Book of Titus - Ch. 2, v. 7

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She smells like s'mores! You know...

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You might be surprised. You might be surprised. You'll never know.

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I'll show you. Okay, dude, get us in the hall. If we're already 15 after now, that's not...

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Open up that... No, I am... I will remain silent for the rest of the party.

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I am happy to get us on track for Mother's Day. So let's turn to Titus and talk about young men.

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That's right. Titus chapter 2.

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Of course, we're starting back up after a little six -week hiatus from this study.

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When David and I swapped. And we're gonna... It's hard to do it, but we are gonna pick up roughly right where we left off.

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Which was in the middle of verse 7. But of course, before we get into it, why not go ahead and get a quick reminder of what some of the context is.

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As we look at the beginning of chapter 2 and are reminded that Titus here is preparing to essentially minister to his congregation.

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He's already been told how to appoint... How to find and appoint elders so that he can duplicate and delegate himself all throughout the island of Crete.

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But now, Paul is looking at Titus and giving him specific instruction, I believe, for his congregation.

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Or perhaps a number of congregations that he is overseeing during this time. And all of this would then apply to each and every congregation throughout the island.

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And then throughout all of Christian history for the last couple thousand years or so. And so he tells him that you are going to speak the things which become sound doctrine.

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Things that can be lived out by his congregation. So that the world can see these doctrines in real time.

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He says in verse 2 that the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in love and patience.

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That the aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as becometh holiness. To be priest -like is what the

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Greek term connotation is there. Not false accusers, in other words, not gossips.

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Not given to much wine. In other words, they're not under the lordship of any particular thing.

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Wine usually being at the top. Rather, the Lord is their Lord. Excuse me, still in verse 3 here.

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Not false accusers, not given much wine. Teachers of good things. And then he gets specific on what those good things are in verse 4.

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He says that they may teach the young women, these are mothers, to be sober. To love their husbands. To love their children.

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To be discreet. To be chaste or morally pure. To be keepers at home. To be good, obedient to their own husbands.

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That the word of God may not be blasphemed. So we've talked about all that detail of course.

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And then at verse 6. And keep in mind that what Paul is doing here is he's covering every single group that could possibly be inside of a congregation.

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And he's giving exhortations to all of them. And in verse 6 he changes his crosshairs to the young men.

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And he says young men likewise exhort to be sober minded. And we talked about that verse at length. Because the term sober minded, you know, this is an all encompassing term that is applicable to every area of the life of a young man.

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Regardless of what their particular sin habit may be. What their proclivities may be. What their endeavors, their pursuits are.

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Sober mindedness is the antidote to keeping them on the straight and narrow so to speak.

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And then in verse 7. Paul is still talking to young men.

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But what he does is he looks at Titus directly. And he says essentially

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I want you to be the role model. I want you to live this way so that you are the role model for all

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Christian young men for the rest of human history. Essentially.

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Of course we have a number of role models throughout the New Testament. But Paul wants Titus to be one of them.

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And so you get to verse 7. And he says in all things showing yourself. That's how we know that he is now talking directly to Titus.

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And not necessarily to young men broadly. Although the application is still to all young men.

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Because what he's doing is he's simply showing us what this role model should look like.

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And how we should live accordingly. In all things. All parts of life. Showing yourself a pattern of good works in doctrine.

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Showing uncorruptness, gravity, insincerity. And so that was the verse that we left off of last time.

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And just a couple of thoughts that we already covered. But of course the phrase in all things at the top of verse 7 there.

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That is also an all encompassing phrase. We're talking about the whole aspect of the man's pursuits.

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The totality of man's pursuits. All of his, everything that he's doing. And more specifically his conduct while he's doing it.

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Whether we're talking about business or being a husband and father. Being a friend, a son.

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Being a churchman, being a co -worker. Even when he's out working on his hobbies. Everything that he's doing.

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He will show a pattern of good works. He will have a behavior that is Christ -like.

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And that points back to the Lord ultimately. Now, he moves on and he says, showing thyself a pattern of good works.

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And this particular phrase is a great example. This is a great example of the different, the otherness that Paul wants from these

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Christian young men. This phrase is an example of what exactly does set them apart.

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What exactly does make them look different from the rest of the world. And allow them to accomplish great things.

