Out of this text might come three
sermons. And I pray that you would just think
for a minute. Sometimes we come to hear what
is being said and not think. So I want you to think. I want you to listen intently. For several reasons, one is because
when God's Word is open to us, we need to be mindful and fearful
of hearing. Secondly, because there will
be things that that I will possibly say that that may take that may
take you for a moment to say, wow, that's that's interesting.
And you you'll go off into La La Land and you'll miss what
else is coming. So I want you to listen. Listening is not. It's not always reflecting as
it is thinking. And I said, well, what are you
talking about? Well, don't don't ask me to explain that, because then I'll spend
all day running in circles about how I think about thinking, which
is not very helpful for any of us. And finally. I think the word commands us
to hear and not just with our ears, but with our hearts and
minds, our souls. And so I want you to listen.
It's real easy to make sermonizing. A time of study. And I think
it's good to desire that, but fight your notes, fight your
footnotes, fight your study Bibles, fight the inclination to look
at the cross references, fight the inclination to and just stay
with me in a very small portion of this sermon as we're in this
little tiny Titus. It's really a small letter, but
it's very rich. And I want to show some things
today that I believe Paul is showing us that it is so much
better than an explicit apologetic for certain aspects of theology.
And let me explain what I mean. What Paul teaches in Titus is
so clear. In regard to sanctification and
regeneration and justification of redemption, and it's so clear
about the beautiful grace of God that I think If in the future,
and I've been going to Titus a lot lately, that as I as I
make a defense on the doctrines of grace and the gospel, when
I make a defense for the gospel with professing Christians, I
think Titus is where I will go from now on. That's how strong it is. And
what makes it so strong is that Paul is writing really briefly
to Titus about a people who claim to be in Christ who are wicked,
cretins. Have you ever thought for a moment,
if today were the day that Jesus were to appear for the first
time, the advent of the Christ would be in our era. And it were
an American Messiah, not a Jewish Messiah. Who would be the Jews? Who would be the Pharisees? Friends,
I believe Jesus would have pastors. As his Pharisees. And what I don't want to do with
that, as I don't want to take a this is this, this is OK, OK,
look, the temple's not the church. And vice versa, and the priest,
the pastors, that's not a parallel. That's one thing pointing to
the other. The outcome of all that which
God pointed to in the Old Testament is the church, is Jesus. It's
not a parallel. But if we were to say for the
sake of saying historically and in the context of our culture,
if Jesus were an American 21st century advent messiah, his Pharisees,
his Jews would be pastors of evangelical churches. You might
think, what about the Catholic Church? They'd be right there
with them. and every denomination under
man. It's very common for us to think because we have an intrinsic
error. We have this idea that when we
hear something, we don't first filter it through our own lives.
We automatically Contemplate someone else who fits the mold
of that which we're hearing. For example, if we hear someone
is lazy, we go, well, I'm not lazy. In fact, we probably even
go there because the idea that we would be lazy is probably
not even on our minds unless we just love being lazy, which
is another problem. But if we say we hear, don't
be lazy or it's wicked to be lazy, which is what Paul has
said about the wicked, lazy, lying, gluttonous, creepies who
speak evil and who preach a false gospel. Those who profess to
be Christ are doing just like the culture there that we hear
it and we go, well, that's not me. Or worse, we don't even think
that it might be us, but we say, oh, I know who they're talking
about, that I know that guy and we don't. It's just an error.
It's an error in thinking we we have this weird thing in us,
even as the redeem that there is some type of good in us, no
matter how hard we see our sin every single day, we've come
to a place by action and by thought that our that our depravity is
not as depraved as others. And in that same sense, we come
to the place of our works and we go, OK, our works, though
we know they are not salvific or redemptive, nor do they gain
the gaze of God in favor toward us, but are an outgoing of God's
grace, as Paul proves in this letter. We still feel good about. In
comparison to those who don't perform. Now, maybe I'm just. of twisted up guy. But if I sit
down for a few hours and really think, why would you do that?
Well, I time it and we don't sit all day, but a few hours
is necessary time. So set your watch. I'm going
to sit here for a little while, but I'm not going to sit here
past this time. And I'm going to think about this for a minute. We got to think. That even in
our ministry, even in our goodness, even in God's glory and grace
given to us, that there's a little tiny bit of pride in us. There's a little tiny bit of
of esteem that comes not because of God's grace, but because of
who we are. Because of God's grace. It's
nepotism at its finest. We have this idea that, wow,
we're the children of God by His grace. Oh, so unworthy. Woe
is me. I tear my clothes, ash on my
head and all that good stuff. But then when we're confronted
with teaching, when we're confronted with the doctrine and the teaching
that accords with sound teaching, we have this thing that happens
in us that we really don't apply it to ourselves fully, we might
even share it. I put my elbow in there, I put
my toe in, we do the hokey pokey with it, but we're not putting
ourselves in there. And if we do, we're hopping right
back out. Weird example, but everybody
knows what I'm talking about. And what I don't want us to do,
Church, is to hop out. I don't want the Word of God
in all of its power, the Holy Spirit of God running through
us, for us to quench the Spirit of God by not sin and all these
other things that are obvious, but we will quench the Spirit
of God, and I pray that we do not, when we do not apply the
teaching of Scripture to ourselves personally at every moment. We quench Him. We take it, we think of, and
yeah, Paul is talking about the cretins when he's given these
negative examples of these negative reflections, these negative characteristics. But at the same time, then he
says, but that's not how you are. And so that demands a comparison,
doesn't it? It's not they're bad. Look at
us and put our nose in the air. It's they're bad. You're not.
