Scott Brown's sermon on 'The Truth That Changes You' delves into the themes of Paul's letter to Titus. Brown emphasizes the importance of living a life aligned with the truth that leads to godliness, as outlined by Paul. He describes how Paul, nearing the end of his life, writes to Titus to establish a new culture within the church, family, and individual lives on the island of Crete. This culture is grounded in simple, everyday faithfulness, which Paul argues is transformative. The letter addresses the need for sound doctrine, the qualities of church leaders, and the roles of different members within the family and society. Brown highlights the power of grace as a transformative force, urging believers to live lives that reflect their faith. Titus is instructed to set things in order and to silence false teachings, while promoting a new kind of community that embodies truth and godliness. The sermon connects these teachings to contemporary issues, noting that many societal problems arise from a lack of adherence to biblical doctrines.

In Titus chapter 1. Titus 1 verse 1. This is the inerrant, all-sufficient, sweeter-than-honey Word of God. Paul, a bondservant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God's elect, and the acknowledgement of the truth which accords with godliness, in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began, but has in due time manifested His word through preaching, which was committed to me according to the commandment of God our Savior, to tithe us, a true Son in our common faith, Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Savior. For this reason I left you in Crete that you should set in order the things that are lacking.

The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever. Let's pray. Lord we pray that you would come and use these words to equip the Saints to cast the devil aflight from us, that you would use it to teach us the ways in which we should go. That you would open up our ears to hear wondrous things from your law. Amen.

Please be seated. So these opening words of Paul's letter to Titus open the door to all the teaching that comes after it in the following chapters and it really is a focus on the phraseology that comes right out of these verses that I just read of the truth which accords with godliness and the setting in order the things that are lacking. And what the Apostle is presenting here to Titus is that there really is a there's a very simple and it's a very beautiful life that God calls his children to. The small things, the rhythmic things, the things that happen in eyeball to eyeball in your local church, the things that happen eyeball to eyeball in your family and with your and with the people that you know as you move out into the civil realm. These simple things, these small things, these rhythmic things, they really are the most powerful things and they're the most important things.

This letter to Titus was written in the 60s, not the 1960s, in the 60s in the first century. And Paul is writing Titus and 1st and 2nd Timothy very near the end of his life. He writes 1st Timothy and then he writes Titus in the middle and then he writes second Timothy when he writes second Timothy he's only months away from his death and his time on earth is waning. My sense of this, Paul is writing this at the end of his life and he knows the end is near and he's saying the things that would secure the church through the centuries, that he would actually establish an understanding of how to function in a family, and how to function in civil society. He's working through all these categories in the different chapters and he's writing this letter in between his first and his second imprisonment.

It's after his second imprisonment that he is beheaded. It's a very short book as you've seen. I hope you've been reading through it this week. It's just 46 verses in three chapters. It's about as long as the first two chapters in Matthew.

We're gonna read the whole book here this morning. You can see the outline. I want to make some introductory comments as I am now. I want to walk us through the message of Titus by reading it. It'll only take seven or eight minutes.

And then I want to loop back and do an exposition of the first five verses, particularly the first four verses. So the Apostle is writing to Titus on the island of Crete. It's the largest island in the Aegean. Well, it's the fourth largest island. It's very, very large.

And it's a notable place. It's well known. The great philosopher of the day, Epimenides, said that Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, and lazy gluttons. And the act of the Cretan, actually, was to play the liar. The term, cretizo, means to play the liar.

It was a very low trust culture. You know, the West has been a very high trust culture for many, many years. People enter into contracts, they keep their promises, their vestiges of biblical law. That's why it's easy to do business in a place like the United States of America, because people keep their promises. They're not liars, typically.

Of course, you run across liars from time to time, but it's because of really the structure of morality but it wasn't that way on the island of Crete and and God sends this brother Titus to the island of Crete to set things in order in the church and in the family and also to set the people in that society, in that in that Christian society loose in a way that proclaims the truth. And this is what the Lord Jesus Christ does. He sets everything in order in your life and but there were problems in Crete. There are there are men upsetting whole households says the text in Titus and Titus is told to silence these men. He was, Titus was really charged to establish a new kind of culture, a new kind of culture in a church, a new kind of culture in a family, a new kind of culture in an individual who's actually directed by truth, not by the surrounding culture, not by his own emotions, and he's really calling for faithfulness in small things and that's why in chapter one you have this whole new kind of living but it's living according to the truth by the truth and you have you have this new kind of man who is charged to be a leader in a local church.

