Book of Titus - Ch. 2, vv. 2-3

All right, they're still working out some issues, but we'll go ahead and get started for our purposes. If y 'all would like to turn to Titus chapter 2, we've been working our way verse by verse through the first, well, technically the second of the pastoral epistles.

We're going through all three of them, but we started with Titus. And we finished up chapter 1 a couple of weeks ago, which was a lengthy study in and of itself as we took a deep dive into the qualifications of elders, pastors, things like that.

Sound Doctrine That Is Lived Out in the Church

As we move into chapter 2, though, we are going to see the focus shift from the leaders of local churches to the members of local churches. And Paul is going to give us, well, specifically Titus, and by extension, all of Titus' successors, pastors throughout the ages, some instruction on how to help disciple and shepherd their flock, so to speak.

And so that's what we've been talking about. We got through verse 2 of chapter 2 last week, and so we'll just kind of pick it up right where we left off. Well, let's go ahead and read the first couple of verses together.

It says in verse 1 of chapter 2, Paul says, but speak thou the things which become sound doctrine. Now, obviously the but there is for some contrast. The previous six or seven verses right above it in chapter 1, Paul is warning Titus about the enemy that he will face as a young pastor, as well as the enemies, the false teachers that these newly appointed elders will face upon beginning their ministry.

And so for contrast, with all of the negative character traits that Paul gives Titus in the final verses of chapter 1, he gives us some, again, contrast right there at the beginning of chapter 2 by saying, but what you're going to do, Titus, is this.

You are going to speak the things which become sound doctrine. Now, it's an interesting way to put it because Paul didn't simply say speak sound doctrine. He kind of said that in chapter 1. So obviously there is a time and a place for the pastor to get up and to preach doctrinally sound sermons and exposition and so on and so forth.

But what Paul specifically pulls out here in verse 1 is that he wants Titus to speak the things that will become sound doctrine. What that means is literally how it is lived out by the people he is preaching to.

So I want you to speak the things that will be lived out by your congregation in such a way as to allow the world to see that you are under the learning of sound doctrine, that you are not only hearing it, but that you are living it as well.

And let's see what that begins to look like. Beginning in verse 2. That the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in charity, in patience. Obviously, the audience that Paul has in mind here, or at least segment of the congregation he is speaking to, are the older men, aged men there.

He's talking about old men and the Greek term that is used biblically speaking, but even in a lot of other contemporaneous works at that time, basically anyone about the age of 50, 55 and up. So it's not only talking about the most elderly in the church that perhaps are under the care of some of the younger generations, but this is simply talking about older people that have lots of life experience and that have, because of that, have a lot of experience to share to the next generations.

We're actually going to see that in some later verses, not today, but we'll eventually get.

To that.

So we're talking about older men specifically here, and we kind of outlined a number of notes last week, but I'd like to kind of pick it up right in the middle of our thoughts on this verse from last week.

We were talking about the fact that ageism is kind of one of the last accepted isms left in our current culture, culture in the West. Racism is obviously out, sexism is out, chauvinism, you can go down the list, but ageism is still.

Okay.

It's still okay for younger generations to degrade the older generations and use derogatory terms and tones and things like that toward them. And usually, at least this is more anecdotal than anything, it seems in observing that it has a lot to do with just, you know, as soon as a particular generation gets to the point where they can't keep up with the tech evolution, that's when they're kind of pushed to the side and considered elderly, live their years, stay out of our way kind of attitude.

And that particular attitude isn't unique to the secular world, it is just as pervasive in the church world, so to speak, as well. And you can see that in the way that services are conducted, you can see that in the things that churches do to attract new audiences, I'll just, I think that's a more appropriate term than anything, and it's mainly to appeal to the younger generations.

And so we talked at length about how the Bible, in contrast to all that, uplifts the older generations in crystal clear terms, it doesn't beat around the bush at all, we even talked about the fact that in the Mosaic law, when the law was delivered to Moses and Moses then delivered that to the people in the context they were living in, the elderly, the elders, both men and women alike, were to be so revered that if they were to be degraded in any way, shape, or form by the younger generations, the death penalty ensued.