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Over the last 2 ,000 years we've had many great examples of very lazy, erratic, bad motives when it comes to approaches to ministry.

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And we've seen ministers time and time again just totally botch the ministerial office.

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Whether we're talking pastor or deacon or whatever it may be. And so, Paul, knowing that this is already the case.

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We already looked in the first chapter at these false teachers that are coming in and trying to get in there and do things with the wrong motives and trying to subvert whole houses.

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As Paul said, we already know that that's the case and Paul knew that this would be a pattern that would continue forever.

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And so, Paul is setting Titus up and every good Christian man after to look different.

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And how to look different. How to be different. And again, this phrase is a great example of it. This is Paul's way of telling

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Titus that he needs to practice what he preaches. This is a phrase that we're all familiar with. And he says, show yourself a pattern of good works.

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You're going to be the preacher. You're going to be the one bringing the doctrine before the congregations. Now go out and live it yourself.

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Show yourself a pattern of good works. And when you do that, all of the sudden, people will take your teaching seriously.

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It's one thing to wax eloquent on whatever doctrine a pastor could do. It's another thing when he goes out and he shows his congregation what it looks like in practice.

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And when they see him doing that and striving for holiness and godly living and all these types of things, what it does is it makes them take all of his words seriously from that point forward.

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Again, we talked about this a little bit the last time we were together, but we can all think of preachers, quote -unquote, just in the modern era, in our lifetimes, that have just absolutely embarrassed themselves time and time again with their conduct, with the way they live, in some cases with what they preach.

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And what is the result when we see this happen? The result is that they are not taken seriously and none of their words are taken seriously.

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And in some cases it can be a bad testimony on God's Word itself.

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Not that God's Word is messed up, but rather the perception of it is messed up because of these ministers that are not showing a pattern of good works.

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And so we talked about all that, and then we asked the question, because what is

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Paul saying? Show yourself a pattern of good works. We asked the question, what is the proof of regeneration?

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What is the proof of an immaterial thing, something that we can't see but we know is a reality?

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In fact, here in a little bit, in this very letter, we will get to the verse that talks about the washing of the regeneration of the

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Holy Spirit. What is the proof of this though? What is the proof of something we can't see?

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Of course, someone can say that they're saved, but the way that God has ordained for this miraculous thing to be seen, in order for us to be able to have something as miraculous as a spiritual birth to be seen by the world, his ordained means for that is through patterns of good works, and that's what

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Paul is talking about here. Of course, God defines the good. So someone could take this one phrase, patterns of good works, and they can shove any kind of box or rule book that they could come up with into that phrase and say, see, we're just obeying

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Paul here. You need to follow these rules, these steps, in order to be obedient to Paul.

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Anyone could do that, but the problem with that approach is that when Paul says, show yourself a pattern of good works, you have to ask yourself, by what standard are the works good?

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Who defines the word good? And of course, we have to remember that God is the one that defines the good, the patterns of good works.

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He doesn't leave us guessing. And of course, that's why when we look at the

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New Testament, let me show you guys just one example that I happened to stumble across yesterday during our

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Bible study. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, did the

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Internet go out? Okay, that's fine. God is the one that defines the good works, and like I said, he doesn't leave us guessing.

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That's why the commandments of the New Testament, when we come upon them, we need to take them very seriously, and why though they are commandments, though they are instructions, though they are rules, if you want to put them in those terms, they're not rules in the sense of condemnation or in the sense of a burden or a weight that you're having to bear, like would be the case under a religious group like the

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Pharisees. Rather, the commandments that Jesus gives us are a grace in and of themselves.

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And as you read the New Testament, you will see it pop up. Let's see here.

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This isn't in my notes. I'm just trying to see if I can spot it really quick because I saw it yesterday. There's a part in...

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Here it is. It's at the end of chapter 14, 1 Corinthians. Paul, after laying out a number of very specific doctrines and very specific instructions for good practices in the church, he ends all of this by saying,

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If any man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you,

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I, the apostle Paul, write unto you, are the commandments of the Lord. And so we hear the term commandments.

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Sometimes we think of the Ten Commandments or something like that, and that's just fine. That's good. But what we need to remember is that the term is still...

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It's pulled over in various contexts in the New Testament as well, not just the fact that all of the

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Ten Commandments are reaffirmed in the New Testament, but also in the fact that the apostles expound upon the kind of, let's call them the baseline commandments.