He's called an elder and he has particular character qualities. But when you read the character qualities, there's really nothing out of the ordinary, the things that every man actually should aspire to. You know, if you if you're this kind of man, you don't go viral, but you're you actually become a vital person with the people that you live with and the people that you go to church with and the people that you rub up against in civil society. There's this really, this new institution, new kind of institution that's being established called the Church of Jesus Christ there on the island of Crete. And when you get to chapter two, you find this beautiful picture of a new kind of family.

You have the whole generational family is addressed there. The older men, this is how you're supposed to operate. The older women, you operate this way. Younger men, younger women. He's speaking to young boys and young girls and he's teaching really for the purpose of a different kind of culture, a very different kind of culture compared to the culture of Crete.

Very, very, very, very different. And then you get to chapter three, you have a new kind of citizen. Cretans are always liars and evil beasts and lazy gluttons, but that's not the kind of citizen you should be that's really what he's saying and And it's it's actually you have this new kind of person That's that's set loose in the society and and What is he doing? He's adorning the doctrine. He's like wearing the doctrine in his lifestyle.

And it's really a very, very beautiful picture. And slavery was very common there in Crete and in the Roman Empire and there's even a new kind of slave if you're a slave in this society Here's what you here's how you should act and Really the presentation of a new kind of life that's really it's created by the grace of God a life that is that it really arises out of the grace of God and what Titus is saying is that grace doesn't make you insensitive to your sin grace changes you it transforms your whole life and he speaks about that at the end of the book you know we're saved by grace but grace makes you a new person and if you're not a new person you probably haven't been saved by grace you don't have it you need it and so you have these pictures of of a healthy person of a healthy church of a healthy family operating in a way that operates very visibly and publicly in civil society. And all of this is for a new kind of person who exists for life and godliness. These are really very simple things.

Now this letter to Titus was written to believers to help them know how to live in the midst of the chaos of their society. It was a chaotic society. It was a rugged and rebellious island, and God wanted something very different there. I just think this speaks to a really important fact of life. There are moments and there are places in history where people forget who they are and they forget what they ought to do and that happened in Crete and this this actually is what has happened in America.

It's happening seemingly you know in increasing velocity In the last century and even in this century still, the church often trades the scriptural patterns for what a church is and for what a family is. For newer, for a shinier kind of script. And it's written by the spirit of the age. You know this period in American history will go down as a bad time for the family in America and a bad time for the church because of the pragmatism and the inventions of man that have seeped their way into church life and even family life. Here's what Titus has to say, it doesn't have to be that way for you because the vision is cast here.

It's really time, you know, for all of us and I know so many of us have set their course in life to recover really the biblical doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ and the biblical doctrine of the family and it's such an important thing and that is the purpose of this letter to Titus because a new generation must be taught again what their parents and their grandparents did and what their grandparents and grandparents miss because all parents and grandparents miss things okay I have a front-row seat on that in my own life but it's so critical because so many of the great maladies of our culture can be traced directly back to a biblically ignorant dysfunctional church and a dysfunctional family. This is such an important message and we've said this many many times you've heard it over and over again but it's so true as the family goes so goes the church and as the church goes so goes the culture and the recovery of these two institutions for the glory of God is is the most important work so it's time to dust off the doctrine here we are in Titus you know to do such a thing and you have this tremendous blueprint and what I think what Titus is saying what Paul is saying to Titus is that you can mend what has been broken and you can strengthen what remains and you can plant and it can flourish in your life and in your church and in your family.

So that's sort of a broad picture of what's going on here. Now let's read the letter. Do you have your Bibles open to Titus chapter 1? I'm going to try to lead you through the various sections and the first section is composed in verses 1 through 4 and here in these verses he's really speaking of the foundation of all of this and that is that it's the truth that produces godliness and so Paul says and we're going to do an exposition of these verses at the very end, Paul, a bondservant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ according to the faith of God's elect, and the acknowledgement of the truth which accords with godliness in hope of eternal life which God who cannot lie promised before time began but has in due time manifested His word through preaching which was committed to me according to the commandment of God our Savior to Titus a true son in our common faith grace mercy and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our Savior. And then in verse 5 he begins to speak of this critical matter to set things in order and he and he begins really to speak with the speak about the church and particularly the leaders, the elders in a church.

And so you have this new kind of institution that's being established here in the island of Crete. Verse 5, For this reason I left you in Crete that you should set in order the things that are lacking and appoint elders in every city as I commanded you. If a man is blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of dissipation or insubordination. For a bishop must be blameless as a steward of God, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but hospitable, a lover of what is good, sober-minded, just, holy, self-controlled, holding fast the faithful word as he has been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and convict those who contradict. So this is the establishment of qualities character qualities of elders there's another list in in first Timothy 3 and we'll probably be referring that one to that when we get to this but these these character qualities here are the character qualities that every Christian man should have and we'll make we'll make that very clear.

