Doug McMasters: I invite you to take your Bible and turn with me as I turn to mine in the book of Titus and chapter two.
Doug McMasters: Titus chapter two.
Doug McMasters: In the years following the Civil War, there was no pulpit taller than that of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn.
Doug McMasters: He was there at the time led by a man by the name of Henry Ward Beecher.
Doug McMasters: And Beecher wasn't just a pastor of a church.
Doug McMasters: He was, in some ways, known as the conscience of the nation.
Doug McMasters: Abraham Lincoln would seek his advice.
Doug McMasters: Mark Twain would attend his services, as would Walt Whitman.
Doug McMasters: He was called the Great Divine.
Doug McMasters: He was a man who would speak and the nation would listen.
Doug McMasters: In fact, his words didn't just go into the pews of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn.
Doug McMasters: They were also printed in the newspapers all across the country, and they were even telegraphed across the continent.
Doug McMasters: But in January 1875, Henry Ward Beecher was in the news for a different reason.
Doug McMasters: His closest friend, Theodore Tilton, had sued him for quote, alienation of affection, which was a very euphemistic way of saying that Henry Ward Beecher had committed adultery with Theodore Tilton's wife.
Doug McMasters: It was the trial of the century, literally.
Doug McMasters: It was such a media circus that tickets for the courtroom were being scalped in Brooklyn outside the courtroom.
Doug McMasters: And special telegraph lines were put up in order to bring the news immediately to the rest of the world.
Doug McMasters: That long trial ultimately ended in a hung jury.
Doug McMasters: Beecher was acquitted.
Doug McMasters: His church even acquitted him, and he continued to preach.
Doug McMasters: He returned to his pulpit, and crowds still started to come.
Doug McMasters: But something had shifted.
Doug McMasters: Three years later, Theodore Tilton's wife Elizabeth confessed that it had been adultery.
Doug McMasters: Throughout this time, Beecher's theology hadn't changed, his voice was just as resonant as ever.
Doug McMasters: His sermons were still master classes and rhetoric.
Doug McMasters: But for the rest of his life, his brilliance was overshadowed by a brutal reality.
Doug McMasters: That the gap between the pulpit and the message and the man was the loudest thing in the room.
Doug McMasters: The tragedy of Henry Ward Beecher's life is a sobering reminder that a sullied and compromised life will bankrupt a brilliant speaker.
Doug McMasters: The Apostle Joe Paul understood that.
Doug McMasters: And this is why in chapter two he's speaking to Titus.
Doug McMasters: He's already gone through the congregation, he's talked to the older women, he's talked to the older men, he's talked to the younger women, he's talked to the younger men.
Doug McMasters: But now he wants to speak to Titus, and it's all wrapped around the same theme: that the gospel is not just a message to be believed, it is also a life to be embodied.
Doug McMasters: Just as we read in Ephesians 2 and verse 10, that we are saved unto good works, which God has already foreordained that we should walk in them.
Doug McMasters: This week Paul turns his attention to Titus.
Doug McMasters: The stakes are extremely high.
Doug McMasters: Titus is Paul's emissary, his protege.
Doug McMasters: And he hasn't put him in a comfortable suburban place with people eager to listen.
Doug McMasters: He's put him in Crete, in a place that was full of corruption, where even the poets of Crete would say that they are liars, evil beasts, and lazy gluttons.
Doug McMasters: And Paul said their testimony is true.
Doug McMasters: So this place was looking for any excuse it could find to deny the gospel.
Doug McMasters: And so Paul realized that if the message was to endure on the Isle of Crete, it had to be given in much more than just an eloquent manner.
Doug McMasters: That the message had to be one that was of unimpeachable character among all of God's people.
Doug McMasters: Titus, older men, older women, younger men, younger women.
Doug McMasters: The importance of this moment cannot be overstated.
Doug McMasters: Titus is not just simply a member of the congregation there.
Doug McMasters: Titus is not even just one of the elders who would sit there in a settled long-term ministry among the body of Christ in Crete.
Doug McMasters: He was the apostolic emissary.
Doug McMasters: He was there as the one to provide apostolic order to these churches.
Doug McMasters: He was the teacher.
Doug McMasters: He was meant to be the example before this congregation as he opened up the word.
Doug McMasters: It's very significant.
Doug McMasters: Paul's words to Titus carry a weight more than just in this moment with Titus and the church here, because his words reach into every pulpit, into every church, in every living room, as we'll see in a moment.
