The Gift That Trains Us to Live Godly | Titus 2:11-15

I invite you to open your Bibles to Titus chapter 2.

Titus 2 · chapter mention

I'm going to read verses 11 to 15.

For 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 unlaw, 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.

Praise be to God for his word.

Let's pray.

Lord, may your words live.

May we see Christ this morning and in seeing Christ be transformed from one degree of glory to the next.

Lord, may your spirit be present this morning.

Convict and convert the unbeliever.

Bring sanctification to the believer.

And Lord, and may everything we give honor and glory and praise to you as we marvel at your grace.

You pray this in Christ's name.

Amen.

Well, these verses, verses 11 to 14, really are the capstone of the book of Titus.

They're the engine of the book of Titus.

If you remember, Paul is writing to Titus in Crete, and he's giving him instructions on how to reform the church and how to bring order to the church and how to the churches to be effective.

In many ways, this book has been used as a church planting and church revitalization manual.

It's been used as instructions for how we're to operate in the life of the church.

But here in verses 11 to 14, I've been looking forward to this for months.

Paul gives the secret to how all of this works.

He gives the engine.

And it's this five-letter word, grace.

Notice what he says in verse 11.

It's astounding what he says.

We have to understand this, what he says.

He says, now 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.

In your copy of God's word, I want you to underline or circle that word grace.

It's the Greek word caris, and you could translate it as gift.

That's what it means.

It simply means a gift.

In fact, when Paul talks about spiritual gifts, he uses the same word, charis.

It means something that is given, a present, something that is unearned, something that is unmerited.

And I would submit to you that this right here, this idea, is the central idea of Christianity.

The central idea.

This is what you are taught every minute of the day.

If you work hard, you will be successful.

If you diet and exercise, you will lose weight.

If you commit yourself and set goals with clear expectations and manageable timelines, that's what Zig Ziegler said, you will accomplish great things.

This is the world in which we live and breathe.

Do this, and you will merit that.

And in some ways, that's written into the fabric of the cosmos, isn't it?

Remember what Paul says in Galatians 6?

What a man sows, that will he reap.

That is a rule that is fixed into the universe.

What you sow is what you reap.

And all the world's religions have somewhat taken that idea and said if you work hard, if you're a really good person, if you practice the golden rule and do these types of deeds, you can get to heaven.

But that's not how Christianity operates, is it?

Christianity is contrary to that.

It's by grace and grace alone.

To put it more simply, it's by a gift and by a gift alone.

What must you do to receive a gift?

Nothing.

That's by definition what a gift is.

Can you earn it?

No, you cannot.

Can you manipulate it?

Can you merit it?

No, you cannot.

You must receive it.

That's grace by definition.

It is something that is freely given without one ounce of our merit.

And that's hard for us to get our minds around, isn't it?

Because God is holy, He demands obedience.

And we know if we're honest with ourselves that we're not obedient enough.

We know our thoughts, we know what we think about, we know our motivations, we know that many times they are not pleasing to God.

And so if we're honest with ourselves, we look in the mirror and we say, you know, I'm not really measuring up.

We revert back to works thinking.

Earn this.

Earn this.

That's how we begin to think.

But Paul says, no, no, no, no, no.

The secret to the life of the church and the church functioning properly, Titus, is to understand this reality of grace.

That salvation is given freely apart from our works.

I want to show you this.

This is Paul's theology everywhere.

I want you to turn to 2 Timothy.

Turn over to 2 Timothy, chapter 1, verse 9.

2 Timothy 1:9

Great verse.

Who God, that's who it's in reference to, God saved us and called us to a holy calling.

Salvation is of the Lord.

Now look at this.

Look at this delineation.

Not because of our works, not because of our works, but because of his own purpose, and there's the word, grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began.

It's a gift, not by works.

If you turn over to the left, famous verses we have our children memorize these verses.

Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8.

Ephesians 2:8

This is a summary statement of the Christian faith.

For by grace, grace is the instrument, by charis, by gift, you have been saved through faith.

Faith is the means by which we receive this grace.

And he says, this is not your own doing.

None of it is.

Notice the explanation.

It is the gift of God.

It is the gift of God, not of works, so that no one can boast.

Now, to the moralist and the self-righteous person, is that offensive?

It is offensive because what you're saying is that all I have to do is receive this grace, receive this salvation.

I don't have to earn it.

That means that the prisoner, the convict, and the penitentiary can receive this just like I can receive this?

