Titus 2:7-8 - Blueprint for All

I invite you to take your Bible and turn with me as I turn to mine in the book of Titus and chapter two.

Titus chapter two.

In the years following the Civil War, there was no pulpit taller than that of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn.

He was there at the time led by a man by the name of Henry Ward Beecher.

And Beecher wasn't just a pastor of a church.

He was, in some ways, known as the conscience of the nation.

Abraham Lincoln would seek his advice.

Mark Twain would attend his services, as would Walt Whitman.

He was called the Great Divine.

He was a man who would speak and the nation would listen.

In fact, his words didn't just go into the pews of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn.

They were also printed in the newspapers all across the country, and they were even telegraphed across the continent.

But in January 1875, Henry Ward Beecher was in the news for a different reason.

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.

It was the trial of the century, literally.

It was such a media circus that tickets for the courtroom were being scalped in Brooklyn outside the courtroom.

And special telegraph lines were put up in order to bring the news immediately to the rest of the world.

That long trial ultimately ended in a hung jury.

Beecher was acquitted.

His church even acquitted him, and he continued to preach.

He returned to his pulpit, and crowds still started to come.

But something had shifted.

Three years later, Theodore Tilton's wife Elizabeth confessed that it had been adultery.

Throughout this time, Beecher's theology hadn't changed, his voice was just as resonant as ever.

His sermons were still master classes and rhetoric.

But for the rest of his life, his brilliance was overshadowed by a brutal reality.

That the gap between the pulpit and the message and the man was the loudest thing in the room.

The tragedy of Henry Ward Beecher's life is a sobering reminder that a sullied and compromised life will bankrupt a brilliant speaker.

The Apostle Joe Paul understood that.

And this is why in chapter two he's speaking to Titus.

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.

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.

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.

This week Paul turns his attention to Titus.

The stakes are extremely high.

Titus is Paul's emissary, his protege.

And he hasn't put him in a comfortable suburban place with people eager to listen.

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.

And Paul said their testimony is true.

So this place was looking for any excuse it could find to deny the gospel.

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.

That the message had to be one that was of unimpeachable character among all of God's people.

Titus, older men, older women, younger men, younger women.

The importance of this moment cannot be overstated.

Titus is not just simply a member of the congregation there.

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.

He was the apostolic emissary.

He was there as the one to provide apostolic order to these churches.

He was the teacher.

He was meant to be the example before this congregation as he opened up the word.

It's very significant.

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.

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.

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.

The passage is an intimate passage, but his treatment of it was not careful.

It was coarse.

He spoke with graphic words, with a brazen tone, and in a shock jock bravado.

And of course, he got the effect he wanted.

The congregation was unsettled.

Some people laughed nervously.

Some even left.

But the moment did not honor Christ.

Because what settled into the heart of the people wasn't the monumental importance of the passage.

What settled into the hearts was the sort of flair of this man who made the scriptures a spectacle.

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.

Those outside the church would look at an example like that and say, well, preaching's nothing but a performance.

But what it did do is it caused a lot of people inside the church to ask this question.

What happens when the pulpit loses reverence?

What happens when the holy is handled that lightly?

What happens when the messenger is the one that gets the focus rather than the message itself?

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.

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.

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.

It's talking to us about the gap between what we say and what we do.

About that difference between what we proclaim as a father and how we lose our patience every day with our children.

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.

Or about those who have said something true but have never, ever lived it.

Some people in this room are carrying the weight of knowing that deep in their heart, their life and their message are not aligned.

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.

All of us, every one of us, live in a world where the credibility of the gospel is constantly being evaluated.

It's being weighed and it's being measured, not by what we say, but how we live our lives.

And Paul was not naive about that.

And so this passage has great significance for us today as much as it did to Titus and his.

I just want to look at two verses, verses seven and eight, and this is where we'll look today in Titus chapter two.

In everything, make yourself an example of good works, with integrity and dignity in your teaching.

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.

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.

But it can also be distorted by those who handle it carelessly.

So this morning I want us to look at three things this morning.

That the credibility of the gospel is carried by three things.

The credibility of the gospel is carried by a life that embodies it.

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.

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.

So let's take these in order.

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.

Take a look at verse 7 in the first part of that.

Paul here tells Titus, in everything, make yourself an example of good works.

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.

And he's saying, Titus, I'm talking about you now.

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.

Titus, in everything, make yourself an example of good works.

Paul is telling Titus that before he ever opens his mouth, his life is already speaking.

And Paul uses a word here for example that is we we can hear it in our English.

Tupas, type, an example.

And what it's talking about is a impression on wax from a signet ring.

I hold in my on my right finger here a ring that Royal gave me for our 20th anniversary.

I think about that anniversary all the time, the significance of it.

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.

And so people with authority would have a signet ring that bared some symbol or image of theirs.

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.

Because it bore some relationship to the original.

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.

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.