Doug McMasters: The significance of this cannot be understated in our time either, because there is today things that there are today, things that are happening that are just as grievous as what was happening in Henry Ward Beecher's life, and just as monumental as what Titus needed to understand it here in his day.
Doug McMasters: That came home to me several years ago when I was ministering in London, and there was a man who came over from the United States and preached in Scotland, and he preached a sermon on the Song of Solomon.
Doug McMasters: The passage is an intimate passage, but his treatment of it was not careful.
Doug McMasters: It was coarse.
Doug McMasters: He spoke with graphic words, with a brazen tone, and in a shock jock bravado.
Doug McMasters: And of course, he got the effect he wanted.
Doug McMasters: The congregation was unsettled.
Doug McMasters: Some people laughed nervously.
Doug McMasters: Some even left.
Doug McMasters: But the moment did not honor Christ.
Doug McMasters: Because what settled into the heart of the people wasn't the monumental importance of the passage.
Doug McMasters: What settled into the hearts was the sort of flair of this man who made the scriptures a spectacle.
Doug McMasters: And once the clip spread online and was shared by typically young men who like shock, it went around, not because it was a faithful message, but because it was a jarring one.
Doug McMasters: Those outside the church would look at an example like that and say, well, preaching's nothing but a performance.
Doug McMasters: But what it did do is it caused a lot of people inside the church to ask this question.
Doug McMasters: What happens when the pulpit loses reverence?
Doug McMasters: What happens when the holy is handled that lightly?
Doug McMasters: What happens when the messenger is the one that gets the focus rather than the message itself?
Doug McMasters: It was a jarring instance, but it's part of a larger pattern, a pattern that we're seeing in evangelical circles all over, where pastors are using shock value in order to substitute for the substance of handling God's word accurately.
Doug McMasters: But it's not just a problem for pastors, and it's not just an issue of video clips that go scrolling around in social media.
Doug McMasters: What Titus is talking about here in this passage, not just, or Paul is talking about to Titus, is not just about Titus and his preaching and his leadership, and not just about older men and older women and younger men and younger women inside the congregation.
Doug McMasters: It's talking to us about the gap between what we say and what we do.
Doug McMasters: About that difference between what we proclaim as a father and how we lose our patience every day with our children.
Doug McMasters: Or about the Sunday school teacher who talks about Jesus in the class, but then talks about all the people in the church in the parking lot.
Doug McMasters: Or about those who have said something true but have never, ever lived it.
Doug McMasters: Some people in this room are carrying the weight of knowing that deep in their heart, their life and their message are not aligned.
Doug McMasters: And there's some people in this room that have felt the effect of a person who's done this, who've been hurt by a teacher, or hurt by a pastor, or hurt by a church, or hurt by a parent, whose lives were in direct contradiction to what they talked about.
Doug McMasters: All of us, every one of us, live in a world where the credibility of the gospel is constantly being evaluated.
Doug McMasters: It's being weighed and it's being measured, not by what we say, but how we live our lives.
Doug McMasters: And Paul was not naive about that.
Doug McMasters: And so this passage has great significance for us today as much as it did to Titus and his.
Doug McMasters: I just want to look at two verses, verses seven and eight, and this is where we'll look today in Titus chapter two.
Doug McMasters: In everything, make yourself an example of good works, with integrity and dignity in your teaching.
Doug McMasters: Your message is to be sound beyond reproach, so that any opponent will be ashamed, because he doesn't have anything bad to say about us.
Doug McMasters: Paul here, knowing that the church's witness is always public, always visible, always being assessed, he knew that believers and unbelievers alike would be listening to Titus, and so he tells him that this message of grace needs to be adorned by those who carry it.
Doug McMasters: But it can also be distorted by those who handle it carelessly.
Doug McMasters: So this morning I want us to look at three things this morning.
Doug McMasters: That the credibility of the gospel is carried by three things.
Doug McMasters: The credibility of the gospel is carried by a life that embodies it.
Doug McMasters: The credibility of the gospel is carried by a voice that honors it, and the credibility of the gospel is carried by a message that's so sound it cannot be discounted.
Doug McMasters: And we'll finish with this: that here's the good news that the fuel behind that life, that voice, and that message is the grace of God, which gives us the ability to have a different voice than we would have, to have a different life than we would live, to have a different message than we can offer.
Doug McMasters: So let's take these in order.
