Good Works Are Your Purpose

The Purpose of Good Works in Titus 2

Well, please turn in your Bible to Titus chapter 2. Preaching text today will just be on verse 14. We'll read verses 11 through 15 for context. This message will begin a new series on motivations for good works.

I do intend to continue in Luke, but I also intend to start this new series on motivations for good works, where we'll be going through various motivations for good works, as you might imagine, given the title.

When you have Titus 2, please stand for the reading of God's word. Titus 2, beginning in verse 11. 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. Amen. Maybe seated. We live in a world that is plagued by mediocrity. People do not have very ambitious aims in life.

They go about their life in a malaise of sadness and despair, and it's no wonder either, given that they have no real purpose in their life other than to just continue on till their eventual demise, till their eventual death.

In the church today, it's often not much different. Many people come to the church for primarily consumeristic reasons, for primarily therapeutic reasons, to have their woes solved so that they can just solve those problems and feel okay.

A lot of sermons are preached primarily with therapeutic emphases just to make people comforted and feel okay. And so it's not a wonder that many in the church are also plagued by a malaise, a sadness, a despair, because they do not have a good sense of what their purpose is.

Well, the good news, part of the good news that God has given us in Jesus Christ is that He has given us a wonderful purpose. He has called us to something high and something excellent, something that you can get out of bed for each morning.

He has called us to good works. Good works are our purpose, as we see in this passage. So I'd like for you to consider what Titus 2 .14 says, what it says about Christ's purposes in redeeming us and how that gives us our own purpose that we ought to pursue wholeheartedly.

Redemption from Lawlessness and Purification for God’s Possession

It says here in verse 14, He gave Himself up for us to redeem us from all lawlessness. Jesus Christ has redeemed us from all lawlessness. Now the notion of redemption means that we were owned by something that we had to be.

Bought out of.

To redeem is to buy out of something. So we were slaves to lawlessness, slaves in multiple senses. There is a political sense of this bondage where our identity was one as a slave to lawlessness and we were headed to death.

And there is also a spiritual sense of this slavery, that we are not capable of doing any good because we are ones who are given over to our sinful nature. This is the state of man before Jesus Christ redeems him out of lawlessness, that he is totally depraved, that he's unable to do any good because even those outwardly good things that he might do are not attended with an inward heart of faith that honors God as it ought.

And so absolutely no work that that man does is pleasing to God, even if outwardly he might do things that are according to God's law. But Christ has redeemed us out of this. He has by His own death paid the penalty for our sins that we might be bought out of that state, not just forgiven but bought out of that state of lawlessness.

This is the purpose of Christ's death. And I'll say as a side note, I find this a very good question to ask people when I'm talking to them about Christianity, especially those who likely have very little exposure to Christianity.

If you ask them, if you ask them, are they familiar with Christianity, they'll usually say yes because they know something about it. But I'll usually quickly follow up with, and for example, if I asked you, do you know why Jesus had to die, would you have an answer for that?

And so if you throw that in with your question, that gives them an opportunity to say, oh, well, I guess I don't understand it that well. So it's a very important, critical part of our faith, why Jesus came to die.

He came to die to redeem us, that is, forgiving us of our sins but also purchasing us out of that state of bondage. It says also, in addition to redeeming us from all lawlessness, He has purified us. He has purified for Himself a people for His own possession.

And so He has cleansed us from sin, He has made us fit for His purposes. So just because we have been forgiven does not make us fit for His purposes, right? That alone is not sufficient. We need to be purified, we need to be made holy for something else, right?

If you tell your child, don't go outside and play in the mud, he goes outside and plays in the mud, you might forgive him for going outside and playing in the mud, but he's not fit to come into the house and do the things he needs to do in the house until he is cleansed on top of that.

So it's not just forgiveness that is necessary but also a holy status that we might be able to do God's works, that we might be fit for His honorable purposes. And then on top of purifying us, it says that He has made us a people for Himself, for His own possession, who are zealous for good works.

