Titus

Okay. Titus chapter 2. You hover must teach what is appropriate to sound doctrine. Teach the older men to be temperate where they respect, self controlled, and in faith, in love, and endurance. Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderous or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good.

Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children to be self controlled and pure, to be busy at home to be kind and to be subject to their husbands so that no 1 will malign the word of god. Similarly, encourage the young men to be self controlled. In everything, set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching, show integrity, seriousness, and silence of speech that cannot be condemned so that those who oppose you may be ashamed because they have nothing bad to say about us. Teach slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please them, not to talk back to them, and not to steal from them.

But to show that they can be fully trusted so that in every way they will make the teaching about our god and our savior attractive. For the grace of god has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say no to ungodliness and worldly passions. And to live self controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age. While we wait for the blessed hope, the appearing of our, the appearing of the glory of our great god and savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us, to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own eager to do what is good.

These then are the things you should teach. Encourage and rebuke with all authority, do not let anyone despise you. Thank you, Steve. I'm on good. I'm fully aware this morning that we're jumping straight into the middle of a book.

And I'm also fully aware that I've picked an absolute minefield of a passage here in terms of the cultural applications. However, there is some absolute gold here for us as well and it applies to every single person in this room no matter who you are. So, I'm looking forward to getting into it. Let me pray and then we'll, we'll start. Father, thank you, for your word.

Thank you for what we've just heard. Thank you that your word is for everyone, no matter age, 6, social standing, you have something to say on every aspect of life. Please help us now as we we open this up, and and seek to understand and apply that to to where we are at here this morning. I think it's fair to say that Christianity is is is attractive. It should be attractive.

It should be the most beautiful thing on the planet So why is it that Christianity's often seen as the opposite, unattractive, Why is it so often that you hear people saying that church is just full of judgmental hypocrites? And it's because our actions so often do not match up to our claims of faith. And this is the very issue that that Paul is addressing here. Paul is writing to Titus. Now Titus was a convert of Paul's, probably from the Ephesian church on Paul's first missionary journey.

And Titus has now been kicking around with Paul for about a decade. And during that time, Paul has come to depend and and trust Titus with many of the most difficult and important tasks, in the ministry. So Titus accompanied Paul to Jerusalem the first time that he went. He's looked after Paul in prison. He's raised and delivered funds and taken the collection.

He's delivered letters and administered them throughout, the churches in the empire. So for example, he delivered the second letter to the Corinthians And if you know anything about what was going on in the church in corinth, you will know that that was a pastor's nightmare scenario to be sent into to administer teaching. So Titus is clearly in Paul's view, a capable and resourceful leader. Currently, Titus is on the island of crete. He and Paul had gone there some time earlier, and Paul left Titus there to organize the new converts from that mission.

And it sounds as though capable titus may just be the man for the job, because from what we read at the end of chapter 1, We can see that much like Titus's experience is in corinth, Ministry on Crete is going to be anything but a walk in the park. Chapter 1 ends with Paul saying in verse 16 that they claim to know god, but by their actions deny him, they are detestable disobedient and unfit for doing anything good. A pretty strong language that Paul's using there about certain elements within the cretan church. And what prompts him to say this is that earlier on in verse 12, he says that 1 of Cree's own prophets, 1 of your own said this about you. Cretons are always liars, evil brutes, and lazy gluttons.

Are there any cretons in the room today, because I certainly hope not, but anyways, and Paul goes on. He doesn't stop there. He says, you know what? From what I saw when I was there on mission, this saying is always true. It's definitely true.

I've seen it myself. Pretty strong stuff. Now, the point that Paul's making is not that all of crete, not all creteans behave in this way. The point he's making is that this type of behavior is a particular threat to the churches in crete. It's prominent in their culture.

This is the culture you are in Titus and you must be on guard against this type of behavior, seeping into the church, seeping into the ministry because if it does, then how are you gonna be able to show people what they've been rescued from and for and to be? How will the word of god look if the people of god look no different from the culture around them? Attractive or not? I would argue it actually makes it all rather pointless. Why would you want to join a church that's just the same as the culture you're already in?

