Christians Change

So if you would, if you haven't already gone there,

open up to Titus chapter two. And like I said,

we get to have this baptism service in both services

today to hear from in this service one individual and

in the second service two about how God has intervened

in their life and has become has started a process

of making them more godly by the power of the

Gospel at work in them. And I just want you

to think about this as you have gathered here, some

of you members, some of you guests, but have come

here this morning to Crossway Bible Church, and you might

be looking around going, I don't know, these people seem

pretty buttoned up. I guess maybe that's how they've always been.

And the answer to that is not true.

Thank you, Kara. You are sitting next.

To people that before Christ have been ravaged by drug addiction,

have had lives that had been overtaken by alcohol by all.

Sorts of sexual impurity.

Maybe on the other side of the equation, some that

had given themselves over to legalism apart from the Gospel

of Christ, or were just going through life in lukewarm

religiosity apart from the Gospel of Jesus. And what God

has done is come into their life. He has appeared

to them, bringing His salvation, and their lives began to transform.

And by God's grace and by their efforts and by

one another in this church, their lives are continuing to

transform for Christ's glory, because he or because.

They are His possession.

And so if you don't know much about Titus, we're

we're gonna learn more today. But one of the key

aspects of context that I want you to know is

Paul is writing this letter to his fellow pastor Titus,

who is situated on this strategic island in the Mediterranean

called Crete.

And if you don't know much about Crete.

Really we can summarize Crete by this. It was a

rough place made up by a bunch of rough people.

It was notorious in antiquity and in this age for

immorality and evil behavior. These people were scoundrels if you

look in chapter one Paul referring to how much of

scoundrels they are, He says that even a person of

your own, he quotes saying Cretans wrote, even a person

of your own refers to Cretans.

As always liars.

Evil beasts, and lazy gluttons. And yet still on this

island that was notorious for immorality, the Gospel had the

power to change. The Gospel had the power to change

lives forever. And so as we think about how we

apply this here in San Antonio, I don't think it

would be fair to say that San.

Antonio is a one for one to create.

I don't think people refer to San Antonio as being

filled with people that are always liars, evil beasts, and

lazy gluttons. And yet, as we've already discussed, we all

come from somewhere. We all have a testimony apart from God,

apart from our relationship with Jesus Christ. In this serve

as a reminder to each one of us. This message

serves as a reminder to each one of us not

just that we do change when we interact with the

God of the Bible.

Through Jesus, but that God that has called us as his.

Own possession is going to continue to change us until glory.

So if I were to say the title of this

message in one sentence, it would be as simple as

this Christian's change.

Christian's change.

And so we're going to take these verses through three

moves The first one is because Christians change our internal

motivation to that change, which is our integrity. The internal

motivation is our integrity. Then there's an external motivation, which

is to say our witness.

To the outside world.

And then lastly and most importantly, there is an eternal motivation,

and that is because we are now God's possession.

So let's read. Starting in verse one.

Paul writes, But as for you, teach what accords with

sound doctrine. Older men are to be sober minded, dignified,

self controlled, sound and faith, in love and in steadfastness.

Older women, likewise.

Are to be reverent in behavior, not slanders or slaves

too much wine. There to teach what is good, and

so train the young women to love their husbands and children,

to be self controlled, pure, working at home, kind and

submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God

may not be reviled. Likewise, urge the younger men to

be self controlled, show yourself in all respects, to be

a model of good works, and in your teaching, show integrity, dignity,

and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an

opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to

say about us. Bond servants are to be submissive to

their own masters.

In everything.

They are to be well pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering,

but showing all good faith, so that in everything they

may adorn the doctrine of God, our Savior, because the

grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,

training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to

live self controlled, upright and godly lives. In the present age,

waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory

of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave

himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and

to purify for himself a people for his own possession,

who are zealous for good works. Declare these things, exhort

and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you.

So Christians change? Why do they change? What is the motivation?

The first is internal that we would eliminate hypocrisy, the

elimination of hypocrisy in our lives. This internal reason that

God gives us through Paul writing to Titus, which is

our integrity. Let's look at the text and see Paul's

reasoning and where I'm getting this from the very first

verse of our passage starts with but as for you,

teach what accords with sound doctrine, or to put another way,

teach what accords to teach a Christian living that aligns

with the Gospel truth, the truth of scripture that we

that that's revealed in the Bible. And to understand that

first verse, which is the but as for you part,

we have to look up and so look at the

end of chapter one. See there was these these teachers

here in crete that had duplicitous lives, that had hypocritical lives.