People for His own possession, zealous for good works. We are the inheritance of Jesus Christ. He has inherited all things, but most especially He has inherited a people, and He has inherited them for His particular purposes, and He identifies this particular purpose here as good works.

So if you consider the trajectory we have here, right, there's the lawless state that we're in, we're redeemed out of that, and then we are purified for good works. The words of Isaiah 1, 16 through 17, cease to do evil, learn to do good.

Redeemed out of lawlessness for good works. Cease to do evil and learn to do good. So what are good works? Let me go ahead and give you a formal definition that I'll be working with, not just in this sermon but throughout the rest of the series.

Good works are the graces of God's Spirit within us and the actions that flow from them. The graces of God's Spirit within us and the actions that flow from them. So there's several things that I don't mean when I say good works.

What Good Works Are Not: Supererogation, Charity Only, or Merely Outward Deeds

The first is the Roman Catholic notion of supererogation, if you've never heard me talk about that before, you don't know what that is. That refers to the idea that God is required of every man this much, and you can also go above that, above and beyond what God has required.

This is how a lot of people think about good works. You don't have to be Roman Catholic to think this way about good works, that God is required this much, and when I do this much, those are the good works.

God has required perfection from everyone. There's no way that you can exceed what God has required. Matthew 5, 48 says, you therefore must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. God has required perfection.

The servant who has done what his master requires cannot say anything other than, I've simply done what the master requires. I'm an unprofitable servant, unprofitable meaning if you think of profit as going beyond what your initial value is, there's nothing being added there, unprofitable, there's nothing profited.

So good works are not supererogation. Good works are also not strictly acts of charity. So if you imagine good works as being, okay, well, that's when you help the poor and needy, you go serve soup kitchens, you go give money to the poor, that kind of thing, that's also not strictly what I mean by good works.

Those would be included in it, but that is not all of it. There's also not those works that are merely outward in nature. As I mentioned a moment ago, those who do outward works but without that inward condition of faith, these are not good works at all.

These are not things that God finds pleasing at all, even if they externally accord with God's law. And good works are not things that are necessarily outward either. They can merely be internal. When you are thinking right thoughts about God, when you are praying even internally, these things are good works.

Okay, so good works, when I speak of this, I'm not just talking about acts of charity, I'm not just talking about big things, I'm talking about all kinds of things that God.

Would require.

I am talking about simply lawfulness. You see here that Christ has redeemed us from all lawlessness, so what is He redeeming us.

To?

Lawfulness.

Good works is simply lawfulness. He has called us to abide by His law. He has called us to a wholehearted law-keeping. Now just to prove this, consider this. Scripture tells us that faith without works is dead.

It gives us an assurance that every believer is going to have good works. It also tells us that the criminal on the cross has true faith, but yet what are the criminal on the cross's good works? He did not really have time in his life to do many outward things other than confess that Jesus is Lord.

And so if Scripture is true, and it says that the real faith is attended by good works, criminal on the cross has real faith, he must have good works. And so good works include more than just the volunteering at soup kitchens, etc., these kinds of very outward things, it includes all sorts of ways that we would honor God in our thoughts, in our words, and in our deeds.

It covers all of those things. Now consider what this means for the law of God. It means that the law of God is good. It may help to think through the three uses of the law. When I say the three uses of the law, a lot of times people think about the threefold distinction of the law, if you're familiar with that, moral, civil, ceremonial.

If you don't know what that is, don't worry about it. I'm not talking about the three uses of the law. And if you read other people on this, a lot of times they'll be numbered differently and they'll be talked about differently, so they're not very standardized.

But the three uses of the law are as a curb, as a mirror, and as a guide.

Okay?

So the law as a curb shows you, or it restrains you from sinful actions, it restrains you from lawlessness. The law as a mirror shows you where you have erred so that you see your need for Jesus Christ, for forgiveness from sins, and the law as a guide shows you what you ought to do and how you ought to live pursuing good works.

Okay?

So the law as a curb restraining sin, is a mirror to see your need for forgiveness where you have erred, and is also a guide. Now when most people, especially evangelicals, consider the question of whether or not God's law is good, they know that Scripture has said God's law is good.

