Titus 2:11-15 - Our Deepest Motivation

Have you ever thought about what motivates you to do good works or to do godly things or live a moral life?

What is it that is deeply seated in your beliefs that leads you to do things?

Maybe you do good things because you want to look like a good Christian.

I know I fall into this where I'm reading my Bible, I'm teaching others, and people are like, wow, you know so much, that's amazing.

And that really puffs me up.

Like, yeah, maybe I do know a lot, you know.

Maybe that's maybe that's your belief to doing good things.

Maybe you do good things so that God might listen to your prayers.

Lord, I've tithed and I've prayed and I've read my Bible.

So why don't you just get rid of my anxiety?

Why won't you just heal my cousin of his cancer?

Why won't you just fix my problems to my family?

Maybe you do good things because you believe, once you finally do enough good things, you'll finally have a relationship with God.

Like, Lord, I'm doing so much, I just want to feel your love, and I don't feel it, so I'm just gonna keep doing more to feel your love.

Maybe you just do good things for the sake of being good.

So deep down in what we believe, uh, what our actions showed is what we believe deep in our hearts.

And I think Paul does a really good job in explaining that to Titus here in Titus 2, chapter, or chapter 2, verses 11 through 15, on what this deep-seated belief is supposed to be.

So I'm gonna go ahead and read, read from that text, if you'll join me.

So this is Titus chapter 2 verses 11 through 15.

Titus 2:11–15

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 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.

Now, here in Titus verse 11, chapter 2, we see the word for, and typically that means it's referring to a passage before this this paragraph right here.

So I want to give you kind of the context in Titus 1 and 2 before I can explain what this passage is talking about.

So what Paul is doing is that he's encouraging Titus to train up the churches in godliness.

He gives them a lot of commands of what it looks like to live for God and uh what they're supposed to do, these good works.

You know, uh, as Rick read, older men are to be sober-minded, older women be reverent and teach younger women, younger men be self-controlled, and Titus himself is supposed to be a model of good works.

So he wants these churches to grow in virtues or good and right living unto God.

Now, this is all contrasted with false teachers, especially that of the circumcision party, that infiltrated these churches in Crete.

And what Paul does first is he calls out their character.

He said they were prophesied to be liars and evil, and that they are gluttons, and that Paul makes the claim that they profess to know God, but by their works they deny him, that they even know him, and that they are unfit for any good work.

They are full of vices or immorality, and they live ungodly lives.

Now, what their circumcision party believed, or what their doctrine, was that you had to follow certain ceremonial laws, like food laws or washing of hands, or that you had to be circumcised in order to be saved.

It was Jesus and works.

That's what they believed.

And they were bent on making people abide by these rules and these laws.

So not only laws that came from the Old Testament, but also Jewish myths and from people who didn't even know Christ.

And this is called legalism.

That's what that doctrine is called.

It is the doctrine that you have to earn your salvation.

Doctrine just kind of meaning belief in this case, that they believed you were saved by Jesus and works, this legalism.

And they were upsetting many families by this doctrine.

Obviously, there were probably a lot of Gentiles in the church at the time, and they were going in there saying, you have to be circumcised in order to be saved, and that could be very upsetting.

That I thought it was just Jesus, but now you're saying I need Jesus and works.

That would be very upsetting.

So what we see here then is that these false teachers have bad doctrine and it's leading them to ungodliness.

What they deep down and what they believe is leading to bad fruit.

But Paul wants Titus to rebuke these false teachers, and he wants Titus to command them to do commands that adorn with good doctrine.

So then he lists all those commands that we read in the first part of chapter 2, and then in Titus 2, 11 through 14, he finally gets at this good doctrine.

So the first part of this good doctrine that that Paul wants us, that Paul wants Titus to know, is that God's grace has appeared for the salvation of all people, not just circumcised Jews.

In Acts 11, this is the story of Peter up on the rooftop, and God lays down the sheet of unclean animals, and God tells Peter, Rise, kill, and eat.