Is that what you're saying?

It's exactly what we're saying.

That's why the preaching of the cross is folly to the world.

Because the world operates quid pro quo.

I do this, I get that.

I earn this, I'm better than you, I should get that.

I'm wealthier than you, I should get this.

That's how the world operates.

Christianity operates by grace.

It's a gift.

And to be a genuine Christian, you have to partake of this grace.

In fact, in Philippians, Paul says to the Philippians, he says, you are partakers of the grace of God.

That is what makes you a Christian.

Is that you come to Christ humbly on your knees, and you say, Lord, I can't earn this.

I receive your grace.

I receive Jesus Christ alone.

That is, by definition, what a Christian is, a partaker of grace.

And it's true with the church.

The church must be marked by this grace.

That we don't just preach moralism like modern century liberalism did.

Obey the Ten Commandments, do the golden rule, help other people.

Well, yes, of course.

But that's not grace.

Grace is unmerited divine favor given to you apart from your works.

It's astounding to think about.

What is this grace?

Well, if you look over at Ephesians 1, look over at Ephesians 1.

Paul just, I'm not going to exposit this section, but you should go and study it.

But Paul unpacks what the grace of God really is.

Look what he says in Ephesians 1.

He says, verse 3, he has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, every one of them.

Verse 4, he says, He has given us cleansing and holiness.

He says that we should be holy and blameless before him.

He's cleansed you.

He's declared you righteous.

Verse 5, he's given you the adoption as sons.

That means every legal right of sonship that God can give.

He's given to you in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Verse 7 and 8, he says, in him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses.

Amen.

Do we need forgiveness?

Cleansing by his blood.

Yes, we do.

Everything that you've done wrong, wiped away, he says.

Amazing.

Furthermore, verse 9, he's made known to us the mystery of his will.

How do you live an upright and godly life in this present age?

He's disclosed the will of God to us through his word and given us a mind, the mind of Christ in which we can understand it.

And then, if that's not all, he's given us a heavenly inheritance.

Verse 11, in him we have obtained an inheritance.

And then he says, We've been given the promised Holy Spirit.

Verse 13.

He says, In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.

So when we talk about what grace is, it encompasses all those things.

The spiritual blessings, the adoption of sons, a divine inheritance, understanding the will of God.

These are marvelous things, undeserved things that we've been given unmerited as a gift.

Well, this passage, turn back to Titus.

This passage in Titus, I want to briefly show you four facts about grace.

Four facts about grace that Paul unpacks to Titus.

So let me give you these first.

Very important.

The grace of God causes Christians to live virtuous lives.

The grace of God causes Christians to live virtuous lives.

This is so important.

Massively important.

Notice what Paul says in verse 11.

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people.

And then look what grace does, verse 12.

Training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age.

Such a profound statement.

Because if you've studied Titus II, you've gone through all of these virtues and character qualities that godly men and women workers are to possess.

You look at these character qualities, they're astounding character qualities.

Older men to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, etc.

Older women likewise to be reverent in behavior, not slanders, slaves to much wine, train the young women to love their husbands, so on and so forth.

Urge the younger men to be self-controlled.

You go down the line, there's all these virtues and there's all these character qualities that are to define the people of God.

And what Paul is saying is that to get that, you must get grace.

In other words, Christianity is not moralism.

It's not simply teaching behavioral modification.

We're not simply telling people, this is what a Christian does, do it.

We're telling people, receive the grace of God.

And that's what trains you to be these things.

That word train is the Greek word paidea.

And the Greeks use this word to talk about an all-encompassing sphere of life.

For example, the Spartans they trained their young men to be warriors from the moment that they were born.

And it was an ecosystem of training.

Everything that they did, yes, it was correction, yes, it was instruction, but but the entire way of life was meant to instruct these men to be warriors and the women to support the men in this endeavor.

All of it was was for this purpose.

And in that way, the Spartans were different from the Thessalonians and the Athenians and the other Greek city-states.

It was this Pideon, of course, in Athens, it was centered on wisdom and study.

It was this whole sphere of instruction.

And what Paul is saying is if you want to get godly virtue, Christian character, it has to be from this sphere of grace.

You can't be a Spartan without being raised in Sparta.

And you can't be a Christian without operating from grace.

It's kind of like with my kids, my boys, they get these remote control cars.

And you can take the car out of the box and you can spin the wheels and and push it around, you know, push it down the stairs.

It'll look like it's it's it's rolling, but what do you need to do to make that car work?