Doug McMasters: Let's look, first of all, that the life that preaches, that the credibility of the gospel is held up by a life that embodies it.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 7 in the first part of that.
Doug McMasters: Paul here tells Titus, in everything, make yourself an example of good works.
Doug McMasters: And like I said, Paul is now moving from the broader discussion of older men and older women and younger men and younger women, and he's now looking Titus directly in the eye.
Doug McMasters: And he's saying, Titus, I'm talking about you now.
Doug McMasters: And everything that I'm about to say is going to land on your shoulders with a great deal more importance and significance than it will anybody else's.
Doug McMasters: Titus, in everything, make yourself an example of good works.
Doug McMasters: Paul is telling Titus that before he ever opens his mouth, his life is already speaking.
Doug McMasters: And Paul uses a word here for example that is we we can hear it in our English.
Doug McMasters: Tupas, type, an example.
Doug McMasters: And what it's talking about is a impression on wax from a signet ring.
Doug McMasters: I hold in my on my right finger here a ring that Royal gave me for our 20th anniversary.
Doug McMasters: I think about that anniversary all the time, the significance of it.
Doug McMasters: And if I if this was to be a signet ring and I would take milted wax and I would stick it down into that wax, that imprint on that would bear the marks of what lies in my heart as I remember those things.
Doug McMasters: And so people with authority would have a signet ring that bared some symbol or image of theirs.
Doug McMasters: And every time they needed to do something that would mark the authenticity of the authority that they were carrying, they would put their signet ring into that softened wax and leave on that document or leave on some matter the imprint of that authority and the imprint of that authenticity.
Doug McMasters: Because it bore some relationship to the original.
Doug McMasters: The impression obviously was there, but the significance of it was this that that mark in the wax was a sign of the invisible authority and the invisible authenticity of the person.
Doug McMasters: And so Paul is telling Titus here that you need with your life, that your character needs to be the wax that shows the imprint of Christ upon it.
Doug McMasters: His authority, the authenticity of your life will show who Christ is.
Doug McMasters: And so Paul was telling Titus here that people should be able to look at the totality of your life and to be able to get an impression in the ordinary fabric of your days that God is the Lord and that Christ is the Savior.
Doug McMasters: And so, no matter where Titus was, whether he was preaching or outside of the pulpit, when he was proclaiming God's word or simply talking about the weather for the day, people were to see in his patience, in his honesty, in his careful handling of those who would wrong him in those moments of disappointment and difficulty, that there was an example there of good works.
Doug McMasters: And this type, this example is not some sweeping dramatic moment that sort of appears and everybody goes, aha.
Doug McMasters: It is meant to be that steadied statement about the lordship of Christ in his life that you could watch every day.
Doug McMasters: Now notice what kind of example he's to be.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at the verse 7 again with me.
Doug McMasters: He says there to be an example of good works.
Doug McMasters: Now, just like the English language, the Greek language can be very, very colorful, shows different words and different movements of emphasis.
Doug McMasters: And there are words that talk about moral goodness and moral integrity.
Doug McMasters: And Paul doesn't use that word.
Doug McMasters: He uses a different word which goes more to the aesthetic side that talks about things that are beautiful, things that are noble, things that are admirable.
Doug McMasters: Now, of course, it includes a moral aspect to it, obviously.
Doug McMasters: But these good works are to be a life of Christ-like goodness on display.
Doug McMasters: A goodness that catches people's eye.
Doug McMasters: A goodness that makes them say there's something different about that life.
Doug McMasters: There's something attractive about the way that person lives.
Doug McMasters: That kind of thing.
Doug McMasters: It's meant to be the visible display of a fruit of the Spirit, an evidence of an inward transformation.
Doug McMasters: Only the gospel can produce this.
Doug McMasters: This is not about Titus's personality or just about his sort of sheer determined persistence to do certain things at certain times.
Doug McMasters: This is about the fruit of the gospel bearing out in his life.
Doug McMasters: And notice how Paul describes it.
Doug McMasters: He says, in everything here.
Doug McMasters: Now, that word in everything could have could move easily to the group before it, or it could move to Titus directly, but I think it's applicable to both because all of us need to realize that that imprint of good, beautiful, attractive, noble works is meant to be seen everywhere, pervasively in our life.
Doug McMasters: No compartment of Titus's life is to be withheld to the work of the Spirit and showing the likeness of Christ there.
