Titus chapter 1. It's on page 1300. Some of you
are using the Pew Bible. It's on page 1300. Titus chapter 1. I just want to read
a few verses here beginning in verse 9. Titus chapter 1 in verse 9. We've
got quite a few studies on this, but I've determined when I started
this book that I was going to get into quite a bit of detail
on it and just take my time through it and do that. This first section
here we've been studying about is concerning pastors, ordaining
pastors. But what's said to pastors here
really applies to all of us. It applies to all Christians,
all believers. So let's read our text in Titus
chapter 1. and begin here in verse 9. Well,
I tell you, let's go back up in verse 5. Let's read these
qualifications for a pastor. In verse 5, For this cause left
I thee in Crete, that's that island there out in the Mediterranean
Sea, most of you know that, that thou shouldest set in order the
things that are wanted, and ordain elders, or pastors, overseers
in every city as I had appointed thee. If any be blameless, the
husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot
or unruly, for a bishop," that's the same thing as a pastor and
elder, he must be blameless as the steward of God, not self-willed,
not soon angry, not given to wine, not a striker, not argumentative,
one that wants to fight, not given to filthy lucre, gain of
some kind, but a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober and
just and holy and temperate, holding fast the faithful word
as he has been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine
both to exhort and to convince the gang sayers, For there are
many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, especially they
of the circumcision, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert
whole houses, teaching things which they ought not for filthy
lucre's sake. One of themselves, even a prophet
of their own, said, The Cretans are always liars, evil beasts,
slow bellies. This witness is true, wherefore
rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith, not
giving heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men that
turn from the truth." So here in verses 7 through 8, Paul has
been setting forth the attitude of these pastors, the men that
they were going to ordain as a pastor, the disposition of
these men, what their whole attitude should be. And this wasn't to
be men that they picked out, men who were just putting on
a front, just putting on a show, acting. He wasn't talking about
getting men like that. We've got enough of those fellows
now. You know, they go off and live
in a commune and they wear the same kind of clothing and have
the collars that's turned around backwards. They eat the same
food, wear the same kind of garb. But these are men just like me
and just like some of you, common people who lived in a community
and worked and supported their family just like everybody else
if they had a family. That was the kind of men the
Apostle Paul told him to ordain. The Bible knows nothing of ordaining
ministers who aren't allowed to marry. We know people like
that, don't we? They're not allowed to marry.
They don't allow their ministers to marry. But Paul said here,
let him be the husband of one wife. If he's going to have a
wife, he's allowed to have a wife, but just one husband if he has
a wife. Now, if anybody wants to live, an isolated life, that's
fine with me. I feel like sometimes I want
to do that myself. Just leave me alone and let me
go out away from everybody and away from my family sometimes,
my children and everybody else. And just eat certain kinds of
food and wear certain kinds of garb. If that's the way a man
wants to live, that's fine. But the Bible doesn't require
anybody to do that, especially pastors. Especially pastors. These qualifications that the
Apostle is talking about here is a heart attitude. It's their whole nature is what
he's talking about. He said here that they be not
self-willed, just wanting their way all the time, thinking they
know everything and you know nothing. That comes to an attitude,
doesn't it? And he says here, a lover. Now this is the attitude they
were to have. A lover of good. A pastor has
to be a lover of good. He has to be a lover of what's
wholesome. What will profit you and edify
you and encourage you. A lover of good things and a
lover of good people. That's a good qualification,
isn't it? But that's the attitude of the heart. And he said they
have to be sober and just, just in their relationships with men,
and holy in their relationship with God. They have to be temperate. They have to have these passions
of this old flesh under control. He can't live out of control.
But see how this comes to an attitude. It's not. It's not separating yourselves
of some of the Catholic priest doing a monastery or something
somewhere and wearing all this garb in a certain way that you
look, the main thing is the attitude, the attitude of a heart, a man's
disposition. But this is only part of being
a pastor, isn't it? This is a good part, but it's
only a part. There may be men who fits this
qualification, and that's a good thing. Boy, to have an attitude
like this, that's a good thing, is it? You know, to be holy and
just and temperate, that's a wonderful thing. To be kind and hospitable.
But being a pastor requires more than having a good attitude.