That's just an added layer of inconvenience to your life that you don't really need. What do you gain from doing that? You're already in the culture. The church looks exactly the same as the culture. So Titus needs to be on guard for this.

It's a disaster for evangelism. It's a disaster for ministry. And so he needs to address the culture he's in. So then, this is what Paul says that Titus should teach. He should teach in verse 1 what is appropriate to sound doctrine.

Now, what does that mean? What is doctrine simply a body of teachings or instructions? Doctoring in the original Greek or Latin is it literally means teachings. That's what it means. And so what Paul is saying is you take a particular issue and you see what the whole weight of scripture has to say on that subject.

And in doing so, you have your doctrine, your teaching, your body of instruction on that particular issue. And you also get to know what god says about that issue, and that's why doctrine is such an attractive thing because you get to know the heart and mind of god on these specific topics and what you then do with these doctrines is that you teach them and apply them to the people in front of you and the culture that you are in tightness. That is what you are to do counter the culture with the application of sound doctrine. And that is what we're going to attempt to do this morning. Teaching and applying what is appropriate to sound doctrine within the confines of our current modern day culture.

And at this point, as I've already said, it's it's worth noting that no 1 in the room is left out by by Paul's teaching here. We're all either male or female. We're all somewhere on timeline between birth and death, and we all have a range of different jobs both inside and out of the workplace. So it covers every single person in this room, and that's how Paul goes about it. Those are the sorts of scales that he deals with as he goes through his instruction to titus.

This is for us, all of us. Every single 1 in this room. So Paul starts by going after the older men, verse 2. Now you might be wondering what exactly constitutes an older man, is it because I have less hair where I used to have more and more I used to have less? Is it because those trousers no longer fit?

Is it any of these things? I think generally speaking, what Paul is talking about as an older man is 40 plus When he talks about younger men, younger women, it's teenage up to 40, generally speaking. I'm getting close to straddling these 2, so I have a bit of an identity crisis is going on in passages like this. But anyway, let's, let's see. I think deep down, you know when you're no longer classified as a young man.

I'm already starting feel that myself and you might look at me and go, what are you talking about? But I certainly feel it, especially when I play football nowadays, it hurts. Listen to what Paul says about how the older men should be, temperate. They should be temperate, well tempered men. Not given to violent, sudden, or extreme swings of mood.

Men who are restrained, they don't indulge in in in excesses. I guess I guess for our culture, the pull for older men is is wealth, health, home, family, and holiday. I I guess that's that's largely where it's at. If you're gonna indulge in anything, it's gonna be the best wines, the best food, the best entertainment, the best holidays, the best houses, the best cars, that's the sort of thing that you've got available to you in our culture. And they're not bad things of themselves, but to indulge in them excessively, to have them as some kind of idol ruling over you is not healthy and not for men of the church, not for followers of Jesus.

They should be men who are worthy of respect. Now I think the best way of describing this is is the word integrity So I'll never forget my stepdad explaining to me a a a guy an elder in his church who throughout his life, he's had more respect than almost any other man that he's ever met, and I asked him why this was, and he said, well, because he is a man of integrity. I said, what do you mean by and then he told me at length what he meant by that. It's because this guy was the same on the inside as he was on the outside because this guy, when he said he was going to do something, it was as good as done. He was a man of his word.

He was dependable He was trustworthy. He spoke truth to the best of his ability. Sure. He wasn't perfect but you knew what the heart of the man was. You knew that he was always going to do what was expected of him.

You knew that he was gonna be battling and fighting sin in his life. You could just leave stuff with him and know, and that was fine. And so because of these reasons, he was worthy of respect. You're to be self controlled older men, Now Cretons had a reputation for wildness in their culture, wild living, wild partying, all kinds of wildness in all aspects of life. We're gonna come to more of this later, and you're gonna see self control as a theme keeping on coming up as we go through the letters.

You're also to be sound in faith in love and in endurance, if you notice. In other words, you're to be an example to us all in these areas. Your faith and your trust should be something that the rest of us can see and take heart from. You men who have trusted the lord in many situations and seen that he's good, that should be an example to the rest of us. Older men are to set an example of love putting themselves before others, modeling something of Christ as he laid down his life for the good of others, we should feel safe and protected in the company of the older men of our church, knowing that at need, they will give generously of themselves for everyone's good.

