So we're in Titus chapter 3. And we're going to read from
verse 1. We're going to read from verse 1. Put
them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to
obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work, to speak
evil to no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, showing all meekness
unto all men. For we ourselves also were sometimes
foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers' lusts and pleasures,
living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. But after
that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,
not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according
to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing
of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus
Christ our Saviour. that being justified by his grace
we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. Amen. May the Lord bless to us
this reading from his word and a lovely reading it is indeed. Now The Apostle is encouraging
the believers on Crete to good works. That's the context of
the opening of this little chapter. And he's talking about good works.
He's talking about obedience to authority, of the authorities
around about. He's talking about peaceable
living with their fellow citizens. And he's reminded them how the
weakness and foolishness and perversity that they see around
them was their own state in times past. It's always a good thing
for us to remember that when we become critical of the things
that are going on around about us. I think we mentioned last
week there, but for the grace of God, go I. And that's something
that we should always temper our critical spirits with. Even if that criticism is legitimate. If it wasn't for the grace of
God, that's where I would be right now. And had God not converted
us, had God not changed our hearts and our dispositions, we'd still
be acting out the very same conduct through that malice and hateful
spirit that is rife in the world. So now in this little passage
before us which is predominantly I'm going to be concentrating
on verses 4 to 7 of Titus chapter 3 today. In this little passage
the apostle shows how the gospel or our justification by the grace
of God is the believer's motivation to good works and godly service. So remember, that's what he's
talking about, that we are to exercise ourselves in good works,
we are to exercise ourselves by obedience to the authorities. And we made mention as to why
the apostle would write such a thing last week. But here he's
telling us that our motivation for doing so is the gospel. It's by knowing and experiencing
God's grace and his mercy and his kindness that we have a desire
to emulate those attributes, those qualities. They are the
great inspiration and incentive for all aspects of a believer's
life. God's people are motivated to
graciousness towards those around about us because God has been
gracious to us. Believers are motivated to be
merciful to those around about us because God has been merciful
to us and believers are motivated to be kind to our neighbours,
our friends and our neighbours and our family and in those relationships
that we have, whether they are formal or informal, because God
has been kind to us. And as we have been blessed by
these things, so we endeavour to help others. We give as we
have received. And Paul shows that while we
were yet in our sins or despite all our sins, even when sin had
full control of our lives such that there was no good thing
in us or anything desirable in us to recommend us to God, God's
mercy abounded to us nevertheless. And that's what the principle
message is in this little passage four to seven. It is the mercy
that abounds to us from God by his own free will. grace and
goodness. It's the essence of grace. It
comes while we are without strength, while we are yet sinners. It
comes when we have no reason to expect it and even when we
have no desire for it. And that's what makes it sovereign
grace. It comes at God's good pleasure,
Paul told the Romans, while we were yet sinners, Christ died
for us. And here he says, while we were
yet driven by lust and malice and hatred, the kindness and
love of God our Saviour toward man or toward us appeared. And We note here that the kindness
and the love of God our Saviour is the kindness and the love
of God the Father because that's what the Apostle is talking about. He's talking about the love and
the kindness of God the Father. And we can see that because if
we look at verse 4, it tells us there that after the kindness
and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared, if we then look
at verse 6, it says, which He, that is God our Saviour, which
He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour. So
it's God the Father who is our Saviour, as well as the Lord
Jesus Christ who is our Saviour. And again, this little passage,
verse 4 to 7 in Titus chapter 3, it is such a glorious summary
of so many of the central and fundamental truths that really
ought to be underlined in all of our Bibles, I think. Because
it's showing us here that though these blessings come to us through
the Lord Jesus Christ, it is God the Father who first established
and initiated them. So it seems to be talking about
our election, our predestination, and the placing of the elect
in Christ by God the Father in the covenant of grace. That's
what's in view. And then Paul goes on to speak
about the way in which that is revealed to us in verse 5. He says, not by works of righteousness
which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us. And this is why the scriptures
are so wonderful when we just pause and think about and meditate
upon them. You see what he says there? According
to his mercy, he saved us. That's a past tense. It's not
saying that God has a desire to save us or that God will save
us or that he intends to save us, but that he has actually
saved us by the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, by the washing
of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost. So here we
see each person in the Godhead engaging in this great saving
work. God the Father choosing, the
Lord Jesus Christ securing and God the Holy Spirit bestowing
the blessings of salvation. God, the three persons in the
Godhead engaging in the salvation of believers. God, the Father's
love and his mercy and his kindness. God, the Son's act of sacrifice,
procuring and bequeathing salvation at the cross. And God, the Holy
Spirit's regenerating and renewing of our souls and spirits and
quickening life. and conversion. And it makes
