to renounce ungodliness and walk into the gospel, to renounce worldly passion, and to live self control. Now how many of you struggle this week? When I mentioned last week, I'm a lay it out there with you and let you deal with this all week. Like, I've been dealing with it for several about self control.
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How many of you struggled with the things that you struggle with all week this week? You struggle with the things you struggle with, but the grace of God has appeared, and it is training us, and it is available. And it is God's grace that he will see us through those things. I I honestly, I praise him that he does keep on seeing us through those things to live self control. That's the fourth kind of love verses he's mentioned that.
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He keeps going and says upright, to be upright. Based on God to live in a way that is upright, it lines up with the way God wants us to live and live godly lives in this present age. But in this present age part, why we're here is very, very important. Our last song today is gonna be about heaven, and we're looking at ways because the text goes But there are some folks who are so heavenly minded. They're a double earthly good.
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What's up? Yeah. Okay? We're between the already and not yet. You can be a part of God's kingdom, not here, and then working toward that incorruptible hope, Peter talks about.
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Waiting for our blessed hope is what Paul says in the very next verse. We are in this life. We are awaiting our blessed hope. And maybe if you're living and things are rocking right on along and you feel like you're going through your life. I wonder why there's such an emphasis on heaven.
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And I I said this morning,
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Speaker 2I think sometimes, and I I
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Speaker 1mean to in difficult times and dying churches, all I know reunion with loved ones, and there are things that we're looking forward to, that sort of thing. But while we're waiting for our blessed hope that appearing, what Keith pointed out in the Psalm this morning, when we see Jesus, So sanctification is a process. And from the moment you believe you believe you are saved. Christ has already done work. When you believe on him, you're saved.
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But this process of sanctification is a two steps forward, one step back proposition sometimes. Okay? It does it. If we will submit our will, I'll call it a proposition. If we will submit our will, God will follow through, and he will shape us and form us, and he will make us holy if we'll submit our will.
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But when we don't, when we resist and we are proud and we wanna hold on to our rights, like the slave. Okay. You wanna hold on to your self evident rights because you're human. You don't want someone else taking over. He's already said submit willingly voluntarily.
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Waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and our savior, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ who gave himself for us to redeem us. That is about salvation. He gave his son to redeem us, paid the price, but redeem us from what? From all lawlessness.
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That's about salvation, but it's also about, sorry, sanctification. Jesus Christ who gave himself to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself and people for his own possession. Paul is talking to Titus about Christ purifying for himself a people for his possession. Christ possessing a people. That's the ecclesia, called out one from all tribes, hung in nature, called into the family of God, but we're called to be what did Paul describe himself as in one one of Titus?
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Dulox. Jesus Christ gave himself for us to purify for himself a people have been given has been given by the unmerited favor of a benevolent God. Paul, a doulas of God. First verse of first chapter of title. Think about this too.
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It is used with the highest dignity in the New Testament. When I think of slave, dignity does come to mind, but it's buried under some other images. It's not in the New Testament. It's always He wants for his people, the serve his servants, to be zealous for good works, to do things. Now you don't get saved by doing good works.
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That's absolute heresy. If anybody ever tries to say, yes, you do. Yes, you do. You have to do these things. No.
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But when you are saved, saving faith produces works, and a zeal for good works is what Christ had given himself for. We should be doing good works. We should be calling out about social justice, and we should be trying to put an end to the slavery that still exists in the world physically, involuntary servitude. Oh my goodness. It's reprehensible, and we should be doing everything we can to with it.
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We should be zealous for good works if we are a people of Christ's possession. Now he goes on to 15 says, declare these things. What is that again? Teach this. Teach it.
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Declare it. Say it out loud in the public assembly. Declare these things. Exhort and rebuke with all authority. We don't use exhort very often anymore.
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We don't use rebuke very often anymore in typical parlance. We don't use parlance very much, know, are you? Exhort and rebuke with all authority. This, I think got one more plug. This thing probably has just died on me.
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There it is. Declare these things. Exhort. That is urge towards goodness. I I had encourage goodness up there before.
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It's even stronger than encourage. Exhort is a more powerful word with more oomph behind it. Sharply urge towards goodness. You should be doing good things, Paul says to Titus, and I'll say it to you. You should be involved in doing good things, urged toward goodness, and rebuke and rebuke is sharply disprove disapprove of sin.
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I said discourage badness, but it sounded so wimpy. It is to discourage, but it is sharply call sin sin. Now do you have to call sin sin in somebody's face shaking your finger and wagging that? No. But I'm speaking to the church.
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Paul was speaking to Titus to speak to the church. I'm gonna keep on teaching these things.
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Speaker 2What the Bible says is sin. It's sin, and it's wrong.
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Speaker 1Are the things we are to be involved in. Okay. Sharply disapproved stand. With all authority. You have the authority of scripture as long as you stick with scripture.
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You don't have the authority to say whatever you want to. You don't have the authority to practice things the way you want to because of your self actualization. You feel that should be the way that it is. As long as you're standing on the bedrock of scripture, you can't exhort and review. That's Titus two fifteen, and then he ends with this, and let no one disregard you.
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And he's talking about Titus speaking to Christians. I'm not trying to say, for all of Jackson, I get to say what you think based on this. Based on this, I'm telling you, Christians, live by this, and you'll make a difference in the town of Jackson. Amen. Do you get that?
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Amen. Alright. Amen. I think that's it. That's the last verse I had up there.
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John Lennon wrote a rebuttal to it. It was the most vitriolous thing he ever wrote. Gotta serve somebody. You know the song, 1979. You may be an ambassador to England or France.
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You might like to gabble. You might like to dance. You might be the heavyweight champion of the world. You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls, but you're gonna have to serve somebody. Yeah.
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You're gonna have to serve It may be the devil and it may be the Lord, but you're gonna have to serve somebody. He goes on through the list. You may be a rock and roll addict practicing on a stage. You might have drugs that trick a man or woman in the cage, a businessman with some or some high degree thief. You may they may call you doctor or they may call you chief, but you're gonna have to serve somebody.
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You might be a state trooper, a young turd, a head of some big TV network. You might be rich or poor, blind or lame. You may live in another country, under another name. He keeps on construction workers. You might live in a mansion.
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You might live in a dome. You might own guns. You might own tanks. You might be somebody's landlord. You might own banks.
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His point is, it can be anybody, but every one of us has to serve somebody. And we can either voluntarily serve the Lord, or we can involuntarily serve sin. Those are the two options. That's my exhortation for you. You got a choice.
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You can voluntarily serve the Lord. You can voluntarily serve a devil too. That's fine. That's that's bad. But you can do it.
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You can make a choice to do it. Most people don't do that. Most people are not voluntarily serving lords, so they are involuntarily serving self and a devil. You get that? Alright.
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Let's sing when we all get better. We need this. Yeah. And we're gonna sing this one country style, Wyoming style. I really like the second verse says, let us then be true and faithful, trusting, serving the