Check yourself. That's what comes through the
word of God. That's why so many people do
not want to adhere to exposition. That's why I believe so many
pastors say that it's lazy to be an expositor. And think that
it's easier to come up with creative allegorical stories by book about
rhymes and poems and come up with creative object lessons
to teach something that's not even being taught by the passage
that they're teaching. That, that isn't hard. That's
not hard at all. As a matter of fact, I bet any
of us in the room, if I threw out a topic and I said, you don't
have to worry about the truth of the topic, just talk about
it, teach us about it. And you don't have, you're not
going to be fact checked. You're not going to be held accountable.
You just do what we all can play Boulder Dash. I do very well
with that game. If you don't know what it is,
it's a game. Now, look at me going to do something after I
bash using stuff. It's a game where you get a topic
or a sentence or a word and then you come up and say, let me give
you a hug. That was precious. A topical
word and what you try to do is if you know the answer, you write
the real answer down, but they're sometimes so obscure that you
don't know that. So what you do is you come up with an answer
and then everything you have a person that's keeping the score
and then they read all the answers and everybody in the room playing
the game decides which one of the answers they think is correct.
And if they pick your fake answer, you get a bunch of points. Really
good. Yeah. Three points. You know,
and so it and it's just a really good game. And what you do is
you come up and you just fabricate, you lie. Friends, that's what
creativity against God's word is, truth is, is lying. It's
lying. To stand and say this is what
the Lord says and it's not what the Lord says is a lie. It's
not ignorance, even though it may be, it's lying. Because you
make God to be a liar. Therefore, we who do those things
are liars. And then we ascribe our lives
to God. Now, back to the point. Any of us could do that. So why
is it lazy? To take God's word and to read
it for what it says and nullify your creativity, nullify your
oratory, nullify everything that has to do with you and exemplifies
everything that God is. God doesn't need me, friends. God doesn't need James Tiffins
to preach his word. God doesn't need Jesse Bates
to be his evangelist. God can use the ass of Balaam,
and he could use him more proficiently than he could ever use me, because
Balaam's mule never sinned and was created to do that which
he did fully, holistically, perfectly, and righteously. Now don't, just
don't go there. I'm not saying animals are righteous
enough, but they're holy. Animals do that which they are.
created to do, and they are subjected to the futility of sin unwillingly. Romans 8. And God can speak better through
animals. They don't have pride. They don't
have creativity. They don't have all of these
things and these characteristics that are so damaged by sin that
they get in the way. God doesn't need my creativity,
doesn't need my eloquence. He doesn't need me. He doesn't
need me to come in here and to say what's not plain so that
everybody go, oh, wow. We don't see that, so we better
follow this man around so we can stay connected to this thing.
God's word is plain. And where it's not playing, use
what is playing to understand what's not playing. But on the
truths of God's grace and the purpose of the church and the
power of the scripture and all of these things, who Christ is
and the glory of his face revealing the father perfectly, these are
playing. Because of that, listen. Listen. Now, there's two things I want
you to think about as you listen, and I want you to put them in
perspective based upon the text we see. Let's look at the word
of God here. I'm just going to read chapter three, verses one
through seven, and then we'll take out the first two verses
when we begin to teach. Remind them to be submissive
to rulers and to authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for
every good work. to speak evil of no one, to avoid
quarreling, to be gentle and to show perfect courtesy toward
all people. For we ourselves were once foolish,
disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures,
passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating
one another. But when the goodness and loving
kindness of God, our Savior, appeared, He saved us, not because
of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy,
by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,
whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior,
so that being justified by His grace, we might become heirs
according to the hope of eternal life. In verse eight is closing of
that text. Look at it. The same is trustworthy. And I want you to insist on these
things so that those who have believed in God may be careful
to devote themselves to good works. But I don't want to go
on because that's another sermon. So here, what we've gotten so
far from the beginning to now is that there are two groups
of people. This is review. I say it every week. Those who
are in Christ fully and who are regenerated and who are born
again and who are redeemed and who possess the power of God
and thus their lives prove that. And those who also say they are
in that group, who are among that group, who are not that
group. whose lives are not exemplary of the gospel, whose lives do
not expose the power of God's grace, nor do their hearts and
affections, nor do their words and teachings, nor do they submit
to the authority of God, which is also, as we saw last week,
the authority of man that God has placed in authority. And
we see these two people. Now, there will be certain aspects
that I want you to think of. Think of these things that you've
heard. You've heard these biblical realities. You've heard these
biblical truths in your day. I know you have the work of God. So if I were to say, what is
the work of God? Everybody has an idea of what that is. Some
people talk about creation all the way to redemption, all the
way to glorification and all this stuff. Some people may go
to the very specific things of John 3 that may clearly be seen
that these works are being carried out by God or in God. May think
of John 6 where Jesus says, this is the work of God that you believe
on the son whom he has sent. So maybe specific text or maybe
a holistic idea or a narrative of someone hears about the call.