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They expound upon them and give us more nuance to them. And so one of the reasons why it is so important for us to pay attention to what those commandments are, especially for young men in this context as we read the

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New Testament, is because that is how we know what God defines is good. And when we know what

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God defines as good, we will then be able to live that out and show a pattern of good works.

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Okay, so that's where we left off. Now, this phrase, showing yourself a pattern of good works, is very important in and of itself, but there's a really interesting word here within the phrase.

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So again, we're looking at verse 7. And the word pattern, so we're showing ourselves, young men are to show themselves a pattern of good works.

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And that same, the Greek term there, could also be translated example or ensample.

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And you guys have heard that word used before. We often talk about the ensamples of the

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Old Testament. In other words, perhaps a story or an image or a message of some kind can then be viewed as an ensample of a spiritual truth that is then talked about in the

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New Testament. So we talk about ensamples, we talk about examples, the Old Testament showing us examples of things to come and that sort of thing.

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And this Greek term for pattern could be translated as ensample. But what the word literally means is the mark of a blow.

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In other words, you take something and you hit it with a hammer, and it leaves an indention.

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That's what the word means. And so you picture hitting something with a hammer, and what's really interesting about it is this exact same

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Greek word for pattern here is found in a very unique context in the

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Gospel of John, if you all want to turn there. It's just one verse, but I'd like for you all to look at it because it's interesting.

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Look at John chapter 20, the Gospel of John chapter 20. And keeping in mind, what are we talking about?

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We're talking about young men. We're talking about young men living out their lives in a way that is pleasing to God.

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Paul is instructing them. He's telling Titus to live this way so that all young men can look at him as their role model.

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And he says, I want you to show yourself a pattern of good works. I'll get there in just a second.

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It's chapter 20, and he wants us to remember or he wants this image in Titus' mind to be something that's striking, something that won't leave him, something that he'll be able to remember in the future, especially when he's tempted to veer off of the narrow path, so to speak, and start living in a way that may not be a good role model all of a sudden.

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But Paul says, I want you to show a pattern of good works. So look at verse 25. And I want to point out an interesting context in which this exact same word is used.

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It says, The other disciples, therefore, said unto him, We have seen the Lord, but he, and this is

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Thomas, doubting Thomas, before he saw the Lord for the first time, he said, But he said unto them,

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Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into the side,

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I will not believe. Now, the Greek word for print there is the exact same word that Paul uses for pattern when he says, show yourself a pattern of good works.

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So again, this is to give you an example of what the literal term means. It means to leave a mark, the mark of a blow, just like the blow or the mark of the blow of the

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Roman's hammer into the hands of Jesus. This is the Greek term that Paul uses here.

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And why is that? The word means, you know, to be a die or to be a mold or the form or the imprint of something, such as the imprint of the nails in Jesus' hands.

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And that's what Titus is supposed to be. He's supposed to be the imprint of something. He's supposed to be the form or the mold of something.

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And this is what Titus is supposed to be, but it's what every Christian man is to be. He is to be the perfect living imprint of virtue, of God's virtue.

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He's the imprint of virtue. He's to be an example or an example for others to model. And so what

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Paul is doing here is he is, again, trying to leave this somewhat striking picture in Titus' mind to remember who he represents ultimately.

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It's not a matter of arbitrary rule keeping. It's not a matter of here are some things that you can do to look a little bit different from the world.

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It's not a matter of, you know, here are my suggestions for living in a way that I think could lead to a successful life.

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It is a matter of Titus being a manifest person representing something that, again, is immaterial.

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He's representing the attributes of God. He's representing the virtue of God as a Christian man.

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He is to be the imprint of God's, well,

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God's virtue, but God's moral framework for living. Again, that's why

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I mentioned that verse in 1 Corinthians 14 a minute ago when Paul talks about the commandments of the Lord. The way that we can know what the pattern looks like so that we can be that imprint of godly virtue is to know what is godly in the first place.

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What is pleasing to God in the first place? And again,

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I know I'm somewhat repetitive as we go through these verses because they're somewhat meticulous. There's a number of things that Paul is hitting up.

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But I don't want us to lose the main principle and the main important application in the weeds of the specific word studies and things like that.