Doug McMasters: Now, this is not just a burden that Paul's laying on Titus.
Doug McMasters: Paul uses this same word in several different places.
Doug McMasters: 1 Timothy 4 12, he talks to Timothy and he said, Let no one despise your youth, but be you an example to the believers.
Doug McMasters: There's that word.
Doug McMasters: In speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.
Doug McMasters: Different messenger, different city, same call.
Doug McMasters: Peter, when he wrote to the elders of the churches in 1 Peter chapter 5, says to these elders, not to be domineering over those given to your charge, but rather be an example to the flock.
Doug McMasters: Paul, when he wrote to the Philippians, spoke to every person.
Doug McMasters: He said, Join in imitating me and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example that you have in us.
Doug McMasters: That there is within the church those who are living a life as they've progressed in their walk with God that should stamp the image of Christ on them in such a way you could watch their life and say, That's how I'm going to live my life like them.
Doug McMasters: Paul, when he wrote to the Thessalonians, said the same thing, that he worked with his hands.
Doug McMasters: Instead of taking money from the church, he worked with his hands so that he might be an example to them.
Doug McMasters: That he might show that, yes, he may be remunerated for his work, but the gospel wasn't connected to the money he received.
Doug McMasters: The pattern is consistent and the expectation is unwavering.
Doug McMasters: One of the benefits that I had when I was in my 30s was to serve the Lord at Grace Community Church in Grace to You.
Doug McMasters: And at Grace to You, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, they would have the volunteers come in.
Doug McMasters: And all those, if you've ever been uh someone who's received either cassettes, I'm aging myself, of course, here, or CDs or any of those materials that you might have received from Grace to You, those were all packaged by a band of 60 to 70 volunteers.
Doug McMasters: Most all of them were retired folks from the church who would show up on Tuesdays and Thursdays and would take books and tapes and CDs or whatever it was and package them up so they could they could be sent out.
Doug McMasters: It was delightful to watch them.
Doug McMasters: They were such a fun group to be around.
Doug McMasters: And here I was in my 30s, sitting down with folks who had at least 30 years on me.
Doug McMasters: And so I would sit down with them and from time to time grab a lunch when they were having their lunch break and sit with them and talk with them.
Doug McMasters: And there was one gentleman that I remember well.
Doug McMasters: He was never a preacher, he never spoke publicly, he was he's never famous.
Doug McMasters: You would never know his name if I told it.
Doug McMasters: He was a quiet guy, but he was a part of that church for many, many years, decades.
Doug McMasters: And every morning he would sit down at his kitchen table and spend time reading his Bible and praying, and then walking with God for the rest of the day.
Doug McMasters: And I had the opportunity to speak to his grandchildren.
Doug McMasters: And the biggest effect that was had upon them was not the preaching of John MacArthur or the size of Grace Community Church or the excellency of its programs.
Doug McMasters: It was their grandfather spending time at the table praying and reading God's word and showing them what it looked like to be a believer.
Doug McMasters: He was an example of good works.
Doug McMasters: Paul is not inviting Titus to a generated goodness, he's inviting him to walk closer with Christ and let the display of Christ be seen more clearly in him.
Doug McMasters: Because when we think about this imprint in softened wax, what we're talking about is that imprint who is Christ Himself.
Doug McMasters: Think about Jesus for just a moment and the way he treated the marginalized, touching lepers, dining with tax collectors.
Doug McMasters: Think about the way he handled power, grabbing a basin and a towel and washing the disciples' feet that were dirty.
Doug McMasters: Think about the way he responded to hostility when he remained silent before his accusers when he could have called legions of angels down to battle on his behalf.
Doug McMasters: Think about the way he served those who were Would deny him, the way he would love those who would desert him, the way he would speak to those who would drive the nails in his hands.
Doug McMasters: Christ didn't just teach integrity, he was integrity.
Doug McMasters: He didn't merely describe goodness, he was the embodiment of it, the full, perfect, comprehensive display of God's goodness here on earth.
Doug McMasters: And so what Paul is calling Titus to do is not to achieve the perfection of Jesus, but to show the imprint of Christ on the pattern of his days, being a man as he was, but to show the congregation what it would look like for Christ to be imprinted on the heart.
Doug McMasters: And so for us, maybe we teach here, maybe we read a Bible passage here, maybe we teach in the children's class, Sunday school, or the children's Bible lesson, or vacation Bible school, or wherever it might be, there's one thing we need to remember is that our life is talking before our mouth is even open.