This is a new kind of man in a new kind of institution called the Church of Jesus Christ. And then you and but let me just say one thing about this. This man, in many ways, he's an ordinary man with ordinary faithful qualities. These are the things that everybody desires. They're not rocket religion.

They are the things that really hold the world together. And then because of the type of things that Titus will encounter in this rebellious society, he speaks of, beginning in verse 10 through 16, speaks of silencing, false teaching, silencing the people that aren't that way, who are, first of all, insubordinate. Verse 10, for there are many insubordinate, both idle talkers and deceivers. Notice how opposite that these men are compared to the the description of elders, especially those of the circumcision whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole households teaching things which they ought not for the sake of dishonest gain. One of them a prophet of their own said Cretans are always liars evil beasts lazy gluttons you know had a funny moment this week I was teaching this to the women's mentoring kids this week and one of the kids went home and said, Mr.

Brown said all Americans are obese. Well, I actually said, Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, and lazy gluttons. And he says, this testimony is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the faith, not giving heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men who turn from the truth. To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure.

But even their mind and conscience are defiled. They profess to know God, but in works they deny him, being abominable, disobedient, and disqualified for every good work." So then in the second chapter as we turn the page, the apostle is speaking about the application of the doctrine, the living out of the doctrine, and He speaks to older men, older women, younger women, and young men, and then he turns to slaves. So chapter two, verse one. But as for you, speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine, and notice what the sound doctrine does that the older men be sober, reverent, temperate, sound in faith, in love, in patience. The older women likewise that they may be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things, that they admonish the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the Word of God may not be blasphemed.

What he's saying is that there are things that that happen in a family life that can cause the Word of God to be blasphemed. It's very serious. Verse 6, likewise exhort the young men to be sober minded. I can't wait till we get to this this section because I get to look in the eyeballs of all the young men in this church. Exhort the young men to be sober minded in all things showing yourself to be a pattern of good works in doctrine showing integrity, reverence, incorruptibility, sound speech that cannot be condemned, that the one who is an opponent may be ashamed having nothing evil to say of you." In other words, God desires a certain kind of young man.

He's the kind of young man that makes the other young men ashamed of the way that they're acting. There you go. Then he then he speaks to slaves, verses and beginning in verse 9. Now in the Roman Empire it's been estimated that somewhere between 10 percent and maybe even as much as 40 percent of the population were slaves so the apostle is is dealing with the problems of this culture. He's not endorsing slavery.

We'll talk a lot about what the Bible says about slavery. But here you have what God is doing is he's really governing the people who ended up in this unfortunate situation. Verse nine, exhort bond servants to be obedient to their own masters, to be well pleasing in all things, not answering back, not pilfering, but showing all good fidelity that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things." That is a really key phrase in Titus, adorning the doctrine. And then, and in verse 11, what we find in chapter two is what this doctrine looks like. You wear the doctrine like you wear clothes.

It makes you zealous for good work. So in verse 11 there's a really powerful statement about grace. Everybody wants to know what grace is but here you find a very distinctive power of the grace of God and it's this that grace is a is a power of God that changes you that's what grace is for the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men So grace brings salvation but that but it doesn't stop there. Verse 12, teaching us grace is teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people zealous for good works speak these things exhort and rebuke with all authority let no one despise you This is the culture of the grace of God at work in your life. And then we turn the page to chapter 3 and now he addresses Christian citizenship.

How do you function in the secular state how are you supposed to act in the midst of a secular government Remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities, to obey, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to be peaceable, gentle, showing all humility to all men, for we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. Imagine the radical shift that this new culture in Crete is going to accomplish. But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to his mercy he saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit whom he poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior that having been justified by his grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. What a beautiful section. Verse 8 this is a faithful saying and these things I want you to affirm constantly that those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works.

These things are good and profitable to men, But avoid foolish disputes, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law, for they are unprofitable and useless. Reject a divisive man after the first and second admonition, knowing that such a person is warped and sinning and being self-condemned. So You have this beautiful picture of regeneration and then also in the midst of this tendency in this society to always be involved in disputes and divisions and then actually to reject a divisive man after the first and second admonition. And it's a disaster to have divisive people in your church. And here's the reality, it goes very, very poorly for people who divide churches.

For being a pastor for 50 years I've seen this many times. And then the apostle concludes the letter beginning in verse 12 with a salutation. When I send Artemis to you or Tychicus be diligent to come to me at Nicopolis, for I have decided to spend the winter there. Send Zenas the lawyer, yes there are some godly lawyers, and Apollos on their journey with haste that they may lack nothing. And let our people also learn to maintain good works, to meet urgent needs, that they may not be unfruitful.