It requires more than just having your own children, if they live
at home, under subjection. What does the man believe? What
does the man teach? What does he preach concerning
God, concerning Christ and concerning sin, concerning himself and redemption? What he believes and teaches
means a lot, doesn't it? There are two things that we've
looked at here in this first chapter that must correspond,
and that is what a man believes. what we believe. We often call
them cardinal truths, and by that we simply mean necessary
truths. There are things that you and
I must believe to be saved. The Bible says it
is not enough to be sincere. Somebody said if you just be
sincere, but that is not enough, is it? Some people are sincerely
wrong. But the Scripture says this,
Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
But listen to this, How shall they call on Him in whom they
have not believed? And how shall they believe in
Him in whom they have not heard? So we can't believe in a Christ
that we've never heard of, can we? And that's what a pastor
does. He opens his Bible and he sees
who Jesus Christ is and what He's done for sinners. And he
tells the people about that. That's essential for a man to
understand and believe the Bible. And then when we believe, what
happens? We're saved, aren't we? Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved and then what
happens? Then you can live the Christian
life. Then you're free to live the
Christian life. And you know these two things
must correspond what we believe and how we live. Those two things
must correspond together and that's what he's talking about
here in this first chapter. If either one of these things
are missing, then we're not Bible Christians. If a man says, well,
I believe the truth and he's living in his sins, he's not
a Christian. He's not a Christian. And if
a man says, well, I'm living a separated life, but I don't
know what the Bible says about what I have to believe. I don't
know if I believe on Christ or not. He's not a Christian, is
He? So these two things must correspond,
what we believe and how we live. And when we believe right, we'll
live right. If any man's in Christ, he is
a new creature. I was reading a a little article
about this man. I think he lived in the 1800s.
His name escapes me. But he was talking about a preacher
that he had listened to. And he said he's the clearest
preacher that he's ever heard in his life when he's preached.
And he said he's the most powerful preacher he's ever heard in his
life. And then he made a statement. And he said he's the most corrupt
man in private that I've ever met. And I thought, man, a lie. That's scary, isn't it? That's
scary. You say, Bruce, how could that
be? Well, look at Judas. He went out and preached that
men should repent, but he was without it himself. He cast out
devils, but the Lord Jesus called him a devil. So I guess this
could be, couldn't it? It's not enough to to say, I
believe the truth and I'm going to speak the truth, do you live
it? Do we live it? And that's the
first thing we saw here as we were studying these qualifications
for a pastor. He begins with his character
before he ever goes to what he believes. And aren't we living
in a day when we see that's so important? We see these preachers
sometimes on TV and in places and they're preaching to us and
then you find out how they've been living all along and they've
been living a shameful life. And then on the other hand, there's
those who are separated and they seem to be holy but they don't
know the truth. I was reading John Wesley. If
you've never read any John Wesley, his memoirs are good when he
talks about his life. But he talks about he was a member
of the Holy Club. They call it the Holy Club. I
think George Whitfield was in the Holy Club with them. And
he said, I was in a holy club with an unholy heart. And he
said, I came to America. I sailed on ship, he said, to
America to preach salvation to the Indians and I was without
salvation myself. And yet Wesley was such a separated
man, separated from this world. So these two things must go together. What we believe, we must believe
the truth of God's Word and then the life, the Christian life
that's lived. And if those two don't correspond,
then we could very well need to examine ourselves. There is
a Christian doctrine which we must believe and there's the
Christian life which must be lived. And what's these based
upon? Well, this brings us here to
verse 9 in our text. And the Apostle Paul said this
here in verse 9. And this is what he bases everything
upon. Hold it fast. The faithful Word. Now this is Paul's opinion about
the Word of God. This is his estimation about
the Word. The faithful Word. I like that,
don't you? And the definition of faithful
here is trustworthy. God's Word is trustworthy. You can absolutely trust the
Word of God. Nothing else in this world you
can absolutely trust, but you can absolutely trust this Word. Satan is out to deceive us, isn't
he? Sin will deceive you. Our own
hearts can't be trusted. Solomon said a man's a fool that
trusts in his own heart. And men will deceive us. If the
blind lead the blind, they'll both fall off in the ditch. But
I tell you one thing that won't deceive us, there's one thing
that we can absolutely trust, and that's this Word, the Word
of God. And you know why we can trust
it? And you know why it's trustworthy? Because it's Arthur that's trustworthy. God who wrote it is faithful
and true, and he can be trusted. Put your trust in the Word of
the Lord. That's the best advice I could
give anybody. Listen to what David said in
Psalm 119 and verse 41. He said, Lord, let Your mercies
come unto me, even Your salvation, according to Your Word. That's what we love about the
Scriptures, isn't it? Everything is according to His
Word. And then he said this, so shall
I have wherewith to answer him that reproaches me for I trust
in thy word." Who reproaches David? Who was reproaching him? Who is it that reproaches us?