They were teaching.

Away, and yet their lives reflected a different way, an

ungodly way. It says that their minds and their consciences,

their their internal consciences were defiled. They professed to know God,

but they denied him by their works, of course that

was detestable, and and all sorts of things. But they

were living hypocritical lives. They talked about spiritual things, they acted,

you know, they they would they would come across as

communicating as if they knew God. But by the manner

of their lives, they it became clear that they did

not know Him. Their lips said one thing, but their

actions revealed a heart that believed another. And then we

see further here in verse seven where where Paul is

encouraging Titus and he's saying, make sure that your life

matches up with your teaching, show integrity. It's for your

integrity before the Lord. Paul's instructing Titus now the importance

of protecting his conscience before the Lord, that he would

not be duplicitous, that he would not say one thing

but live another way. You've already heard talk and many

of you I know were there on Wednesday night at

our member meeting, but a part of that meeting, if

you weren't here, Richard was up on the platform and

he was One of the things that he was talking

about was the importance of church membership, and he was

talking about what entails church membership. And then he was

talking about this thing called church discipline. And the praiseworthy

thing was there was nobody that was informal church discipline

at the church level, but he was making the point

that church discipline happens every day all through the life

of the church in our discipleship relationships with one another.

He also talked about the.

Importance of elders, and we talked about the importance of

elders and overseeing the discipleship of the church and also

being a part of that discipline process where God gives

us one another.

God gives us the church so that.

We might have our integrity with the Lord protected. And

we see that here in crete, and we see that

throughout God's word that he gives us one another, He

gives the members of the church, He gives the leaders

of the church, the elders of the church, so that

we would be able to be admonished and rebuked and exhorted,

so that our consciences wouldn't be defiled before the Lord

with a duplicitous life. Did you know that that is

one of an elder's jobs is to teach sound doctrine,

to protect doctrine, but then also in verse fifteen, to

declare and exhort and rebuke when we become deceived by

our own sin. And I'm taking a little bit of

a tangent here, but this is a very important part

of the life of this church here at Crossway. If

you look at your bulletins, you'll see that there are

four elder candidates that are listed on there those four

candidates were presented to the church that are members me

and or remember meeting on Wednesday, and one of their

main rules is that they would be involved in the

shepherding so that your life would match up with the

sound truth that you profess with your lips. And that's

not to say, especially if you're new around here, it

might feel like, well, so what are we to be

without sin? And the answer to that is an affirmative. No,

there is not one of us in here that is

without sin.

But there are two types of people in the world.

There are Christians that are repentant sinners, and that there

are those separated from the faith that are unrepentant in

their sin. And so we have the Church, we have

God's word, We have these things to push us toward

a life that comports with the gospel that we profess

with our lips, that we would believe it.

In our hearts.

And so the answer is, no, we are not without sin.

But it is true that as Christians we can't go

on sinning in the egregious ways that we once did

before the Gospel changed our lives, before we knew the

Christ that appeared bringing his salvation to you and So Christians,

we change for our own integrity, and we have pastors

that help us in that. We have one another that

helps us in that. But one of the motivators for

why we change and become more godly throughout our lives

is for our own integrity. But then there's also this

external motivator that I've already mentioned, and that takes us

to point to the external motivation for why we changed

is for an enhanced witness, an enhanced church witness to

the onlooking world. Really, a majority of this text is

examples of different types of people within God's family and

how they change. This isn't an exhaustive list of what

is change, But in every one of these examples, what

Paul grounds it with is the fact that these ways

in which you change are so that the word of

God may not be reviled. It's so that an opponent

of the gospel, and and that was in verse five,

Verse eight says, so that an opponent of the gospel

may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say

about you, or in verse ten, so that in everything they,

being God's people, may adorn or where beautifully the doctrine

of God, our Savior. So what did protecting Christ's witness

look like in crete? It looked like these things that

older men do, the way that older men live their lives,

the way that older women live their lives, the way

that younger women live their lives, younger men live their lives,

and the way that the bond servants.

Live their lives.

So we're going to run through each one of these quickly,

and I'm not going to pick up every example here,

but for the purpose of understanding this better, let's start

from the top verse two older men. They're to be sober, minded, dignified,

self controlled, sound and faith and love and in steadfastness.

In summary, older men are to have a certain gravitas

to their lives. There to have a dignity, a maturity

that only an older man can have because he only him,

has lived this long to be able.