His authority, the authenticity of your life will show who Christ is.

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.

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.

And this type, this example is not some sweeping dramatic moment that sort of appears and everybody goes, aha.

It is meant to be that steadied statement about the lordship of Christ in his life that you could watch every day.

Now notice what kind of example he's to be.

Take a look at the verse 7 again with me.

He says there to be an example of good works.

Now, just like the English language, the Greek language can be very, very colorful, shows different words and different movements of emphasis.

And there are words that talk about moral goodness and moral integrity.

And Paul doesn't use that word.

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.

Now, of course, it includes a moral aspect to it, obviously.

But these good works are to be a life of Christ-like goodness on display.

A goodness that catches people's eye.

A goodness that makes them say there's something different about that life.

There's something attractive about the way that person lives.

That kind of thing.

It's meant to be the visible display of a fruit of the Spirit, an evidence of an inward transformation.

Only the gospel can produce this.

This is not about Titus's personality or just about his sort of sheer determined persistence to do certain things at certain times.

This is about the fruit of the gospel bearing out in his life.

And notice how Paul describes it.

He says, in everything here.

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.

No compartment of Titus's life is to be withheld to the work of the Spirit and showing the likeness of Christ there.

Now, this is not just a burden that Paul's laying on Titus.

Paul uses this same word in several different places.

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.

There's that word.

In speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.

Different messenger, different city, same call.

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.

1 Peter 5 · chapter mention

Paul, when he wrote to the Philippians, spoke to every person.

He said, Join in imitating me and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example that you have in us.

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.

Paul, when he wrote to the Thessalonians, said the same thing, that he worked with his hands.

Instead of taking money from the church, he worked with his hands so that he might be an example to them.

That he might show that, yes, he may be remunerated for his work, but the gospel wasn't connected to the money he received.

The pattern is consistent and the expectation is unwavering.

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.

And at Grace to You, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, they would have the volunteers come in.

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.

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.

It was delightful to watch them.

They were such a fun group to be around.

And here I was in my 30s, sitting down with folks who had at least 30 years on me.

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.

And there was one gentleman that I remember well.

He was never a preacher, he never spoke publicly, he was he's never famous.

You would never know his name if I told it.

He was a quiet guy, but he was a part of that church for many, many years, decades.

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.

And I had the opportunity to speak to his grandchildren.

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.

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.

He was an example of good works.

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.

Because when we think about this imprint in softened wax, what we're talking about is that imprint who is Christ Himself.

Think about Jesus for just a moment and the way he treated the marginalized, touching lepers, dining with tax collectors.

Think about the way he handled power, grabbing a basin and a towel and washing the disciples' feet that were dirty.

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.

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.

Christ didn't just teach integrity, he was integrity.

He didn't merely describe goodness, he was the embodiment of it, the full, perfect, comprehensive display of God's goodness here on earth.

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.

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.

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.

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.

They're evaluating us, they're weighing us, they're calculating the significance of what's said by how we live our life.

And they're not just looking at our best moments, they're looking at our ordinary moments.

They're looking at our weekday fatigue when we come home from a long day at work.

They're wondering about the consistency of our character at home in the quiet spaces of our everyday.

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.

We are the wax.

The scriptures talk about this very, very strongly.

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.

How does if you took the imprint of a signet ring and put it on hard wax, it's going to crack and shatter.

But what makes it malleable is the heat of the flame.

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.

We start looking to God in prayer for help and assistance and understanding and wisdom.

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.

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.

So don't be afraid of suffering.

Don't be afraid of what it might do in you.

Because God is working in those moments through the trials and sufferings you're enduring to make you more like Himself.

Well, let's move on.

Let's look at the next one.

Not only a life that preaches, but also a voice that honors.

At the end of verse 7 here, Paul tells Titus that he is to bring this message with integrity and dignity.

Now he's moving from his life to the teaching itself.

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.

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.

And he is to deal with that in an appropriate way.

That his tone, that his posture, that his spirit is to be shaped by the word of God.

That people would expect when he speaks to hear what God has to say.

And so he tells him here, do it with integrity.

What is integrity?

Well, it's a colorful word, it means the exact opposite of rot.

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.

They're terrible.

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.

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.

May it not be done in such a way that people are just stepping on the mush on the ground.

Your preaching needs to be one of integrity.

What does that mean?

It means his devotion, his motivations must be free from corruption.

That's what it means to rot.

Therefore, he should not have hidden agendas when he preaches.

He shouldn't have any self-serving distortions to his message.

He shouldn't adjust the message to gain approval or to avoid discomfort.

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.

Because it's possible to do all that.

It's possible to even say all the right things for all the wrong reasons.

It's possible to preach the truth with a heart that's impure.

It's possible to use sound doctrine as a platform for self-promotion.

It's possible to wield the very word of God as a weapon of manipulation.

Those things are all possible.

And so anybody who preaches for applause for the purpose of gaining that applause has preached for the wrong reason.