I tell you some of them, one of them is the devil, one of
them is Satan. You ever have him to come to your mind and
accuse you? You ever having to come to your
mind and say, you think you're a Christian. God don't love you. You don't have an interest in
the saving merits of Jesus Christ. Christ is not making intercessions
for you. You ever have Him to come to
your mind and say things like that? Well, here's the answer
for Him. Lord, I trust in Thy Word. If the Word says you love Me,
then you love me. If the Word says that Christ
is on the right hand of God making intercessions for me, then you're
there. His Word is trustworthy. Satan
don't tell us that, does he? He tempts us to despair. I'll
tell you who else reproaches us. Atheists reproach us. And boy, there's a bunch of them
around today, atheists. And they say things like this,
you trust the Bible? They found a thousand mistakes
in that thing. We've got good proof now that
the universe and the earth and man has all evolved. And you still believe that antique
book? You are not end of all, man. And they mock you and they reproach
you. Can you imagine what young Christian men and women are going
through that's going into our high schools and into our colleges. And they have to sit under those
professors and their classmates that radical them all the time
because they believe that God created the heavens and the earth. They reproach. David said, When
they reproach me, give me something to answer them with. And then
he turns right around and says, I trust in Thy Word. You know
the Word is all we need, isn't it? I was listening one time. Menlo Larry, Menlo Larry, sometimes
we listen to debates. Dawkins, is that his name? Richard
Dawkins, he's one of the Four Horsemen. He's an atheist. He's a devoured atheist. And
he debates a Christian fellow, a very educated man. I can't
think of his name. I heard them debating one time
and Richard Dawkins said this. He said something to this effect.
I think this is pretty much what he said. He said he was debating
that there was no God and the creation just evolved and he
made a statement like this. He said, let's just suppose for
the sake of argument that there is a God. and that He created
this universe and man in all his complexities, his nervous
system and everything. He said, can you imagine how
wise and how powerful that God would have to be to create everything? And then He said, imagine a God
like that coming down to this earth and becoming a man to die
for such people as we are. He said, wouldn't that be amazing?
And I'm sitting there thinking, yes, yes, that's amazing. But that's exactly what happened.
And he just preached the Gospel so clearly. And he's an atheist. That's why it's wonderful, isn't
it? That's why it's wonderful. Listen to what Isaiah chapter
44 and verse 24 says, Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer, and He
that farmed thee from the womb, I am the Lord, the Maker of all
things, that stretcheth forth the heavens alone, and spreadeth
out abroad the earth by Myself. I am thy Redeemer." Our Creator
is our Redeemer. He that stretched out the heavens
alone and spread the earth out by Himself on Calvary's tree
burned our sins and purged them away by Himself." And that's
the glory of the Gospel. And you can't reason with these
atheists by carnal reasoning. You can't take human invention
and human wisdom and out-reason and out-argue those guys. I don't
have that kind of an education, do you? I'll tell you something,
though, that will convince them, and that's this faithful word.
Lord, give me something that I can have to answer those that
reproach me. Lord, I trust in Thy Word. You remember when The Philistines,
they stole the Ark of the Covenant. They got it from the children
of Israel and they took it over to their country. And they set
it up and they set up Dagon, their false god. They set them
right facing each other. And I don't know why they did
that. They thought, well, we're going to see who wins this battle,
I guess. And they left and come back the next day and old Dagon
was on his face before the Ark of the Covenant. They set him
up and said, well, let's give him another chance. Come back
the next day and he's laying on his face with his arms broke
off. I'm telling you, the world, atheists, Satan, they cannot
stand before this Word. It's a trustworthy Word. And
a babe in Christ can defeat Satan with this Word. Put your trust
in the Word. That will defeat him. There is
something else that reproaches us sometimes and that is unbelief,
isn't it? I tell you the most grievous
thing that afflicts us sometimes is unbelief. It turns our blessings
into curses. It turns our joy into heaviness.
It will take our laughter and replace it with mourning. And
it is a thing that grieves the heart of our Lord is unbelief. It reproaches us. The Bible says
in one place the Lord Jesus didn't do many mighty works. Why didn't
He? He went to this place but yet
He did not do many mighty works. He was doing them everywhere
else. Why didn't He do them there? Because of their unbelief. That's a grievous thing, isn't
it? It grieves our Master. He says He was grieved because
of the hardness of their hearts. Unbelief grieves our Lord. And
I tell you what, it takes our blessings and turns them into
curses. You remember when Peter was walking
on the water? The Lord said, Come to Me. And
he got out of that ship and started walking on the water. And he
took his eyes off of Christ and looked at the waves and he began
to sink. He was so thrilled that he was walking on the water.