Just as Christ did, they're to lead the way in this. And finally, you're to model endurance for the rest of us. You're to be men who having had much experience of all kinds of situations know that you have to keep on going to win the race. You have to press on towards the prize. No matter how tough things are getting, no matter how bleak the forecast might be, you don't just bow out of the race.

There's a toughness, there's a strength there, an endurance. It's a weighty responsibility on the shoulders of the older men of the church. And we have to say at this point that none of these attributes are really possible without god. They're only really possible because of god's grace, their fingerprint if you like, their signs, their marks in an older man's life that God's grace has taken hold of a person and is at work in their lives as they begin to say no to natural desires and say yes to godly desires. Instead, Marx of grace, and that's another topic, another theme that's gonna come out as we go through this.

Paul then moves on to the the older women picking up in verse 3, and you see I've picked a minefield of a passage here. Now I'm not going to do a Dean and then ask everyone over the age of 40 to stand up in the room. I don't think that's necessary. But to the older women among us, like the older men, you are to be reverent in the way you live. Now, you can translate this to say that you should be respectful, worshipful, adoring, loving, admiring, devoted, devout dutiful in the way that you live for the lord.

In the way that you conduct your life for the lord, this is how you should be. You shouldn't be slanders or or gossips, and you shouldn't be addicted to much wine. Now, it seems that on crete, as throughout the Roman empire, this this was an issue. So older women, but who by and large remember the context that we're in here, who by and large are unable to work. That's the culture they're in.

There were no jobs for older women. By and large, generally speaking, they would be at home looking after the children, looking after the house, they have a particular problem here, the problem being that the children have grown and they've gone. And so the work at home has dramatically decreased, leaving them with this glut of time on their hands. And as the saying goes, the devil makes work for idle hands, and in this case tongues, and what was happening on crete that Paul has identified was the older housewives are getting together, their gossiping, and their drinking, and their slandering as more drink goes down, the tongues get looser, and more gossip comes out and Paul saying this is this is this is damaging. They're gossiping about their husbands, about the younger women, maybe there's some jealousy creeping in, there's slander, there's sowing discord, creating drama to spice up a life that's not as meaningful as it, I guess it wants was that maybe there's some boredom creeping in here.

And Paul says this is not good. This is obviously not good. There's no place for this within the community of Christ. There's no place for this in the church. These older women are to be women of unity, not discord, of alert sobriety not dulled and compromised by the effects of having too much too much alcohol.

Instead, they're to be women who teach what is good. Older women, this is Paul's charge to you, you're in positions of authority and influence by the virtue of your social standing within the community. And you're to use this position to teach what is good, particularly to the young women and by extension, therefore, to their children and husbands is your teaching, your, your influence has an effect on the young women, so that's gonna filter through into their into their households as well. And the context of this teaching seems to be by relationship and by example, to the younger women. That's not to say that older women don't teach by giving talks that there is a place for that within the church family, but it's just that in this sense that Paul is describing here, it's to the younger women by instruction and example.

So in a relational aspect because older women you're in the matriarchal position, aren't you? As the older men are in the patriarchal position within the family of Christ. Your biological children may have grown and flown the nest, but your spiritual children are surrounding you. You may never have had any biological children, but you are surrounded by your spiritual daughters and sons. And there's a lot that they can and need to learn from you.

So teach them. You have a massively massively honored and important role there younger women as part of a church, you have a unique opportunity to receive wisdom and experience an instruction from a range of older women who can offer real insights into your challenges in life unique to a woman and offer insights into your struggles and stages of life. So let them teach you, don't despise their teaching. Don't don't take that away from from them, that's not godly, that's not part of the family. This is why things like sisters for example, why 1 to ones, why the women's bible study groups, why there's various WhatsApp groups that that are on the go throughout the week.

I've I've just learned about loads this week from my wife. She's telling me all sorts of stuff. And and, you know, it's pleasing to see. It's really great to see that on so many different levels, in so many ways within the Cornerstone family, there are conversations between all kinds of women of all kinds of ages taking place on a daily basis. Where they're helping each other to puzzle through and understand and work out these things, sometimes really difficult things that are going on in life.

