Titus Overview: Doctrine and Deeds

All right, so as the title states, we're going to be talking about doctrine and deeds, right? Doctrine and deeds are very much intertwined together. What you believe in your head should come out through your hands.

Orthodoxy leads to orthopraxy, all right? What we believe in our minds should come out in our actions, and we're going to see that with regards to this letter. So just a real quick overview. This letter encourages and gives instructions to Titus in his leadership role on the island of Crete.

It shares many characteristics with 1 and 2 Timothy, and I'm going to show a slide later to show you the parallels between them, since both relate to combating heresy, teaching sound doctrine, appointing leaders, and relationships within the church.

That's just a real quick synopsis. What it contains, it contains instructions to Titus for setting in order the churches on Crete, including the appointment of qualified elders and the instruction of various social groups, families, men, women, set against the backdrop of some false teachers and cultural issues.

He addresses both the leaders and the legalists, okay? So this is Paul setting up the churches in Crete. He's also setting them up in Ephesus and Greece, and I'm going to show you a little map in a minute or two to go through that.

So who's the author? The author is the Apostle Paul, although it's actually doubted by some people because the letters to Titus and 1 and 2 Timothy are so similar, they think that maybe it was done by the person who takes dictation, something along those lines.

But for the most part, most scholars are in agreement that it is the Apostle Paul. It's dated around 6263 A .D., apparently from Macedonia, at about the same time as 1 Timothy. The recipient is Titus, who is a Gentile and sometime traveling companion of Paul, and we can see that in the book of Galatians, 2 Corinthians, also in the book of Acts, and the churches written to the churches in Crete.

Paul wrote this when he left Titus on Crete to finish setting the churches in order while he and Timothy apparently went to Ephesus, where they met a very distressing situation, see 1 Timothy. But Paul had to go on to Macedonia, that's in 1 Timothy 3 and Philippians 2, so he addressed the churches through a letter to Titus.

So let me make this a little bit easier for us to understand. Okay, so this is Ephesus. You know the Philippians, that's Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, that's where the Bereans are, that's Corinth. This over here is Crete.

Now Paul was in Italy when he sailed, he was on his way to Ephesus, and then he stopped at Crete. Crete was inhabited by Jews who went to Jerusalem, which is down here. They went to Jerusalem to celebrate the feasts, and then they would sail back to Crete.

So there were some Christians on the island already. Paul drops Titus off there, leaves him there, and then he goes to Ephesus. A little bit closer up for you. So that's Crete, that's the little island of Crete.

That bracketed area, I did the best I could with the shape, that's modern day Greece. So you see Corinth is over there, Ephesus and Greece are parallel to one another. So these were all on Paul's missionary journeys.

So the island of Crete is where Paul left Titus. And when we go into the background of the island of Crete, you'll understand a lot more of what the epistle is actually addressing. Now to get an idea of the size of Crete, Long Island is approximately 118 miles long.

Crete is about 160 miles. So it's not to scale, but Long Island is about three quarters the size of Crete. So Crete's a good size, it's not a tiny island, it's a decent size island. So let's talk about Titus and who he is.

Titus was one of Paul's early converts, and Paul would end up later calling him my true child in the common faith. Now remember, Paul wasn't married, he didn't have children, so he became very close with Titus as he took him on his missionary journeys, so much so that he calls him my one true child in the common faith.

So there was a definite bond between him and Paul and Titus. Titus was a Greek Gentile and he was uncircumcised, and that's going to come into play in a minute, possibly from Antioch of Syria. And Antioch of Syria was on this side in the north.

He was taken by Paul to Jerusalem to discuss the nature of the gospel in Galatians 2. Do anybody want to remember what he was talking about with regards to Galatians 2 when he brought him to Jerusalem?

Circumcision, right, that's why I made a point of saying he was uncircumcised. He was so vibrant a disciple that the Jerusalem leaders were persuaded that Paul's grace-based gospel was acceptable. Now remember, the Jews would say, in order to be a Christian, you have to become a Jew first, which means you need to be circumcised.

You need to do all the things we do as Jews, then you can become a Christian. And Paul is saying, no, no, you are a Christian by grace through faith. The gospel is from people of every tribe, every tongue, every people, every nation, not just the Jews.

You don't have to become a Jew in order to become a Christian. That's what the Judaizers were trying to do, trying to get Gentiles to keep the Mosaic Law and to trust in Jesus, which is addressed in the book of Hebrews, right?