What do you have to do?

You have to put the battery in.

And then the battery calls it to jump and and turn and do circles and does all that stuff.

Christianity without grace is like operating a remote control car without the battery.

You don't have it, it's just you're just going through the motions, and it's it is not measuring up to Christian virtue.

So Paul's saying you have to understand this.

Grace is the fuel, it's the firepower, it's the battery to all of the virtuous living in the Christian life.

And and it doesn't just we we think of grace as, oh, I well, I was saved by grace when I believed the gospel, and and then now I I I kind of live by works.

Not so fast, as Lee Corso used to say.

Do you need grace today?

Do you need grace tomorrow?

Do you need grace in the weeks to come?

Are any of us gonna live perfect lives?

Do we need strength and power every single day?

You bet we do.

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, training us.

It trains us to renounce ungodliness, worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives.

The secret to the Christian life is the grace of God.

That's the first fact.

Fact number two.

The only hope in the world is God's grace.

I know we know this, but we forget it.

The only hope in the world is the grace of God.

Do we know this?

Since the fall of man in Genesis 3, man's nature has become corrupted.

We use the phrase total depravity.

That doesn't mean that mankind is as bad or evil as they could be, but it means that man in his faculties, body, soul, spirit, will, does not desire the things of God.

In fact, we rebel against God.

This is the natural bent of man after the fall.

Notice what Paul says.

It is the grace of God, verse 12, which trains us.

It trains us.

This is the church.

It trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.

Where would you be without the grace of God?

And ungodliness and worldly passions.

All of us were there before grace.

Look at verse three of chapter three.

Skip down.

Remarkable verses.

For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

That is the state of mankind.

And notice where Paul puts his finger.

Look back at verse twelve.

Notice this phrase, worldly passions.

He's getting to not just the external circumstances, but the heart.

Notice what he says in verse 3 of chapter 3.

Slaves to various passions.

Why can't I stop doing this sin?

Why?

Answer.

Because you are a slave to that passion.

Chris Ann and I were watching a documentary about JFK.

Incredible wife.

Jacqueline Kennedy.

Yet he could not keep from staying away from mistresses.

Just constant adultery.

Could not stop.

It's easy to point the finger at him, but what Paul's saying is this is us pre-conversion.

In some way, we were slaves to various passions.

And without the grace of God, that cannot change.

James says, James 1:14, each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed, listen, by his own desire.

James 1:14

In other words, we can't say that the devil made me do it.

It's here.

The problem is in the heart of man.

We are slaves to these passions.

Paul says in Ephesians 2, 1, you were dead in your trespasses and sins.

He said in Romans 7, the very thing that I do not want to do, I do.

And here's the truth, friend.

This is what our world doesn't understand.

No amount of education can fix the issue.

No amount of education will fix this issue of the heart.

No amount of wealth will fix the issue.

Ever hear the name Bernie Madoff?

I I read a survey of Fortune 500 CEOs, and one in five felt that they needed to be unethical in order to be competitive.

Such was the cheating on Wall Street.

Do you think power can deal with this problem?

I once was talking to a man who was saved out of the sex industry.

And uh I was talking to him and he said, Do you know where the worst place in America is?

I said, LA?

He said, No.

It's DC.

It's DC.

You see, all of the ideas of man to deal with the heart of man end up falling up short.

They don't work.

None of it works.

The only answer for the world today is the grace of God.

The only answer.

Listen, politics, yes, I'm not saying we don't pass good laws.

Yes, of course.

Yes and amen.

Well, let's pass good laws.

But laws are the dam keeping the water from breaking.

Grace is doing something about the water on the other side.

Grace is turning the darkness into light.

Therefore, what is most needed today in our country is a sweeping revival of God's grace.

Where we proclaim the gospel and see the grace of God transform lives.

People called from darkness into his marvelous light.

That is what is most needed.

And we're praying that this would be ground zero for such a work.

God, would you do a work of grace within our midst?

Where the sinner is converted and comes to Christ humbly, receiving your grace, receiving your salvation.

This is what is most needed today is a recovery of grace and souls that are filled with grace, proclaiming the good news of grace.

Third fact.

And this is really amazing when you think about it.

The grace of God is Jesus Christ.

Grace has a name.

His name is Jesus of Nazareth.

The grace of God is Jesus Christ.

How do we know this?

If you look at verse 11, notice how grace is personified.

The grace of God has appeared.

That's an aorist tense verb.