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Who is Paul talking to? He's talking to Titus. Who is Titus? He is a very young man, possibly in his early 20s.

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He's bearing a lot of responsibility already on his shoulders. He's already an ordained elder.

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He is already exhibiting the spiritual maturity in order to fulfill these roles. In fact, if you recall way early in our study,

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Paul took him with him. Paul took Titus with him to the council of Antioch.

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No, no, no. He took him to the Jerusalem council in Acts chapter 15 to show the apostles there and to some of the believing

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Jews that felt that circumcision was still necessary for salvation. He brought Titus to say, look at this guy.

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He's a Greek. He's not compelled to be circumcised, and I'm not compelling him to be circumcised. And he is just as godly and just as much a model of godly living as any of the rest of you.

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That is what Paul thought about Titus, even as young as he was, but he's still young.

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And so he's talking to Titus in that context. He knows what appeals, what are some of the things that appeal to a young man because, of course,

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Paul was there himself at one point. And he also knows that Titus is to carry the burden even further by being the role model himself for other young men.

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And so Paul knows something, and he's being intentional with the way he's laying all this out because of this thing he knows.

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And what is that? He knows that men, young men, always look up to other men.

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They look up to other men. And if they can't find a role model in another man, if they can't find a model that can inspire them and that they see standing for truth.

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And that they see is not capitulating to every wind of doctrine just because that's what's the appealing thing to do in the moment.

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Just like with clothing and with home decor and all this kind of stuff, there are fads that run within the currents of Christianity and theology and things like that.

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Fads pop up, they come and go. And just like with looking at a picture of yourself 20 years prior and kind of laughing at the wind pants or the

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Velcro shoes or the floppy hat or the bell bottoms in The Case of Dead.

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Although I still think those are kind of cool. Whatever it may be, just like when you look back in the past and see these fads and you see those didn't really play out all that well.

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The same is true for theology and things that are taught within Christianity. Most of the quote -unquote progressive movements within theology over the last several decades, the last 120 years, leave rotten fruit behind.

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And so young men, when they're zealous, when they have zeal, and they are perhaps new in the faith, and they look around them.

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They're going to be looking for a model that stands firm even in the midst of all of the fads that are coming and going.

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That stand firm even against the doctrines that they know just using common sense that seem contradictory to what the very words of God says.

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Many of which are right here in this epistle we've been reading. They want to look for a model that will not succumb to the fads and to the things that seem appealing in the moment because they are popular.

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They want to find a role model, again, that stands firm on the truth. And if they do not find a role model that fulfills all those things, talking about young men here, what they'll do is they will find a model somewhere else.

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And sometimes those models are just as bad, just in a different way. There are a number of guys out there that appeal greatly to young men right now because they're very masculine.

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They are exhibiting masculine virtues that are virtues because God put them there.

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But the problem is they're exhibiting them in a very worldly, fleshly fashion.

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And men are fed up with feminism, and they're fed up with the progressive movements of the last few decades.

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They see the rotten fruit. They see the appeal of it going down. They see the way that they are treated because of what has been brought into the world.

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And so what they're doing is they're looking for role models of older men that can help them wade through all of that, give them the answers for how to live through all of it.

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What they're doing is they look to the church, and they see a bunch of pastors that have succumbed to the feminist movements and things like that and that are just as bad as anyone else.

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They're not finding the role models they need. So what do they do? They go somewhere else to find them. And they do find them, but they're not in the places that they should be, and then they are then pulled into the opposite side of the spectrum.

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They overcorrect, and it can be just as ugly, just in a different way. Everything I'm saying is happening right now as we speak.

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And everything that Paul is saying in Titus 2 ,000 years ago is directly applicable to what is happening as we speak.

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What he's saying is I know that these young men need role models because naturally they seek to in father figures and in men they look up to, in their uncles, their grandfathers, men that are in the circle of their fathers.

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They look to them to see how they work, how they exhibit masculinity, how they treat their wives, how they treat their daughters, how they treat those around them, how they lead, how they lead the church, how they lead in businesses.

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They are looking for all of these things naturally. Paul knows this, and so he's setting up Titus to be someone that these young men can look up to.

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And in doing so, he's teaching every other – he already talked about the old guys at the top of the chapter, but they can certainly pull from this too.

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He's teaching all men how to live so that others can look up to them and so that those young men have someone to look up to.