They know that Romans 7, 12 has said the law is holy, the commandment is holy, and righteous and good. And in Romans 7, the context there is about righteousness, so a lot of people think about it this way.

Well, the law is not good as a means for righteousness because no one is righteous apart from the righteousness of Christ, right? Like we have no righteousness of our own from good works. We know that from many passages.

This is a really important part of our faith that our righteousness doesn't come from ourselves, it comes from Jesus Christ. And so the alternative seems to be, well, the law is good to show us our need for Jesus Christ, our need for forgiveness.

So many times when people are answering that question, they're saying, no, not for righteousness sake, but to see our need for forgiveness. So not for righteousness sake, but for the second use of the law, as a mirror.

And this really is a false dichotomy because there are other uses of the law than just as a mirror to see your need for forgiveness. Another use of the law is as a curb to restrain sin. Another use is as a guide to know what to do for good works.

So what is this passage saying here? 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. The law is not just good to show us our need for forgiveness, the law is also good to restrain.

Sin.

The law is also good as a guide for good works. And these are not just things that is good for in abstract. These are things that are especially empowered by the good news of the gospel so that the one who is to appreciate the gospel and enjoy the gospel most fully cannot do so apart from knowing God's law, apart from hearing about the restraining of sin, what sins he ought to avoid, hearing what good works he ought to pursue.

It is only through the first use and the third use in addition to the second use of the law that people can fully appreciate the gospel. So this is not, so the law is not just good to show you your need for forgiveness, the law is also good even in a gospel context, even in the context of Christ having done a work in us because we have been empowered to restrain from sin and we have been empowered to pursue good works.

These are ways that the law itself, that the law itself is good for us. Now there are all kinds of ways that people reject the law thinking that they're upholding the law sufficiently good but somewhat allergic to the first and third uses of the law.

What are some of those ways? Well the first one is very obvious, that's pure licentiousness, right? This is a very rare thing where there's someone who claims to be a follower of Christ but he believes that the law has no power over him so he can sin however he wants and there's no implication or consequence of any kind.

I have met someone like this before, believed it was perfectly alright for him to get drunk all he wanted, to fornicate all he wanted because Christ has set us free from the law and scripture is so clear that this is not how we are supposed to think of the law.

Are we to continue sinning that grace may abound? May it never be. We've been set free from lawlessness, we've been set free from lawlessness. But there are other ways that people do this as well. A lot of times people identify meditating on the law as legalism, right?

The Bible proclaims multiple times that we ought to meditate on the law of God but sometimes when Christians see other Christians meditating on the law of God they'll say, ooh, that seems legalistic. You know, didn't the Pharisees have an unhealthy focus on the law of God?

Well, they had an unhealthy application of the law of God to make it something that is for their righteousness but it wasn't the focus in and of itself as though the law isn't worthy of meditation, as though God's word and his commandments aren't worthy of meditation.

They are worthy of meditation. So it is not, yeah, that is not the problem. And you see this from, and sometimes when the Bible's talking about the law it's talking about scripture in general. Many times though when it's talking about meditating on the law it is talking about particularly commandments.

If you've ever interacted with many Eastern Orthodox folks, they'll a lot of times accuse evangelicals of bibliolatry, like worshiping the Bible because they read it so much and care about what it says so much, you know, they say they're worshiping the Bible.

This is an unhealthy focus on the Bible. This is the way a lot of people treat those who would think deep thoughts about God's.

Law.

This is unhealthy. This is overzealous. This is legalistic. But it is not, it's not wrong to meditate on God's law. And the one who does meditate on God's law will arrive at specific conclusions, they'll arrive at deeper thoughts, and a lot of times those deeper thoughts are identified as legalistic.

It's okay to have big abstract thoughts about the law, you know, it's wrong to, you know, it's wrong to use the Lord's name in vain, but thinking more specifically, a lot of times these things will be identified as legalism.