And so it sounds severe, but think about it for a second. God ordained a specific story, for lack of a better term, for His humans, for His people. From infancy all the way through death, every age of life serves a particular purpose, and yes, it's different, the stages are different, and humans interact with each other, things in their lives change over time.

We go through phases, there may be a particular phase that people like to glorify more than others, maybe that's the 20s, maybe that's the 30s, I don't even know. Maybe there's a specific phase that everyone wants to glorify, but that's not how God designed it, He didn't want a specific phase glorified, He wanted men and women to be able to live to their fullest potential and to thrive in each and every phase in life.

And apparently, it's not a new problem for the older generations to be talked down to by the younger generations, because Moses took it very seriously, of course, as an agent of God. And so this is kind of some of the stuff we're talking about, let me read a couple of verses to y 'all, y 'all can jot them down if you want to, but they're so brief, you don't necessarily have to turn there.

And Job 12 .12, just to give y 'all a taste, I mean, we could break off into a lengthy study on the way that the Bible, again, reveres and honors the aged, but just for the sake of getting some progress through our Titus study here, Job 12 .12 says, With the ancient is wisdom, and in length of days is understanding.

Now that idea right there, you got in the oldest book of the Bible there in Job, but you also have that idea just sprinkled throughout the Proverbs, you have that idea hit up through the Psalms as well, there's a number of Psalms we could look at that hash out that idea even.

More.

With the ancient is wisdom, the length of days is understanding. If that is true, then that means the older generations have lots to offer. And it is to the demise of the younger generations if they ignore it, and it's usually by choice.

In Leviticus, going back to the Levitical law, 1932, it says, Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head and honor the face of the old man and fear thy God. I am the Lord. So again, time and time and time again, you have God putting the fear into his people, the Israelites, to ensure that they are honoring the age to the elderly, their elders in such a way as to not be in disobedience to the Lord.

And again, they should do it in fear because this is a direct command from the Lord Himself. And that imperative flows right into the New Testament as well. That's not unique to the Mosaic law, so it's not like we're in a new dispensation now and that applied to them.

No, the apostles took it just as seriously. I just thought that those were a couple of good passages, again, just to give you a taste of how the Bible reveres the age. Again, in the Psalms, we learn that even in old age, the godly man will yield much fruit.

Just think about that for a second. The older man will yield much fruit. He will continue to grow. And the way the Psalms puts it, the way that Dave puts it in one of the Psalms is that like a cedar in Lebanon, they will continue to grow even in older age.

Now, from the human viewpoint and certainly from the secular mind, it's the older age, older ages where fruit bearing of various kinds start to die down to where they just kind of retire into the sunset with no one paying attention.

But in biblical terms, the fruit bearing not only continues, but is exponential. It's like compound fruit bearing from the time you were a young person all the way through your final days. You continue to grow like a cedar in Lebanon.

Now, the fruit bearing might be different. It might be different than how it looked in your 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, etc. But it's still happening. That wisdom is being imparted. That experience, hard lessons learned are being delivered to the next generation so that they don't have to learn it the hard way.

Not necessarily that mistakes were made. Sometimes it's by mistakes, but sometimes it's just hard living just in the grind and passing on that experience to the young generation, the younger generation, so that they can learn from all of it themselves.

And so David, again, took it very seriously. The fact that we need to continue to revere those that are aged just as much as anyone.

Else.

Now, back to Titus. In Titus here, Paul is telling him, that being Titus, what one of the results of sound doctrine.

Will be.

One of the results of sound doctrine. What does sound doctrine become? Well, it becomes in one manifestation the older men that are to be respected and that are to be essentially counselors to disciple the younger generations.

They will be sober. They will be grave. They will be temperate. They'll be sound in the faith. They'll be loving. They will be patient. Just a quick note, when we get to 1 Timothy, so this is in verse 2 of Titus chapter 2 here, we see these character traits put in the positive.

When we get to our study in 1 Timothy, we actually see what it looks like when the older men aren't living up to this standard that Paul is giving here in Titus. And what the young Timothy is to do about it.