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And so then, of course, we ask the question, and you'll hear this kind of argumentation out there in the bigger churches that I was referencing a second ago that have succumbed to much of the feminist dogma over the last few decades, over a century.

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And they will say things like, you know, we just need to look to Christ. We just need to look to Jesus, and that's all we need for all standards of godly living and things like that.

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And they treat Jesus as some kind of moral archetype rather than as the

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Lamb of God that came to live in a particular way to die for the sins of his people. They look to him as this moral archetype that then, oddly, it turns into this weird kind of legalism almost, even though most of the churches that are doing this are actually kind of the opposite of legalists.

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And they are what I would call more of the easy -believism, antinomian, kind of cheap -grace type foundations that they are built upon.

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And they look to Jesus, and they create this moral figure. And one of the reasons I think they do it is because there is so much detail left out of Jesus' life, as John tells us at the end of his gospel.

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If I were to write the books—if I were to write books listing every detail of everything that I know about this man

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Jesus, the world could not contain him. That's how the gospel of John ends. So we have very specific, very succinct accounts of Jesus' life, and it's every detail that we need to know about his work that led to his finished work on the cross.

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And Peter does tell us that we should imitate him, no doubt. But here's the thing. If we ignore some of what

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Paul says, which I'm going to read to you all in just a second, young men will be left wanting. Because the

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Lord ordained it in such a way as to His people on earth in manifest form, because Jesus is in heaven now.

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And these young men, they are yearning for role models. They are yearning for someone to look up to, and they want someone that they can see.

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And in their zeal, the Lord knows that it's something that they need, because otherwise they could just go nuts.

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They could go crazy. They could be led astray in any number of ways. So what does the Lord do to prepare for this?

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Well, everything we just read in Titus. But in Philippians 3, verse 17—I'll just read it really quick.

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Still the apostle Paul talking. He says, As you have us for a pattern.

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And who is the us? It's the apostles, it's the disciples, and it's Paul specifically in this context.

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So why didn't Paul just say, follow Jesus, follow His example? Well, we are told that in the first epistle of Peter.

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But again, the Lord and His grace is providing for these young men and young men that would come for 2 ,000 years after and however much longer we have before He comes back.

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And so Paul says, look to me as an example, because I am someone that you can see.

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I'm someone you can feel. I'm someone you can touch. Peter does the same thing too, which is interesting. But Paul is saying, look to me as an example.

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Look at the way I'm living. I am striving for holiness. I am striving to live up to the standards that Christ gave.

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So look to me. And of course, by extension, all of us can look to Paul. And all of us can look up to our spiritual forefathers and our spiritual mentors in life.

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We can look up to the Brother Otis's of the world, to the Bill Nichols of the world, to the David Mitchells, to the Myron Goldins, the

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Rocky Freemans. We can look up to these guys as examples as well because God ordained for them to be as examples, to be examples as well.

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Another example, 1 Corinthians chapter 4, verse 16 says, Wherefore, I beseech you, be ye followers of me.

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This is the Apostle Paul talking again. He doesn't say be followers of Jesus. That is said elsewhere in a different context.

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But there are other contexts where he says, be an example of me. Why? Because young men need role models that they can see and that they can look up to.

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And the Apostle Paul knows this. If you skip a few chapters in the same book, chapter 11, verse 1, he says again, be ye followers of me.

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And listen to this. Even as I also am of Christ. So there you have kind of both sides of the same coin.

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You have one man, the Apostle Paul, looking to Christ as his example for living. And as he lives that out in real time, day to day, week to week, in the flesh, the younger men around him can look to him as an example as he follows

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Christ as his example. And so, again, a little bit repetitive, but it's important.

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Paul understands this principle really well. The principle that men always look up to other men.

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He understands this principle because he obviously, like I said a moment ago, could have just said, imitate

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Jesus every single time he had the opportunity to say that. Sometimes he did. Sometimes he says, imitate me.

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But when you're talking about men, especially young men that need the direction, they have all of these wonderful attributes just packed into them, ready to explode, ready to conquer the world.

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It's all in there. But if it's just unleashed in an aimless fashion, kind of like the analogy

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I used for little boys a few weeks ago, you want the fire, but you want the fire contained. You don't want it just out and about and ready to consume the whole house.