Psalm 119 .96 says, I have seen a limit to all perfection, but your commandment is exceedingly broad. The commandments of God are exceedingly broad. The more you meditate on them, the more you will know all the specific applications of.

Them.

So that example I just gave you of the third commandment, I shall not take the Lord thy God's name in vain, that's one where Christians can all agree, yes, we should not take the Lord's name in vain. And as I've meditated on that and come to certain conclusions for my own life and the things that I'd like to pursue in pursuing that, I have had conversations with people where they have been very disturbed that I would try to pursue it with more specificity just than the broad command of not use the Lord's name in vain.

You know, I was talking to someone recently, maybe a few months ago, and said that I wanted to try to refrain from using the word unfortunate because you should not ascribe things that belong to providence to fortune, to some kind of pagan notion of fate.

Now I know that most people, when they say that, they're using it colloquially. The same time, I really do want, in my words, to honor God by trying to avoid, as much as I can, words like unfortunate.

That is very disturbing to people to hear that I would arrive at more specific conclusions, but this is what happens when you meditate on the law of God. You come to more specific conclusions. A lot of times, also, people will erect unreasonable standards for ascertaining and discerning the law of God, right?

For example, we just finished a 14-week Sunday school series about family worship, household.

Worship.

I'd encourage you to go check that out if you weren't part of it. Many people, when they hear about household worship, they ask for chapter and verse. Now there are many verses that apply to this. There's Joshua's statement that it's for me and my house, we'll serve the Lord, talking about worshiping the Lord.

There's all kinds of patterns about morning and evening worship throughout Scripture. There are the statements about how a father is supposed to look after his family and his children and teach them the word of God.

And so there's not a single verse that describes morning, evening family worship, yet all the pieces combined, you see that to follow God, really, there's a reason why saints in ages past have regarded this of a certain duty, yet many people erect some standard where they need to see it in the most explicit terms in order to affirm it.

Or statements about online church, right? The Bible has called us to gather together. It's talked about our authority as a church to make the declarations we make as being something that happens when we gather, wherever two or three are present, there I am among.

You.

Yet many people would say that, yeah, I need to see a verse that says online church is not real church, right? Well, you're not going to find something in the New Testament that talks about online.

Church.

It did not exist at the time. So people erect all kinds of standards, and then they also want to uphold cultural norms,.

Right?

If I were to, they scoff at certain conclusions about the law because they just seem so foreign to the culture, right? If I make a comment about hormonal birth control being a problem, it's like, well, that couldn't be because so many people use it.

Or the Sabbath abiding, well, that couldn't be because so many Christians go out to eat after church, right? And I even know that in saying these things and giving you some examples, and I do think it's important to give you examples, it may be that some of the examples I've pulled out are not ones you agree with and are right now inhibiting you from listening to the rest of the message because you hear what I'm saying, right?

So like there's just this reaction that happens when people hear the law of God in deeper thoughts about the law of God, and I know I'm not able to go to explain all these things, I'm just giving them as examples, but maybe you can even realize if you did have such a reaction in yourself as you're hearing this, like just how easily the heart reacts to these things.

Another way that people reject the law and denigrate the law is by looking down on rebuke. You know, the Bible commands rebuke for brothers many times, even calling others to repentance outside the church many times it tells us that.

A lot of people would look at rebuke as being something that is unnecessarily judgmental, that it's elevating yourself over others and not considering that you are a sinner too. Well, certainly you shouldn't forget that you are a sinner saved by grace, but it is not, yeah, it's not the case that that means that rebuke is now no longer commanded by.

Scripture.

A lot of people are concerned, well, if you rebuke someone, that would suggest that you're looking down on them or you're disgusted by them or their sin, and I understand part of what's being said, like if you really consider, if you think that yourself apart from Christ is better than them apart from Christ, there's a problem, right?

But consider what the Bible says about notions like disgust and loathing. Psalm 158, I look at the faithless with disgust because they do not keep your commands. You have this statement in Scripture that it's right and good to be disgusted by sin, to even be disgusted by the sinner, and many Christians go out of their way to tell the world that they are not disgusted by them, right, that it's just the commands of God that are against their lifestyle, et cetera, and they want to affirm that, you know, I'm not personally offended by this, I'm not disgusted by any of this, but that's a problem.