of God. You know what that is? Oh, that's
God's called me in this just the last two weeks. I've had
three people come to me about the call of God in their lives.
What is the call of God? What is the will of God? And
they've come to try to find the human answer to this supernatural,
divine call. And so we've all heard the call
of God, which would be the calling of man. We've all heard this
biblical thing called the commands of Christ. Jesus says they will
know that you love me. It'll be clear that you love
me, that you obey my commandments. So if you love Christ, you obey
him. If my children love me, they
obey me. That's it. Love is not a feeling,
an expression of googly's in our stomach or butterflies in
our belly. Love is not an attitude of affection. It can come to that some, but
love is an action of obedience and a surrendering of one's own
affection for themselves, for the sake of another. For there's
no greater love than this, that a man would lay down his life
for a brother. If you disobey, you do not love. Period. The command of Christ. Everybody's
heard the terms God's grace. Everybody's heard the terms salvation,
redemption, repentance and faith. And everybody's heard the term
being saved for the phrase being saved. We've heard these things
and they are biblical. Even in our translation, you'll
see these terms absolutely explicit in that way. You'll see them.
They're almost like direct quotations. But why is it that those are
not the terms that are used in evangelism and in preaching and
in the calling of man to submit to the authority of God, who,
by his mercy, has given his son that they might see salvation? Why is it that we don't hear
those? phrases. We hear these phrases, you better
find Jesus. Have you found Jesus? Have you
found you? I can answer that question. Yes,
I've found Jesus. But it begs another question.
How did you find Jesus? It's like the bill collector
going to the door, remember the days when bill collectors used
to go door to door? And they knock on the door. Grandpa
goes to the door. Can I help you? I'm John from
the local gas company, and I need to pick up your payment. And
what does people always say? The old joke. Oh, I wrote the
check last Tuesday. It's in the mail. Oh, the check? That's fine. I made that payment. Oh, no problem. And they'd go
back for another week or two to see if the check showed up.
Sure enough, it didn't. And they'd come back and they'd
call on it again. I think that's how most people believe. Or speak
when they talk about finding Jesus. Have you found Jesus? Yeah, I found it. Praise God,
brother. Come give me a hug. I want your money. Oh, I've already
sent that payment. When did you send it, sir? What
was the address you sent it to? Could you give me the check number?
Could you show me in your check register where you wrote it down?
Can I see the bill? There you go. Well, how do you
send the payment if the payment stuff is still on the bill? How
did you find Jesus? The Bible says you found Jesus
because God sought after you and found you. The Bible said
you found Jesus because in your blindness and in your death,
God, through his grace, reached down and opened your eyes and
opened your heart and gave you sight and you saw. That's how you found
Jesus. Another phrase I hear a lot of
time, well, I asked Jesus into my heart. Good, I asked pizza
into my belly a lot. What does that have to do with
anything about salvation? Where did you ask Jesus? The only time
we see talking about things that Jesus is in the heart of anyone
is that we see Paul praying for the believers of Ephesus. He
says, I pray that your heart may be filled with the love of
Christ, that you may understand. There's a paraphrase there. But
it never does he say receive Jesus in your heart or ask Jesus
in your heart. It's that Paul prays that the love of Christ
may be full in your heart. That Christ may be found in your
heart, that Christ may be received in your heart, but it's not an
issue of asking Jesus in your heart. Where did that come from?
Well, we know history. We don't have to. And I love
to ask people what that means. What does that mean when you
say you ask Jesus in your heart? Well, they'll say, well, I decided
to follow Jesus. You know, that old, I love that,
that as a boy, I don't know how many verses are on that thing,
but I have stood till I started to swoon. And almost went back
to Costco one time as a boy, because I have decided to follow. No turning back. But it doesn't
say no falling out because they all stand there. until the aisle
is full. And most people have decided
to follow Jesus, not because they want to follow Jesus, because
they just saw Jesus leave for the buffet. They're like, OK,
Jesus just left to eat. I'm coming to follow Jesus right
to the restaurant. So, you know, what does it mean to follow Jesus?