To develop this character.

There is a powerful witness in an older man, in

a church that has been committed to God's word over

many years, that has been committed to the discipleship life

of Christ for many years, that has seen many trials

and tribulations and has seen God take him through those,

there is a powerful witness that only an older man

can have in these ways, he becomes a safety for us.

When the storm clouds roll in, we can call that,

we can call on that older man's experience and wisdom

and receive comfort that Christ extends to us personified in

this man. And so my call to the older men

in this room, which I'm not really sure where I land,

older man, younger man. My kids love to point out

I have gray hair, so I don't feel like I

can say I'm a young man, but I sure don't

feel like an older man.

But older men, we need you.

I'm just gonna say I'm a younger man right now,

and I need you older men in my life.

The young men of this church are sons. They need you.

And I'm so encouraged that at Crossway we have older

men that are committed to, you know, like in our

small groups where we have multi generational small groups, and

sometimes that irks us, and you know, but I'm so

thankful for the older men in this church that are

committed to the small group life that we have set up,

that are giving themselves to the discipleship of the younger

men in this church, myself included. We need you, And

to the younger men, We're about to get to you

and talking about these things. But I want to encourage

you right now to find older men in your life

that you can lean on to disciple you, to encourage you,

to give you perspective that you.

Don't have yet in life.

You need older men in your life. So, continuing to

move through this verse three, we get to older women.

Older women are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers

or slaves too much wine. There to teach what is

good and so train the young women. Older women are to,

as a commentary put it, practice the presence of God.

Isn't that what this describes?

Practicing the presence of God?

There to be worshipful.

Their lives are there to live lives of worship of

the one who has saved them. And then the Paul

points out these two moral failings here that they are

not to be slanders or addicted too much wine. I

don't have to look too far around in my community

and maybe even my family tree to see older women

that have kind of just given themselves to their bridge

game and wine and gossip, and that's that's kind of

what they're living for. So I guess maybe San Antonio

isn't too different from crete in that regard. I don't

know if y'all can relate to me if you've if

you've seen some of these older women. But instead the

instruction is instead of spending their time on themselves and

tearing up down there to there, to spend their time

sacrificing themselves, sacrificing their lives and building others up, namely

the younger women that they're so qualified to help. Just

this week, I was having a conversation with I'm not

going to say an older woman of the church, but

she was a woman, and she might be older than me,

but she was just sharing, she was testifying to just

a sweet time that her and some other older women

and younger women spent over the past I think it

was last fall semester going through I think it was

Titus and and just the mutual encouragement that they provided

one another, the older women teaching the younger women, and

the younger women even teaching the older women through.

This mutual discipleship.

And I just thought, how beautiful it is that these

women are sacrificing their lives when this is the time

for them, you know, like they've already done the heavy

lifting with their own children. Or they've already done the

heavy lifting with their careers and now they can kind

of just sail off into the sunset. But no, these

women were sacrificing their time, their bridge game, their whatever, majhon,

which I hear.

Is a wonderful game. I still haven't learned to play it.

You can play majhon and disciple at the same time.

But you get the picture.

They're not giving themselves over to their own selfish desires.

They're serving others. This is what biblical community looks like.

And I tell you, the world on the outside is

looking in and going that's different, and I kind of

want some of that. And so this is the reminder

that Paul is saying, like, do this so that the

Gospel would not be maligned, This beautiful picture of helping

one another's lives accord with sound doctrine. The world is

watching and marveling at your selflessness, sisters, So thank you

for that, and all of us let's engage in that

kind of sacrificial discipleship. Okay, Younger women Verses four through five.

Younger women are to love their own husbands and children,

to be self controlled, pure, working at home, kind.

And submissive to their own husbands.

Paul has married younger women in mind here who are

to love and prioritize their husband and their children.

When children are young, it.

Is so easy to weary of that primary responsibility, which

is to your husband and to your children. I know

how easy it is to weary of that, not because

I've been a young woman, but because I've lived with one,

and I've seen the struggle and the hardship it is

to raise a household of children, to have daily responsibilities

of managing the household well, loving a difficult to love

husband at times, and how easy it is to grow

weary of that and to lose sight of that being

a primary call. We see the phrase in here working

at home, which I just want to be clear, is

not a proof text for a stay at home stereotype

or even a prohibition of wives working vocationally outside of

the house in some professional context. That's not what Paul

has in mind here, And I think that we can

balance that just by looking at Proverbs thirty one to

see a woman who loved her husband well, who loved

her children well, and who was a rock star entrepreneur

business woman that would buy fields and.