Ezekiel 36, 31 talks about the new heart that we receive. It says, then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations.

The right Christian attitude towards self, if you don't want to elevate self over the other, right, if that's the concern here, the right Christian attitude towards self when you have the new heart is to loathe your own self apart from Christ.

The only way that you should have a good self-image or a self-love is knowing that in Christ you are perfect. It is there that you can have a good self-love, et cetera, but you are called to loathe yourself apart from Christ.

Now, if this is the case, then who is the one who is hypocritical, the one who is disgusted by sin or the one who is not disgusted? It would be the one who is not disgusted because he's supposed to think about himself the same as the other, right, to loathe that state apart from Christ, and this is not inconsistent with compassion.

To the degree that the image of God is in someone, to the degree that they are made in the image of God, you should have compassion on them. To the degree which it is corrupted, that should be abhorrent to you.

So these are the commands we have in Scripture about the attitude we ought to have, but a lot of people are so concerned about exuding any kind of judgmental attitude that would express a disgust at sin, this thing that the psalmist is saying is a good thing, that they don't want to speak about the law because they don't want to come off as self-righteous.

Well, certainly you shouldn't be self-righteous, and there are ways of speaking self-righteously that you should avoid, but, yeah, it is right to rebuke. And this is something that many people just have a very, many people, because I describe all the ways people reject the law, many people have a lot of difficulty hearing it.

Titus 2 .15, I do not think it is without cause that this comes immediately after Titus 2 .15, or Titus 2 .14. It says, declare these things exhort, rebuke with all authority, let no one disregard you.

A lot of people interpret that, let no one disregard you, as live in a respectable manner so that people respect you and you gain their ears. Better interpreters, like, for example, Calvin, have concluded that this is saying people have such delicate ears that are not inclined to listen to the difficult things of Scripture or even the simple things of Scripture, and they will reject you, so be ready to correct that with all authority.

So Paul, in writing to Titus, is anticipating, anticipating the rejection of such truths. So now, having considered the goodness of the law, consider the statement about good.

God’s Possession, His Purpose, and the Chief End of Man

Works.

He has made a people for his own possession, okay, he has owned us, he has possessed us, he has purchased us, redeeming us out of slavery, now we are his own possession. We are in bondage before, now we are in a new kind of bondage, a bondage to a better master, a good master.

And he has, this is very similar to the statements made about Israel, there's a way the church fulfills the statements made about Israel being God's possession. Let me read a few verses to you. Psalm 138, and he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities.

How is that fulfilled? Right here in Titus 2 .14, how does he redeem Israel from all her iniquities? He redeems this people from lawlessness, he redeems the church from lawlessness. Ezekiel 37 .23, but I will save them from all the backslidings in which they have sinned and will cleanse them, and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.

Very similar phrasing here in Ezekiel. He's purchasing them, he's cleansing them, and then they are his people. Deuteronomy 7 .6, for you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.

So God having chosen Israel to be his treasured possession ultimately points forward to us being an eternal treasured possession in a way that Israel was a temporal one, right, for a particular land, for a particular people.

Now we are this transcending kingdom that he has purchased for himself. Now ownership implies purpose, okay? If you own something, you decide what its purpose is. If I own a piece of wood, I get to decide this wood's purpose is to become a table, this wood's purpose is to become a house, this wood's purpose is to go into a fire, et cetera.

So ownership determines purpose. If Christ owns us, he determines our purpose. If you are slaves to lawlessness, if you're in bondage to lawlessness, what is your purpose? Your purpose is to be lawless.

That is your only purpose, right? But if you are owned by Jesus Christ, if you are his possession, then your purpose is as it describes here. It is to be redeemed from lawlessness, to be zealous for good works.

This is the purpose that he has given us. Now some people would reject this as being the great purpose of man, good works. It doesn't sound quite like what you've heard before, maybe. Consider Westminster, short of catechism, question one.