So he was with Paul in Ephesus on his third missionary journey and was Paul's ambassador to the troubled church in Corinth. Titus ends up being like the fixer guy. Paul leaves him in places and tells him, look, set this thing in order.

After Paul was released from his Roman imprisonment, he assigned Titus the responsibility of helping the churches on the island of Crete put sound leadership in place. After this letter was written, Paul sent him to Dalmatia, 2 Timothy 4 .10.

Titus proved to be a courageous and strong leader. He was the fixer. So Paul trusted him enough to leave him on the island, says, look, set up elders, set up deacons. This is how you do it. These are the requirements for elders and deacons.

And we've gone through that a bunch of times here. So the church at Crete wasn't organized at that point in time. So this is the first organization that they're getting from the apostle to Titus and now to the rest of the inhabitants.

So the overview of Crete. This is really important. When you're reading through the letter, you start seeing certain things that I never saw before because I didn't know the context of Crete. Does anybody know what Crete was for?

What god came from Crete? It was known as the birthplace of Zeus. And he was a god who deceived the people on the island. He would say one thing and do another. So they were all following this god, Zeus.

And this god, Zeus, was a liar. In fact, the residents came to be known as liars. The word kretizo meant to be a Cretan. And to be a Cretan was to be a liar. Their top poet, Epimenides, he writes himself, Cretans are always liars, vicious beasts, and lazy gluttons.

So that's a guy from Greece talking about the Cretans, came up with a name for them. Kretizo. So why do you think Zeus, being a god who lies, plays into what Paul is going to write to Titus? You can talk now.

Now would be a good time. No. No. No, the Jews were trying to be truthful anyway. All right, because Paul writes in verse 2 to the god who never lies. He offers them the god of the scriptures, the one true god, Yahweh, a god who doesn't lie.

This is the exact opposite of Zeus and the exact opposite of the Cretans who are on the island. They were known for lying. They were brutes. They were very rough and tumble people. The island itself was known as a treacherous and greedy place.

They were brute, rough, and tumble men. Most of the men on the island were actually mercenary soldiers, which are soldiers who are hired out to fight someone else's battle. So Crete was inhabited by soldiers who lied, who were in their flesh, who were doing all the things that soldiers do when soldiers want to do them.

And that's very important because, again, this is an epistle about doctrine and deeds. The deeds of the Christians on that island were going to be vastly different than the deeds of the mercenary soldiers and the Cretans that lived there.

It was a place of violence, crime, sexual corruption, and it had many good harbors. So this was a place of trade. There was always new sailors coming in, staying for a couple of days, leaving. It was a lot of transient people coming to the island, which lends to a criminal element, on top of the fact that the Cretans were like that to begin with.

So this was not a real easy place to live. This was a rough and tumble place. The culture of Crete, I'm trying to think of a town that it would be like. It would be just a very rough town with mercenary soldiers and sailors all over the place.

Again, the Jews migrated there and would sail back to Jerusalem for the feast days. So there would be Jews living on Pentecost, living on Crete, going back to Jerusalem for the temple sacrifice. Some of them went, and obviously they were there during Pentecost.

Some of them became Christians, and they sailed back to Crete. Titus was left in Crete to appoint elders and order and organize the church. Now, who knows the requirements for an elder? Anyone? His wife isn't supposed to drink, not him.

He's allowed to drink, not the wife. Elder is to be above reproach. Is that like the Cretans? No. The husband of one wife. Is that like the Cretans? No. Not pugnacious, not given to fighting. Is that like the Cretans?

No. Who's a good steward of his money. Is that like the Cretans? No. One who handles his family well. Is that like the Cretans? No. All the requirements of an elder are the exact opposite of what the Cretans were.

So this is drawing a clear dichotomy between the people of God and the people who live on Crete. And it's going to be a tough go. Look at where we live. We try to live upright lives, and the culture just doesn't like it.

The culture rails against us. How much more so in the area of Crete at that time? So there was an emphasis to the Christians on that island for good works, integrity, generosity, because the inhabitants of the island were liars and brutes to begin with.

They were a rough and tumble crowd. So their witness to them would make a big difference if your behavior followed what you believe. So what comes in here has to come out here. That's going to be very important in a little bit.

What we believe translates to how we act. Your doctrine and your deeds must line up. Orthodoxy leads to orthopraxy, how you practice what you believe. So this is going to be a witness to the inhabitants of Crete that these people are willing to love me, to sacrifice for us, to do these things for us when we're acting like animals.