It means it's a completed action in history.

When did the grace of God appear?

It appeared when Jesus came.

That word appeared, it's where we get our English word, epiphany.

It describes that moment.

If you ever watch a magician where he disappears, you don't see him, and then all of a sudden, up in the balcony, he appears.

He's there, he's suddenly there.

That's the picture that Paul's using to describe the grace of God appearing.

And it's it's really a perfect picture of Christ, isn't it?

After Malachi, you had 400 years of silence, people waiting, and then all of a sudden, one night, shepherds guarding their flocks.

Angels appear.

The Messiah, he's been born in Bethlehem.

Suddenly, quickly, he appears.

They go and see him, and then they leave, rejoicing.

The Son of God comes into the temple, age 12, and the leaders are astounded at the wisdom of this young man.

He appears just suddenly.

Did the world herald him and recognize him?

Sadly not.

John said in his prologue, John 1 9, the true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him.

He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.

So he's talking about Jesus here.

And that's further delineated if you look at verse 11.

He he clarifies bringing salvation for all people.

That's not all without exception, that's all without distinction, Jew and Gentile.

We're not universalist.

He says he brings salvation for all men.

Who does that?

Jesus.

Jesus does that.

Then if you look at verse 13, he says, we're waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing, same word, the epiphany of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.

So he's talking about in verse 11, he's talking about the first advent, and then in verse 13, he's talking about the appearing of Jesus Christ coming in glory.

So he's talking about Christ.

This is what John says, John 1.16, important verse.

For from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace.

What this means, friend, is that all grace, all grace, finds its source in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

All of it.

All of it.

I remember Rome at one point taught that you could have a treasury of merit and different lives of saints had extra work that could be credited to you and all this nonsense.

No, no, no, no, no, no.

All grace flows from the person and work of Jesus Christ.

All of it.

Therefore, he is the recipient of all of the glory, praise, and honor, because the grace that we receive, all of it, is from him, all of it.

And so the more we lift up Christ and his work, that is the message of divine grace.

The message of divine grace.

And that gets to the fourth fact about grace, the fourth and final fact I want to show you this morning.

That is this.

The grace of God is costly.

The grace of God is costly.

Now you say, now wait a second.

I thought it was free.

I thought that was the whole point.

It was given to us freely.

It's a gift, it's unmerited.

I thought that's what you said.

I thought it was different from the Galatians 6 thing about what you sow, that what you reap.

I thought you said it's not that.

It is, but it isn't.

You see, it was earned.

It was costly.

It was procured.

It was merited.

It was achieved.

It was purchased.

It was purchased by Jesus Christ.

You see, God is not an unjust God.

God operates by Galatians 6.

That which a man sows, that which he will reap.

That's how God operates.

Someone had to achieve this glorious salvation.

Somebody had to merit this grace that we've been freely given.

And it's so important that you come to the end of yourself and understand that you could never do this.

You are a sinner, and you could never, not in a thousand lifetimes, do enough good works to merit salvation, but Jesus in one lifetime did.

Perfect.

Obedient to the law, perfectly fulfilling the law.

John the Baptist said, Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

He came complete perfection and he marched to Jerusalem to die on our behalf.

He pulled his disciples aside so many times.

He said, I'm going to Jerusalem.

The chief priests, the scribes, and the Pharisees will mock me, they will beat me, they will kill me, but in three days I will be raised again from the dead.

Don't go, Jesus.

That's not your path.

Stand behind me, Satan.

I'm going to Jerusalem.

This is the purpose for which I came.

You remember Jesus said the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and give his life as a ransom for many.

Matthew 20.

He came to procure grace for us.

Very clear from the text.

Look at verse 14.

Jesus Christ gave himself, very important prepositional phrase, for us.

It's a little Greek word, who pair, on behalf of, on behalf of us.

He gave himself on behalf of us.

Not some accident, not some misfortune, not some misunderstanding.

At any point, he could have ended the whole charade, the whole false trial, the whole thing with Pilate.

At any point, he could have just said, Here's, see me in my glory, you're done.

At any point.

He goes through it 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.

Praise be to God.

That's amazing.

That's costly grace.

All of it procured by Christ at a cost.

The cost of his own life.

And this, that little message for us, that is that is really in a nutshell the message of the New Testament.

But God demonstrates his love for us.

And that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

That Jesus died in our place for our sins.

That is, friends, the grace of God.

It produces all the Christian virtue.

The world is without hope, without the grace of God.