And so it's not like as soon as you have some old guys in a congregation, they're going to be perfection. They're going to be anything and everything they need to be based on God's standards of living for them each and every time.

No, there will be times where the pastor, even a younger pastor, may have to entreat and there's a particular Greek term that is used in 1 Timothy, we'll get there eventually, that it essentially means to rebuke, but Paul throws in some qualifiers.

It is done in a very specific way. The way you would come alongside your own father with respect and reverence and honor and talk to him about an issue that is manifesting himself. That is how older men are to be addressed, even when they're in the wrong in a local congregation.

And so we'll get to that when we get to 1 Timothy. But in Titus here, it's put in the positive side. Let's take a look at some of these words that are in verse 2. Sober is the first one. In chapter 1 of the same book, the English word sober is used, but it's a different Greek.

Term.

And in chapter 1, Paul is referencing self-control of the mind, having control over oneself. But here in chapter 2, verse 2, it means what we consider, when we think of sober, that's what it means here.

In other words, not drunken. Now it can be used metaphorically. This Greek term can be used metaphorically to basically just refer to, to give the person the commandment to not be overindulgent in anything.

Obviously that would apply to drink, but it could apply to anything else as well. To be moderate, to live moderately, not to be overly indulgent, not to be drunk is the literal meaning of the Greek term for sober here.

Like we mentioned earlier, last week we talked about this a little bit. This is a sin, alcoholism is a sin that can be very common among the aged. And that's not a problem unique to any one generation, because apparently 2 ,000 years ago when Paul is warning Titus about the things to look for in the way that the elderly men should conduct themselves in the congregation, this was a concern of Paul.

They need to be sober, they can't be drunk, they need to have self-control over their whole bodies, and that certainly includes drunkenness as well. So alcoholism isn't a sin unique to any generation.

This goes way back throughout time, and Paul is addressing it here. It is a problem in every generation. The old men need to be sober, literally and metaphorically as well. He says they need to be grave.

What that could mean is they essentially need to be worthy of respect. So we are commanded to respect them, but they also need to be worthy of respect as well. It's not a one-way street in that sense.

We need to respect them, but they need to be worthy of respect, live in such a way that we want to respect them even more. They need to be worthy of respect, they need to be serious about life is what it means to be grave in this context.

They need to be serious about life. They're not flippant about anything, they're not unserious about anything. And there's a really odd, now this is, again, something that is more of an observation than anything, but it might not be all that new either, but there's a really odd thing, and it's a somewhat contorted, just messed up, disfigured picture.

In any culture, when you see an older person that is indulging themselves in the same types of immodest things that the younger generations do, in other words, when you see old people so afraid of their age, when the Bible talks about it in the context of it being a beautiful thing, when they're so afraid of it that they need to feel like they are sticking with the young crowds, and they're doing whatever they can to do that, there's something that just is observably wrong about it.

Nothing looks right about it. It looks weird. It doesn't look quite right. And so when you talk about the older generation being grave, being serious about the right things, being worthy of respect, you have a modesty that comes with the life experience of their years, the years that they have lived.

And there are times, though, when age is such a fear for the older people that they start trying to live like the young generations, and then you have two problems. Number one, you have no discipleship taking place.

So all the experience they've had to get them to the point where they are, all of that is being thrown out the window, and they are now indulging in perhaps immodest behavior. And I use immodest somewhat loosely.

That could be applied to emotional immodesty. That could be applied to verbal immodesty. In other words, they want to sound young, so they're adopting whatever vernacular the young people use, and that's how they talk.

It could be immodest economically. They could just be blowing whatever money they have, not even caring about the next generation or building any kind of legacy. They could be immodest in confrontation.

So one of the things that old people have going on for them through those years of experience is that they have learned how to deal with a wide array of situations, confrontation being one of them. And there is wisdom that could be applied there, but sometimes it's a learned wisdom.

Well, we see that all around us as well. This immodesty in the relationships and confrontation and blowing up about things and basically being self-seeking, even though they have all of the years of experience to show that that's not the way to yield any kind of happiness.