Isn't that simple? It's the simple, faithful life. It's not the viral life but it's the vital life for the people that you know, the eyes that you look into, and the people you gather to worship God with. And then he says this in verse 15 and this is so remarkable to see how he ends this. All who are with me greet you, greet those who love us in the faith grace be with you all amen the Apostle Paul knew that Titus would need a lot of grace He would need these things and he ends with those words because life was very disorderly in Crete.

You know it was this beautiful island in the beautiful Aegean Sea with some of the most bullheaded people you'd ever meet in the ancient world and the Apostle is setting the church on a firm foundation with with a new kind of person a new kind of church leader a new kind of man the false teachers must be must be rebuked and this combative people needed to see a new kind of society in the Church of Jesus Christ where people are just doing the normal, ordinary, faithful things that you don't get medals for, that nobody sees, except for the people who know you. So let's move into the the exposition here in the first five verses really four I I'll next Sunday I'll begin in verse five but I think verse five is pivotal because it casts a vision for really everything in the letter. So we encounter in verse one Paul a bond servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ. Paul uses the word slave he's saying I am a slave a servant of God. What Paul is saying is that God has mastery over him, that he is a servant under authority.

I don't want us to miss this. To be a bondservant of God is the highest earthly position anyone can ever hold. Imagine to be a servant of the God who created the heavens and the earth. This is what God's people are. And in Roman society, there were many, many slaves.

There were on the top of, there are three levels of society in Rome. There were the patricians, that was about 400 men, the top of society, and then you had the plebeians, the common man, the second-class citizens, and then you had the slaves, a huge population in the Roman Empire, 10 to 40%. They could own nothing, they had no rights, they belonged to someone, and they could not go where they wanted to go or do what they wanted to do. They were slaves. In 1 Peter 2, 16, Peter says that the Christian is a slave of God in John 15 Jesus says no longer do I call you slaves this is a new kind of slave The Christian is a very different kind of slave.

Jesus says I don't call you slaves I tell you what I'm doing. I tell you what I'm doing. This is what God has done with his people. We are we are slaves on the one hand but we are also sons at the same time. We are slaves, but we have an inheritance.

We are a very different type of slave, not the slave that was in Rome. In 1 Peter 2, 16, we are told not to be slaves of man but to be slaves of God. But there's no better position than to have the authority of God in your life. It's the very best authority. So then he says to Titus, he's speaking these things, he says in verse 1 still, according to the faith of God's elect and the acknowledgement of the truth which accords with godliness now so this stumbles us on the theme of the book it's the truth that accords to godliness and there are two words here there is faith and truth he says according to the faith not faith not faith but the faith faith meaning the common body of doctrine.

It's the truth, it is the faith of God's elect. The faith of God's elect is a trust in God's in the whole council of God the whole body the whole common body of doctrine and and this is according to the truth which accords with godliness and this godliness is God centeredness It's the heart that is focused on God, a Godward heart and an inward admiration of God which actually creates every part of your life because what you admire you you will end up carrying out in your everyday life. The things that you admire don't stay inside They always come out in some way. What you love will determine what you do, what you think about, how you spend your time. All these things really really flow from the truth or they flow from falsehood.

What he is saying is that truth shapes your life. Not just intellectual beliefs, but a way of living. The truth must always give birth to life. There's shoe leather in every doctrine. It's all meant to be applied in some way or another in the world.

And who is this for? The faith of God's elect. The faith of God's elect. This is election is God's action towards sinners. God does much for the sake of his elect and of course it is his election that saves.

And then we, and then he, if you go to chapter two, verse one, you have a very similar principle here about how the doctrine works out in life but as for you speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine in doctrine showing integrity, reverence, incorruptibility that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things. So walking in the truth which accords with godliness he says in verse 2 puts you heavenbound. I'll read it In hope of eternal life which God who cannot lie promised before time began. So this is the way of eternal life. The people who desire life eternal can only have it through embracing the doctrine which brings hope for eternal life.

He uses this terminology eternal life, Literally the age abiding before time began, God has had an eternal plan and this is so important to understand. Before time began, God had a plan to save sinners. This is the timelessness of God's plan. This is the timelessness of God's plan toward you who are a believer. God's plan is not something that was secured in a temporal moment when you turn to the Lord.

It was secured before time began. And what's so important to understand is that eternal life doesn't depend on man. It depends on God. God is the one who conceives of it and God is the one who promises it. It does not depend on man.

Your faith doesn't depend on your ups and downs emotionally. It actually depends on God's everlasting plan. Paul uses very similar language in 2nd Timothy 1 9 he says who has saved us and called us with a holy calling not according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began. The Apostle says the same that's a very similar thing to the Ephesian Church and Ephesians 1 verses 4 & 6 just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before him in love having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself according to the