Titus 2
v.4-5
Then the older women can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, 5to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.
According to Paul’s instruction, Titus was not to make it his ministry to teach the young women directly. Instead, he was to equip and encourage the older women to teach the young women. Of course, this doesn’t mean that the young women were barred from listening to Titus teach. It simply means that it was wrong – and dangerous – for Titus to make the young women a focus of his ministry. If there was a young women Bible Study group, Titus shouldn’t teach it. The older women should.
v.10
and not to steal from them, but to show that they can be fully trusted, so that in every way they will make the teaching about God our Savior attractive.
What can we do to adorn the Gospel of God our Savior? Well, first, remember that the adornment of the Gospel of God our Savior is not to be aesthetic. We cannot adorn the Gospel with music, and with painting, and with architecture. When you stand beneath the blue sky and see how God has decked His world with many flowers beneath your feet, and all around you hear the birds singing. And when, in the still and silent night, you gaze upon the silver stars, you feel that there is nothing we can build and nothing we can make that is in the least worthy of the great God. You remember how Stephen said of the temple at Jerusalem, “Solomon built him an house,” and then added, “Howbeit the most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands; as saith the prophet, Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool: what house will ye build me? saith the LORD: or what is the place of my rest?” As much as to say, there was nothing in all that material grandeur, for from the very day in which Solomon built the temple with all its splendor, religion declined and decayed throughout all Israel. You cannot “adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour” with anything tangible and material—it is to be adorned in quite another way.
- Well, holiness suits the Gospel.
- The Gospel is also adorned with mercifulness.
- Men of business, adorn the Gospel by the strictness of your integrity.
- Adorn the Gospel, next, by your unselfishness.
- Again, let a quick forgiveness be upon you.
- Next, have patience under trouble.
- A placid and steady calm is also a great adornment for the Gospel.
v.11-13
For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. 12It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope - the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ,
See more in Spurgeon on Titus 2 11-13 Titus2 v 11-13.
One may say that in a world where we are tempted to say “Yes” to every desire and feelings, that the reality of our faith can be demonstrated by what we say no to, by what we are willing to deny.
The most difficult part of the training of young men is not to put the right thing into them, but to get the wrong thing out of them.
Christians are not to run out of the world, as monks and hermits sought to do, but to live in this present world. Yet, while in the world, we are to be godly, that is, full of God. That kind of life which is without God is not for Christians. Those worldly desires, the pride and ambition, which are common to worldly men, are not to have power over us. We are to deny them, and to live soberly.
Grace has its discipline, and Grace has its chosen disciples, for you cannot help noticing that while the eleventh verse says that, “the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men,” yet it is clear that this grace of God has not exercised its holy discipline upon all men and therefore the text changes its “all men” into “us.” Usually in Scripture when you get a generality you soon find a particularity near it. The text has it, “teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world.” Thus you see that grace has its own disciples. Are you a disciple of the grace of God? Did you ever come and submit yourself to it? Have you learned to spell that word “faith”? Have you childlike trust in Jesus? Have you learned to wash in the laver of atonement? Have you learned those holy exercises which are taught by the grace of God? Can you say that your salvation is of grace? Do you know the meaning of that text, “By grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God”?
that it is not sin that humbles most, but grace, and that it is the soul, led through its sinfulness to be occupied with God in His wonderful glory as God, as Creator and Redeemer, that will truly take the lowest place before Him.
It is grace, not sin, that teaches us to deny ungodliness and live uprightly before Him. If sin was our teacher for living holy lives, it would be because we deny God’s justice in dealing with sin. Sin kills the soul; grace kills the self.
v.15
These, then, are the things you should teach. Encourage and rebuke with all authority. Do not let anyone despise you.
As I have already reminded you, Titus was a young man, and people are apt to despise the pastoral office when it is held by a young man. Yet they ought always to respect it, whether it be held by a young man or an old man. God knows best who is most fitted for the work of the ministry, and those of us who are getting old must never look with any kind of scorn or contempt upon those who are commencing their service, for we, too, were young once. You cannot measure a man’s grace by the length of his beard, nor by the number of his years.