And then ultimately, it can turn into the immodesty that comes to mind when you hear that word, and that being sexual immodesty. Again, it is quite the contorted picture when you see the older generations stooping down to remain in the glory years of the 20s, 30s, 40s, whatever it is, and to feel quote-unquote young again.

It just doesn't work, and it doesn't look normal either. And sin, it's a seedbed for a very fertile ground for sins and for wasted time and for younger generations to be missing out on the experience that they could be getting and learning from them.

So to be grave in this context is to be at the point in life when you take everything.

Seriously.

That is the way these old men in Titus' congregation, but how all of them throughout the island of Crete, need to be living. They need to take life seriously. They know what time it is, so to speak. They know that it is time to impart as much wisdom as they possibly can.

By living a life based upon biblically defined self-control, something we've talked about a number of times in this study, having self-control of themselves, the aged men actually become a constraint for the younger men and the younger women in the sense that what they're doing is they're looking at them, they're discipling them, and they are encouraging wisdom by providing all of the life stories and experiences and lessons learned that they had to learn the.

Hard way.

So by constraint, what I mean by that is that when you are in a healthy congregation that's very diverse among all of the age groups, and you have the older people living up to their biblical calling to minister to the younger generations, what you have is them constraining some of the youthful blunders that the younger generations may have fallen into, the pitfalls that they could walk into.

Those could be avoided. There can be constraints put on the damage done by youth when the older generations are doing what they're supposed to do, and that is a part of what it means to be grave, to be serious, and to be passing on these types of things.

Now the next word that Paul uses is temperate. I won't spend a lot of time on this one. It simply means to be discreet, to be discerning, to be sensible. Of course, that is a very natural attribute that follows gravity that we just talked about.

A lot.

Now here's the thing, though. What have we looked at so far? Sober, sobriety, to be grave, to be serious about life, to be temperate. The thing is, as good as all of those character traits are, these particular things we've talked about so far, if you think about it, they would be expected from just about any cultural scenario you find yourself in, even the ungodly ones.

So even if you're in a more pagan culture, there's still going to be some borrowed character from the Christian religion because everyone knows that there has to be a limited principle somewhere and people have to live a certain way to keep things orderly.

No one wants chaos, no one wants anarchy. Even if their worldview demands it, they're still going to borrow from the Christian worldview to keep that from happening, and this is one of the ways they do it.

And so you expect sobriety, you expect a sense of gravity, a sense of seriousness, a sense of discretion from old people regardless of whether they're Christian or not. So what does Paul do here? Paul, knowing this, is going to add a little bit of extra to his list here to kind of make the Christian aspect of his audience and of these people in these local churches really.

Pop out.

So what's the next thing that he says? He says that they need to be soundly faithful, they need to be sound in the faith, they need to be full of love, they need to be full of charity, and they need to be full of patience.

You have a thought, Dad? Yeah, text me your passcode.

It's too long, it's too long. It's alright, I'll come do it in just a minute, I'm almost done. So they need to be full of love, they need to be full of patience, and they need to be sound in the faith themselves.

Now a man of old age, when you're talking about older people and you look at them, and you look at them in a local church, what you want to find, and what you will find in a very healthy body, is that their faith is getting stronger and stronger.

Again, it's exponential, in fact, it's compounding. When you live a life in the Word, under strong teaching, so think about it just for a second, you have Titus the pastor, he's doing the preaching, he's preaching the sound doctrine, but what does that sound doctrine become?

How is it lived out? And the older men, what that looks like, is you have a life, a lifetime, of abiding in God's Word, of hearing sound doctrine, of hearing good preaching, of discipling the younger generations, and you have a compounding effect in your faith.

And so Paul is saying these older men, this is what they should look like, they should be sound in the faith, it's getting stronger and stronger, giving them the ability to be brave, to be serious about life, in the best sense.

And by the way, to be serious about life doesn't mean you're boring. So that's not the sense that Paul is getting at here, he's not trying to say that these guys are to just be fuddy-duddies, boring, sitting over there, waiting to impart wisdom when they are sought after, no.

They are involved, they're part of their kids' lives, their grandkids' lives, Lord willing, their great-grandkids' lives, and the lives of the youth in the congregation. There's lots of fun to be had.