Anybody who's adjusted his message to avoid offending, say, a wealthy donor, has corrupted that message.

Anybody who's used the pulpit to settle personal scores has corrupted the message.

Anybody who's used the pulpit to promote their own brand has corrupted the message.

Anybody who's preaching to build their own platform has corrupted the message.

Because this is not about just the truth of the message.

It's about the truth of the motivation of the messenger.

Preach it with integrity.

But he also says to preach it with dignity.

Take a look at verse 7 again there.

To preach it with dignity, with the gravity and the earnestness that God's word deserves.

Now it doesn't mean you can't be a funny person if you happen to have a humorous spirit about you.

That sort of thing could be fine.

But there has to be in the middle of this a determined gravity about the glory of the message that's being proclaimed.

Because as John Stott said, a preacher stands between two worlds.

He is here as one who sits in a sacred place, who's taking heaven's word and bringing it to people on earth.

And he's really just the messenger of what God once carried to the people.

And so Paul is telling Titus here that you need to speak with these kind of things in your heart.

Integrity of the message, the dignity of the message must be at the forefront of your mind.

What do we have today?

We've got people who are dragging beds up onto the platform when they want to preach a marriage series.

We've got people with wires, with people coming down to the pulpit from some sort of spot in the ceiling.

We've got people dragging props onto the platform and using them.

What are we all just kindergarteners now?

Right?

And all of it is a show to create a buzz rather than just make sure God's word's known.

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.

Because they form in us a sense of understanding of what is this.

Or I would even say, even the most profound sense of joy and gratitude, either.

Think about it for a second this way.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Let me ask you this question: Which doctor are you going to trust with your life?

Which one?

The answer is obvious.

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.

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.

In 2 Corinthians 2.

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.

He said, We're not doing that with God's word.

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.

He said, We're standing in the awesome place of the presence of God and speaking the truth in the sight of God.

And again, he said in chapter four, we've renounced the hidden things of shame.

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.

What is that?

That's an open, honest, reverent display of what God says.

Jesus did the same.

He taught as those, as one who had authority and not as the scribes.

He handled the word of God as he spoke it, embodied it.

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.

That your tone, that your preparation, that your posture all have to come in alignment with what you're actually handling here.

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.

Right?

I want to tell you something.

Your instincts were right.

Your instincts were absolutely right.

You should have run out of there as fast as you could.

And they're doing the same thing right now.

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.

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.

You're asking for the right thing.

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.

Take a look at verse 8.

Your message is to be sound beyond reproach, so that any opponent will be ashamed because he has nothing bad to say about you.

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.

Sound words.

It's that word we've been looking at a few times, the healthy teaching, sound doctrine.

Here is that again.

It is to be the teaching that produces the life of God.

And he tells him that it is to be done in such a way that it is uncondemnable.

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.

It needs to be one that is so faithful, so clear, so true that no lawyer could prize it apart from its accuracy.

No prosecutor could probe it, no critic can scrutinize it, no opponent can parse it.

They have to remain silent in the face of it, so that they'll be ashamed.

Literally, the one who is in opposition, the one who is on the other side.

And he says, live your life and preach with such integrity that your critics have nothing substantive to say, that they would be ashamed.

A word that means empty.

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.

I can't bring any slander against that.

I can't bring any reproach against that.

It's one that's unimpeachable.

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.

We remove the credibility of the criticism by the integrity of the church's life and message.

And Crete needed it because they were always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.

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.

And off it would go.

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.

Give them nothing to say.

Let's take a look at the end here just for a second.

How is all of this possible?

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.

But look at verse 11.

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.

Grace didn't just come in with a trickle, it popped onto the scene like the sunrise.

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.

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.

The very things Paul's been talking about this whole chapter.

And he's saying that these are not entrance fees to grace, these are the fruit of grace.

This is what grace accomplishes.

It not only saves, it shapes us.

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.

And so he talks about grace coming in the first appearance and grace coming back in the second appearance.

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.

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.

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.

It's glorious.

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.

That compartment, I've not even begun to inquire whether the Lordship of Christ is there.

I want to tell you something.

The grace of God can meet you in those moments.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

And the scriptures say that to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ is to have life and life more abundantly.

You won't always be happy, but he'll always be moving you toward holiness, and holiness is the best place to be.

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.

Let's pray.

Father, we stand before you this morning as a people of heard a standard we cannot meet in our own strength.

And we're grateful that you don't leave us there to meet it in our own strength.

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.

And so we come seeking Christ.

And Lord, we pray that you would press the pattern of Christ into the wax of our lives again this morning.

We pray that where we've been careless, may Christ make us careful.

And where we failed, may Christ meet us with grace that redeems and restores.

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.

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.

I pray for all of us who listen to the word.

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.

That you would make us a people who are zealous for good works, not for our glory, but for yours.

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.

We long for that day.

Amen.

Amen.