Doug McMasters: That we have an ob an awesome responsibility to be able to share with people not just a message, but a life where grace is visible.
Doug McMasters: So whether we're parents, whether we're spouses, whether we're workers, or whether we're neighbors, and we might be any one of those or all of those, people are watching us.
Doug McMasters: They're evaluating us, they're weighing us, they're calculating the significance of what's said by how we live our life.
Doug McMasters: And they're not just looking at our best moments, they're looking at our ordinary moments.
Doug McMasters: They're looking at our weekday fatigue when we come home from a long day at work.
Doug McMasters: They're wondering about the consistency of our character at home in the quiet spaces of our everyday.
Doug McMasters: Our children are looking at how we treat our spouse, how we handle frustration, how we deal with pressure, how we handle the frictions within our community and our wider nation.
Doug McMasters: We are the wax.
Doug McMasters: The scriptures talk about this very, very strongly.
Doug McMasters: And I think one of the ways that we can be the moldable kind of people to have the imprint of Christ laid upon us is to take that figure a little bit and just sort of break it down.
Doug McMasters: How does if you took the imprint of a signet ring and put it on hard wax, it's going to crack and shatter.
Doug McMasters: But what makes it malleable is the heat of the flame.
Doug McMasters: And there are times, and I think most times, when the trial of our faith, those moments of suffering that we endure, those testings that lead us into places of increased dependence and the recognition of our weaknesses, and the out the outer edges of our own wisdom.
Doug McMasters: We start looking to God in prayer for help and assistance and understanding and wisdom.
Doug McMasters: In those moments in which we're consciously dependent upon the living God, it is the flame of trials and sufferings that's softening the wax in which the imprint of Christ can be laid more strongly upon us.
Doug McMasters: And then those moments which we may say, Lord, get me out of this, are the very moments that God uses to bring us into conformity with Jesus Christ.
Doug McMasters: So don't be afraid of suffering.
Doug McMasters: Don't be afraid of what it might do in you.
Doug McMasters: Because God is working in those moments through the trials and sufferings you're enduring to make you more like Himself.
Doug McMasters: Well, let's move on.
Doug McMasters: Let's look at the next one.
Doug McMasters: Not only a life that preaches, but also a voice that honors.
Doug McMasters: At the end of verse 7 here, Paul tells Titus that he is to bring this message with integrity and dignity.
Doug McMasters: Now he's moving from his life to the teaching itself.
Doug McMasters: And he's telling Titus that teaching is more than just transfer of information, it is a stewardship that he is to hold with a great deal of careful responsibility.
Doug McMasters: That this fallen, finite human being, Titus, is going to speak to finite human beings and hold up a message that says, This is the word of God.
Doug McMasters: And he is to deal with that in an appropriate way.
Doug McMasters: That his tone, that his posture, that his spirit is to be shaped by the word of God.
Doug McMasters: That people would expect when he speaks to hear what God has to say.
Doug McMasters: And so he tells him here, do it with integrity.
Doug McMasters: What is integrity?
Doug McMasters: Well, it's a colorful word, it means the exact opposite of rot.
Doug McMasters: So if you ever go to a peach orchard and pick peaches, and I recommend you do, don't ever buy them in a grocery store.
Doug McMasters: They're terrible.
Doug McMasters: But if you go to an orchard and you realize that the picking of the peach is a very, very time-sensitive manner, that they can go from looking beautiful to looking like mush within a couple of days.
Doug McMasters: And what he's saying is, let your speech be that beautiful image of a fruit in all of its full ripeness on the tree.
Doug McMasters: May it not be done in such a way that people are just stepping on the mush on the ground.
Doug McMasters: Your preaching needs to be one of integrity.
Doug McMasters: What does that mean?
Doug McMasters: It means his devotion, his motivations must be free from corruption.
Doug McMasters: That's what it means to rot.
Doug McMasters: Therefore, he should not have hidden agendas when he preaches.
Doug McMasters: He shouldn't have any self-serving distortions to his message.
Doug McMasters: He shouldn't adjust the message to gain approval or to avoid discomfort.
Doug McMasters: There shouldn't be any shading of the truth in order for the message to be formed in a way that the people want to hear it.
Doug McMasters: Because it's possible to do all that.
Doug McMasters: It's possible to even say all the right things for all the wrong reasons.