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You want it in the fireplace. Young men are the same way. They have a fire within them that wants to be unleashed in a way that takes dominion and subdues the earth and fulfills the creation mandates.

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But if they do that aimlessly, it can be a disaster. And we can see that all around us because they are walking around aimlessly because they haven't had the role models, because men have abdicated their responsibility to lead them, and because they're within a culture that at this point doesn't like them very much and they can feel that and it hurts.

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They need the role models. They need the examples. But when you're talking about men, again, young men struggling in this world, weak in the faith in some cases, striving for holiness, they desire a model that they can see and whose faith is already strong.

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Their faith may not be there yet, so they need to be able to see what it looks like so that they are not left aimless, like I mentioned a second ago, and not left unsure and in a just cloud of murkiness wondering, what on earth am

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I supposed to do with all of these feelings that are within me and these desires that are within me?

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Just a couple more words and I'll close it out. We can move on to verse 8 next week. He goes on to say, In doctrine, show yourself uncorruptness.

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Uncorruptness, the Greek term there, could just as easily be translated integrity. In other words, it's the opposite of corruptness.

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So in your doctrine, Titus, young man, as you are the example for other young men, show integrity in everything that you do, in your doctrine specifically, but that will flow out into everything you do as well.

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He says gravity as well. What is gravity? Well, that's honor. That is respect, to be a respectable man.

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What's interesting about it is it's not just honor in the sense that the world may view something honorable.

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The Greek term is very specific because it carries the connotation of a pure honor, a purity, a majestic honor, almost like a king on a throne.

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That is the type of gravity that these young men need to be showing. They need to be serious. They need to be honorable.

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They need to be respectable, but in a pure way. And then he ends by saying sincerity. And what's interesting about it, the

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Greek term could be translated there incorrupt. Well, he already said to be uncorruptible in your doctrine, but also be sincere.

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And sincere is a fine translation because that would be the most literal translation of the

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Greek term, to be a sincere man, but it carries the connotation of being sincere by being incorrupt, which is kind of repetitive on Paul's part, but it's intentional.

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It's intentional. It's important to be pure and things like that. And so this is the pattern of good works.

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He starts to spell it out for us quite a bit there, and he will continue on in verse 8, but we will have to move on to that next week.

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Do you all have any thoughts or anything you'd like to share in our final minutes here? I'm glad to be back in the swing of things here.

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Appreciate you all being patient with me, kind of bringing everyone back up to speed, doing a little bit of review.

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We'll get our cadence back shortly, and I'm really excited about it because we are very close.

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As we'll see next week, he continues. It says, sound speech that cannot be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part might be ashamed, having no evil thing to say about you.

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So he brings the enemies right back in, and he shows how these young men living in this virtuous way is a weapon against the enemies of the world.

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Yes, Emily. Okay, this isn't a question for me, but if there's a guy that doesn't know where he should start within knowing how to be a man, or even just teaching your son, would you start with Titus?

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Well, sure. I mean, when they get to... Okay, so let's talk about the context for a second of a young boy that, you know, he has a father and mother, and the father has been a great father, kind of showing him the pattern of good works himself.

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So that right there is first and foremost the number one God -ordained means for a young man to learn how to be a godly man, is through the actions of the father.

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And so, you know, let's say you got a young boy from the time he's born until about the age of 12.

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We'll just use that. What he's doing is he is seeing theology applied through, hopefully, in the case of Paul, the assumed

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Christian living of the father. So he is seeing what you might call practical theology. The boy might not be reading the scriptures all that much yet, although by the time he's 12 he certainly could be, and, you know, that would be great if he were by then.

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But even in the years prior to him learning how to read and learning how to interpret scripture and things like that, he is still receiving doses of theology every single day through the practice of the father.

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So that's number one. Secondly, the father will get to a point where, yes, he needs to substantiate why he lives the way that he does and set the foundation for that boy.

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And sure, you could go to Titus, as you'll see when we get to 1 and 2 Timothy. There's lots there too. Just about all of the general epistles talk about manhood in Ephesians.

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And, of course, it talks about every stage of life. We've already talked about elderly men. We're talking about young men now. In Ephesians he talks about husbands specifically and fathers.

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So the epistles are just filled with instructions on youth, young manhood, how to be a virtuous man.

