Titus Lesson 6
Titus · Miles Driedger · Sep 24, 2023
Titus, No. 19
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261932454585

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

I'm just going to read our verses for today, and let's get going. So, we're going to read Titus 2, verses 1 through 5. And this is from the NASB. But as for you, speak to things which are fitting for sound doctrine. Older men are to be temperate, dignified, sensible, sound in faith, in love, in perseverance. older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips, nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored." So then continuing on from here, Paul gets into talking about two young men and two bond slaves. So you get to choose for yourself here where you fit in. Are you an old man or a young man, an old woman or a young woman? He doesn't define these things here, but today we're going to get into talking about old men.

So you decide if this applies to you or not. a fun section to look at here. I enjoyed studying it. You know, it's an interesting thing. I know of one, I don't really know much about it, but I mean, there's, I know there's one ministry, I shouldn't, I don't know, name calling here, but it's called Titus Two Ministries. I don't know that much about it, but I know that it's a fairly legal group. And that often happens. When we get to a chapter like this, you know, and we rip it out of context and we divorce it from grace, we can get really legal really fast, right?

Because we've got lists of things that we've got to do or live up to. And so that's what we're going to talk about this morning. What is Paul's intent here? Let's look at question number one. You tell me if I've got the right questions here and I'm going on the right track. Does everyone have a copy of these questions Mike sent out? When you see in a Greek sentence the first word in the sentence, what does it tell you about the importance of that word?

A strong contrast. Strong contrast? Yeah. It's a little different than we have in English. I was trying to think of this. I'm not much of a grammarian, but when we want to emphasize a word in English, we tend to stress it. There, see how I did that? I kind of stressed the word stress. That's my emphasis in the sentence.

So, but in Greek, you can, and so sometimes you'll see that in English writing where we'll italicize a word because we want to make sure that the reader understands that's the word we're emphasizing. Because it's hard to do in written English form. But in the Greek, the first word in the sentence is the emphasis of the sentence.

That's kind of where your attention is to be at, so it comes first. Now, Joanne, you're right about the word but. There's a strong contrast with the word but. And we do want to pay attention to that. The first Greek word is, however, the word you in the Greek word order.

And that doesn't really make much sense to us if we were to directly translate that to English. It would be you, but, speak. We can't really render it that way in English. And that's what we're getting at here. The emphasis can't really be portrayed in English quite the same way. But maybe we'd write that you in italics.

We say, but you speak the things da-da-da-da-da. So that's what Mike was getting at in that question. And so, that's question number two. I guess I just kind of rolled these into one here, where we get that. The word you is the first word in verse one in Greek, and what does that tell you? So, let's talk about that a little bit. What does that tell you that the word you comes first?

And it does have to do with that strong contrast that Joanne talked about. Any thoughts on that, given the context of where we come from tail end of chapter 1. Look back at chapter 1 verse 9 and you'll see that strong contrast. Someone want to read chapter 1 verse 9?

Holding fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching so that he will be able to both will be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict. Yeah. So we see that there's kind of, that's addressed to elders, and we see there's like the two sides of what an elder is supposed to do. And on the one hand, to exhort in sound doctrine, and on the other hand, to refute those who contradict.

And then in the next verse, in chapter 1, verse 10, Paul begins talking about those who contradict, right? So those who the elder is supposed to refute. And he describes them as rebellious men, empty talkers, deceivers, especially those of the circumcision. And he says they must be refuted and silenced. So So then Paul goes on to the end of chapter 1, describing those people that are to be silenced by the elder, and then he turns to Titus.

And in strong contrast, he describes how Titus should exhort in sound doctrine. So this is all kind of built on that chapter 1, verse 9, where He says, exhort in sound doctrine and refute. Okay, this is what refuting is about and why. Now let's talk about the sound doctrine.

So, does that make sense? We get on what's going on there and why the emphasis is turned to you now? That you is singular. That's another English thing. We don't, you know, in modern English, we have you singular and you plural, but this is you singular. So it is addressed to Titus, who's the recipient of this letter. So this is Paul's personal direction to Titus. Paul has... Now he's going to tell Titus the things that he should speak and and verse one says but so but as for you speak the things which are Fitting for sound doctrine so we want to talk about that.

This is question number three What would be the things? befitting sound doctrine So and depending on your translation, let's talk a little bit about that word befitting and We'll get into the things that question is a little bit maybe looks like we're asking for the list of things. And we'll get down to that. But right now, let's talk about the word fitting. Any good synonyms for befitting? Just to get the idea of what we're talking about here. Like appropriate. Appropriate. Yeah, that's a good That's a good synonym.