Doug McMasters: It's possible to preach the truth with a heart that's impure.
Doug McMasters: It's possible to use sound doctrine as a platform for self-promotion.
Doug McMasters: It's possible to wield the very word of God as a weapon of manipulation.
Doug McMasters: Those things are all possible.
Doug McMasters: And so anybody who preaches for applause for the purpose of gaining that applause has preached for the wrong reason.
Doug McMasters: Anybody who's adjusted his message to avoid offending, say, a wealthy donor, has corrupted that message.
Doug McMasters: Anybody who's used the pulpit to settle personal scores has corrupted the message.
Doug McMasters: Anybody who's used the pulpit to promote their own brand has corrupted the message.
Doug McMasters: Anybody who's preaching to build their own platform has corrupted the message.
Doug McMasters: Because this is not about just the truth of the message.
Doug McMasters: It's about the truth of the motivation of the messenger.
Doug McMasters: Preach it with integrity.
Doug McMasters: But he also says to preach it with dignity.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 7 again there.
Doug McMasters: To preach it with dignity, with the gravity and the earnestness that God's word deserves.
Doug McMasters: Now it doesn't mean you can't be a funny person if you happen to have a humorous spirit about you.
Doug McMasters: That sort of thing could be fine.
Doug McMasters: But there has to be in the middle of this a determined gravity about the glory of the message that's being proclaimed.
Doug McMasters: Because as John Stott said, a preacher stands between two worlds.
Doug McMasters: He is here as one who sits in a sacred place, who's taking heaven's word and bringing it to people on earth.
Doug McMasters: And he's really just the messenger of what God once carried to the people.
Doug McMasters: And so Paul is telling Titus here that you need to speak with these kind of things in your heart.
Doug McMasters: Integrity of the message, the dignity of the message must be at the forefront of your mind.
Doug McMasters: What do we have today?
Doug McMasters: We've got people who are dragging beds up onto the platform when they want to preach a marriage series.
Doug McMasters: We've got people with wires, with people coming down to the pulpit from some sort of spot in the ceiling.
Doug McMasters: We've got people dragging props onto the platform and using them.
Doug McMasters: What are we all just kindergarteners now?
Doug McMasters: Right?
Doug McMasters: And all of it is a show to create a buzz rather than just make sure God's word's known.
Doug McMasters: And what's tragic about that is those things are not only undignified, they do something to what we expect God's word to be.
Doug McMasters: Because they form in us a sense of understanding of what is this.
Doug McMasters: Or I would even say, even the most profound sense of joy and gratitude, either.
Doug McMasters: Think about it for a second this way.
Doug McMasters: Imagine you come into the doctor's office, and the doctor sits down with you very lovingly, very kindly, but very directly says, We've gotten the results back and they're not good.
Doug McMasters: And that doctor begins to unpack for you what is going on in your body, handles you with care, handles you with truth, and begins to lay out what the next steps are.
Doug McMasters: And you realize that that person understands just how significant that diagnosis is, not just for you, but for the rest of your life, and perhaps for the rest of your family's life too.
Doug McMasters: But then there's another doctor who comes in and he's cracking jokes and he's using crude language and he's rushing through the consultation and he's got a lot of energy, a lot of entertainment.
Doug McMasters: Let me ask you this question: Which doctor are you going to trust with your life?
Doug McMasters: Which one?
Doug McMasters: The answer is obvious.
Doug McMasters: When a teacher handles God's word with crass levity, with theatrical tricks designed to generate reactions rather than reverence, a congregation learns to treat God's word with a similar degree of irreverence and lightness.
Doug McMasters: Paul told the Corinthians, he said, we're not like so many peddlers of God's word, but as men as sincerity as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ.
Doug McMasters: In 2 Corinthians 2.
Doug McMasters: He said, We're not those peddlers, we're not like those guys in the marketplace who are taking their jugs of wine and they're watering it down so that they might have more of it to sell, so they can use this commodity for a greater degree of personal gain.
Doug McMasters: He said, We're not doing that with God's word.
Doug McMasters: We're not taking God's word and just sort of watering it down to make it more acceptable and palatable so that it might be to our benefit.
Doug McMasters: He said, We're standing in the awesome place of the presence of God and speaking the truth in the sight of God.
Doug McMasters: And again, he said in chapter four, we've renounced the hidden things of shame.
