This sermon on Titus was given in a series at Kew Baptist Church, London.
I recently received a letter. While it was addressed to me, it included greetings for all of you as well. I was wondering if I could read it to you, for I think we would all find it instructive. It was written to help us understand what we should do next as a local church, how each of us can grow in personal godliness and establish an evangelistic presence right here in this culture and community. You will never guess who sent it to me, it is from Paul! I’m not sure if that is how Titus first introduced his letter to one of the congregations on the island of Crete, but I have no doubt that this letter was read and discussed much with them. How useful it would have been for those churches to read! Direct instructions from Paul on how they should be organised and arranged. Criteria to help identify who their leaders should be and reasons why they needed to appoint them soon. Teaching on how to engage with the distinctive culture that developed on the island. How the church could protect itself from false doctrine and division. How older men and elderly women, younger men and women, mothers and wives, church leaders and slaves all should go about their every day lives. How they should interact with those outside the church, whether rulers and authorities, or simply their neighbours and colleagues. Not only would it have been valuable for its practical instructions, but also for its beautiful descriptions of both their salvation and Saviour. Both the goodness and grace of what God had already done for and in them, and also the blessed hope of his future appearing, of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ. What church would not love to receive a letter like this? I can imagine word spreading around Crete that Titus had received this letter, and each of the churches rushing to find out when he might be able to come and share it with them. However, the Cretan churches of the first century were not the only ones with whom this letter was to be shared. For God, in his wise and perfect providence, seen to it that it was one of a small number of epistles preserved through persecution and compiled in the New Testament cannon. God did this so that millions of churches beyond the confines of Crete could profit from its contents. And that is what has happened. For the value and usefulness of this letter has not diminished over time. In August 1555, around 1500 years after Titus stood before a congregation in Crete with this letter in his hand, John Calvin likewise stood before a congregation in Geneva. Speaking to them of the same letter, which he would spend several months preaching through, he commented: ‘This letter is as necessary for us today as it ever was.’ Friends, I am confident that as we study it together, we will find the very same. That we will be the latest in the long line of churches instructed and built up through its words.
I plan for us to spend around 8 weeks working through this letter: two weeks in each of the three chapters and an additional two weeks at the start considering the opening verses. These are the verses that we typically skim through to get to the main body. However, they are incredibly helpful in understanding the context the letter was written in and some of the main ideas it contains. Next week, we will think through verses 4-5, and mainly deal with the purpose of the letter: the context of who it was written to and why it was sent. However, this week, I want to focus on verse 1-3. For here I believe Paul gives us a clue as to the point of the letter: that is, its main theological theme and idea. You see at first glance, you may think verses 1-3 are rather ordinary. Similar to how Paul starts all his epistles. Following the style of his day: he identifies and introduces himself briefly before identifying the recipient and including a blessing. However, when you take this introduction and compare it to Paul’s others, you notice something very strange. For while Titus is the second shortest letter, only Philemon is smaller in size, Titus has the second longest introduction. Only one Pauline epistle has a longer introduction than Titus, and that is Romans, his longest letter. Now, what turns this from a bizarre quiz question into a query worth investigating is this: here the recipient does not need a detailed description in order to recognise Paul. That is the case in Romans, for Paul had not met the Roman church before writing to them. We can understand his detailed personal introduction there. But why this one here? Next week we shall see Titus was a close companion of Pauls, working alongside him in ministry for many years. He knew exactly who Paul was. Why then does Paul write such a lengthy introduction for Titus? Well, I believe it was to remind him, not who Paul was as a person, but of his purpose and process in ministry. Paul is writing to Titus to instruct him about his ministry on Crete, but before he get to that, he reminds Titus what faithful ministry looks. This gives him an image that he can imitate, guidelines he can follow, something to aim for. By giving an overview of his own ministry in 1:1-3, Paul provides Titus, churches in Crete, and each of us, with a Model for Ministry. A model that is presented to us in 3 parts: The Man (1:1a); the Motive (1:1b-2a); the Method (1:2b-3).