Does that mean you believe in Jesus? Many people believe in
his name that day because of the signs and wonders that he
did. But Jesus himself did not entrust. Jesus did not entrust
himself to them, for he knew what was in their hearts. No
one had to tell him about the heart of man. The Pharisees that
we see in the latter parts of John and the Jews that came to
faith. Many people believed on his name
that day, during that time, because of the words that he preached
and the signs that he did. But they refused to profess him publicly
because they loved the glory that came from man rather than
the glory that comes from God. They are not eternally saved. They are not eternally secure.
They're spatially and specifically and particularly pacified, not
saved. You've decided to follow. What
does that mean? You've decided to follow Jesus.
Are you born again? You know, that was big in the
60s and 70s. Are you born again? Are you born again? Are you?
It was so big that nobody says it anymore because they're afraid
they're going to be called a hippie. And now these reformers are coming
out and saying, the Bible says you must be born again. Oh, they're
not dressing like hippies anymore. They're not naked in the streets,
but they're weird. Oh, what it means, Pastor, is
that I said the sinner's prayer. Oh, my gosh, you know that. Would
you show it to me in Scripture? Could you show me where everyone
who calls in the name of the Lord shall be saved? Let's understand
the context. And let's understand what it
means to what about what about Esau? Who cried for repentance,
but he couldn't find it. I know that's a stretch there,
but it's not it's not as far as stretches saying I said a
sinner's prayer and therefore unsaved. That's one of the great that's
one of the worst things that's caused me one of the single things that's
caused me the worst pain in my ministry through the years. And
before I even understood the doctrines of grace, I began to
preach against modern evangelism. Very critically. And I began
to preach against the sinner's prayer and the altar calls and
the openly and outward public profession of faith that had
nothing to do with obedience or following or regeneration
or rebirth or anything. I began to preach against these
topical pastors who preached all of this stuff. And it made
people feel really empowered to do something different in
their lives. And then at the end of the tagline, like, oh, by the
way. So like the. I don't know, John
Philip Susan, all of his marches. And he has that last stinger
at the end. And we finish the song, there's
Jesus, by the way. You did come to church, so I
guess I need to actually, since we are the people of Christ,
I should maybe mention Christ. But all you who already have
him, you already know it. So just be at peace, my brethren.
All of you who don't understand what I'm talking about, you haven't
said the right thing, haven't done the right thing, you haven't
come the right way. Well, I came to Jesus where I
got saved. How did you get saved? Share
with me, how can I get saved? Isn't that what they asked Peter?
Isn't that what the rich young ruler asked Jesus? How can I
have eternal life? I believe. Friends, keep these
in mind, because there's one that's biblical and one that's
terribly worldly. And look at this text in chapter
three, verse three. Well, that was too long. For we ourselves were once foolish,
disobedient, let us stray slaves to various passions and pleasures,
passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating
one another. Verse three is packed. It's packed with this picture
of who these professing Christians are and they're acting just like
the Cretans. The illustration of how the unbelievers
of the world are. Not just act, but how they are.
Foolish. Disobedience. And now Paul says,
for we ourselves. Paul didn't say for you, those
of you once were, for we. And he's not just being proper
in his Chicago style of writing. He's actually saying we ourselves.
He's personalizing this. He's saying, look, we, ourselves,
were once. Like the rest of humanity. Like
the rest of mankind. Objects of wrath. Vessels of
destruction. We once were dead in our trespasses
in sin. We once were foolish. So let's look at these things.
Just like the rest of humanity, our condition was with them.
Our humanity, our sinfulness, our depravity, along with those
who oppose sound teaching, who oppose right living, who oppose
the brethren, who hate the apostles, who created a god of their own
design and refuse to submit to the authority of his word. We
were once just like them, and we were foolishness. Paul says,
all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. But now
he says in chapter two and in chapter three, but the grace
of God has appeared. We once were dead, but the grace
of God has come shining. It has come bringing salvation,
certain salvation. God's grace is not a billboard
on the highway of life that he hopes will take the right exit.
God's grace is not this invitation that we must open in the mail.
God's grace is not a powerless, pansy, pathetic, just humanized
offer. God's grace is a powerful, redemptive
power that seals and sets His people apart from the world and
lets their wrath be foregone on the life and the body of His
Son Jesus. That's God's grace. The old man, the one who was
dead, were foolish. What are these things? I love
the way you prayed, Brother Randy. You prayed. I had to get up,
come write it down. Pray that we may drink in the grace you
have given. Drink in the grace you have given. Friends, when we drink in the
grace that God has given, we're no longer the old men. We're
no longer foolish and disobedient and led astray. We're no longer
slaves to passions and pleasures. Let's look at these for a second.
This is what Paul is saying, that these people who claim to
be in Christ, who are in the church, are now. They're foolish. They know it
all, and yet they know nothing. They're senseless. They're stupid.