this little passage extremely powerful and blessed to the hearts
of all believers. Our triune God has, for the sake
of his own love towards us, worked all goodness, all grace and kindness
for us in time and to eternity. The moving cause of our salvation
is the love and mercy of God. God's love and mercy moved him
to make a covenant with his Son, the blessings of which are the
sure mercies of David and in which God is merciful to our
needs, to our sins and to us in our fallen state. And Paul's
telling us here, telling Titus to tell to the people of Crete
to share with the world who would read these things, that our present
condition as blood-bought saints and justified souls, as God's
holy nation and peculiar people, is not by the works of righteousness
which we have done. We haven't done any of this for
ourselves. And it's interesting, he says, works of righteousness,
that's what he's talking about here. These are works of righteousness,
are works according to a righteous law, which have been rightly
fulfilled, and that don't have any sin in them, and that might
legally be assumed to recommend us to God. And Paul says, no,
not even the best of works by the best of people in any way
recommends us to God. There's no blessedness flows
to us for our righteous works, neither before, which there cannot
be, nor indeed after our conversion. Everything about our justification,
everything about our blessed state and standing before God
is founded upon the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's all of
free grace. It's all in the covenant of grace
and it is all free to the beneficiaries of that covenant. And yet I'm back to my first
point. Remember what Paul is talking about here. He is telling
us that there's no blessings flow to us by our works of righteousness
and yet he's encouraging us to good works. So that he is reminding
us that this clear statement of God's sovereign mercy is in
order that we might strive to live a right before men and women
in this world and to the glory of God. He is calling for us
to strive for good works and upright living before the men
and women of this world. Now it's ironical in a sense
because sometimes people will call us antinomians because we
do not believe that the law can bring righteousness to fallen
creatures, nor even that it rightly motivates good works. But here
the Apostle is emphasising that it is the Gospel that motivates
our good works, the Gospel that motivates our holy living, by
revealing God's grace to redeemed sinners and showing us what God
has done for us and calling us to honour him by serving one
another. And the Apostle continues, and
he says, these gifts of grace and the love and the mercy and
the kindness of God towards us in Christ, together with the
regenerating and renewing gifts of the Holy Spirit, are shed
on us abundantly and richly. There's no parsimony with God. There's no meanness or stinginess
with God. When God gives spiritual life,
it is abundant life. Here's a verse from the Old Testament
to illustrate this. I quote it because I love to
remember this verse and I love to remind people about this verse
as well. It's the verse that is quoted
by God when he was speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, when Moses
went up the second time about the tablets of stone, the first
ones having been broken. This is what the Lord says to
Moses on the top of the mountain. He says, And the Lord passed
by before him and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful
and gracious, long-suffering and abundant, goodness and truth. And here the Apostle Paul picks
up that word abundant and it's to remind us that there is a
plentitude, there is an abundance in our God as far as his goodness
to us and his grace and and his mercy and his truth is concerned. I suspect that part of the frailty
of our flesh and the failure of our understanding, even as
believers, is to appreciate just how abundant is God's love and
grace towards us. And we often see sin as a small
thing and consequently perhaps we don't see grace for the wonder
that it is. But... It doesn't stop there
because we're told here that every good and perfect gift is
given to us in abundance. God is rich in mercy. It's Ephesians 2 verse 4. And
God's mercies flow bountifully from his kindness and his goodness
and his gentleness towards us. So whatever our trouble, whatever
our trial, whatever our personal anxiety in this moment, whatever
the challenge of the day, whatever the worry for the weeks and the
months and the year ahead might be, let us not overlook our God's
abundant kindness and love towards us and the promise that he makes.
And we note because Paul tells us that all of these come to
us through the Lord Jesus Christ. Not by works of righteousness
that we've done, not for reward, not deserving, nothing of merit,
nothing of our accomplishments or our achievements or our intelligence. Not because we are smarter than
anyone else and because we chose God On the contrary, God's grace
is a free gift in Jesus Christ. He has made us all we are. Righteous, holy, reconciled,
accepted and beloved in Christ and beloved by God. It all comes
to us by grace. And just so we all know the abundance
of God's goodness doesn't end in this world or in this life,
Paul continues in verse 7, that being justified by his grace,
that is being made righteous, made holy by his grace, we should
be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. And that's
a beautiful phrase, is it not? Heirs according to the hope of
eternal life. When the New Testament speaks
about hope, it's not an uncertain outcome in the way we use the
word today. It is a sure confidence that
is being spoken about. We are heirs, joint heirs with
the Lord Jesus Christ with a sure confidence based upon the sure,
certain and better promises of God. And none of us know what
a day far less what a year will bring forth for us. And we're
approaching the end of the year now. And perhaps some of us will
not make another year in this world. But what a blessed hope
we have of eternal life because of God's justifying grace in
Christ. What peace that passeth knowledge. What blessings are ours entrusting
such a saviour. Of course we have doubts and
we have fears, but even these doubts and fears we can safely
resign into God's hands, knowing that he who does all things well
shall never leave us, shall not lose one of his little ones who
is feeble and frail and fallen. and yet who hopes in Jesus' blood
for forgiveness and cleansing. May the Lord bless these thoughts
to us. Amen.