So there's a certain conduct that is appropriate to write doctrine. Mike had put in the notes here that when Jesus came to John to be baptized in Matthew 3, verses 13 through 15, John hesitated because it didn't seem appropriate that he should baptize one as great as Jesus. And Jesus replied saying, permit it at this time, for in this way it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. And that word fitting is the same word used here by Paul. So, another word that comes up is, in my mind, is the word suitable. So, we got fitting, or appropriate, or suitable. So we could say that the things that Paul is about to list are things that are appropriate to write doctrine. So this is where we get really legal, right?

Because isn't this exactly what the reform guys would say, right? They'll take you on this, you know, logical, quote unquote, logical kind of ride. And they'll start out with this, well, there is an appropriate way to live as a Christian. Therefore, if you're not living this way, well, then you're probably not saved or something like this. And right away, it turns the root concept that there is an appropriate or a fitting conduct for a Christian, turns that into legality. What would be, let's just comment on that. What would be the issue with that? Why would we, how would you just mentally combat that way of thinking? Because we're pretty prone to it, I think.

I mean, I am, right? Give me a list and I will try to do it. I'll give it my, give it 110%. You know, you want me to be temperate, you know? I will do that. How do we scripturally refute that kind of thinking, that kind of legality, as soon as we give ourselves a list like this? Any thoughts on that? Yeah, I think the first thing that And Titus is being a younger man, and then speaking to older generations as well as younger, must feel, you know, a little bit, it had to be, I don't know if the word is intimidating, but he knows that he is entrusted with this body of healthy teaching, and that he is being asked to communicate the things that are part of that body of healthy teaching. to these other generations. And so, you know, when I think about approaching that, there's two different ways.

And if you fast track it down, you'll see that in verse 11, that this is where the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation. So this is a list that's presented in a context of grace, not presented in a context of legalism, which is what the false teachers were really trying to do in their own way, even if that body of teaching was different, it wasn't healthy. It produced a kind of legalistic response, more consistent with Jewish myths and the like, right? And so all of the things that they were combating and the elders were protecting the body from were wrapped up in, like you said, that legalistic packaging. But without that understanding, I would run right into this verse and say, okay, healthy doctrine, what does that mean?

You know, where's my systematic theology book? I've got to make sure that I got all that right. I've got to have my eschatology, you know, in check. I need my, you know, all of the ologies should probably be right, especially if I'm going to be teaching others.

So, you know, the question is, In my mind, how did Titus know what was sound doctrine for this group of people in this local body? How did he know what that was? And how did he deliver it so that it was not a list alone, but was in a context of grace?

Yeah. Yeah, that's great. Any thoughts? Yeah. Yeah, that's really good. I mean, I think it's interesting that verse 9, 1-9, he talks about sound doctrine and then refuting those who contradict, but then he reverses that order and he first deals with those who contradict because those are the legal guys, you know, especially those of the circumcision, you know, so he's already you know, condemned the idea of legality in the Church before he turns to this, you know, so that we're not going to, hopefully, so we don't confuse this with legalism.

And then, like you said, yeah, that's exactly it. That when you get down to chapter 2, verse 11, this is all based upon the fact that the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation. You know, it starts with the word for. It's an explanation of the whole reason that this is fitting for the Christian is because the grace of God has appeared. Right? So, yeah.

And we just, we want to be, we want to be just thoughtful in terms of grace around these kinds of issues because it can be so easy. I don't know how many, I mean, it kind of bothers me, but I don't know like how many guys I've listened to that really understand grace and they'll be teaching a book. But sometimes what happens is we teach a book in our circles as we go verse by verse by verse and it's slow and it takes like a year to get through, you know, Titus or something like that or Ephesians. And we talk about grace, because Paul typically sets this up in the early parts of a book, and then we get to these later chapters, we get to these, you know, instructions, these imperatives for Christians, and I'm amazed how often it turns to very, kind of, works-oriented. But we kind of lose that emphasis or that focus on grace as we get into the weeds of, okay, what are these things that are appropriate?

And that's just because our sin nature is so inclined to works, to works of the flesh, right? To trying to be pleasing to God out of our flesh. And so, it's so easy as we kind of get you know, drilling down into, you know, what does this word mean? What does temperate mean? What does dignified mean? And as we just kind of focus in on that, if we're not keeping grace really clearly in mind, we can easily float off into that legal world.

I don't know if I have time for it, but I had a little personal story. I don't know how old I was. I was in vacation Bible school. So this goes back a few decades anyway. And at the beginning of the week, the teachers or the head leader said, she pulled out this giant paper mache, Mr. Big, you guys have Mr. Big candy bars, right? Do you? It's a big, it's like, big. You don't have Mr. Big? All right. You guys got to visit us up here and have a Mr. Big sometime. We don't even call them candy bars. It's a chocolate bar. But we have a big chocolate bar called Mr. Big. And they'd taken, I don't know, 20 some of them and put them inside this paper-mache thing.