Peter says, I would never eat anything unclean.

And God says, Do not call unclean what I call clean.

So what that means is what's happening is that God has invited all Gentiles to be saved.

You know, in the Old Testament, it was kind of like Israel versus the nations were gonna go out and kill and destroy and conquer.

In the New Testament, in this new covenant, God says, I want all these Gentiles, all these people, to be my people.

Now, we might think that the circumcision party is kind of crazy or weird for believing that you need works in order to be saved.

But I was thinking about this, and there are some things that we can kind of add to this as well.

Uh, we might think that unless you are physically baptized, you are not saved.

Now, I'm not saying physical baptism is a problem.

I'm a big advocate for it.

I think the Bible teaches that if you are a Christian, you should be baptized.

There's not even a precedent in the new in the New Testament of being a Christian and not being baptized, except for this one exception, which was the thief on the cross.

And he had good doctrine.

He's like, I'm on the cross for a reason, and Jesus is not.

You know, he is not on the cross for a good reason, but I know that he's my savior.

And he said, Will you remember me in paradise?

And Jesus said, Yes.

So there we see that the thief on the cross did not need physical baptism in order to be saved.

But maybe it's not certain acts that we believe can save us, but maybe certain attributes we have that we believe can save us.

Maybe we would believe that Larry is a Christian and Johnny isn't, because Larry is more wise.

He's got that elite ball knowledge of understanding, you know, what is true and what's not, and Johnny just doesn't.

Or maybe it's not wisdom, maybe we believe that uh I'm more spiritual than someone else.

I've always grown up in church, I've always had this knack, so of course I'm gonna be saved because I'm more spiritual.

And this is obviously not true, because we are saved by grace alone through faith in Jesus Christ, not by attributes, not by anything we've done, but purely by the grace of God.

Now, this is legalism of believing we're saved by certain attributes we have or certain things we do, but the opposite end of the spectrum can also happen, and this is called anti-nomianism.

Anti-meaning against, and nomionism meaning law, against the law.

And so these people would claim that they are saved, but by their lack of works, they actually deny that they know Jesus.

Now, I don't mean people who are struggling or fighting with sin.

Uh you know, that's that's just what's gonna happen in the Christian life.

As you grow, you're gonna fight with sin.

But these are people who habitually sin, who make it a practice and do not care whatsoever to grow in godliness.

And Paul writes about these Christians in Romans chapter 2, verses 4 and 5.

Romans 2:4

Paul writes this or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance, but because of your hard and impenitent heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.

So again, Paul is explaining that good doctrine leads to godliness, bad doctrine leads to ungodliness.

And so we have the legalists, we have people who are antinomian, and they're both leading to bad fruit, bad doctrine leading to bad fruit.

But correct doctrine is meant to lead you to repentance.

Now we know that God's grace has appeared to all people, as it was say, as it was said, it's not appeared to just circumcise Jews, but it's appeared to all people.

But now we want to know what the grace of God does.

So let me go ahead and read verse twelve.

For the grace of God is training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age.

So not only does the grace of God appear, bringing justification, meaning that we are now righteous before God, and sanctification, meaning that he's going to continually grow us in godliness, but we're we want to know what that means?

What does it mean to grow in godliness?

What does that look like?

In verse 12, I think this is very important before I tell you exactly what that is.

Verse 12 is very important.

The verb training.

Now it does not say trained as in past tense, as if the grace of God trained you immediately when you were saved and that you would never sin again.

That's called the doctrine of sinless perfectionism, which people who believe that can often be boasted with a lot of pride and therefore not be sinlessly perfect.

And so this verb is training, meaning that it is an ongoing process.

The grace of God will continually train us.

And when you become a Christian, you don't become immediately an adult in this grace, but you become a baby.

The Greek verb for training actually means to train up a child.

Now, I don't know how you were when you were a baby, but I didn't start working a full-time job, I didn't start paying a mortgage, and I did not start drinking black coffee yet.