1. The Man (1:1a) – We are servants who are sent
When we write letters today, we set them out differently. Our address may go at the very top and we will probably introduce ourselves in the first few lines. However, we only sign off on the letter at the very end: attaching our signature, writing our name and including any relevant titles. In Paul’s first century context, letters started the way we end them. Each epistle starts the same way: ‘Paul…’. After this, there is always a brief description of Paul’s role. The language he includes in Titus is ‘a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ’. Apart from the inclusion of his name, this is the least surprising thing about these verses. Paul describes himself as a servant and apostle in many of his letters. It seems that when Paul considers his identity, this is one of the dominant ways he thinks about himself.
Paul’s description is both universal and unique. The first way he identifies himself is universal: he is a servant. If Jesus teaches that you cannot serve two masters, Paul tells us that we always serve one master. In Romans 6:16, he explains, ‘you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness…’. Bob Dylan dwells on this truth in his famous song ‘Gotta Serve Somebody’. In each verse, he goes through a variety of people: ‘You may be an ambassador to England or France; You may like to gamble, you might like to dance; You may be the heavyweight champion of the world; You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls.’ And each time the chorus is the same: ‘But you’re gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed; You’re gonna have to serve somebody; Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord; But you’re gonna have to serve somebody.’ Paul knew he was serving somebody, and he was certain that it was the Lord, for he calls himself ‘a servant of God’. As a Christian, is this idea a dominant one in your identity? Do you ever think of yourself as a servant of God? Or do you reserve that for a certain class of Christ? People like Paul! Perhaps those called to teach full-time in a church? Or evangelists who go around the country preaching? If so, I want you to see that although Paul uses this term to describe himself here, it is a reality he often assigns to all Christians. In 1 Thessalonians 1:9, Paul describes Christiaan conversion in this way ‘how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God…’. Paul tells us that when we were saved, we started to serve. In Colossians 3:23-24 he speaks of such service to the church: ‘Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men…You are serving the Lord Christ.’ Paul tells us that whatever we do, we are in service to the Lord. Friends, alongside thinking of God as your father, do you think about him as your master? The term ‘master’ is entirely appropriate, for although the word is translated ‘servant’ in 1:1, it is translated ‘bondservant’ in 2:9 and is more simply rendered ‘slave’. It means ‘somebody who is solely committed to another’ (BDAG). In his parables, Jesus frequently uses it to refer to all Christians, described us as servants working for a master, entrusted with a task by God. We shall see being saved to serve is prominent in Titus. Surely then it should be prominent in our Christian lives, for like Paul, we are all servants of God.
That is the universal description Paul uses, however the next one is more unique: ‘an apostle of Jesus Christ.’ Here we see that Paul was a man who had both a master and a mission. The terms apostle is first used in Matthew 10:2 to describe the 12 disciples and then of Mattias in Acts 1:26, who replaced Judas. However, Matthias is not the last Apostle to be added in Acts, for so too is Paul and it may be that Barnabas and James were as well. Apostles were the eyewitnesses to the resurrection, those to whom Jesus appeared and assigned authority to establish the early church. In Ephesians 2:20, Paul explains their missions to us. For while the church is built upon Christ as cornerstone, these apostles and the prophets were to be its foundation. It is through the apostles the gospel was first declared, confirmed by their miracles, and it was under their authority the New Testament was written. In 1 Corinthians 15:7-9 Paul indicates that he was the last one who was given this apostolic mission. And so, after Paul no one can claim to be ‘an apostle of Jesus Christ’ in the same way. Yes, like all of us, Paul is a servant of God, but the shape and sphere of his service was special. In 1 Corinthians 12:29, Paul tells us to expect this: ‘Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles?’. We that God assigns different forms of service to different servants. And yet, do not doubt that while God does not give all his servants the same mission, his does assign all his servants a mission. That is the point of Paul’s famous illustration in 1 Corinthians 12: every part of Christ’s body has a role to play. The eye and hand, the head and feet all are given a job to do. And in distributing spiritual gifts, God gives us different tools for our different tasks. We are all servants, we are all sent, although we are not all sent to serve in the same way. Paul was a man with both a master and a mission. He was a servant who was sent. The same is true of Titus and each of us, even if we are sent on different missions. We are servants who are sent.