And she said, she's like, I don't know what the theme was. I don't know, the Beatitudes or the Fruit of the Spirit or something. And she's like, All throughout the day, every day this week, we're going to, your teachers are going to be, you know, cataloging, like marking down who's exhibiting these characteristics. And by the end of the week, whoever scores highest is taken home as Mr. Big.

Well, that engaged my flesh like you wouldn't imagine. That's the only thing I thought of all week long. you know, with these chocolate bars. And, you know, I stayed behind after crafts to put away the crayons. And then the teacher's like, well, that was really nice of you, Miles, but the next group is coming in. We actually need those out. But it didn't matter.

I just did, you know, I went, you know, 110% on all the works I could pull up. And, and I won the chocolate bar. Like, I mean, I, I did, I did take home the chocolate bar. That was my objective. That's what I achieved. Right. And that's what VBS taught me that year.

But, um, you know, so when we come to these lists of things, is that our, is that to be our mentality? Is that to be our motive? And that's what this, like I talked about, these, you know, reform guys and so forth that turn this into works, that becomes the driver. We become focused on, you know, how can I do these things in order to be pleasing to God?

And it's just completely backwards, right? Completely backwards. So, so there you go. That's, um, uh, I mean, I think what's important here is to understand that ultimately, I mean, we may succeed in getting a chocolate bar here and there, or we might think, you know, we might think for a while we're doing okay with keeping up some of these, you know, call it a virtue list, call it whatever, you know, you want.

But what Paul is describing here, what he's laying forward, if we take it in a legal sense, it's going to defeat us, right? If we take these things that he's about to lay out in any other context than grace, we will be defeated. We will find ourselves on our face, right? I was just going to say something that we've been studying on Monday nights is that legalism was made for the sin nature.

Grace was made for the new nature. So, this is going to appeal to the state of a man's trust and dependence upon either the old man or the new man. You could look at this entire list, and there's others, we know them. We've had them held over our heads, you know, whether it be VBS or whatnot. Even his parenting, right? And, you know, we give our kids lists all the time. Things to do. And we know what appeals to the old man, and that's that legalistic mentality.

But grace is hard to understand. But what's interesting is that for this chapter is that everything starts with a common sound doctrine. Paul started at the very beginning of Titus here, he talks about the common faith. And so those that Titus is addressing, they have this common faith. They have a trust in the Lord Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection, and now they're adding things on to that, right? And they're having to teach things that are, now that you understand these things, these are the things that flow out of the grace that the Lord saved you with, and therefore these are the things that we do by operation in grace.

However, It's very clear that these lists can appeal to the new nature, but in a much different way than they appeal to the old man. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, these things are descriptive of the new man, right? Of the man, yes. Yeah, these things are the nature of the man, Jesus Christ, right? That's the man, you know, that we're connected to.

And if we think of it in that sense, then the only reason as a believer why I would fail to be any one of these things is simply because I'm failing to rest in that grace by faith. Because these are the things that that are ours by by grace to faith. Does that make sense? Am I fair to say that? Yeah, that does make sense.

And one thing that maybe I'll just add real quick is that there's a lot of growth between not knowing something, knowing something, in this case knowing the nature of the new man. We're not getting into that in great depth in Titus right now, but There's growth in the process. Going from appealing to the old man through legalistic requirements to seeing those requirements is not for the old man to achieve, but for the new man, and he's already achieved them. There's a lot of time needed for the Lord to teach us individually. And in this case, it's older men, it's younger men, it's older women, younger. So he's teaching the same thing to varying generations. Why? Why is he teaching it? Why is he talking about these things?

Wouldn't they have got this as young men already? Young women? Shouldn't they already, now that they're older, shouldn't they know these things already? But this is a newer church, right? So, but nonetheless, we see this, that these things take, this knowledge takes time to be applied by faith and to be understood. And there's a, it's funny that Yeah, I'm not going to go down that rabbit trail either, but it's just interesting that without an understanding of who the new man is and how we operate, we can run right into this.

And what I was going to say is that I know a lot of people in legalistic environments who, you know, they don't, they're not reading all of the books. They're just steady churchgoers. They're doing their job. They're the greeters, you know, they're the ones that are, that are doing the work behind the scenes and, you know, are they operating by grace or are they operating by legalism?

You know, it's very difficult for us to judge that without going to the doctrine, right? We can't measure the fruit at the top of the tree without talking about what the roots are made out of, you know. And so I guess for us, it's important to realize that There's a lot of growth with these passages and how an older man becomes temperate, how he becomes dignified and sensible and so forth.

And you look at this and you're going to pick yourself out in this list. You're going to be like, OK, those are my things. Those are the things that I need to be aware of. You know, those are my goals, if you will. Those are the goals of operation in the church that I should aspire to.