When you are living a life and you are imparting the kind of love, because that's the very next thing talked about, you're sound in the faith, but also in charity and in patience, that love is going to manifest itself in so many ways, and one of them is fun.

And so Paul's not trying to give the connotation of boring old people, that's not what he's talking about when he says they are to be grave and to be serious. They're serious in the best way. They're serious about the things that are most pleasing to God, that is probably the best way to summarize it.

He is loving in a way, so that's the next thing in verse 2, after being sound in the faith, in charity as well, sound in charity, sound in love. He's loving in a way that may be more difficult for those who have been through a long and often tough life.

We talked about this a little bit last week. There's a lot of bitterness in old age.

Why?

Because people have been batted around for 50, 60, 70, 80 years. And life is very tough, and it's tough because of the fall, and because of the fall it makes it really, really tough to come out of that with the character of rejoicing in all things.

That can be tough. There are plenty of temptations to keep our older brothers and sisters from living in such a way. But despite, the kind of man that Paul is talking about here is despite the tough life, despite the long seasons they've been through.

Remember Jacob when he appeared before Pharaoh, and Pharaoh impressed beyond all comprehension, seeing his offspring and what Joseph has done. He says, I'm paraphrasing, but what has life been like? How did you do all of this?

And Jacob's response is that his years have been short and evil. And he's of course touching on the brevity of life. He's talking about the concept that life is but a vapor, life is but a breath, life is vanity that Solomon of course expanded on many centuries later, but that it's also been.

Evil.

And this is the patriarch Jacob we're talking about. Life is very, very tough, but even through all of that, there's love there. There's a lot of love there. And in addition to the love, look at this, patience.

He has enduring. Patience or perseverance is another way that you could translate it. But really patience is just fine because the literal meaning of the Greek term is enduring.

Patience.

So yes, perseverance is perfectly fine, but patience, even in the way that we think of patience, just in the little things in life, all it's kind of all encompassing. It's all part. It's on the micro level, but it's also the macro level.

When you think perseverance, you think the macro level, persevering through life, persevering through all of the trials, all of the things until you cross the finish line. When you think of patience, at least the way I think about it, you think of it on the micro level, making sure you don't lose it.

Brother Russell, when you're on Interstate 45 trying to get to church and there's traffic that stopped, you know, it's all encompassing. It's talking about all of it. They have enduring patience. Now, I want you guys to consider how interesting this is for a second.

Paul's emphasis here for older men. We have in other places, the New Testament, kind of the well-known triad, if you will, of love and faith and peace. Faith, love, and peace. But here, Paul modifies it a little bit.

What we have is faith, love, and patience. Normally we think of it with faith, love, and then peace coming alongside of it. But here we have patience, and Paul is emphasizing it for good reason. You think about life as a race, as Paul uses the analogy for, the Christian life specifically.

The Christian life is a race, and when you think of a runner that's been running a very well-fought race for a long time, in the grind, decade after decade after decade, that final stretch of any race is arguably the toughest part of the whole thing.

You're so close, yet so far, so much energy has already been expounded. But there's just not that much left. But all, you know, everything, and of course you have the devil on the sidelines over here trying to throw anything and everything he can at you to make you stop and to make you finish poorly, finish the race poorly.

Paul, on the other hand, knowing the enemies that he had against him, prayed and yearned to finish the race well, and he wanted that of all of his disciples, too. And so he throws in patience here, in the context of talking about the older men.

He wants that final stretch. He wants them to be thinking about patience and perseverance in that final stretch. And so he emphasizes it, because he knows the race well, and he knows that by the time you get to this point in the race, and you're one of the old guys in the congregation discipling all of the young men, teaching them how to be good dads, teaching them how to be good husbands, showing them what it looks like to be a good grandfather someday, he knows that it's going to be a tough stretch, and that there's going to be some trials and some things that they run into even then.

So he emphasizes patience, perseverance. And so that's what we see there in verse 2, a number of unbelievable character traits that of course are massive blessings to the whole congregation. Last week, we talked about the fact that there are a lot of things in life that can either be a little bit of heaven on earth, or a little bit of hell on earth.