They have no way of even realizing that they're walking around like
the king with new clothes. And all the while he's naked
and doesn't even know it. Not because he's righteous, because
he's ridiculous. Foolish. Senseless. Disobedient. We know what that means. That
means we see the commands of Christ and we don't do them. We see the good that we've been
called to and we ignore it. We hear the commands of the Lord
our God through the Scriptures and through the preaching and
we go, oh, he'll understand. I will disobey. And not only are we disobedient to
the man's commands of Christ, but we're disobedient, remind
them to be submissive to the rules and authorities to be obedient
to every good work. Keep in mind, even when we have
to disobey the authorities of our world, because they call
they called us to disobey God, we don't disobey God and disobey
man. Said that last week. We're led
astray. We were led astray. The wicked
of the world are led astray. They're stumbling through life.
They do not know where they're going because they cannot see.
Their eyes are blinded. Their hearts are cold and dead.
They are corpses. They are led astray, like waves
in the sea being tossed to and fro, like leaves being blown
in the wind. James and Paul both use those
illustrations. They're deluded. They're imagining
that the grace of God is a liberty to sin, a license called liberty. Oh, no, God told me this, but
Paul says this. Well, God told me this. I'm supposed
to be rich, I'm supposed to be healthy, I'm supposed to be this,
I'm supposed to do this. I know my God. You do know your
God. And his name is Satan. And you
are the son of the devil. And do not put yourself in a
place to say that you have confidence in eternal life when the God
that you know so intimately is not the God of Scripture holistically. It would let us strain. We're
slaves. We once were slaves. That means
we were not our own. We were dominated by the pleasures
of our flesh. We were dominated by the passions
of our lusts. We were dominated by the gifts
of the world. We satisfied our every thirst
and our every hunger and our every desire to see and hear.
We satisfied it with the world and the dead things of the world
that are passing away. We were slaves. And we looked at the wonder of
Christ and we said, no, because we had much wealth and the wonder
of our wealth and the wonder of this world led us away. The
word of God lost its root. As it was intended to do. We pass our days, what does that
mean, leading our lives, living till the end, we exist and walk
in the path of slavery, in the path of disobedience, in the
path of blindness, in the path of depravity. And we are perverse
and wicked and evil. We are no longer like that. We
were like that, Paul says. We were like that. We're not
like that now. We have an evil, we had an evil
disposition. We had wickedness at the core
of our heart. We envied others. We had malice. We hated everybody that didn't
please us. We were envious. We looked against
others and saw their joy and despised it. We couldn't stand
the saints. We couldn't stand the gospel.
We couldn't stand the old Orthodox church, the old way. Grandma's
church was outdated. We hated it. I wish we had more of grandma's
pastors around who weren't grandma's age and
leaving the world. Hated by others and hating one
another. You see the picture. This is who we were before God
came to us. This is who we were before the
grace of God saved us, the grace of God appeared and the grace
of God saved and the grace of God secured and the grace of
God sanctifies. And teaches us the power. and
empowers us with the power to live as Christ lived. Those human
ways of responding to grace that I mentioned earlier, or I got
saved, or I believed, or I came to faith, or I did this and I
did that and I did the other. I decided, I said the prayer,
I came, I chose, I believed, I, I, I. And we stand before
God in our proverbial fist in His face and say, look what I
did, God, look at me. And we wonder where all the false
teachings of the world, where all the false gospels of the
world. Friends, if the act of physical circumcision was considered
to be cut off from Christ, what do you think the act of a works
of salvation will be? A man-centered, man-motioned
salvation is an abomination from the pits of wickedness that is
rooted in the center of Satan, in the center of the gravity
of man. It is what Adam and Eve longed for when they saw the
serpent who said, you look at that tree you've been looking
at and God said you can't have it. But I tell you, God lies.
He does not want you to know all that he knows. Just take
it and eat it. And they wanted themselves to
be the author of their own glory. And that's what coming to Jesus
on one's own terms is. And if we lived in a day where
people could take martial law into their own hands, that statement
in the public square would lead to execution as it did not 400
years ago. Where have we come, Church? The gates of hell will not prevail
against it. It's interesting that we see
that image and as a child, I always saw that image as the gates of
hell coming after the church, but the gates of hell. If you really look at it or holding
people in. And the gospel will tear them
down. And snatch those out of death. We don't get snatched
out of hell, there's no purgatory. But in that metaphor, it means
That those who are dead and headed for destruction are saved by
the gospel. Alone. Human ways of responding to God's
grace are still in the way we once were. And let me tell you
something right now, folks. I hate to say this because it
is manipulative, but I have to say. There's a lot of feelings
that happen when people hear that. And I know and the greatest
of humility that when people sit under that type of teaching
and they get angry, they are not born again. It breaks the heart of the redeemed.
It makes us worship to the praise of His glorious grace. We are
overwhelmed with the joy of what God has accomplished for us and
through His Son given to us. We don't get angry with the grace
of God. We repent. We think and we worship. But when we take when we take
people's babies and we say, that's ugly, that's an ugly baby, that's
hard. Put the picture up. Nobody wants
to see that ugly baby. That makes them mad. And people's
man centered salvation is their ugly baby that they keep in their
body. And they want to flaunt it. Look at my pride and joy.