And what exactly is it that the old women are supposed to be modeling and teaching to the younger women? Well, firstly, in verse 4, Paul starts with to love their husbands and children. You might be thinking that's a weird thing to say, Paul, Why do young women need to be trained to love their husbands and children? I mean, it's not that difficult to love your husbands and children, is it? And of course, I think it probably is because husbands and I speak very personally now, we are all sinful and frankly, sometimes completely derelict in our duties as leaders of the household and as men.

And it's in those moments that our wives need to be trained and urged to love us to remind us of god's grace in our lives by showing us grace, at the moments we least deserve it. And as for the children, well mothers, I'm sure you will know how easy it is to always love the little darlings, how angelic they always are, how they never cause any trouble whatsoever, And if anything, they've actually made your lives easier and more relaxed. We know that's not the case. We know that's not the reality. We know it's not always easy.

I mean, I'm not speaking as a parent myself yet. I can observe to some degree what goes on in in parents' lives in the church, conversations, but we know it's not easy. At the end of the day, these little darlings, they're raw sinners with little to no self control. They don't make it easy. It's not always in your first instinct to wanna love them.

Sure you have maternal instincts. Sure there's paternal instincts, but my goodness, it's not always easy to show it, is it? But you can receive instruction. You can go to the older women and go, how did you deal with this? How on earth did you manage to get through that year?

The terrible twos, like my goodness. How do you cope with that? I don't know how you cope with that, and you can then they can give you a load of load of helpful stuff. Self control pops up again next. But like I say, we're going to come back to that at the end.

The next area The next potential mine to step on is, purity, and it's sexual purity that Paul's talking about here in particular. And Paul is saying that Christian women should be pure in this area. They should be imminent in this area, and it's obvious to see that sexual purity in the end is more attractive than sexual promiscuity. And this was an issue within creting culture, and so women who upheld purity in this area would be noticed by the culture around them. The hope would be that people would stop and they would think about that, and they would ask questions.

Why? And there comes the opportunities to share the gospel in that situation. I mean, I don't actually think crete and culture all that different to our culture, the wildness of living, you know, the excesses of life, go out in Kingston on a Friday or Saturday night, you'll see what I mean. You know, for our younger people, we're in a love island culture, a culture where you're told you have to flash as much flesh in order to get as much attention and attraction as you possibly can. That's really prominent in our culture, and it filters on to our young people's particularly.

And Paul's not saying to young women that they should be plain or prudish or boring or or actively go about trying to make themselves ugly. He's not saying that at all. I think if anything, he's saying there should be a prettiness and a loveliness to our young women that comes from something that's going on inside. It's an outworking of their heart for the lord. So there's nothing wrong with being attractive.

In fact, that's where this ends up going. We should be attractive, but for the right reasons. And at the same time, on the other hand, young women are not to be sexually provocative, and this isn't just young women, this is young men, this is everyone, you can apply almost everything we talk about this morning to every single person just in different ways, but Paul has said this specifically here because obviously there's something going on in the context of cretan culture that makes him say this. So they're not to be sexually provocative on purpose, they're not to be flirtatious, They're not to on purpose, by the way, they behave and dress to go out trying to attract the attentions, of of the men around them in the culture because, look, they might be gaining the attention for themselves, but the attention they get at the end of the day is hollow. And it makes the church ugly at the end of the day.

Unless that man happens to be your husband, then flirt away. That's absolutely fine. None of the husbands in the room are gonna complain about that. Older, just wanna say on this topic, you need to be really careful how you deal with it. A lot of damage can be done here.

This isn't about this isn't about saying your skirt's too short. It should be below the knee preferably down to the ankle. In fact, I I would rather that you only showed your hands and your face and maybe from the neck upwards. This isn't Islam. This isn't legalistic, pharisaical teaching.

This is this is principles that Paul is applying and they're principles of grace that Paul is applying to the lives of the people in the church in crete. And so as you seek to instruct and guide and model, I think in this area model is really important. So the younger women in the church, you need to be very gentle very wise about how you do that, feelings could be hurt very easily and damage could be done very quickly. So you need to puzzle that 1 through. I'm not gonna be too prescriptive because Paul's not too prescriptive.