Some of you here know this, right? What is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is to, anybody know, glorify God and enjoy him forever. This is the real purpose of man, right? To glorify God and enjoy him forever.

Good works sounds different than that. Well, is it really? How do you glorify God except for by good works? How do you enjoy him apart from him working in you in good works? And I don't say this just on my own interpretation of things.

I have a direct testimony from Christ on this one. John 15, verse 8 says, By this my Father is glorified. Okay, how do you glorify God? By this my Father is glorified. That you bear much fruit. He's talking about good works.

That you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love. Just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.

So he's talking about commandments, keep my commandments, etc. These things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full. Do you see what he's saying? How is it that you glorify God?

Bearing fruit, good works. How is it that you have joy? Obeying my commandments. The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. This is not something that you can have apart from good works.

So good works are not heavy law put on you to condemn you. There is now therefore no condemnation on those who are in Christ Jesus. Good works are the way you experience the glories of the gospel as God is working in you so that you are glorifying him and enjoying him.

Now, the one who is fulfilling his purpose is a happy person. Okay, God is perfectly happy. He's perfectly content and blessed because he is the source of all purpose. He is the source of all meaning.

You see the book of Ecclesiastes, which a lot of people realize when they're reading it, this is a guy who's wrestling with what is the purpose of man? What is the purpose in life? And what's his conclusion at the end?

How do you be happy? How do you find your purpose? His conclusion at the end is, the end of the matter, as all has been heard, fear God and keep his commandments for this is the whole duty of man. He decides that this is his purpose, fear God and keep his commandments.

This is not a heavy burden. This is the path to happiness. And consider existentialists, right? If you don't know what an existentialist is, an existentialist is someone who believes that there is no inherent purpose or meaning to anything except for what they slap on after the fact.

Essence, you know, being, existence. That comes before, or sorry, yeah, existence precedes essence. So something exists and then you slap meaning on it after the fact. Okay, so if you exist, you have no inherent meaning, you slap some meaning on it after the fact.

And you say, okay, well, my purpose is to do these things or to have fun or whatever the case may be. It's no wonder that existentialists have a reputation for being a sad, depressed bunch.

Right?

It's because, and a lot of times people talk about someone having an existential crisis. You know, they don't know what they're here for. They have no happiness because they have no purpose. But we live in an essentialist world.

Essence precedes existence. God had a purpose for us before the world was even created. And he has made us for that purpose so that we can enjoy it and be happy. A couple of verses, Psalm 48, 40 verse 8.

I delight to do your will, O my God. Your law is within my heart. You know, this is the psalmist's delight. Psalm 119, 35. Lead me in the path of your commandments, for I delight in it. You know, this is the delight of the psalmist.

This is his purpose. You know, scripture talks about the folly of putting a light under a bushel, right? You don't do that because that's contrary to life's purpose. Anyone who bought the light bought it to do something else other than that, to shine, not to be dark.

And so if you put it under a bushel, it's not a happy light. Now, of course, light has no consciousness to be happy or not happy. But we do, and as our purposes are not fulfilled, they are. Yeah, we end up in despair and a lack of happiness.

How to Hear the Preaching of God’s Word and Cultivate Zeal for Good Works

Now, considering all this, putting it into practice, what are you to do? First, I'd like to offer some ways that you can hear the preaching of God's Word. There's a lot of specific things I could talk about, about studying God's Word, etc.

We're going to be talking about this for a number of weeks, so let me just talk about how you hear the preaching of God's Word. Hear it with a desire to understand the law. You should hear it with a desire to understand the law.

It is like you should come eager, knowing that, hey, I'm coming here to be a more full person, to more fulfill my purposes, and I know that that happens by me understanding God's will for my life in a greater way, and that's what I'm here eager for.

Right?

Non-moral agents fulfill their purposes automatically, you know, like that wood that I mentioned, right? If I own the piece of wood and I throw it in the fire, it just does its job. It is the—it's fulfilling its purpose.