Titus, Guardian of The Truth

In the world we live in, more often than not, it’s hard to get a handle on who’s telling us the truth. In this pandemic, who is accurately telling us the whole story? In this American Presidential Election, which candidate is painting a true picture of themselves?

Cynical about truth We live in a world where truth is hard to come by. And, that might serve to make us cynical about the truth. It made a powerful man who met Jesus once, cynical about the truth. His name was Pilate.

Pilate had become so wrapped up in politics and manoeuvring that he spoke these famous rhetorical words: ‘what is truth?’ (John 18:38). Many of us might be tempted to think the same. We look here for truth, and we find lies. We look there for truth, and we find errors. It’s just a fact, that in this fallen world, the truth is a rare commodity. So much so, that I doubt that there is much benefit in trying to discern whether the Coronavirus stats are being massaged or not. I doubt there’s a lot of advantage in trying to figure out which is the more truthful candidate for president, Trump or Biden.

You could spend a lot of hours on that one! We would simply wear ourselves out, if we tried to root out the truth in all the situations of life.

Godliness We’re in Titus again this morning, and still in verse 1 because I’ve committed us to pressing into what Paul means when he says that he’s an Apostle and a slave of Jesus for this purpose: ‘the furthering of the faith and knowledge of the truth in God’s elect that leads to godliness’. Paul’s goal in people who have come to faith in Christ is godliness. Christians need to become in their experience, what Christ has made them in the courtroom of heaven.

In the positive sense, Paul’s estimation of godliness is that it has, ‘value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come’ (1Tim 4:8). And, ‘Godliness with contentment is great gain’ (1 Tim 6:6). Negatively, it’s possible to have, ‘a form of godliness but deny it’s power’. That text is found in 2 Timothy 3 verse 5 and it’s accompanied by no less than 18 attributes of ungodliness.

Serious about godliness Now what that passage says, is that there are people who, to all intents and purposes appear to be Godly,

but their real attributes are a denial of their profession that God is in them. The 18 attributes listed, are at odds with God’s character. Therefore, these people only have a form of Godliness. They are the kind of people who are always learning but never - and this ties us right into Titus 1:1 – never coming to a ‘knowledge of the truth’. And even more alarming – like Jannes and Jambres who opposed Moses – they oppose the truth. ‘As far as the faith is concerned, they are rejected’. So, I think Paul wants us to grasp that playing at godliness is not a trifling thing.

You can be the rejected of God if you oppose the truth. If we profess to have ‘God in us’ – the hope of glory, then real, authentic godliness must be a mainstay of our Christian walk. And, it must be a godliness that accords with the truth. Truth leads to Godliness.

The church is in the big picture But before we look in detail at truth, just a word about the intentions of Paul in this letter. Paul wants godliness in the Cretan believers but, there’s a bigger goal in his mind as well. And it’s definitely one that ought to be our shared ambition, and it’s one that is very important for the Kingdom of God and the glory of Jesus Christ in the earth.

Paul’s bigger goal is that of the church. He wants all these believers to be growing up in godliness. To be growing in the attributes that are God-like. He wants them to be passionate about that. He wants to spur them on to pursue more godliness. We’ve got that. But the collective benefit of those Godly individuals is one thing – It’s a Godly church. Now that is very significant because of what Paul says in 1 Timothy 3:15. There he reminds Timothy, that the church of the living God is the ‘pillar and foundation of the truth’.

That means that the church’s marching orders are to be the guardian of the truth. If the church does its job well, the truth stands. And if it doesn’t, the truth will disintegrate. Now, don’t get me wrong here, I believe God is truth. And assuredly, God needs no-one to guarantee that He stands. But in so far as His truth is shining and visible in a world of untruths, the church is the at the fulcrum of that endeavour. To the extent that - ‘God is truth’ - needs to be visible to the world, the church is responsible for ensuring that it is seen. So truth serves godliness, Paul is telling us in Titus 1:1, and as that godliness comes to expression in the

church, godliness in turn serves the advancement of truth out into the world.

Member godliness That is very helpful in our individual pursuit of Godliness. Our godliness as a unit in the body of Christ – as a member of it – will serve to shine the truth of God into the world like a beacon to the nations. And therefore, our pursuit is not only great gain to ourselves, but to the kingdom and glory of Christ. Let me put it this way: The conduct of an ambassador can be the difference between national pride and national disgrace. And, so it is with us and the truth.

Which is why Paul puts this goal of his, right up front in his letter to Titus. Titus the teacher To underline the significance of this link with the church, we find that Paul’s instruction to Titus is laden with ways that he must get truth into the people. So, Titus is to appoint elders who hold to the ‘trustworthy message as taught’ and, who are capable to encourage others by ‘sound doctrine’. Titus himself must teach what is appropriate to ‘sound doctrine’. In-fact, ‘soundness’ occurs no fewer than five times in this short letter.

Sound in faith. Sound in doctrine (twice). Sound in speech (twice). That means: Faith according to truth. Doctrine according to truth. Speech according to truth. Paul charges Titus to ‘teach’ what is ‘right’; to ‘teach’ what is ‘doctrine’; to ‘teach’ what Paul says; and to ‘teach’ what is ‘good’. And he charges him to teach with ‘integrity’; and with ‘seriousness’. And, to teach the ‘older men’;

the ‘young men’; the ‘older women’; the ‘younger women’; and the ‘slaves’. To ‘refute’; to ‘silence’, to ‘rebuke’ and to ‘warn’. Paul’s - and therefore God’s - vision for the church on Crete, and indeed, every church, is that all the people (believing slaves included) are so well taught in the truth that they themselves radiate the truth about God in a kind of godliness that commends itself to the world; the world where nobody knows what truth is.