I didn't even have any chest hairs.

So this training is going to take time just as a baby matures into adulthood.

And that is exactly what the grace of God is doing in our lives.

Now this can be discouraging, like, oh my goodness, am I going to sin?

Like, am I never going to finally defeat all my sins before my life ends?

But I find it very encouraging because when I sin, I'm thinking, man, has the grace of God failed me?

Am I even loved by him?

But this training, this verb training, is so helpful because that means we know the grace of God has not failed you, and that he will continue in his sanctifying work, and he is very, very faithful.

Now, what exactly though is this grace of God training us in?

We see that in the first part that's training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.

Now, the word renouncing is more than just avoiding certain sins or something like that, but it's a complete denial, saying no to sinful desires.

For example, if you are addicted to pornography, it is not enough to just put blockers up on all your devices.

Is that helpful?

Yes.

Do that, put up all the blockers you can, avoid, like try to give rid of those limitations as much as you can.

And even Jesus said, like, cut off your hand and gouge out your eye.

So that's very important.

But it doesn't get at my heart, because if I didn't have my eyes or my hands, I could still lust.

Another example is that maybe you are hating someone at your work, or maybe it's a friend that you're frustrated with, or a classmate or boss, or maybe your spouse at the time, you're just frustrated with them.

And so what you want to do is you just want to avoid them.

Like, oh, I can't stand this person right now, so I'm just gonna leave and chill, and I'm not gonna talk to them for a while.

Okay, that might be temporarily helpful because you're not hating them to their face, but you're still hating them in your heart, and it does not get at the problem.

It doesn't get at the root, it doesn't get at the base of all our beliefs.

And that's what the grace of God is doing in the sanctifying work.

It's rewiring your heart and desires so that you aren't loving your sin anymore and you're actually denying it.

And more than that, it's not just denial of sin, but it's actually replacing it with godliness, with good and upright living.

So maybe instead of hating that person, you are near to them and you talk to them, uh, you try to get to know them, or maybe you pray for them when you're God, when you're when you're gone, not God, you are not God, when you're gone.

And maybe, maybe you struggle to look at your phone first thing in the morning.

Maybe that's a part of ungodliness you struggle with.

So instead of just saying no to my phone, I'm actually going to replace it by hearing my father's voice first thing in the morning.

So this is what the grace of God is doing.

This is what we're supposed to be trained in as a church.

Now I think, uh, at least I've fallen to this trap before, that it can be easy to think that if we'll be in heaven one day, if we'll get to see Jesus face to face, why should I worry so much about it now?

You know, I'll get there eventually, you know, maybe I'll work on it here and there, but it's not that much of a problem.

When I get to heaven, then I'll then I'll make it, and then I won't sin anymore.

But Paul says at the end of verse 12 that this change is supposed to take place in the present age, currently, right now.

And I think verses 13 and 14 really help clarify more on this.

And that brings me to my next point, and that is the deep-seated motivation of godliness.

What are we supposed to believe that leads us to this godliness, especially in this present age?

So let's go.

I'm gonna go ahead and turn back to Titus 2, verses 13 and 14.

Titus 2:13

It starts with the verb waiting, that can be translated as while we wait, as it is in the CSB.

So we're training to renounce sin and grow in godliness while we wait for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Now, this waiting is the first and greatest motivation that we can have in this Christian life.

This waiting for our Savior.

Now, I was reading commentaries, and I'm not gonna lie, I've had a hard time understanding how waiting for Jesus to return could actually grow me in godliness.

Because I would I would really fall into that trap of thinking, well, if he comes one day, like why should I worry about it now?

I'll just be perfect in heaven.

But this uh an example that I thought of that was very helpful for me is the example of an engaged man.

That's me.

I'm engaged, guys.

I'm engaged with my lovely fiance, Aaron, and we're very excited.

Yes.

Praise God for marriage.

And we have a wedding day set.

That day is going to come, and we are super, super excited.

Very, very exciting.