Can you imagine? I tell you what, sometime you
go try it. And if you start walking on water, I'm telling you, you're
going to be thrilled. What a miracle! And he was so happy, and then
what happened? He began to sink. He began to
be filled with dread and torment. And what did the Lord say to
him? O thou of little faith, why did you doubt? That's what
doubt will do. And the only remedy, the only
thing that will cure a doubtful heart is just simply taking the
Lord at His Word. Trustworthy. Trustworthy. Everything He says, you can trust
Him. Believe His promises. Even believe
His threatenings. Listen to what Joshua said. He
was ready to die. And he got all Israel together,
that great prophet, and listen to his last words. He said, I
am going the way of all the earth, and you know in your hearts and
in your souls that not one thing has failed of all the good things
which the Lord your God spake concerning you. All are come
to pass unto you, and not one thing has failed. Not one thing,
not one thing ever promised, brothers and sisters, that God
makes to you, it will not fall. There's never been a promise
to fail because this Word is trustworthy. Take Him at His
Word. Take Him at His Word. Just simply
take Him at His Word. Put your trust in His Word. Paul
says it's faithful. And you can live and you can
die in the full assurance that He's yours and when you die,
you're going to heaven to be with Him. Faithful word. I love that song that Mr. Gabriels
wrote, He called me long before I heard, before my sinful heart
was stirred, but when I took Him at His word, forgiven, He
lifted me. I love another one that says
this, His word shall not fail you, He promised. Believe Him
and all will be well. Believe Him and it will be well. I do not care what circumstances
you find yourself in. Believe His Word and all will
be well. And Paul is talking about that
here in verse 9 when he says, Holding fast the faithful word. One version said, clinging, clinging
to the faithful word. Clinging. These pastors must
cling to this faithful word in their own hearts. They must cling
to it themselves first. I, as a pastor, have to cling
to this word myself. It's my help. It's my hope. It's my strength. And then when
I cling to it myself, then I preach it to you. And then you're to
get a hold of it and you're to cling to it. But if a man is
not convinced in his own heart that the Word of God is completely
true and trustworthy, he won't feel the power of it. He won't feel the power of it.
The power of the gospel always comes to us. The power of God's
words always comes to us through faith, doesn't it? Through faith. And if he don't feel the power
of it in his own heart, he won't hold it fast in the face of such
opposition. And that was what Paul was saying
here in verse 9, holding fast the faithful word, that trusted
word. Well, there are many unruly and vain talkers. There's a lot
of opposition, ain't there? Boy, if we ever lived in a day,
brothers and sisters, where we need to hold fast God's Word,
it's the day we're living in. It's going to get worse, too.
This is what I would encourage each of us to do. Don't go home
on Wednesdays and lay your Bibles on your tables or on your nightstands
or up in the shelf and not pick it up again until Sunday. Read
your Bibles. Read God's Word and believe it. It's trustworthy. And this is
what helps us face the opposition in our own hearts and opposition
from without. We need to know it, don't we?
And that's what he's telling these pastors here. You're going
to have a lot of opposition. He says there in verse 10, Because
there's many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, How are
you going to spot them? How are you going to war against
them and overcome them? By this faithful Word. Look what
He says about this opposition down here in verse 11 again. He says here in verse 11, "...whose
mouths must be stopped. They subvert whole houses, teaching
things which they ought not." They are teaching things which
they ought not to teach. It is contrary to the Bible.
How are we going to confront these people and stop them? With
a faithful Word. And here in verse 14, look what
they were teaching here. Not giving heed to Jewish fables
and commandments of men that turn from the truth. This is what they were teaching,
fables. I read in an example by one of the commentaries on
what a fable is, a Jewish fable. they said the jews had an old
saying among them that in the millennial they have the cross
that's going to physically reign a thousand years and they said
in the millennial when you sow wheat it won't have little grains
it'll have whole loaves of bread that's some more stock corn but
that's a fable you see that's just a little example of a fable
and the commandments of men The Lord Jesus told the Jews, He
said, You teach for doctrine the commandments of men. You
go to man's writings, and boy, the Jews have a bunch of commandments
of men. I don't know if any of you ever
heard of Laura Schletchinger. She was converted to Judaism.
She used to have a talk show, radio talk show, and I think
she may have passed away, but she said one day, Somebody called
in and wanted to know what she believed about the love of God.
And she said, I don't have time to concern myself with the love
of God. I have six hundred commandments that I've got to try to keep.
Six hundred! God just had ten, didn't He?