He teaches a principle of grace. Right? More minds coming up. Real minds here, let's see how this 1 goes. Next, the older women are to teach the younger women to be busy at home, kind and subject to their husbands, in the correct biblical way.

Now hold off a second what is going on here. We're saying affect actively, if you if you take this passage that young women are to be good wives, good mothers who stay at home and get on with the housework, are we back in the 19 fifties or something? Well, no, we're not, but we are in first century crete. And by and large, Paul is addressing the fact of the culture. Paul is not a social reformer.

He's not in a position to be able to reform things socially, but he is in a position to tell people to act in a way that it's in accordance with the gospel and to use the situations they're in for the gospel. As I've already said, women didn't really have the opportunity to have a job and work in first century crete throughout the Roman empire. It just wasn't the way it was. And so Paul tells titus to deal with and advise people where they are at. To be busy at home.

The Greek word Paul uses here is quite a rare 1, and what it really translates to is to be good managers of the household. Not to stay cooped up at home wasting time but to exercise managerial gifts and skills for the family's sake. And there's a caveat here, and I want to say at this point that there's absolutely nothing wrong with being a stay at home mom. In fact, quite the opposite, I think there is, in many ways, that is 1 of the most noble job roles. You are bringing up the next generation.

What could be more important than that? And actually, what could be harder than that? You'll hear so many of the women in this church say, I went back to work to get a break from being at home. That was harder work than I've ever had in the workplace. And yet, likewise, at the same time, you can rightly apply this, be busy, be busy managers, with busy managers of the household, to our secular workplaces, to be busy and hardworking.

And you can just as easily then take this and apply it to the church family, where there's multiple opportunities to serve the family, to be busy to be good managers of the household of the family of Christ. There's certainly enough work to do. I'll tell you, there's tons that we can be getting on with a good manager of the workload in front of her is what young Christian women should excel at. They should be kind. Young Christian women should be growing in kindness towards people.

It's another area that it should be obvious that they are maturing and growing Paul urges Titus be kind. They should be kind. They should be approachable. And the older women need to be modeling this for them again. And finally subject to their husbands.

So this is in the correct godly way. He's laid out in ephesians 5 colossians 3. 1 Peter, I'm not gonna go into it. Because we don't have time, but it's not in a downtrodden, abusive way, but in a way that models the church's submission to Christ, and therefore, the husbands are modeling Christ's sacrificial love for the church back to their wives. And at this point, Paul says, so that.

No 1 will malign the word of god. All of these things, all of these signs of grace, these fingerprints on people's lives are so that no 1 will malign the word of god. Because if the young Christian women are not submitting to their husbands in the correct godly way, if husbands are not sacrificially loving their wives in the correct godly way. Well, then, that, that, that's the very fabric of scripture. That's the fabric of God's love for the church, that we've got an opportunity to show through our lives here on this church.

And if we're not doing that, If our lives are not matching god's word, well, then it's easy to malign the word of god. We're maligning the word of god. Young men, we're next on the list. We didn't escape it. Paul's incredibly brief and to the point, and I think that's usually because young men are incredibly brief and to the point.

You try teaching rooted and ask for an answer. You usually just get a yeah. That's about it. But the thing that Paul goes for here with the young men is self control He wants the young men to exercise self control, and I guess in all of the areas we've already talked about, it all applies to the young men as well, and particularly because I think young men are probably a nightmare in this area. I know certainly I have been as a young man, a nightmare with self control.

And I think young men have a particular capacity for going after the excesses in their culture, and they need to exercise restraint and self control. It's a particular thing that young men struggle with. I hope you don't mind me saying this young man. I can say what I want here because I am a young man. So we're often given to not listening, we often don't like to receive instruction.

Someone tells us something's wrong. We say, no, it's not. Something tells us something's right. We say, no, it's because we always think we know best. We can be so abstinent as young men, so abstinent.