The grace of God is Jesus Christ.

And the grace of God was procured costly in a costly way by Christ.

Now, is it enough to know those things intellectually?

Is it enough to be a barstool theologian and you know the solas, you know the verses?

Is it enough to just to study the New Testament and say, yeah, I know about grace, I know about what Jesus has accomplished?

Is that enough?

Check this out.

Look over at Titus 3.

Verse 4.

Remember, we were talking about that word epiphany appeared.

What Paul says is that this must happen to you experientially.

It's not just enough to know that Christ appeared in history.

There's a sense where Christ must appear to you.

He says, verse 4, but when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared.

Now here he's not talking about history, he's talking about my life.

He says, but when the goodness and loving kindness of God are, in other words, there's a connection point where Paul experienced the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior.

Where was that?

Acts chapter 9, the Damascus Road, where Jesus appears to him.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

And what Paul says is, in a sense, that has to happen to every one of us.

Where you're going through this life of malice and envy, slaves to your various passions.

He says, at some point you have to have this moment where you encounter the kindness and goodness of Jesus.

Verse 5, he says, He saves us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.

And so that's experiential, this washing of regeneration, this renewal of the Holy Spirit.

And the way that it happens, Peter says, you are born again, not by perishable seed, but imperishable seed through the divine living word of God.

We encounter Christ today through his living word so much that Jesus appears to us when we're converted in such a way that he seems real to us.

I talk to people all the time, and they say, I met Jesus at this point.

Oh, you mean you saw Jesus in his body and and and and he appeared?

No, no, no, that's not what I mean.

It means that the gospel was proclaimed to me, and I encountered Jesus in such a way it was it was spiritually, experientially real.

I was talking to Jim Branch.

Y'all know Jim Branch.

He's like a uh Texan transplant in North Carolina.

And uh Jim told me, he said, I was in BSF for five years, and one day the uh the instructor called me over and he said, Jim, you know the answers to all the questions.

He said, Oh yeah, I do.

And then he said he put his finger in his chest.

He says, But you got a problem.

You don't know Jesus.

You don't know him.

You haven't had this born-again experience of grace.

It's not enough to know the historical Jesus.

I grew up in Dallas when we won the Super Bowls.

I know.

That ages me.

92, 93, 95.

Troy Aikman was the quarterback.

Y'all remember Troy Aikman?

Monday Night Football now.

And uh I I love Troy Aikman.

I had a poster up on my wall.

I got an autograph of Troy Aikman.

Still have it to this day.

One of my prized possessions.

Love him.

No his stats.

Followed along, grew up in Dallas.

Do I know Troy Aikman?

Never met him.

He doesn't know me from Adam.

Some of you are like that with Jesus.

You hear all this stuff about grace and the work of Christ.

You've never met him.

And that's a tragedy.

He'll change your life.

How do you know if you've met the risen Christ?

Well, he tells us.

Paul tells us right here.

Three things.

He trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.

He trains us to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age.

And third, you long to see him again.

You look forward to his second coming.

So if those things are true of you, that means that you are a genuine, bona fide Christian.

But if you've never met him, you're just struggling.

You're just puttering along, trying to pretend and do the things that Christians do, but you don't have the battery in your car.

And you're never going to achieve the Christian faith.

Because you have to receive it.

So I want you to bow your heads.

Let's pray.

Lord, I pray for the person here who has never truly met Jesus Christ, who has never received the grace of God.

Lord, I pray that they would repent of their dead works and their righteous deeds, which are like filthy rags, and that they would come to you in penitence, repentance.

They would plead for the grace of God.

They would surrender their life to Christ.

Christ alone who saves.

We pray, Lord, for those of us who are believers that we would not strive to live the Christian life apart from divine grace.

We need grace every single day.

We need the message of the cross every single day.

It is the grace of God bringing salvation to all people which trains us to renounce this ungodliness and the worldly passions.

Lord, we need your grace every single day.

So Lord, may we live in light of the cross.

May we live grace-powered, grace-fueled, grace-transformed lives.

And Lord, may this church be ground zero of grace.

Lord, where the message of grace is on our lips, but also in how we treat one another.

That we're merciful, that we're gracious, we're kind.

We're not beating people over the heads, but we're speaking the truth in love.

Lord, may this grace, this partnership in grace that you talked about in Philippians, that Lord, may this define us that we would be partners in this majestic, wonderful grace of God.

We pray all this in Christ's name.

Amen.