Now, it's a hard wait, but in this waiting time, I'm encouraged and motivated to try to grow spiritually so I can so I can be a godly husband to my wife and be a godly father to my kids.

I'm encouraged to work hard and try to make money so I can provide for our family.

And I'm encouraged to get wisdom and counsel from other married couples who have already gone through what we're about to go through.

So, what I'm doing here is I'm preparing myself for this wedding day.

Because it's very exciting where we'll become one and we'll get to spend the rest of our lives together.

And I want to prepare myself for that.

In the same way, this is what our waiting is supposed to look like for Christ when he returns.

The Greek, the Greek word for this is meant to mean in an eagerness or an expectant manner, not in some nonchalant, laissez-faire fashion, like I'm just gonna wait until it happens, but with eagerness, for he will come.

And this return of the Messiah is different than when he first came here on earth.

Because the first time he came, he came in humility.

He was obedient to death and dying on the cross, he took on God's wrath for guilty sinners.

But the second time he comes, he will come in glory.

And rather than being hung on a tree, he will be seated on a throne, and all his enemies will fall before him, and he will reign in glory.

And this is the glory of God.

Verse 13 makes that clear, saying, Jesus Christ, our Savior, or the glory of God, who is our Savior Jesus Christ.

So Jesus is the second person of the Trinity, he is God, and this is his glory.

We will all say to him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever.

And he will make all things right, all things new, and all things will be well, for Jesus Christ is coming to return.

Now, this is already really exciting.

That he is coming to return for us, specifically for his bride.

And that is kind of the deeper motivation behind waiting for our Savior, which is the heart of our Savior.

So in the beginning of verse 14, it says that Jesus gave himself for us.

Now, what does that mean?

It says that he gave himself for us.

Uh, this is kind of uh something that's portrayed in the Old Testament of uh the mystery of how God could forgive a sinful people.

You know, uh God is completely holy and just and righteous, and we are totally sinful.

Uh, an example just to show how sinful we are, that I found is very helpful, is there's a documentary called American Gospel.

If you haven't seen it, I would really recommend it.

But in it, there's a guy who gives an analogy of what our sin looks like uh to God.

So let's say I have two rocks and I scratch one rock with the other.

It doesn't really matter, I'm just scratching another rock.

Like, what's the big deal?

Let's say I go to a used car lot and I scratch a rusty car.

It's kind of like, okay, what are you doing?

Like, why are you scratching this car?

Now let's say I scratch like a Tesla or Cybertruck or something.

All right, my punishment just keeps getting bigger and bigger because the thing I scratched against is more valuable.

So one sin that we have against the righteous king of the universe who is over all, just one sin, and we deserve his just wrath.

We look at the Ten Commandments, which are a reflection of his character, and being made in the image of God, we're supposed to reflect the Ten Commandments.

And so what we do is we look at those Ten Commandments and think, wow, I just do not live up.

I deserve his just wrath.

But in Exodus 34, verses six through seven, the Lord describes himself as merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty.

How does that make sense?

In the Old Testament, uh there there was like sacrifices going on, but they had to keep making them because there was sin that was so prevalent.

And so they were never going to really fulfill it.

But here we see that God forgives iniquity and transgression and sin, but also will by no means clear the guilty.

If we are all sinful and we all deserve his wrath, how is he forgiving us?

That doesn't make any sense.

David expounds upon this in Psalm 32 when he says this Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity.

So how could the Lord forgive those who are covered in sin and who have iniquity?

And this answer is found in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

What it means when he gave himself for us is that he lived a totally just and perfect life.

His life completely reflected the Ten Commandments being fully God, and yet he was also fully man, meaning that when he was on the cross, he took the wrath that was reserved for us as sinful men.

Being fully God, he's able to live the commandments out completely and able to take God's punishment, his own punishment that he had for us.

He's able to absorb it so that he would impute or give to us his righteousness, this legal declaration that we are now seen as righteous in God's eyes.

And if you are a Christian, be assured that Romans 5.8 says, Christ died for you while you were still a sinner.