2. The Motive (1:1b-2a) – For the salvation of the saints
Having declared that he is a man with a mission, an apostolic assignment, it is interesting that Paul doesn’t focus on its details. He does that in other epistles, like Romans and Galatians. However, in Titus Paul turns not to the details of his calling, but the drive behind it. This is just one of the many places that Paul records the motivation of his ministry. We read how he told the Colossians he rejoiced in suffering for their sake, he toiled, struggling with all the energy that God powerfully worked in him, to present them mature in Christ. If we ever need something to show us how we should serve God, the statements Paul makes about his motivation in ministry are surely it. The greatest example of service is of course Jesus, but so perfect is his example, we feel it is a mountain too high for us to scale, a peak we cannot reach. Sometimes his service seems more a cause for adoration than for imitation. But when we look at Paul, we see a sinner serving God. We are able to do what Paul told the Corinthians: imitate Paul as he imitates Christ (11:1). I think Paul’s most striking statement about his service is in 2 Corinthians. After pleading with the church not to exchange his true apostleship for false apostles, Paul explains that he is coming to see them again and in 12:15 exclaims, ‘I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls.’ What a brilliant summary that is of how we should serve: gladly spending and being spent for each other’s souls. What an inscription that would be on a gravestone: ‘He gladly spent himself for souls.’ It is an inscription that could be added to the lives of God’s greatest servants, including Paul. Christian, is that the kind of service you are striving for? Are you seeking to gladly spend not just your money, time, energy, but even yourself for the souls of others?
For souls. That is a good short summary of what Paul writes here, ‘…for the sake of the faith of God’s elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness, in hope of eternal life…’. This is the motivation behind his mission and ministry. Firstly, we see it is ‘…for the sake of the faith of God’s elect’. This group of ‘God’s elect’ is far wider than the church on Crete, even far wider than the church in Paul’s century. One commentator explains it is ‘all who were, who are and who will be united to Christ by faith’ (Burk). Here we see the breadth of Paul’s motivation: in ministry he sought both the salvation of sinners and the strengthening of the saints. Both bringing non-believers to faith and building believers up in faith. Paul sets his sights on that remnant chosen by grace (Romans 11:5), serving for their sake. In 2 Timothy 2:10, as he sits suffering in prison, bound in chains as a criminal, he writes, ‘I endure everything for the sake of the elect.’ Long before Paul was chained to that Roman guard as a criminal, he had chained himself to the cause of Christ and the church!