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Now, then you get to the tougher situations where perhaps a boy doesn't have a father or perhaps he did but he had a father that abandoned him.

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Whether that be physically, he left, or he was present in the home but abandoned him spiritually. And like I mentioned earlier, just abdicated his role, his responsibility to instruct the son in all of these things.

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There's no doubt. You can't sugarcoat that. There's no doubt that the young man at that point has been left at a disadvantage because of the fall of man, because of sin.

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Why is that? That's because God ordained for the father to be there to be his role model. Well, if the father blows it, the young man is by definition at a disadvantage.

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And sometimes they'll go into the church and they will be told that it's okay. You'll be fine.

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You'll be taken care of. And look, that's great and that intent is good too, but you can't sugarcoat it.

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They need to know up front they are at a disadvantage, but you can't stop there.

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The next thing you would tell them is that that doesn't mean that they can't be everything that God expects them to be even with the disadvantage of not having that fatherly role model.

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What it means is that it may take some more work. It may be harder. It may be a tougher hill to climb.

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And that's sad. It's a result of sin. But it doesn't mean they can't be the man that God wants them to be.

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Why is that? Every instruction for godly living in the life of a young man, godly masculinity, fatherhood, being a husband, all of it, it's right there in the pages of Scripture.

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Old Testament has a lot of wonderful things. The book of Proverbs, the first 30 chapters, is teaching a young man specifically how to live virtuously.

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And it ends, Proverbs 31, with showing him how to find a virtuous wife. You have the Proverbs. You have the

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Psalms. You have all of these epic stories throughout the Old Testament, Joshua, David, that can show them what awesome masculinity when it is used as a force for good on God's behalf, what that looks like.

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Then you get to the New Testament, and it just doesn't get more practical. It's all there. And the man that taught us the most about how to be a husband, how to be a father, was the apostle

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Paul, which was a man that was neither. He was neither a husband nor a father. He was a spiritual father.

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He called Philemon his genuine son in the faith. He called Titus his genuine son in the faith. Same for Timothy and many others.

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So he was a father in a sense, but he didn't have any biological kids. And yet that was okay because all of it's from God.

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It's not created out of thin air because you had one guy at some point that happened to be a decent guy, and he kind of set the standards for people to follow.

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It all flowed directly from God, the perfect father. And so that's where it gets a little bit tougher,

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Emily, is in situations where they don't have the godly role model and a dad. They can find it in their pastors.

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They can find it in men in the church. They can find it in the deacons. They can't replace their father.

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That's the part you can't sugarcoat. You can't act like it's a replaceable thing. But all of that is there by God to help them curb the work and the burden of having missed out on that fatherly figure to begin with.

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So Titus would certainly be a good place to start, but there are many other places too. Are there any other thoughts, any other questions?

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Oh, yeah, go ahead, Jen. How Paul said he's the example in a lot of situations, and other godly men can be the example, not just Jesus.

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That's really interesting and important because especially younger men, but really men of all ages and women, if you're only looking at Jesus as the ultimate example of trying to be perfect, we can't be perfect.

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We're humans. We try to get over these clutches of that. It's possible there's real men to strive for because we can realize, okay, they aren't always perfect.

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They do mess up. Like my kids, I'll always tell them when I mess up, I try to right then apologize and say, okay,

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I just messed up, and I'm sorry. You know, I lost my tipper or whatever. I don't know.

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I just think that makes it more. It helps me to realize at least in my life

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I can strive to be that way. It is possible, and when I do mess up, it's okay.

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Just acknowledge it and keep moving forward. Absolutely. Well, and there's a lot to it.

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Why God ordained it that way? Why did He entrust something like being the spiritual role model for the younger generations to fallible, fallen creatures themselves?

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And the answer is twofold, at least twofold. There's more to it than that,

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I'm sure. But the first is everything you just said, Jen. It is giving.

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It's putting flesh and bones on everything you read in the New Testament because while our faith is evidence of things not seen, and that is very important,

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God in His grace set everything in motion in a way where we can see far more than we might even think sometimes.

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In other words, like I said, the young boy, the little boy, before he can ever read or write can see theology applied through the life of his father and, of course, his mother too.

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This is the context we're talking about. Through his parents together he sees practical theology in real life and he can have an understanding of these things long before he gets into the reading and the discipleship and things like that.