She's got six hundred commandments of men, teaching for doctors
the commandments of men. Paul said that did. It turned
from the truth. Bruce, what's the matter with
this? You shouldn't be so dogmatic about this. It ain't going to
hurt anybody. It turns from the truth. If it's not according to the
truth, it needs to be stopped, doesn't it? You know why? And I made mention
of this last week. You know why so much has risen
up in the last 40 years, 50 years? All of this era has come in and
prospered. You know why that has happened?
Pastors have not held fast this trustworthy Word. They've not
held it fast. And the reason they've not held
it fast, they've not been convinced in their own heart that this
is God's Word. You know there's men all over
the place that's preaching And they don't believe the Bible
is God's Word. They believe the Bible contains God's Word but
you just have to find it in there somewhere. But it's not all Bible. I was listening to a man on the
radio and he said him and a friend of his went to a church Now here's
what's happening. You may think this is crazy,
but I heard this myself, and I believe what the guy said.
He said, a friend of mine went to that church, and we sat down,
and they sang two or three songs, and the pastor got up. The pastor
got up, and he said the first statement out of his mouth was
this, You all realize that I am an atheist. Can you believe that? See, we're
sitting here in our little hideouts, and we have no idea what's going
on. Paul said there's many of this stuff. There's much of this
stuff going on. And there's but one way to confront
it and overcome it, and that's by the faithful Word. I hope
that God convinces us that His Word is faithful. I not only
need to preach God's Word and insist upon the truth of it,
you need to believe it yourself. Lastly and quickly is this. He
calls it the faithful word, the trustworthy word. There in verse
9 he uses something else. He calls it sound doctrine. You see that? Holding fast the
faithful word, the trustworthy word as he has been taught that
he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince
the gangsters. This word sound, it has some
good meanings, it means healthy. The Bible is healthy, isn't it? It is really healthy. That's
one of the reasons we are to read it. Desire the sin-sealed
milk of the Word that you may grow. Boy, I tell you, your body,
your soul, the faculties of your soul will will grow and be strong
if you'll drink the sensual milk of the Word. Let the Word of
Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom. It's healthy. It's
healthy. Another definition of this word
sound means uncorruptible. Uncorruptible. One definition
says it cannot be corrupted. It cannot decay in and of itself. It's uncorruptible. You just
set it out here and for the world stands the next 10,000 years,
it will not decay. You know anything like that?
You say, Bruce, if you lay your Bible up there, it will rot.
Yes, but these words won't. They won't. It's incorruptible.
It will not corrupt. And it cannot, I love this, it
cannot produce corruption. Whatever it produces, it's incorruptible. This is what Peter said about
the new birth. He said, being born again, not
of corruptible seed, but of the incorruptible by the Word of
God which liveth and abideth forever. You know there's a new
creature inside you that's incorruptible. Ain't that amazing? Because he's
born of this incorruptible seed, the Word of God. That new creature
cannot be corrupted. That's a wonderful answer. That's
such a mysterious thought and I can't explain that. But Peter
said, being born again of this incorruptible seed. And this creature is called incorruptible
and holy and righteous. Another definition of this word
incorruptible is unbroken. Unbroken. sound doctrine, unbrokable doctrine. You notice there he uses the
word singular, singular to describe doctrine. And this is something
that you'll notice as you read your Bible. When the Bible talks
about the doctrine of men and devils, it's always plural. Not
giving heed to seducing doctrines, the doctrines of devils, the
doctrines of men, But when he talks about the doctrine of Christ,
it's always singular. It's always doctrinal. And that's
why this word here, sound, unbroken, from Genesis to Revelations,
there is one chain of truth that can never be broken. It runs
throughout all the Scriptures. That is the doctrine of Christ. That's a wonderful thought, isn't
it? One united, broken, unbreakable truth. Jesus Christ is doctrine. Brothers and sisters, let's hold
fast to it. Let's hold fast. We don't know
what's coming. We don't know what's coming.
Things are changing so quickly. But this Bible will not change.
It's Arthur will not change. Put your trust in God's Word.
Put your heart trust there. Be convinced of its truth for
yourself. Don't just get it from somebody
else. Get it for yourself. If things
don't change, we're going to change. Age is changing us. You and I are going to face death,
aren't we? Everybody that we know is dying, and we're going
to die. Put your trust in this Word,
and boy, when you lay on your deathbed, you can lay with this
confidence, Lord, I trust Your Word. I put all my trust in Your
Word, and I tell you, Not one of his promises will fail. It
won't fail. We'll pick up there next week
in that place and we'll continue. Clarence, would you dismiss us?