However, Paul not only tells us of the breadth, but also the depth of his motivation. For it is not only for the sake of their faith, but ‘their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness…’. This connection between faith and knowledge of the truth, is also found in 1 Timothy 2:4, where Paul tells us that God ‘desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.’ God desires not only to save us, he desires to sanctify us. For we see that the knowledge of this truth is connected not only with faith, but with godliness. It is this connection that I believe brings us to the very heart of the book of Titus. It is here that I believe Paul’s point, his main theological idea, can be found: for truth accords with godliness. There are two ways you could understand this phrase. The NIV selects the first one, which I think Paul mainly means here, and translates 1:1, ‘truth, that leads to godliness’. That is, truth that causes godliness. If you were to ask me to summarise the message of Titus in four words, I would tell you ‘Truth leads to godliness’. For I believe this is the idea around which the whole letter is built. Twice, in significant detail, Paul will describe what godliness is. In Titus 2 he spends the first 10 verses setting out what personal godliness looks like for a whole range of different groups of people. And then, in 2:11, he delivers the punchline that will produce this godliness in their lives. Why is it that Titus is to teach older men to be sober-minded? Young women to be pure? Slave to be submissive to their masters? He tells Titus in 2:11: ‘For the grace of God has appeared….’. Paul packs that entire paragraph full of the truth that will transform them and make them godly. He does the same in chapter 3. In verses 1-2 he calls for godliness in public life and then in verse 3, he delivers the doctrine that drive it. ‘For we ourselves were once foolish…’ and again there is a long train of transforming truth laid out. By its very structure, Titus teaches that truth leads to godliness. Right beliefs produce right behaviour. Our convictions will change our conduct. Our doctrine will determine our deeds. Titus teaches us exactly what we learn from Jesus pleading in prayer for God’s elect in John 17. What does he ask? ‘Sanctify them in the truth.’ (17:17) Paul serves for the sake of seeing God’s people know God’s truth. Why? Because truth will transform them. Truth leads to godliness.
Finally, not only breadth and depth, but we also see the height of Paul’s motivation, the great hope he has for God’s elect. He serves ‘in hope of eternal life’. Paul is looking forward to their future life that is eternal both in its quantity and quality. The quantity of living forever. The quality of living fully. Already they were starting to experience it: for we see in John 17:3, to have eternal life is to know the only true God and Jesus Christ. This began through faith in God and knowledge of his truth. However, Paul looked forward to when what they now knew in part, would know in full. A life face to face with God forever. Such is the breadth, depth and height of Paul’s motivation in ministry. We have already said it could be summarised as spending himself for the sake of souls. But what we see in Titus 1 is perhaps better described as serving for the salvation of the saints. That is salvation in its fullest and greatest sense. For Paul says he serves to see the elect justified, sanctified and glorified. He serves to see them firm in faith, growing in godliness and entering into eternal life.
With the right motivation, people can do amazing things. 80 years ago, on becoming PM during WWII, Winston Churchill might have told us he had nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat. But really, he had something much greater: the ability to motivate this country to achieve the aim of victory. Determined to defeat Hitler, this city withstood the bombing of the Blitz. Motivated to free the citizens of Europe, this country sent hundreds of thousands of sons to die on battlefields. Right now, think of the motivation behind all of the chaos caused by COVID, countries crashing their own economies, people putting themselves to enormous pains. Why? All for the great goal of preserving life. All for our earthly good. Christians, we have an even greater goal than that. The motivation that should move us is eternal, everlasting good. The salvation of the saints. So great is this cause, it is second only to bringing glory to God, which it in fact brings about. It was the salvation of the saints that motivated the Father to give the Son. What then can we hold back? It was the salvation of the saints that Christ spent himself to secure. Will we save ourselves for something else? The salvation of the saints was Paul’s motivation in ministry. Should it not be ours? Let us be servants who are sent, for the salvation of the saints.
3. The Method (1:2b-3) – Through the sharing of the word
Of course, motivation alone isn’t enough. Aiming for something is one thing, achieving is another. It wasn’t enough for London to feel determined, it had to suffer every night as the bombs fell. Britain may have been inspired enough to send their sons to war, but those soldiers still had to fight every battle on the way to Berlin. We may all agree that there is the need to save lives in this pandemic, but to achieve that we actually need to take action: ‘stay home, protect the NHS, save lives’. Along with expectation, there must be effort. Action and aim. And as we seen last week, sometimes even that isn’t even enough. For like Elijah: things don’t work out as we expect. Dreams, even the best ones, don’t always come true.