Tell me, what god is it that you serve? We serve Zeus, right? That's a god of lies. And the Christian is able to witness him. No, we serve a god who doesn't lie. The gospel should reflect a transformed life.

It should display purity, goodness, love, and grace. So as he's telling Titus to set up elders, men who have a known reputation, men who can teach and preach the word of God, who have bona fide professions of faith, this is going to be the way that they reach the community through love and grace, which is what the gospel is.

You're a sinner. You're worthy of judgment. But we have a god who's willing to send his son down into the earth to take your place and take your punishment. Repent. Change the way you think about your sin and begin to trust in the god who loves you enough to send his son into the world for you.

There was also a Gnostic movement down there. Now, Gnosticism is actually still sometimes prevalent up here. So what a Gnostic would believe is that everything in the flesh is bad and everything in the spirit is good.

So they frowned on the things of the flesh. They tried to beat their bodies and do spiritual things. In fact, they didn't believe that Jesus came in the flesh because the flesh was bad. I think they were called Docetists.

Am I right? I think they were called Docetists because they don't believe Jesus had a fleshly body. And Gnosticism is also based on this special knowledge, based on whatever emanation you attain to, you would have this special knowledge that other people didn't have.

And that's not true, obviously. All right. The last three letters of Paul were 1st and 2nd Timothy and Titus. So Titus ends up being one of the last three letters that Paul writes. So when you see that little island of Crete and Ephesus, those were the last places that Paul went to to establish churches.

So this is kind of like his parting words to his son Titus, son in the faith, and Timothy. Those letters are endearing. You could tell through the way he writes how he's intimately tied to both of them.

So here's the common themes in 1st and 2nd Timothy. We're not going to spend a lot of time on this. I just wanted to point it out to you. Titus, 1st Timothy, and 2nd Timothy are very similar. They both start off with a knowledge of truth that leads to godliness.

Again, what you believe should translate into actions. Right? A leader's example is vital. That's why we need to set up elders, men who are above reproach, who are able to teach sound doctrine and refute those who contradict it.

So you need men who lead and give an example to the remaining people in the church, what the duties of the leaders are, and this is in each of these epistles. In fact, one commentator said that he believed that Titus and 1st Timothy were written on the same day.

Now, I don't know how he would know that, but they're so similar that you can see how it basically seemed like it was the same letter. Again, godly life and doctrine are to be applied. It's not something that's theoretical.

Oh, this is how we should act. It's like, no. Faith without works is dead. You need to put into practice the things that you've been taught and practical results of our common salvation, how that's going to affect the people around us.

Okay, so two of the themes. One is sound doctrine. Again, Paul stresses the teaching of sound doctrine and warns against those who would distort the truth. There's always, always a desire for the enemy to distort the truth.

They're always seeking ways to distort the truth of Christianity. He tells Titus, he, the elder, must be able to teach sound doctrine and rebuke those who contradict it. So an elder needs to know what sound doctrine is and he needs to know how to contradict, how to refute those who contradict it.

Right now I'm dealing with a guy who's holding to universalism. That means everybody gets to heaven. No, no, that's not what the scripture teaches. In fact, that's dangerous. If you start telling everybody that Jesus died for all your sins so everybody's going to get to heaven.

Could you imagine somebody who actually believes you, takes you up on that? They still try to live a good life, but they end up not repenting and trusting in Christ. Right? So the elder, and even just us as Christians, we need to be aware of the lies and the things that people are trying to teach us.

Like Pastor Chris says every week, we are being evangelized from the world. They are trying to teach us something and tell us something. And I want to tell you that your life is a commercial for your worldview.

People are watching you, especially when you say you're a Christian. All eyes are on you. How you comport yourself in the world is a commercial for what you believe. So make sure that what comes out of your mouth also comes out in the actions that you perform.

Good deeds. This letter puts a major emphasis on good deeds and the conduct of various groups within the church. Again, the good deeds that the church would do are going to be a tremendous witness to the people on that island who just learn to live in a corrupt way.

Similar to Cuba. Every single one of them has to sell something on the black market in order to survive. So criminality is routine there. You can't survive without doing something that's against the law.

But it was even worse on Crete because they were doing worse things than just selling things on the black market. The people in Cuba are doing that to survive. These people were doing that because they wanted to.

All right, Titus 2 .7. Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works and in your teaching show integrity and dignity. Right? So again, we want to model our good works for our brothers around us.

Key passage. I love this passage. Titus 2 .11 -15. For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

Declare these things. Exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you. So in this short little passage, we see that the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation for all people. Why would that be so important on the island of Crete?