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So that's first and foremost is it puts flesh and bones on this for the sake of those that need it.

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But secondly, it puts the person that is to be a role model in a very interesting situation because they are a sinner too, they're imperfect, and yet they're told to live in a certain way to be a role model.

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So it's like this active reminder of who they are and who they're supposed to be.

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It doesn't mean that God is expecting sinless perfection. If He were,

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He wouldn't have sent us a Savior. And the Apostle Paul wasn't expecting sinless perfection either. We talked about that quite a bit in the first chapter of Titus.

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What it means is that it puts us in a position to have a desire to live as godly and in conjunction with Jesus but also the

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Apostles as possible. And of course we know that the times we do mess up, we then have an opportunity to step into an even greater ministry.

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And what is that? That is to show those same people, those same young people that you are to be the role model for what it looks like to ask forgiveness, to confess your sins to the

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Lord, to take your burdens to Him. It shows them what that pattern of good works looks like as well.

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How can they receive that if they only had a perfect person to look at? They need to be able to know what it looks like to have someone they look up to miss the mark and take that burden to the

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Lord, not cover it up, not in pride, act like it never happened, or any of the things that our human nature kind of is inclined to do, but rather to humble ourselves like a little child as Jesus tells us in Matthew 18.

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To humble ourselves, ask forgiveness from God, to confess that what we did was wrong, take it to Him, and those little ones see that and then they have a model now for what to do when they mess up.

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So it's a two -fold thing. It's to put flesh and bones on it for the kids, but it's also to make sure that the role models themselves have the pressure on, for lack of a better term, to live as godly as they can.

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And when they mess up, which we all will, we all do, arguably every single day, we can show the kids the pattern of forgiveness, confession, and the assurance that we are pardoned from our sins.

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All of that is in there, so it's really crazy stuff. It's amazing. Alrighty, guys.

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Any other thoughts? Yes. I was talking to Fern recently about baptism, and I was thinking about how

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Jesus, like Jen said, He wasn't really a model specifically for repentance because He didn't need to repent.

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Yeah. Of anything. That's a good point. But we do find that model for places, but Fern was asking about Jesus' baptism, and is that not an example of Jesus giving a – even in that,

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He gives us something to emulate because He received a baptism of repentance, the baptism of John, you know, being different than the baptism in the name of the

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Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost. For sure. John's was a baptism of repentance, and he was very hesitant to do this for that reason because he's preaching repentance and confession of sin, and Jesus says,

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Baptize me. Yes. And so, I just thought,

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I think it's amazing that even in that, He didn't need to repent, He didn't need to confess anything, but we received repentance as, you know, part of our regeneration because He received that in that way.

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That's right. He didn't need to, you know, repent. For sure. No, that's a great – Repentance is a gift.

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It's a great point, and the key to that narrative is John the Baptist's reaction when

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Jesus walks up because John knew that he did not need to be baptized for repentance' sake, and that's why he said,

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Lord, I am in need of baptism by you. And Jesus knew that this was a part of His ministry, this was a part of the example

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He'd set for us to Ashton's point, and it's an amazing thing. I'd love to look at that story more closely sometimes, and we're out of time, but I'll end with this just to cover our bases here.

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Listen to the words of Peter. For even here unto you are called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow in His steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth, who when

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He was reviled, reviled not again. When He suffered, He threatened not, but committed Himself to Him that judges righteously, who

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His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins should live unto righteousness, by whose stripes you are healed.

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For you are sheep going astray. You were sheep going astray, but are now returned unto the shepherd and bishop of your souls.

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And so there, Peter reminds us that Christ is our shepherd, is an example to us in desiring us to live in a righteous manner and to recognize what

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He did on our behalf. It's a really amazing thing. Let's go ahead and dismiss in prayer. Heavenly Father, thank

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You so much for this wonderful day, for bringing us together and giving us the time to abide in Your Word as a group and giving us this chance to grow together as a local body that is striving to live in accordance with Your Word and with Your desires for all of us.

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We ask You to continue to give us the strength and the guidance and the wisdom to do that. Lord, we ask

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You to please be with the remainder of our services today as we continue to get into Your Word and into fellowship afterward.

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And we thank You for each and every mother in our midst, in our congregation, and the models that they are for their young ones and for the work that You have ordained for them to do to set them up for success in every realm.