People find facts but not God Isn’t it remarkable that people are so amazing at discerning facts? They can put their minds to all manner of fact finding. Science can unearth the most amazing truths about the world we live in. But, so few people respond to the truth that God has revealed about himself in the world. People like Dr Brian Cox with his great understanding of the cosmic universe, can’t see one iota of truth about God in his findings. He confirms what Romans 1:18 says: People ‘supress the truth about God’ and they ‘exchange the truth about him for a lie’ (v.25). You know, the devil knows the truth about God and, he hates it (John 8:44).

Why should we expect his followers to be different?

God makes the truth known But, ‘let God be true and every man a liar’ (Rom 3:4). God is jealous for His truth to be known. He sent the Lord Jesus who called himself ‘truth’ (John 14:6) to ‘testify to the truth’ (John 18:37). And Jesus after he had testified to the truth by giving his life, rose from the dead and sent forth his ‘Spirit of truth’ (John 15:26) into the heart of every believer so that they could ‘speak the truth in love’ (Eph 4:15) – and not only in Israel, but throughout the whole world. Jesus told his disciples, ‘if you hold to my teaching...you will know the truth’ (John 8:31-32). And his prayer to his Father for them was:

‘sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth’ (John 17:17). So, what have we seen? We’ve seen that the created world is speaking truth about God. We’ve seen that God in his very nature is the embodiment of truth. We’ve seen that the gospel of Jesus is the expression of God’s truth, coming to fruition in the lives of people who are dead in trespasses and sins – who can’t see the beauty of the truth of God. We’ve seen the power of God’s truth coming to reside in the hearts of his people to show forth the truth. We’ve seen that Jesus’ teachings and the words of God contained in our bibles, are the truth.

In other words, God has given us everything we need to live lives that have truth weaved into the rope of Godliness.

Truth is not automatic And, with all that in mind, we might be tempted to think we will automatically love the truth and benefit from the godliness it leads to. But that would be an erroneous conclusion to draw. There are simply too many texts in the new testament that point away from that conclusion. Consider these: ‘Though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again’ (Hebrews 5:12). Or,

‘Brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring them back, remember this: whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins’ (James 5:19-20). Or, Here in Titus 1, verse 14: ‘Rebuke them sharply so that they will...pay no attention to the merely human commands of those who reject the truth’. Now, does that not tie in closely with what Paul Cottington was focussing on last week in 1 Corinthians 1? Here we have human commands that have nothing to do with the truth. And last week we had our attention pointed to the difference between the wisdom of the world – the philosopher of this age – and the wisdom of God.

The Lord has provided all we need to grow in truth and yet, we can put his wisdom down; his teachings to one side, and revert to human commands and the wisdom of the age that rejects the truth of God – and in so doing, wander from the truth. If that happens, then the godliness of the church can be compromised and the foundation and pillar of the truth can crumble.

The role of one another The means Paul has in mind for ensuring that the Cretans grow in their knowledge of the truth, leading to godliness is, sound teaching, from godly people, who stick to the truth of God’s Word.

I counted 12 references in Titus to ‘teaching’. God has designed for elders in the church to be the guardians of sound doctrine. But he also expects individual Christians to develop such a handle on the truth, that they are capable of discerning and dispensing the truth. Hebrews 5:12 says, ‘by this time you ought to be teachers’. The goal is to be able to use the truth of God’s word wisely, to instruct each other; to encourage each other; to build one another up; to hold one another accountable, so that brothers and sisters will grow in godliness. Acts 18 tells us that Apollos – who had a thorough knowledge of the scriptures and who taught accurately about Jesus –

was invited to the home of Aquilla and Priscilla, both of whom were able to explain to him the ‘way of God’ more accurately.

Testing all things But, not only, are Christians to be able to teach one another. With a good handle on the truth, they can test what they are hearing too. In Acts 17, the Berean Jews are counted to be of more noble character because they ‘examined the scriptures’ to see if what Paul said was true. And, in a word to the whole congregation at Thessalonica, Paul exhorted them to ‘test’ the prophecies and hold on to what was good. (1 Thess 5:20-21).

Clearly there was mixture in the prophecies they were receiving, but their responsibility was to take the Word of truth and test the prophecies against the truth. I’m not playing down the role of godly, qualified elders in the church – I think they are right at the heart of Paul’s letter to Titus. But even the elders of the church are fallible and what they say is subject to the test of the truth of scripture. And even though their main role is to teach and exhort, that teaching is meant to equip people in the truth, so that they can rightly handle the word of truth (2 Tim 2:15).

The Apostle John agrees John writing in his letters said, ‘It has given me great joy to find some of your children walking in the truth, just as the Father commanded us’ (2 John 4:4). John’s sentiment is the same as Paul’s. He sees it’s God’s will for His people that they should walk in the truth and John knows it’s for their good – and so he’s delighted. I don’t think you can get better endorsements of the role of the truth in the life of the believer than from the Apostle John. Over 40% of all the references to ‘truth’ in the new testament originate with John. If he was keen for believers to be characterised by the truth, then that will do for us.

Summing up So, last time we saw the need for lengthening faith; this time the need for lengthening truth. Both serve the rope of godliness. And godliness serves the church. And the church serves Christ. And Christ must be glorified in truth. For, ‘we have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth’ (John 7:18). I think that is reason enough to take these things to heart. May the Lord bless us through the truth of his word. Amen.