It's your time to talk. Feel free to shout it out. You don't even need to raise your hand at this point. Yes? Well, not all the people were Jewish, right? So no one were Gentile. So there's salvation for both the Jews and Gentiles.

Certainly. And when... I'm sorry? All right. When you're living on an island that is inhabited by fishermen and soldiers who are drinking and, you know, feeding their flesh, you're going to say to yourself, God can't save people like that.

Gosh, how could God save a guy like that? And what Paul is telling Titus and what Titus is going to teach the church is that God brings salvation for all kinds of people. No matter how bad you think you are, you are not beyond the arm of God.

God can save anyone he likes no matter how bad you think they are or how much you think that they disqualify themselves from knowing Jesus. That's something that we have to get into our heads and make sure that we're not unintentionally saying, Oh, that guy, I'm not witnessing to him.

How could he possibly get into heaven? I wouldn't want to be in heaven if he was there. God forbid you say something like that. All right. So this word training, this is originally used the way a family would bring up and educate a child.

It was used of activity directed toward the moral and spiritual nurturing of a child to instruct, particularly with a child or youth. So this is to train young Christians how to walk in the ways of God, to renounce ungodliness, worldly passions, and what?

Live self-controlled lives. What's the last fruit of the Spirit? Self-control. I think they put it last for a reason, right? Because that's like the one where it's the hardest to get to. It's another thing that this passage teaches.

It talks about the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Why is that important? He just called Jesus God, right? Our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. You're witnessing to a Jehovah's Witness?

Go here. Our God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Ask Him, how many Saviors do you believe in? One. In the Old Testament, in Isaiah chapter 46, I think it says, besides me there is no Savior. That's Jehovah God.

Besides me there is no Savior. Well, if Jesus is the Savior, and you think Jehovah's a different Savior, you believe in two Saviors. Again, I always tell them, I say, listen, we don't have a theological problem, we have a mathematical problem.

You can't add. Right? You keep saying, you know, Jehovah's God and Jesus is little God, or Jehovah is Savior and Jesus is Savior. That's two Saviors. There's only one. Right? So this is important. He's telling Titus and the rest of the church that Jesus is our God and our Savior.

And He came to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify Himself of people for His own possession. Like I talked about on Sunday, Jesus' death on the cross purifies those whom He intended to save. There's no such thing as purgatory.

There's no such thing as when you die, now God's going to purge the rest of the sins that you have left on your record, and it's going to take time in order to do that. Jesus' death on the cross is sufficient to purify you without purgatory.

And finally He says, Declare these things, Exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you. Again, He's on an island with a lot of soldiers. Okay? If Titus doesn't stand up for himself and rebuke the soldiers and he starts falling prey to their authority, not going to be good.

So Paul's telling them, stand up for yourself. You have the authority that I as an apostle give to you and the calling that God has upon you. Use that authority. Rebuke others when it comes to the things of God.

Okay, so there's something that I've been thinking about for a long time with regards to good works. And we're going to go through four verses within Titus with regards to good works because we always have people that say, you need good works to go to heaven.

You can't just go to heaven by faith alone, right? The Roman Catholics will look at us and say, well, you believe that we're saved by faith alone. But James says, you know, we're not saved by faith alone.

So how do you reconcile this? I think when we go through these four verses in Titus, we're going to be able to do that. So the first verse, Titus chapter 3, verses 4 and 5. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.

So when it says he saved us, what word would we use to describe saved? Salvation, right? This is talking about salvation. He saved us. This is salvation. Why? It's not because of works done by us. It wasn't anything that we did that was good, that God said, I'm going to reward that with eternal life.

That's no, again, all of our good works are filthy rags before God. Right, verse 7. So that being justified by his grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. What does that word justified mean?

That's a pastorism, yes. Yes. Declared righteous. Declared right in God's sight. Again, not because of what we've done, but because of what Jesus has done for us. So Jesus' righteousness gets imputed or applied to our account so that when we stand before God, we stand on Jesus' account.

So then when God looks at us, it's like he's looking at the record of Jesus. Right? And that's by grace. What is grace? Getting what you don't deserve so that we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

So now, being justified by grace. Now I get to use my Bible software program, right? And Pastor Chris will be able to help us out. Being justified, that's a verb in the aorist passive tense. Now, aorist passive means that it's a perfect action completed in the past and the recipient is passive.

You're not active in doing it. You're receiving something from someone else. Am I right? Okay. Say again? That's passive, right? But the aorist part is it's a completed action in the past. So justification was completed by Jesus in the past and we receive it passively.