Tend to them.

That they would grow fruit. But it is what Paul

is saying is there is a special priority and emphasis

placed on your role in first and foremost loving your husband,

loving and supporting and raising up your children, and handling

things there at the house. And that's not to say

that you can't work outside of it, but it is

to say that that is our God given priority and

responsibility as Christian young women with families. When we in

my house, when our kids were very young, like little

little I remember coming home and seeing my wife exasperated

by the discipline that had to be doled out that day,

the house, managing the things in the house that needed

to be done that didn't stop, the unending loads of

laundry that just seemed to keep coming, and a peer

out of nowhere. And in those times, one of the

most encouraging things that helped get her through it was

when she could pick up the phone or be in

small group with an older woman that was just a

little bit further along the path to say, sister, I know,

and yet this time will pass. As a matter of fact,

five years, ten years down the road, you're gonna look

back on these days with fondness. You're gonna forget the

worst parts of it, and you're actually gonna miss having

those little children in there that seem like so much work.

You're gonna miss the.

Time that you're spending right now shepherding and shaping them.

You're you're you.

Know, the warning against you know, bitterness with your husband,

and the encouragement that I always appreciated when they would

remind her, Yeah, I know he's difficult, but he is

still worth loving and sacrificing for. Thank you older women

for that reminder to my wife. But as we think

about just out there in the world and the ways

that even the world would look down on that type

of work, loving your husband, loving and sacrificing for your children,

taking care of things that need to be taken care

of at the house. But what Paul is reminding us

is that God prioritizes.

That, and that he even uses that.

For out that the outside world looking in that might

be scoffing at that, deep down, he knows that they're

going to be attracted to it, and they're going to

desire that.

And then when we live our lives.

Out in these godly ways, then we have the opportunity

to share why we're doing that.

Where our hope is coming from, and we.

Get to point back to Christ appearing, bringing salvation and

reordering our lives completely. Okay, younger men verse six, Guys,

it's super simple. Be self controlled.

It's like Paul.

Understands that, like we need just the plane, straightforward instruction, dudes,

be self controlled. That means that we need to control

our temper. We need to control our tongue. We need

to control our ambition. We need to control our appetite.

We need to control our sexual urges. We can't be

young men that give ourselves over to too much TV

or too much video game, or too much me time,

or too much exercise or too much recreation.

We need to show restraint.

That is that looks like a life that's been transformed

by the Gospel. As I was thinking about just the

simple command to be self control, I was laughing to

myself about the proverb and this is my paraphrase, but

it's like too much of one good thing, too much honey,

will make you barf. Young men, we must not barf

on our witness for Christ.

We have to be men that are self controlled. You

got me on that.

Working on self control today is going to turn you

into the older man that this church is going to

rally around in the next thirty years. Okay, lastly, bond servants.

Bond servants are to be submissive to their own masters

and everything there to be well pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering,

but showing all good faith. And without getting into a

full we could take a twenty minute sidebar and what

a bond servant is. But I'm just gonna cut to

the chase and say we can apply bond servant to

being an employee in this modern day. I think it's

right for us to just cut right there. And so

a Christian employee is to be submissive to their boss.

They are to be a well pleasing employee. They are

not to be argumentative. They're not to be pilfering or

stealing their employer's time, but working hard and showing good faith.

A life that does this is a life that comports

well with the truth of the Gospel. So how can

we expect to adorn Christ at work when we gather

around the proverbial water cooler to tear our bosses down,

or to tear down the things that we're working on.

That's saying with our lips that we believe something, namely

Christ in his ways, but with our actions are showing

that our heart is far off from that. This un

Christian behavior. And there's obviously other ways with which you

know that gets worked out, stealing time from our employers

when when we're at work we're you know, doing our

own things or just getting by on the bare minimum.

This is not the Christian way. This is the way

of the world, but this is not the way for us,

for those whose lives have been transformed by Christ. And

to be sure, how can we share the Gospel with

those that we work with when we're engaging in that

kind of pilfering Like to protect Christ's witness, we need

to work hard unto him and we need to live

out submissive lives at the workplace to those who are

giving us instructions, and we're to be a well pleasing employee. So,

like I said, this list of these people is not

an exhaustive list of everyone in every scenario. It's what

Paul uses here, But you get the point. There's a

certain Christian way of living that we find revealed in

God's Word, that is motivated by a life transformed by

the Gospel, and that God uses to evangelize the lost.