We need to exercise some self control. He then moves on to instruct titus directly. And at this point, we're talking not just to the pastor of church, but we're talking to all teachers within the church. Whether that's Sunday school teachers, you leaders, preachers, international cafe workers, home group leaders, all kinds of people throughout the church who are in 1 way or another in positions of authority and leadership and teaching. And Paul says you need to set them an example really important that you in that position set the example by the way that you live.

You have to have integrity. You have to have integrity. We've already spoken about it. You need to be the same on the inside as you are on the outside. You need to practice what you preach You're still teaching, even when you're not teaching, you're always teaching through what you do, not just through what you say.

It's equally as important. In fact, 1 cannot exist without the other. That's the whole issue that Paul's talking about here. Seriousness, you need to demonstrate serious to set an example of seriousness. Not a heavy sternness, but you've gotta be serious in your teaching.

You've gotta show people that you're serious about this message. It's a serious message. It's about eternal life and death, consequences. People have got to know that you're sincere in what you believe and of what you're saying and your actions have to back it up. Because if they don't, we're not taking it seriously, are we?

And there's gotta be a soundness of speech modeled here Speech which cannot be condemned, Paul says, so your speech as a teacher should be healthy and trustworthy and our conversation should be edifying for people. What comes from our mouths should be a sound as what goes on in our lives. A soundness of speech, trustworthiness. Why again? Why?

Why all of this? Well, they're marks of grace again. It's all marks of god's grace, fingerprints of grace, so that in verse 8 they will have no bad word to say about us. So that anyone who opposes the church god's word, god's people will in the end have to be ashamed of their opposition because they will have no bad word to say. There'll still be opposition, but there won't be any real basis for the opposition.

And the hope is that maybe even in their shame in their opposition, they might turn and repent and say, do you know what? These people actually haven't they've done nothing wrong done nothing I can accuse them of. I don't know why I'm pursuing them and persecuting them. The final group of people that pull deals with here to titus' slaves in verse 9. And again, there's a huge context thing that we just can't ignore here because you might be sat there wondering why isn't Paul rallying against slavery and condemning it and telling all the slaves to rebel and overthrow their masters.

And that's again not Paul's agenda. He's not a social reformer. He's not a social justice warrior He's an apostle of the church of Christ and he is concerned that in whatever situation anyone is in, that they present themselves in the church in a way that's honoring and glorifying to god. Now, that's not saying that slavery is right or good on any and we've also got to remember here that we're not talking about the type of modern slavery that we often conjure up in our minds at this point It's not, say, the West African slave trade. That's not saying it's okay.

It's not saying it's good. It's never okay for slavery to exist. But Roman slaves were not the same in that respect to the most part in general. They were more like household servants still without any real rights, still slaves, still open to massive abuse by bad masters, with no hope of appeal or protection, they were still slaves, but compared with the images that we often have in mind of a deep south cotton plantation, It's a very different thing going on here. It's a very different culture.

It's a very different age. 1 of the ways that we can see some of this come out is that slaves were notoriously badly behaved in Paul's day, notoriously badly behaved. And they were known specifically for back chat to the master and for stealing from them. And I gotta be honest with you, a large part of me has a lot of sympathy for them in I think, well, they're slaves. I mean, you'd get 1 over on your master whenever you could, right?

That stands to reason, but it also shows us something of the master slave relationship, doesn't it? Because if a slave's back chatting the master and getting away with it, I mean, if a slave on a cotton plantation did that, they'd be whipped or killed. You know, it's not it's not that level, but it's still not okay. Anyway, the slaves were badly behaved. They were bad slaves, terrible slaves, undermining their masters, every opportunity they got nicking stuff whenever they saw the opportunity was there and Paul says, look, wait a sec.

You have to remember that you have been converted and you are now a follower of the lord Jesus Christ. We can't change this situation. It's not in our power to just abolish slavery right here and now. And so Paul urges urges titus to instruct even slaves that they can witness by showing a activeness and trustworthiness. And therefore, the attractiveness of following the lord Jesus, by their conduct in a given situation.

You see how that's subverted, the slaves are teaching the masters. The slaves are showing the masters something here. People would take notice of a slave that suddenly is respectful of the master is not nicking stuff every opportunity they get. Is being polite and helpful and going the extra mile. They have a unique opportunity even in that situation to counter the culture.