And my dad has often talked about marriage in that context. If you are living, if you are taking part in your marriage, you have both parties, both spouses together, keeping Christ at the center, marriage can be a little bit of heaven on.

Earth.

But if you remove the Lord, which is all too often the case, especially obviously in the secular realm where they don't have the Lord at all, marriage can be a little bit of hell on earth, and lo and behold, throw in no-fault divorce in there, and you have divorce rates.

Through the roof.

Well, there's another, well, you can apply that same principle to a lot of things in life, and older people can be one of them. They can either be a little bit of heaven on earth, or a little bit of hell on earth.

This time last week, we hadn't had Christmas yet, so I used the example of Ebenezer Scrooge. That is what a little bit of hell on earth looks like when you're a bitter old person that's been battered around so much that you're not going to let anyone hear the end of it for the rest of your life.

Of course, the story ended well there, but that's what I'm talking about. On the other hand, though, when older people live according to these character traits and according to these standards given to us by Paul, it is a little bit of heaven on earth for everyone around them.

You can't get enough of it. You can't get enough of the wisdom imparted. You can't get enough of time spent with them, and they leave such an impact that they're never forgotten, and so that is what Paul has in view here when he's talking about the older men in the congregation.

He wants them to be that. He wants them to be a little bit of heaven on earth for all of their young men, specifically, but generally speaking, for the entire congregation. Does anyone have any thoughts or anything?

We have about five minutes left. We could touch on verse three a little bit. If y 'all have any thoughts you'd like to share, feel free to do so real quick. Sorry, Dad. My password is so long, it would have taken me a long time to type it out.

It's working for that.

Okay, good.

It's okay.

Great.

Well, I like that you categorized. I'm sitting here, sitting in my 40s going, uh-oh, I'm starting to feel like that. All this stuff that no one's reading here. But that's how an old person is, all those things.

You've got a lifetime of training ground beforehand. If you haven't trained up until that point, you've got a lot of catching up to do. Not that it couldn't be done. Of course, the Lord of all things is possible, but that's why it's important to have those older people who are saying, hey, I'm an example.

I'm great and temperate. You need to be practicing those things so that you can be this way someday, too.

Absolutely.

Obviously, every generation is set up for success when they have older role models that are living out these character traits. I've talked about this with someone not all that long ago. There's no doubt, I will be the first to say, that if you grow up without those models and without those examples, you're at a disadvantage.

And you're at a disadvantage because, let's say you're in a situation where you don't have a dad. Or let's say you're in a situation where you do, but he is not living according to these standards. And so you are raised in a, I'll just say, confrontational upbringing.

It doesn't have to be confrontational. They could be cold. There could be so many different variations of not living according to these standards. There could be many variations of it. But let's say you grow up in a context where you don't have the dad.

Maybe you don't have a good grandfather. Maybe you're at a church with no solid old people that are living up to these standards. You just don't have it at all. You are, by design, at a disadvantage because God's ordained order is for you to have those.

Things.

So there is absolutely no beating around the bush there in that if you grow up under circumstances that don't involve having these older men to care for you and to teach you and to impart wisdom, you are at a disadvantage.

But here's the beautiful part about it. The Word is sufficient in all things. And one of those areas is, let's say you grow up without a dad or with a dad that was just a terrible role model. The Apostle Paul, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, gives you every bit of information you need on how to be a good dad and how to be a good husband.

The same is true with being the kind of old man you need to be for your kids, your grandkids, perhaps even your great grandkids, and everyone in your local congregation. And it's all right here. And there's more instruction later.

And it's all throughout the Old Testament, too. And so, to your point, Dave, yes, you want to be soaking in as much of the model that you have from the older men in your life and be preparing to be the same thing for the next generation.

But let's say hypothetically, and thankfully we do not have this issue in this church, but let's say hypothetically you don't have the model. And you know that your day is coming where you have to step into this role.

You do have the model right here in Scripture. And you can use these principles to live your life in such a way that you break the generational curse, so to speak. And you start being the kind of role model and example that Paul expects, not suggests, but expects the older men in church to be.