Look at my Jesus. Look at my God. Look at my salvation.
Look at this. Look at that. Look at me. I'm
glad I'm not like them. I'm glad I'm not like them. I'm
glad I'm not like them. Oh, God, have mercy on me. This is foolish. Jesus gave. And Jesus saves. Jesus gave himself
an obedience to the Father to be a ransom for many, and through
his giving, he saves many. He purifies his own people. Remember
the last few weeks for the grace of God has appeared, bringing
salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and
worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright and
godly lives in the present age. As we wait for our blessed hope,
the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus
Christ, Jesus, our God, Jesus, our Savior, who gave himself
for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify himself
a people for his own possession, who are zealous for good works,
declare these things, exhort and rebuke with all authority.
Let no one disregard you. Don't let anybody plug up their
ears, Titus. Don't you dare let someone walk
away from this teaching. Go after them and tell them,
thus saith God. Never forget where we come from,
church. But, verse four, What happens? God intervenes. God interacts
with the dead people. God interacts with a depraved
and wicked and foolish and blind and rebellious people. He intervenes. But when the goodness and loving
kindness of God, our Savior, appeared. Now, remember that
in chapter 2, verse 11. For the grace of God has appeared.
The grace of God. is the loving kindness of God.
Ephesians 2. Look at it. Look at Ephesians 2. Verse four. Well, you know what
verse one through three say? We were children of wrath like
the rest of mankind, but God, being rich in mercy because of
the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead
in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ by grace
we've been saved and raised up with Him and seated us with Him
in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming
ages He might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness
toward us in Christ Jesus, for by grace you have been saved
through faith. And this is not of your own doing.
It is the gift of God, not of worse. He said the same thing
to Titus. He just didn't have enough ink. God intervened. when the goodness
and loving kindness of God, when the grace of God, when the mercy
of God, when the love of God, when the Son of God appeared. bringing salvation for all people,
training us, so when the grace of God appears to the one, that
one is saved, that one is trained, that one is changed, and that
one is worshipping the God of His glorious salvation. That
is what the grace of God does when it is shown, when it is
revealed, when it is given. It is always effectual, every
time. He saved us, verse five, not
because of works done by us in righteousness, but according
to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of
the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus
Christ, our Savior, so that being justified by his grace, we might
become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. Now, real
quickly, we've got to bring this on. When the grace of God appeared,
when the goodness of God appeared, when the loving kindness of God,
our Savior Jesus Christ appeared. I want you to see how this works.
Oh, my. Genesis one. In the beginning. God created the heavens and the
earth. Imagine that. God created the
heavens, God created the earth. And the Spirit of God was hovering
over the waters of the deep. The earth was void and formless. I have to say this. Sometimes people
go, well, see, the earth was here already. No, it said God
created. Then he flew over it. Let there be light. God said, let there be light
and there was light. There it is! God created out
of nothing, ex nihilo, everything. There it is. There it comes.
Behold, it has appeared. It was there. It was visible.
In the same way, if you go to John 5 and you see the creative
power of the words of Jesus Christ as he spoke them to those people
in Bethsaida and Jerusalem, you see there in the regions of that
day those people who came to faith because Jesus told them
such as this, stand up, take up your bed and walk. Commanded
them. And they did it. Repent and believe
the gospel. Go do this and you will see. And then he says, now go, your
sins are forgiven and sin no more. The Father is working and
I am working. And what you see me do is what
you see the Father do. And what you hear me say, you
are hearing the voice of the Father. And when you see my judgment,
you are seeing His judgment. When you see my life, it is because
He's given me the power to give life. And when I say it, those
in their graves and those who are dead will be brought to life.