And I'll tell you what, in order to do that, they're gonna need grace. That is not something you conjure up from inside. They need god's grace. So that, if you notice so that verse 10 they will show the attractiveness of our god and savior. So there are Paul's instructions to titus for the converts on He's encompassed pretty much everyone there.

And as we were going through, there's there's these themes that keep coming up on which tie everything together and and all the applications that we've just looked at, all the ways these things work themselves out culturally are underpinned by 2 things. First 1 grace, second one's self control, and it's only possible to have the self control because of the grace that god has shown us. Now, I know I get that there's a common grace that applies to all people. I get that. So we're not saying that that no 1 who's not a Christian can show any of these qualities at all.

Some people who are not followers of the lord Jesus show some of these qualities in astounding amounts, but there is a common grace that applies to all people. God hasn't removed his love and kindness totally from this world. People benefit from that still, but what Paul is saying is that there is a grace which has been shown to you And so because of that, because you are a follower of the lord Jesus, these things all apply to you. These things should all be growing in your life. Self control being chief among them in this passage anyway.

In verse 11, Paul states for the grace of god has appeared that offers salvation to all people. What is the grace of god? Well, the clues in the sentence. That offers salvation to all people. Well, that can only be 1 person.

That can only be 1 thing. It has to be the lord Jesus. It's only through him that there is salvation for all people. Only through him. He is the only way to salvation and in him, in his life, in his teaching, we see a person who exercised perfect self control.

All of the time. We see all of the attributes that Paul talks about in this passage perfectly followed in Jesus. All the time. We see 1 who was always temperate, always in control of his emotions totally worthy of effect, complete integrity. He was the same on the inside as he was on the outside, and what was on the inside was tated totally by god's word, and he was completely aligned with it, completely aligned.

1 who never slandered, never gossips, Never put down without absolute perfect reason. Always taught and modeled what was right and good. Jesus was 1 who you would never be able to used to malign the word of god. Remember it says in verse 5 so that no 1 can malign the word of god. You could never do that through Jesus.

You could never discredit god through anything Jesus did or said. You could never find a bad word to say about Jesus. Verse 8, there was no way that you could look at Jesus and oppose him, where you could oppose him you would have no basis for your opposition of him. There was no evidence, there was no grounding for your opposition of him. You wouldn't be able to say anything bad.

And in everything that he did and said, he made the teaching of god our Soviet attractive. There wasn't a hint of doubts or blasphemy in him towards God, not a hint. He didn't waver for a second. He always looked to god. Never once did he look away from the father.

He had total integrity, words and action matched And so when he's led out into the desert by the Holy Spirit, to be tempted by Satan, what was it he comes back with every time? He comes back with what's on the inside, and the inside dictates the outward actions, and the inside is god's word because his answer to every single thing that Satan puts in front of him well, it's written. It's written. It's written. It's written.

Every single time he goes back to god's word because heart is aligned with god's word, therefore his life is aligned with his heart. Do you see how the flow of that works? Look at verse 12, it says it teaches us to say it being Jesus, it being Jesus' life, the grace of God, it teaches us to say no to ungodliness and worldly passion, and to live self controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age. So in the same way that Jesus was tempted with all manner of worldly passions, so are we? And the same spirit of self control that he exercised during that trial, he has sent to us.

We benefit from that same spirit of self control, the holy spirit who now dwells in us, giving us the fruits of the spirit, growing us in all of these amazing ways that we just didn't have apart from him, not in that degree, not in that way. It was just not possible for us to be able to do that, to have that heart change. The holy spirit who now dwells in each of us teaching us. Jesus died for that. He died.

Rose again ascended and promised he would send a helper, the Holy Spirit. Verse 14, Jesus Christ who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself, a people that are his very own eager to do what is good. Jesus gave his perfect life so that you and me might be redeemed from our sin. That is all your sin is paid for. Completely in full.

Jesus, who is in perfect union with the father, had that connection broken with the father so that you can have that connection with the father. That's the pain and the horror of the situation. The 1 who was perfectly aligned with the father in everything that he did everything he said, every thought he ever had was perfectly aligned with the father. For all eternity, they've always been in relationship They've never been misaligned. There's never been a time when Jesus's words and actions haven't matched.