However, at the end of 1:2, we see that Paul’s motivation in ministry depends on something that is definite. This hope he has of eternal life is a firm rather than a fleeting one. It is not a cursory desire, but a concrete expectation. It is a certain hope for it has been promised by a God who never lies. Friends, our God is the God of truth. He will never speak an untruth or promise something he will not perform. God can neither deceive nor be deceived. The 17th century pastor at Covenant Garden, Thomas Manton, explained God is ‘too good to deceive and too wise to be deceived.’ It is not only that God will never lie to us deliberately, but he will never lie to us mistakenly. Sometimes that is the case with even the best of us. Because we ourselves misunderstand what has happened, we end up deceiving others unintentionally. However, that can never happen with God. He cannot be hoodwinked or fooled. He is wise enough to know what he is talking about. Even more than this, God will never promise something in good faith and then find himself unable to perform it. Sometimes we do that, promise to do one thing and then find it is outside of our control. Again, this cannot happen with God. Nothing is outside of his control. He is powerful enough to perform all the things he has promised. As Balaam explained: ‘God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?... he has blessed, and I cannot revoke it.’ (Numbers 23:19-20) There is nothing surer that what God says. It is the most certain thing in this universe, for all of it came forth at his command and the universe is upheld by the word of his power. When we see the certainty of God’s promises, all that is left for us to do is cry out what Thomas Manton said when preaching: ‘Oh! That our trust was as sure as his promises.’
Paul’s motivation in ministry is built upon the certainty of God’s promises. Last week we seen Elijah learn that he had to do the same: it was God’s promise of Elisha and a remnant saved by grace that empowered him to get back in the game. However, not only is Paul’s motivation in ministry connected to the God who never lies, but so too is his method in ministry. For what God had ‘promised before the ages began’, God ‘at the proper time manifested in his word through the preaching with which I have been entrusted by the command of God our Saviour.’ (1:3) God’s promises were manifested, that is made known, revealed, displayed, through Paul’s preaching. Now, as we have already seen, as an apostle there was something unique about Paul’s preaching. It was under apostolic authority that the gospel first spread and the New Testament was written. And yet, in this letter Paul tells Titus that he too must teach the truth. Proclaim God’s promises. Immediately after those two paragraphs of truth that we seen earlier, the first thing Paul says is: ‘Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority.’ (2:15). Or ‘The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things…’ (3:8). Paul’s preaching might have unique as an apostle, but he still called for Titus to follow him in teaching the truth. Or as he charges Timothy, ‘Preach the word…’ (2 Timothy 4:2). Paul described his ministry method in Corinth when he explained: ‘I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.’ (2:2). We seen that to the Colossians he exclaimed, ‘Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ.’ (1:28-29) Paul sought the salvation of the saints through the sharing of the word. For it is in that word that God manifested his promises.
In ministry, that too must be our method. If we are to see the salvation of the saints, like Paul it will be through sharing the word. As we seen last week in Romans 10, God’s elect cannot believe in him of whom they have never heard. The gospel promise must be proclaimed: forgiveness for all who repent of sin and have faith in Jesus Christ. ‘Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved…’ (Acts 16:31). That is the promise Paul proclaimed to the jailor in prison: it is the promise we too must proclaim. If it is truth that leads to godliness, then to become godly we must be taught the truth. Jesus prayed, ‘Sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.’ (John 17:17). If others are to have that hope of eternal life, if it is to be a concrete expectation and not just a distant dream for them, if they are to be so confident in it that it will sustain them through suffering and persecution, that they will gladly give up this earthly life in order to gain that which is eternal, then we must open our mouths and speak the words of the God who never lies. The only hope we have to see the salvation of the saints is through the sharing of the word. This is no other way than the word. That is why, as a church, Scripture is so central to every single thing that we do. Our method in ministry is sharing the word. Each Sunday our service has us: reading the Word, praying the Word, singing the Word, preaching the Word and seeing the Word.
Friends, here in these verses, find a model for your ministry. Paul presents it to Titus, the churches in Crete, and to us for this very reason. See that you are servants who are sent for the salvation of the saints through the sharing of the word.
ALEXANDER ARRELL