It's not something that we work for. Guess what? That's also true of that verb. He saved us. That's a verb, aorist passive. Again, it's something done in the past, completed action that we receive passively.

It's not something that we do. Okay? So I'm just trying to think of an example of you receiving something that you didn't have to do anything for. Like somebody deposits. Somebody pays off your mortgage, praise God, right?

Did you do anything to get that? No, but it's there. It's done. You received it, right? You don't have to pay your mortgage anymore because someone paid it off. Thank goodness. Someone's going to say, yeah, but that's so that we might become heirs.

You might become heirs. Anybody want to tell me what fallacy he's committed? Somebody would be committing if they if they use he might become heirs. Yes. Yes. Who said that? Thank you. Equivocation. That's like when somebody says you're taking a plane to Ohio.

Get on a plane. You might get to Ohio. It's like, well, you're going to Ohio. You know, that's that's what the word means. But guess what might become is a verb in the heiress passive tense. So, again, this is a completed action.

Okay. That you receive passively. It's not something that you're doing. It's very important that we understand this, because if we take someone who's holding to the fact that you need works to get to heaven.

Right. You're earning something. We can show them this verse Titus three, four and five. Okay. We're going to go through a couple more. Second verse Titus three, eight. This saying is trustworthy. And I want to insist on these insist on these things so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to do good works.

These these things are excellent and profitable for people. Okay. So now, once your life has been transformed, you're going to have a desire to do good things because of what God has done for you. Right.

He's transformed your mind. You recognize that my life is not my own. I've been bought with a price. My Savior sacrificed himself for me and calls me to die to myself and serve others. So the Holy Spirit inside of you is going to bring about this desire to do good works.

Notice it doesn't say that those good works save you. They're the result of what the Spirit has done. Titus three, 14. And let our people learn to devote themselves to good works so as to help cases of urgent need and not be unfruitful.

Right. So good works are the fruit of salvation, not the root of salvation. How are you going to be known by your fruit? Right. So when God changes you and Holy Spirit takes up residence in you, people should see a difference between the way you used to live and the way you live now.

Again, that makes a big, big difference for the people on Crete. Right. If one of the Cretans gets converted, this guy, let's say, was a womanizer, drinking, just doing whatever he was a liar. And now all of a sudden this guy's life gets transformed because God, the Holy Spirit, changed his heart.

That's going to speak volumes to the people around him. Right. So good works are very, very important. You just don't depend on them for your salvation. Right. So we want to depend on the works of Christ on our behalf to save us.

And then we want to reflect what God has done for us to the people around us. Again, fulfilling the commandment. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.

Yes.

This Sunday out of Port Jeff, we had a Greek Orthodox guy talk with Chris and I. And he went to Matthew 25 where he talks about the righteous going to eternal life. When did I see you hungry? When did I see you?

And, you know, ultimately at the end, in verse 46, when the Lord says, put the righteous into eternal life. What does it mean to be righteous? By grace through faith. Yes. In Christ alone. And the proof that you've done that is that you do what the Lord says as described in Matthew 25.

Yeah, I would have told him, listen, your righteousness needs to exceed that of the Pharisees. Right. Okay. Who were righteous according to the law. Right. So what kind of righteousness do you need when you stand before God?

Perfect righteousness. There's only one who came to give us perfect righteousness. That was Christ. That's why we we place our faith and trust in him. Placing your faith and trust in you or anyone else who doesn't have perfect righteousness.

You're not going to get perfect salvation. Right. Okay. One more verse. And we went through this already. Right. We started the first part of the verse. I love this. This is the key verse of the whole epistle as far as I'm concerned.

The grace of God is a peer bringing salvation for all people. Training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions. To live self-controlled upright and godly lives in this 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 himself for himself and people of his own possession who are zealous for good works.

Right. This is what we want to do. All right. I think it's in Matthew. He says, let your good works be seen by everyone and glorify your father in heaven. Right. So the good works I do are not something that I would have.

Maybe you would have done these things. But more than likely not. But you're doing them for the glory of God. Not for self gain. Not for selfish reasons. We're doing them because it pleases our God and Savior.

And he's called us to do these things. And in doing these things, we fulfill the commandment to love our neighbor as ourself. When did I see you hungry? When did I see you thirsty? Right. When did I see you naked?