There's never been a time when Jesus has taken the glory for himself and not given it to his father in heaven. That never happened and yet He is the 1 who has the relationship broken on the cross. He is the 1 that experiences the pain of separation, from a perfect relationship with his father so that we can make that connection, remake that connection with the father. And then he sends us the Holy Spirit so that you can go forwards and continue to fight sin in your life. The Holy Spirit leads us into battle.

He leads us into the trials, guides us through the trials, gives us the grace we need at the moments we need them to fight against ungodliness, to fight against worldly passions, It's not easy. No one's saying it's easy. It's not. That's why God sends us the Holy Spirit. To grow in all the attributes that Paul's talking about in this whole passage so that by the holy spirit, we can we can begin to exercise some of these things.

We can begin to to exercise some self control, to gain some mastery over these things. It's not just it's not just grit your teeth and carry on. You know, like we're just gonna get through this. That's not what it's talking about here. It's saying we're gonna take these things by the scruff of the neck.

We're gonna deal with them together as a family. We're gonna talk about these things. We're gonna preach against them. We're gonna look at what god's word says and put these things into action in our life. And that's gonna be hard work, and that's gonna hurt, that's gonna be difficult.

But, hey, this is the best way. This is the absolute best way. So that, in verse 5, no 1 can align the word of god. So that in verse 8, no 1 will have anything bad to say. They may be ashamed and maybe repent.

So that in verse 10, the teaching of our god and savior would be attractive to the world around us, and that really is the crux of it. It goes back to what we started with right at the very beginning of our sermon this morning. And that is that Christianity is attractive. Christianity is the most beautiful thing on the whole planet as it rescues people from sin and death and then goes to work in our lives. It's not so that we look good, not so that we're the ones that reap the glory, but so that by seeing us, We point towards god, we give him the glory in these things so that he is seen in all his beauty and glory, broken, sinful, people who by the marks of god's grace are beginning to gain some sort of hold on these things, not because we're good, not apart from god.

We're gaining some kind of mastery over these things because of the holy spirit at work in our lives. That is a beautiful thing. We are dearly bought. We came at a high price, and we're now his ambassadors, his messengers, and yet we so often fail in it, don't we? We so often fail and that's why verses 11 to 14 so amazing.

We so often give people a reason to malign the word. We so often give people good reason to have bad things to say we so often don't make god seem attractive, but in verses 11 to 14, because the grace of god appeared, Jesus came to do what we cannot. Friends, I want this to be an encouragement to you this morning. So that we can begin to fight and battle whilst we wait for Jesus' return, safe in the knowledge that we're doing this as part of the family and whilst we mess up He's the 1 who's paid for all the wickedness. He is the 1 who is purifying us as we go.

He is the 1 shepherding through. He is the 1 helping us in these areas. That is what's going on. Jesus is instructing his people on how to be pure in an impure world. And the reasons for that are so important so that we can witness so that we can show the church is attractive so that other people may come to know our wonderful lord and savior, Jesus Christ.

Do you know him? I I I hope you do. I hope that's that's been an encouragement to you this morning. I hope that's been helpful. I hope maybe that's even been a challenge.

There's lots in there, and there's there's absolutely no way we can apply all of this because I could do a sermon on any 1 of these points and talk about a million and 1 application but you've got your principles of grace there. And now it's up to you as a family through wisdom to figure out how these apply and work in your situations and to help each other through it. Let me pray. Father we, we do thank you that you send us your grace. We thank you that the grace of god has appeared and offers salvation to all people.

We thank you that you don't just leave us on our own to try and grapple through things. You send us the the spirit to to help us with these things and father, we're so sorry when we when we bring shame and dishonor on on the family, on on the church, but we're so grateful that you sent the lord Jesus to pay for our sins. Father, please help us in all these areas. Please please help us to be wise about this. Please help us to understand that that your your fingerprints of grace are all over lives, and that in all things, we might use these situations.

Any situations that we find ourselves into great glory to your name to to bring a great attractiveness, to to our lord and savior Jesus Christ and to his church and his body, and to your kingdom. We pray these things in your name, in the lord Jesus' name, amen.