He didn't die for you when you became more wise or more spiritual.

He didn't die for you when you were physically baptized.

He died for you while you were still a sinner.

While you hated him, you were completely against him, you didn't even want God.

An analogy that my friend likes to give me is that if you have a baby and there's candy and there's this credit card, he's gonna take the candy every single time.

He's not going to take the credit card, although the credit card is so helpful for him.

So as sinful people, we're going to deny God every time.

But God in his loving grace died for us while we were still sinners.

He said, I'm going to take your punishment.

And he had this out for us before the foundation of the world, and that is amazing grace.

It's unbelievable.

And so why would he do this?

He did this so that we would become his own possession, as it says in verse 14.

That he has made us his own, that we have become his bride, and he will return for us.

This is the deepest motivation on any basic Christian level, and that is that we will get to know Jesus face to face.

That we know him now kind of in a dim mirror through the Bible and through prayer and through the gathering of churches like this.

But one day we will get to see him face to face.

Christianity is not some self help program on how to be a better person, although we can often make it we can often think that way.

But Christianity is a Relationship with Jesus Christ, your Savior.

That is the whole reason why He gave why He gave Himself for you, so that He could know you and dwell with you and love you and that you would love Him.

And what this is supposed to do is it's supposed to well up in us these good works.

That we would be zealous for good works, that He would redeem us from lawlessness and purify us.

And by the way, isn't that amazing that verse 14 says, He redeems us?

It is not on our own strength that we are redeemed.

It's by his grace that we're redeemed.

It's by his grace that we are purified.

This is completely undeserved.

I mean, again, Romans 5.8 says, You were a sinner and Christ died for you.

You didn't even want God, but not only did he die for you, not only did he declare you legally righteous before his eyes, but he's also sanctifying you and purifying you.

Because one day he will return and we will be like a bride waiting for our groom.

He's preparing us for that day.

That's why in this present age it's so important that we grow in sanctification, because we want to be ready for when Christ returns.

And what an amazing and glorious day that will be.

Now, coming to verse 15, this is the good doctrine that Paul wants Titus to declare to these churches.

He says, declare these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority, let no one disregard you.

And it's very important that he explains it to the churches in Crete, because of all these false teachers infiltrating, thinking, oh, you're saved by works and Jesus, or you need to be circumcised, or you need to be like this or that.

But this gospel, this doctrine, is so important to get down.

And it's not that if you understand it now here in this church service, you'll be good for the rest of your life.

But like I said, training, this grace of God is training us, you're gonna have to remind yourself of this doctrine every single day.

That it that it will be deeply rooted in your beliefs and that you will live by this.

So, church, please understand this doctrine.

Now, Paul wants Titus to exhort and rebuke with all authority.

As a young man, you know, he says with all authority, and as a young man, uh I relate to Titus.

So I want to conclude by doing the same.

If you are not a Christian, or maybe you've never heard this gospel before, you must know this that you are not your own Savior.

Your good works cannot save you.

There's nothing about your attributes of yourself that cannot that can save you.

So humble yourself before God and recognize your own inadequacy.

Repent of your pride and turn to Him who has brought salvation for all people.

There's nothing you have to do to be saved except understand that His grace is sufficient.

And that when you trust in Him, you will get to know and rejoice in Him.

And what a blessing that is.

What a blessing that is.

And if you are a Christian, please be encouraged.

That Christ, your Savior, is the one who gave Himself for you.

That you would no longer live and worship to your sinful desires, but that you would live in proper worship with for Him and dwell with Him forever.

That you would get to one day see your Savior face to face and not die.

And that is a wonderful, wonderful thought.

So let this belief seep down into your hearts and let it motivate you to grow in godliness and have zeal for godliness.

And remember this that as you begin to know Jesus and his glory and grace more and more, that your love for the things of the world will begin to grow strangely dim.

And your love for righteousness out of knowing your Savior will increase all the more.

Let's pray.