I clothed you. I fed you. You know, these are things that we do. Sometimes we give money to missionaries. Right. And we don't know what happens with the money. Well, thankfully, we have guys like Hot Neal and the Jebelos who come here and tell us what that money goes towards.

I talked about, you know, Sunday about works. You know, how do you lay up for yourself treasure in heaven? Now, I don't mean that you can cut a check and send it to heaven. Right. But what that money does in helping missionaries minister to the people they go to, we share in that.

This is a part of what we give goes to that. And we see the gospel furthered because of that. So if God's blessed you and you're able to give, why? Because that's going to help further the gospel. And you've got to be careful about who you give to.

You've got to make sure that they're bonafide and they're doing the real work of sharing the gospel. But guess what? That's how the gospel is spread. You know, I always heard that there's goers and senders.

Right. So if you want to go, go. But if you're not going to go, send. And that means you've got to support them monetarily. Okay. Any questions with regards to the good works part? All right. So Titus 2 .5, we're not saved because of good works.

3 .8, we're devoted to doing good works. They're profitable. 3 .14, they're fruitful. You'll be known by your fruit. 2 .14, we're purified to be zealous, desirous for good works. So I think if you brought somebody to the book of Titus and showed them that we are not saved because of our righteous deeds.

Right. Titus 2 .5. But we like doing good works because they're profitable, they bear fruit, and it's the desire of my heart now. So works come after salvation, not for it. Now, R .C. Sproul did this one time.

He says most people think that it's faith plus works equals salvation. That's the equation. And he's like quick to say, nope, that's not what it is. What he says is faith equals salvation plus works. Once you place your faith and trust in Jesus Christ alone and you're resting on him and him alone, you are saved by grace through faith.

Now you work out your salvation with fear and trembling. You don't do those good things in order to get into heaven or to receive a... in order to receive heaven as your reward. You have Christ. He is your reward.

I'm doing these good things because my heart's been changed and I now love the way he loves. And I hate the things he hates. I turn from sin because I hate it now. I hate what God hates. And now I love what God loves.

I love people. Okay. Questions. Does that make sense now that you kind of understand the background of Crete and what it was all about? How it was a really slimy place where, you know, you had these soldiers and seamen and all kinds of liars, brutes.

It was a treacherous, crime ridden place. And he leaves Titus there. Right here. I'm going to Ephesus. You hang out here. I feel much better living on Long Island now. I mean, it's not Crete. Right. At least it's not Crete.

So we have hope. We have hope. Long Island is Christ's Island. Right. And with a little bit of faith and a little oomph behind it, oomph by the Holy Spirit, we can change things. So be of good cheer. Long Island is Christ's Island.

Does the good works and faith thing make sense to you? Right. That makes sense.

Yes. Could you actually just go back to the moment? This one? Yes. Yes. Could you just explain the second example a little bit more? Because I guess for some reason my brain thinks of it as faith and salvation is what equals works.

So could you just explain this one? Sure. Faith without works is dead. Right. So once you place faith in Christ and the Holy Spirit takes up residence inside of you, now you're saved by grace. Thief on the cross.

Now every time I bring that up, somebody says, oh, you're going to point to the exception. I don't think that's the exception. I think that's the rule. Why would at the most crucial point, the pinnacle of Jesus's ministry, at the cross, we have two thieves, one who's unrepentant and one who's repentant.

He was unrepentant at first, cursing God. Right. He has both of his hands nailed to a cross or tied to a cross. Both of his legs tied to a cross. What can he do? Nothing. He can profess faith. Remember me when you come into your kingdom.

Right. What did he acknowledge just in that one little statement? Jesus is king and it's up to God, Jesus, that I go into your kingdom. Remember me. Right. So he recognized who Jesus was. This is the king.

This is the Lord. Right. Now, thief on the cross is an example of being saved by faith alone. For us who are saved by faith and who get to live another day, what an act of mercy and grace that is. We're sinners, but yet we continue to live.

So as we continue to live, good works should flow from our hearts. What comes in here should come out here. So faith equals salvation. You're trusting in Jesus and the good works flow from that. Right.

Philippians chapter 2. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling for it is a holy God who works in and through you according to his good purpose. So we work out what God worked in. He changed our hearts.

Our hearts have new desires. And as long as we're alive, we should seek to please God by doing these things. Again, not relying on our works as a means by which, oh, God, God will accept me now. Look what I did.

God looks at Jesus and says, look what he did. That's the basis for you getting it. Does that clear it up? OK. All right. I just want to make sure I don't want anybody to think that works are something that you rely on or are necessary to pay the price for your sin.