Doug McMasters: We're not walking in craftiness nor adulterating the word of God, but by an open display of the truth, commending ourselves to every person's conscience in the sight of God.
Doug McMasters: What is that?
Doug McMasters: That's an open, honest, reverent display of what God says.
Doug McMasters: Jesus did the same.
Doug McMasters: He taught as those, as one who had authority and not as the scribes.
Doug McMasters: He handled the word of God as he spoke it, embodied it.
Doug McMasters: And so Paul is telling us if you're going to handle God's word, you need to do so not only in the correctness of your message, but also in the purity of your motivations.
Doug McMasters: That your tone, that your preparation, that your posture all have to come in alignment with what you're actually handling here.
Doug McMasters: And for those who have sat through teaching that's been irreverent, for those of you who have watched the stunts, for those of you that have been subjected to the manipulations, to those of you who have felt like I think he's in it for himself here.
Doug McMasters: Right?
Doug McMasters: I want to tell you something.
Doug McMasters: Your instincts were right.
Doug McMasters: Your instincts were absolutely right.
Doug McMasters: You should have run out of there as fast as you could.
Doug McMasters: And they're doing the same thing right now.
Doug McMasters: You need to be somewhere where God's word is handled clearly, accurately, and it's understood as it's coming from God and not from a man who's simply trying to gain something for himself.
Doug McMasters: And so if you're hungry, if you're weary of clever talks, if you're weary of entertainment that's masqueraded as preaching, you're not asking too much.
Doug McMasters: You're asking for the right thing.
Doug McMasters: Let's go to the third point, because it's not just a life that preaches and a voice that honors the word of the gospel, it's also a message that silences.
Doug McMasters: Take a look at verse 8.
Doug McMasters: Your message is to be sound beyond reproach, so that any opponent will be ashamed because he has nothing bad to say about you.
Doug McMasters: So the credibility of the gospel is built by a life of beautiful good works, a voice of integrity and dignity, and a message that is full of credibility.
Doug McMasters: Sound words.
Doug McMasters: It's that word we've been looking at a few times, the healthy teaching, sound doctrine.
Doug McMasters: Here is that again.
Doug McMasters: It is to be the teaching that produces the life of God.
Doug McMasters: And he tells him that it is to be done in such a way that it is uncondemnable.
Doug McMasters: And so he's pulled from the language of the hospital for healthy words, but he's also pulling from the courtroom and he's saying, your message needs to be unimpeachable.
Doug McMasters: It needs to be one that is so faithful, so clear, so true that no lawyer could prize it apart from its accuracy.
Doug McMasters: No prosecutor could probe it, no critic can scrutinize it, no opponent can parse it.
Doug McMasters: They have to remain silent in the face of it, so that they'll be ashamed.
Doug McMasters: Literally, the one who is in opposition, the one who is on the other side.
Doug McMasters: And he says, live your life and preach with such integrity that your critics have nothing substantive to say, that they would be ashamed.
Doug McMasters: A word that means empty.
Doug McMasters: That there would be, as they reach for their criticisms, as they reach for their slander, as they reach for their arguments, they go into that and they go, I've got nothing to say.
Doug McMasters: I can't bring any slander against that.
Doug McMasters: I can't bring any reproach against that.
Doug McMasters: It's one that's unimpeachable.
Doug McMasters: So Paul is aiming to tell Titus and all of us that our arguments are not one of force, that we don't silence the critics by that means.
Doug McMasters: We remove the credibility of the criticism by the integrity of the church's life and message.
Doug McMasters: And Crete needed it because they were always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.
Doug McMasters: These opponents of the gospel and Crete, they were looking to manufacture accusations, they were ready to do it, and all they needed was to wait for the church to prove itself no different than anybody else.
Doug McMasters: And off it would go.
Doug McMasters: And Paul is saying, in the middle of that world, let your life, let your voice, let your message be so aligned with the truth that these evil beasts, these liars, these gossips, don't give them any fuel.
Doug McMasters: Give them nothing to say.
Doug McMasters: Let's take a look at the end here just for a second.
Doug McMasters: How is all of this possible?
Doug McMasters: And again, I just want to blush on this for a moment because we'll it will be looked at in more detail very, very soon.
Doug McMasters: But look at verse 11.
Doug McMasters: The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, instructing us to deny godlessness and worldly lust and to live sensible, righteous, and a godly way in this present age.
Doug McMasters: Grace didn't just come in with a trickle, it popped onto the scene like the sunrise.