This external reason for holiness is that so that others

would see and desire God's salvation. So we've gone through

the internal reason for change. We've seen these external reasons

for change, and now and most importantly, let's look at

the third point, which is eternal, that we have been changed.

For God's possession. We're his for those in Christ.

God has exchanged a sinner's heart with a pure heart.

He has exchanged an old life for a new life,

old ways for new ways, and he's doing it to

set a people apart straight from verse fourteen, to set

a people apart for his own possession.

Verse eleven says that.

Bringing salvation training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions,

training us to live godly lives. In the present age,

he is training us in verse fourteen that Christ gave

himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and

to purify for himself a people for his own possession.

If you are in Christ, he is committed to change you.

He is training.

You, he is redeeming you, he is purifying you for

his own possession. So a reasonable question that we might

ask then is like, okay, how does the first two

points of the sermon fit with the third point, Because

you're saying that God is purifying me, that God is

training me, that God is helping me to renounce on Godliness.

Should I just sit back and just let God do him?

I'm gonna ask a Josh question from up here. Is

God doing it? Or are we doing it? There we go, Yes,

it's both. God is doing it. He has promised that

he's doing it right here, and he is also calling

us to do it as well.

God is changing you.

His spirit is working in you, convicting you of sin

and unrighteousness and giving you the pa to forsake it.

Apart from God's initiating work in you, you would never

start down the road. Apart from God's grace to you,

you would not be able to endure on the road

toward godliness.

He is doing the work.

And because He is doing it, we can step into

it ourselves with our own personal responsibility to train ourselves

to push ourselves in these godly ways, trusting that He's

already doing it. It's both and and as a grace

and a gift, He has given us the church one another,

our pastors, our small group members, our small group leaders

to help us.

Walk down that road.

And we're about to hear from one baptism testimony, a

baptism that the grace of God has appeared to him.

And we all know this, but we're gonna be reminded

of it. That baptism is an outward expression of this

internal reality of God's salvation. And in each of the

candidates this morning will share about how they have had

God work inside of their hearts in their lives, and

how they are now renouncing ungodliness, how they are as

zealously as the scriptures would put it, pursuing good works.

How Christ is making them his own possession for his glory.

And everybody's story in that regard is different, but it's

all the same. We were all far off and then

He intervened, and now He is creating in us a

trophy of possession for his glory.

And so if you're here this.

Morning and you would say, like, well, I wouldn't refer

to myself as Christ's possession, then I would just encourage

you to listen to the testimony of the baptism. If

you have questions on the text, I'm happy to talk

with you after at the step one table. But but

listen to how God intervened in this baptism candidate's life,

and and just think you being here this morning is

God calling you into that relationship, into that possession of

his and calling you into being a part of His

church that he that that's not just a church in.

This age, but it's it's it's a church and.

It's a people for eternity and for Christians that are

here that might be growing weary of zealously pursuing good works.

Maybe you're here this morning and you've been stuck in

some certain sin pattern for many years. Now, Christ is

calling you out of that. Christ isn't just calling you

out of that and saying good luck, Bud and giving

you a butt pat. He is in the trenches with you.

We have this great high priest that can relate to

our struggles, that can relate to our weakness. And He

even uses a testimony during baptism to remind us of

the hope that we had when we first tasted the

Gospel of Christ and we first started forsaking the sin

that once had total control over us. And so I

want you to listen to this, and I want you

to be encouraged by that that we get to worship

a God that brings in all sorts of jacked up

people and makes them holy for his glory, for his possession,

and that he's even using you to call others throughout

this world of all nations, into relationship with him. Meditate

on these things this morning, Meditate on him this week,

and be encouraged to continue to fight the sin and

pursue a godliness that he has called you too. Let's pray,

Heavenly Father, we thank you and we praise you for

the grace that you have shown to us through the

appearing of your son, Jesus Christ. We thank you that

you have not just called us on our own and

in our own strength to pursue godliness, but that you

have started that work in us, training us for righteousness,

helping us to forsake our old ways for yours and Lord,

for those of us that might be discouraged even this morning,

being freshly reminded of the zealous pursuit for good works,

would we be reminded of your sweet grace and your

sweet mercy that enables us to pursue your works for

your glory. Lord, Christians, change help us do that Lord

help us be a church marked by your gospel, grace

and change in our lives.

We pray in Christ's Name, Amen,