They will hear the voice of the Son of Man and they will come
alive. And then all those in their graves will be raised to
life, some unto the resurrection of life and some unto the resurrection
of judgment. I've been given all authority
by the Father to make judgment, to give life to whom I will by
my own mercy. And it is my words that create
power in the dead people that I speak to. And only by my word
will they ever be born again by the Spirit of God. The loving of kindness of God
appeared That means it was revealed and it was given. Effectively. We see that we're not saved because
of works done by us and righteous, what's the greatest, most amazing,
let me give this to you, what is the most amazing, righteous
work you could ever do? If you're going to measure all
works, what is the most important, most amazing work of righteousness
that you do? Believe on the Son. Why is Paul so hard on this? Because many people exercised
faith in Jesus and they went the way of cretins. And their righteous works are
worthless. So even believing does not warrant
salvation. You must be made new. God can't
take trash into his presence. He must recreate it. That's what
regeneration is. That's why in the day of resurrection,
there'll be a glorification of our being. So many shake their heads at
this and go, I don't agree. Read your Bible, people. Not
your verses. Your Bible. Pray. Turn off the television. Turn
off the radio. And turn off the YouTube. Turn
off the Facebook. Turn off everything else. And sit with God. And watch
Him show you things that you've never seen. But has been as plain
as the nose on your face. We're not saved because of works
done by us in righteousness. But we are saved because of what? His own mercy. What does that
mean? What is the mercy of God? His
grace. His unmerited favor. His unmerited,
unwarranted, undeservable kindness. It's His mercy. Therefore, He
does what He pleases. The mercy of God, the salvation
that comes through Jesus Christ, the atoning sacrifice of our
Lord, is not just this. Somewhat human attainable, obtainable
thing that we can go to. Why is it so hard for people
to see that? Maybe because the mercy of God
is not given them. Maybe it's because they've been
sitting under the teaching of a devil for their entirety as
a new Christian. Maybe it's because no one's ever
gone and preached it to them. Friends, God saved us because
of His own mercy. according to His own mercy, in
accord with His own mercy. What's that mean? That means
that which God owns is His, and that which God does with that
which He owns is His, and His plans are His, His decrees are
His. So in the accordance with His own mercy, He does with it
as He pleases, and He certainly saved those who received it by
His own mercy. And according to his own will. Well, that's a stretch. Well,
it would be if I had read the other part of this text. And
it would be if I had read John and Ephesians and Galatians and
Romans and Luke and Matthew and Mark. Titus versus the second
Thessalonians and Revelation. Jude and all the other books,
James, justification by faith. He's not a, he's not a Pharisee. This is God's mercy. Salvation
cannot be from any work. Salvation is not conditional
on any action. By grace you've been saved through
faith, they say. Right? Your salvation is through
faith. It's received and agreed upon
through faith. It's affected by the evidence
of faith. But how did you get it? It is
a gift of God. So that no one can boast. Well,
I'm not boasting, but I believe. Yes, that is so stupid. How do
you not boast when you say, but I? What is a boast but I? So then the question is now,
in closing, how are we saved? And I might preach this again
next week. By the washing of regeneration
and by the renewal of the Holy Spirit. You see those two things?
That's how we are saved. The washing of regeneration is
by the Spirit. Jesus in John 3 is saying to
Nicodemus, you can't see nor enter the kingdom of heaven except
you be born again. In other words, the only way
to get there is to be born again. And the only way to be born again
is by the work of the spirit. The spirit gives life. Regeneration,
regeneration by all evidences of historical documents and even
the scripture, of course, where these things come from is basically
this is where the Holy Spirit of God transforms the heart of
man into something new. Get it? Through conviction of sin and
the knowledge of Christ and the gift of faith, the gift of repentance. Regeneration is a whole transformation
of the new man. It's the work of the Holy Spirit.
He is the giver of life. He is the Spirit who makes men
holy. He doesn't wash them off. He washes them new. You got that? We can pressure
wash or sandblast the finish off of something, but that's
not regeneration. Regeneration is a creative event
by God, the Holy Spirit. And it makes the man new. That's why he says, by the renewal
of the Holy Spirit, it precedes, regeneration precedes renewal.
So before one's heart changes, and before one's actions change,
and before one's faith comes, and before one's repentance is
effective, before all of that, regeneration comes, and then
renewal is the process of living out that which you are now. If
I took a rock and I went poof and it turned into a fish and
I threw it in the water, it would swim, wouldn't it? But if I threw
the rock in the water, threw it in the air and said, it's
going to become a fish, it'll never swim until it becomes a
fish. Never. Take your puppy. 40,000 feet on an airplane, throwing
out a lot of parachutes. Look, I'm going to create a bird
as soon as he learns to fly. Now, if something doesn't change
that dog to a bird, it's going to die. So it's dead already,
is it not? And that dog can flap and howl
and tweet It can wiggle and squirm and do somersaults and soar,
but eventually, 9.82 meters per second square is going to win
over. And that dog will hit the ground and it will perish. That's a good picture of how
we are. We can cry out, we can scream,
we can exercise all sorts of faith. I think I'm a bird. I
know I'm a bird. I'm a bird. I'm a bird. I trust you, God,
I'm a bird. But you're not a bird until you've been made a bird.
That's regeneration. and become new creatures. Away
with the old, not better the old. That's ridiculous. God doesn't
better dead. He destroys it. The blood of
Jesus doesn't, like, purify wickedness. It's not an antiseptic. It puts to death wickedness.
And in its place is the new man. It precedes Renewing, regeneration,
perceived faith, perceived repentance. Faith and repentance, according
to the Baptist faith and message of 2000, are inseparable experiences
of grace. Lord, help my brothers who don't
see it in their own documents. He saved us. He saved us, and
so regeneration is an entire salvation. He saved not just
my end, not just my hand, not just you and you and not me.