Doug McMasters: This grace, this undeserved, unearned, unmerited favor of God, wrapped up in Jesus Christ Himself, God in human form, came not for the worthy, not for those who had already achieved their integrity and dignity, but for all kinds of people.
Doug McMasters: And this grace came not just to save, but also to train, teaching us, training us, shaping us how to live a life that's self-controlled and upright and godly.
Doug McMasters: The very things Paul's been talking about this whole chapter.
Doug McMasters: And he's saying that these are not entrance fees to grace, these are the fruit of grace.
Doug McMasters: This is what grace accomplishes.
Doug McMasters: It not only saves, it shapes us.
Doug McMasters: And then he talks about it grants us in this hope something to look forward to: the appearing of our of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
Doug McMasters: And so he talks about grace coming in the first appearance and grace coming back in the second appearance.
Doug McMasters: And he says, in between the first and the second appearing, we sit, and our lives are to be a demonstration of the grace of God that's already come, and the grace of God we're looking forward to seeing the fullness of.
Doug McMasters: And that our life is to display that grace by turning away from worldly lust and desires and living soberly and righteously and godly in this present world.
Doug McMasters: And it's something that you can do because it is grace itself that's brought you within that context, and it's grace that's going to fuel and give you the ability to be that kind of person.
Doug McMasters: It's glorious.
Doug McMasters: So if you're in this room this morning and you're a believer and you've been cataloging the compartments of your life, and you're like, that compartment is not God's, that compartment is not God's.
Doug McMasters: That compartment, I've not even begun to inquire whether the Lordship of Christ is there.
Doug McMasters: I want to tell you something.
Doug McMasters: The grace of God can meet you in those moments.
Doug McMasters: The grace of God can so work in your heart that you'll be glad to open those doors up, that you'll be happy to see what this loving, gracious, good God can do in those secret places of your heart.
Doug McMasters: He can open those up and bring health where there is rot, life where there is death, the savor of Christ where the stench of sin in it at the moment.
Doug McMasters: And so I call you to go to Christ Himself again with yourself honestly and saying, Lord, open up these doors in my heart, and may the grace of God teach me in those places too.
Doug McMasters: And if you're here this morning and you don't know Christ as your Savior, the grace of God has appeared to bring life to all kinds of people.
Doug McMasters: What you've walked into today is not a trophy room of people who want to put their lives on display and say, look at my accomplishments.
Doug McMasters: What you've walked into is a place where sinners have found the sweet words of forgiveness from a holy God, where the message of condemnation is one that is removed from your ledger, where the mercies of God fuel your day.
Doug McMasters: And the scriptures say that to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ is to have life and life more abundantly.
Doug McMasters: You won't always be happy, but he'll always be moving you toward holiness, and holiness is the best place to be.
Doug McMasters: And so I encourage you to look to Christ for salvation as the rest of us look to him and his grace to grow in that grace.
Doug McMasters: Let's pray.
Doug McMasters: Father, we stand before you this morning as a people of heard a standard we cannot meet in our own strength.
Doug McMasters: And we're grateful that you don't leave us there to meet it in our own strength.
Doug McMasters: That you've sent your grace, that you've sent your son, the very one whose life was the perfect pattern, whose teaching was flawless in its integrity, whose message was sound beyond any reproach, and that he gave himself for us.
Doug McMasters: And so we come seeking Christ.
Doug McMasters: And Lord, we pray that you would press the pattern of Christ into the wax of our lives again this morning.
Doug McMasters: We pray that where we've been careless, may Christ make us careful.
Doug McMasters: And where we failed, may Christ meet us with grace that redeems and restores.
Doug McMasters: And I pray, Father, for all of us, as I've sat with this word for weeks now, thinking of the importance that it has upon my life, as I've thought about our elders and about my beloved brother Micah, and what significance it holds for us.
Doug McMasters: Father, I also want to include everyone who handles your word, whether they teach a two-year-old or a hundred and two-year-old.
Doug McMasters: I pray for all of us who listen to the word.
Doug McMasters: I pray for all of our parents, for all of our children, for all who might lead in any capacity and everyone who has led.
Doug McMasters: That you would make us a people who are zealous for good works, not for our glory, but for yours.
Doug McMasters: And Lord, we ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, our great God and Savior, who's appeared in grace and who's going to appear in glory.
Doug McMasters: We long for that day.
Doug McMasters: Amen.