No, it's not like that at all. These are the things that come out of spending time with the Lord Jesus. These are the results of sound doctrine, healthy doctrine, healthy living. In this case, the focus on that common faith produces in the new man these types of things. So anyway, sorry. That's great. No, no, that's really good. I think you're right. I like your comment about, you know, We might think we see certain things in the lives of others. It can be very hard, I think, to determine.

Is this, you know, sourced in the old man or is this something sourced in the new? You know, it can be hard to judge that even in our own lives, never mind the life of another believer. But one of the things I find for myself personally is the thing that shakes that out of the out of the tree, so to speak, is trials. When I face a trial, man, I see, wow, the thing that I thought was sourced in Christ. smoothly, when things are going well, you know, we can keep up some semblance of temperance and dignity and so forth, but man, like bring some difficulty, bring some trial and, you know, and I fall apart, you know, and if I'm falling apart, well, it shows you what was the source behind those things.

It was me. You know, if I fall apart and I'm no longer dignified or sensible, well, You know, it shows you what we're sourcing. And that's where I think the Lord is gracious to give us those trials and those difficulties to show us, you know, where we're leaning, you know, and always pointing us back to the need to depend on Him for these things, not on me.

So, cool. Okay, we got like three minutes. Is my clock on? Oh, four minutes? Okay. So, let's see if we can... Question number four, are the men in, oh, does yours have the verse number? Are the, your questions, I just have, are the men in verse elders or just men? So are the men in verse two, are the men in verse two elders or just men of older years? This is kind of just one of those little technical things, but it's, I mean, it's important because we talked about elders. You know, so we won't spend a lot of time on this, I don't think, but the term is presbutase.

This word is used two other times in the New Testament, I believe. Once in Luke 118 of Zacharias, who was an old man. beyond the childbearing years. And then in Philemon 1 verse 9, Paul calls himself an old man, using this word. And it's related to the word Presbyteros, which is the word that we translate elders in the New Testament, typically. And we saw that in Titus 1, verse 5, where Titus was to appoint elders. And that was the word Presbyteros. And this is the word Presbytes, which is like I said, related, but a little different. This is apparently directed to the old men, not particularly those who have been appointed as elders, but just all the older men in the body.

Another thing I was going to point out, if we need to point out, but Paul breaks things down by gender here. Paul clearly believes in gender distinction, and he's what the left-wingers would call binary. So, Paul has no problem being binary. Whether we needed to say that or not, I don't know, but it feels like in this day and age, it's worth saying that there are gender distinctions, and this is for the old men.

But we're really not going to have time here to get into the list here. But where we'll go next, I guess, is talking about the older men and what is fitting for them. I had some great notes on this next part. I guess I'm not going to get into them because next week I've got to teach James.

So, if you have time this week, though, I would recommend to have a look at a Greek interlinear, if you've got one that breaks down the parts of speech, you can look that up. I did it just on Blue Letter Bible because I don't have other software other than that, and you can see, you know, noun, adjective, verb, adjective, so forth.

So, when you look at this verse, you can see what the adjectives are. And the only thing I want to take 30 seconds to point out here is that when you get down to the sound in faith, in love, in perseverance, those are nouns. Those are nouns, not adjectives or verbs. Those are nouns. So, the three adjectives are temperate, dignified, sensible. The verb being, are to be. So, older men are to be. Those three adjectives, those would describe them.

And then there's that being sound or sound in the faith. is a participle. So, it has a connection to the verb to be, and they both have to be, I learned a little bit of Greek grammar here, they both have to be in the present tense, because that verbal participle is connected to the tense of the to be. So, these are to be present continuous. The Greek present tense has a sense of continuous. So, this is what is to be you know, on a continuous basis.

So, I don't know, if you have some time between now and next week, dig into that a little bit. And the other thing that's important to point out, really, is that faith, love, and perseverance all have the definite article attached to them. So, it's being sound in the faith, in the love, in the perseverance.

And if you really have time, check out the verses 1 Corinthians 13, 13. And 1 Thessalonians 1, 2-3. Because I think, especially at 1 Thessalonians, if you pay some careful attention to the grammar, you're gonna find out that this is Paul's list. This is Paul's triad, faith, hope, and love. In Thessalonians there, the word perseverance is attached to the word hope.

So just some cool things to look at next week. So let's close in prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for the opportunity that we've had today to just to spend some time and talk about the fact that these things, these attributes or character qualities are not things that we're supposed to try to produce. These are things that you produce in your righteousness through us. And our job is simple dependence, simple faith. And we pray that we'd be reminded of that, that as we face the trials and then they reveal our self-dependence, that we would just have our eyes turned back to Christ and to recognize that the things that you want to see in us are the things that are only sourced in Jesus. We thank you for that. We praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.