He saves His people. He saved fully the entire person. All of me is saved. All of you
is saved. All of us. We possess a salvation
that's not fully seen, is it? It's fully certain, but it's
not fully seen. We're not glorious and perfectly
holy and sinless, but we will be. We're not in the presence
of Christ and the New Jerusalem, but we will be. And not only
is it an entire salvation, but it's a radical change. Regeneration
is a radical change. These vices that we see, all
of these things, this malice and envy and hatred and hated
being hated and all of this stuff, this is what we're saved from.
Regeneration takes that and destroys it, moves it off of us. It's
no longer there. It's a bad thing to think, church,
that we're just given the power to overcome sin and Jesus has
saved me from the power of sin, which is true. But Jesus has
also saved you from the presence of sin. It no longer rules you. Sin no
longer rules the church. We're not slaves any longer to
the passions of the flesh and the lust of the flesh and the
passion and desires of the heart and the passion of the world.
We are slaves to righteousness, which is not our own. It is Christ's
righteousness given to us. How dare we say it's not powerful
enough to walk away from sin? We've already seen last week
and the week before. That by the teaching of the right doctrine,
this power, this grace of God, through the teaching of His Word,
gives us the power to denounce ungodliness, to walk away from
wickedness, to push away sin. But then why are we saved, church?
You see this in verse 7? So that being justified by His
grace, We might become heirs according
to the hope of eternal life. So that being justified, this
is an emphatic. Look at it, so that being justified,
this is a present reality, an absolute essence of existence,
that we are absolutely now certainly justified by his grace because
being justified, not that we were or that we will be being,
we are living in the age and the time now of justification. We are being actively held as
justified people by his grace alone, alone. You get that? I
don't know how else to explain it. So because we are certainly justified
presently by His grace, period, we then are looking forward to
that certainty of being heirs. The word might is not a possibility,
it's a certainty. We are heirs, but we are becoming
heirs. We're looking to that day. The
culmination of the marriage supper of the lamb. We are becoming
heirs according to the hope of eternal life now. Ayers, let me just put this way,
Ayers, you know what Ayers means, we might get some stuff right.
No. Ayers mean that we are, first
and foremost, royalty. We are the children of God, we
are adopted out of darkness into his glorious kingdom, whose king
is Jesus. We are the children of God, that's
the only way we become heirs is where his children. So if
the grace of God has come, then you are a child of God. And you
are justified by his grace. Secondly, it implies that we
are heirs so that we have others who are heirs. So we have siblings. There's a plural sense. And knowing
that the church is not a person and we see other places in Scripture
where we see that we are joint heirs with Christ, Christ, our
spiritual brother, if you will, the firstborn among many brethren. But most importantly, we're heirs
to something. How do we get to the place where
we have we're heirs according to the hope of eternal life?
What does that mean? It means that we are heirs to
the promises of the riches of the glories of God. As I just
read in Ephesians 2. We are heirs to the promises
of God, which are the riches of his glory and mercy and kindness
and love toward us in Christ Jesus. We are the recipients
thereof of the glorious grace of God, through which we have
faith, through which we have repentance, through which we
have life. Everlasting, eternal, what's
that mean? Never ending life. So therefore, being heirs implies,
according to this text, a continual and everlasting faith in the
promises of an everlasting God who effectually gave an everlasting
son to pay for your everlasting sin. And so that everlasting faith
is an everlasting holding on, as we see Hebrews, hold on, holding
on to the confession of our faith. We hold on to the promises of
God. We rest in their certainty. We
rest in the person of Christ. We rest in the work of Christ.
We rest in the character of Christ. We rest in the will of Christ
and the mercy and the motive of God the Father through God
the Son, who is Jesus, our Savior. And what does it result? Living a life of passion for
Christ, a life of passion for glory, a life of passion for
holiness, a life of passion for praise. The contrary is to live
a life of foolish unreality, blindness, death, depravity,
wickedness, malice and envy and the like. We who are in Christ,
we are not living in a false hope for the false life. But
we've certainly proved by the power of God that we are his
children. Renewal by God reveals a solid
and certain and most importantly, a profitable affection and an
action for his namesake. So I pray as Brother Randy prayed. I pray that you would drink in
the grace of God, who is Jesus Christ. Let's pray. Lord, I am unable. I'm unable to stand under the power of your grace, when it reaches into the core
of my heart and just yanks me. And everyone here who sits before
you as your child has had the same experience. And it's not
just the moment of redemption, which was at the cross, The moment of faith, which was
at regeneration. But Lord, the moment of renewal
that is daily. For your mercies are new every
day and your grace is new every hour, every second. Thank you, Father, that you are
a God of grace. Multiply your power in us and
fill us with all the mercy that is bestowed to us. The fullness
of your mercy. Given to the fullness of your
glory. In the fullness of your son. Tied within us the fullness of
your word. To the power of your spirit.
that we might not sin against you, that we would come and be
a people for your own possession, proving the beauty of your name,
repenting until the day you return, preaching forever the wonders
of your grace. We sing in the name of the mighty
grace you give. The name above all names, His
name is Jesus. Amen, amen, and amen.