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Titus 2 “Getting Ready to Reach Out: The Necessity of a Godly Congregation” **

This past Tuesday evening our church board members took a field trip. Your deacons, trustees, youth director, and I piled in the church van, prayed, and started driving around our community. In our prayer we asked the Lord for something very specific. We asked Him to give us eyes to see this community the way He sees it.

Based on 2000 census figures, there are right at 10,000 people living in Porter Township , 6461 living in the town of Wheelersburg . In the year 2000, there were just under 80,000 people living in Scioto county (that’s down 1,000 from ten years earlier). There are 34,054 houses in our county. It’s one thing to hear the numbers. It’s another thing to see the community.

Church family members, this is our “ Jerusalem .” It’s the place where God has planted us and given us the assignment to make disciples of Christ. Granted, we must be concerned about the whole world, but our world begins right here. Hence, our prayer, “Lord, help us to see this community the way You see it.”

From time to time we stopped the van, discussed what we saw, and then prayed for that slice of our community. We stopped at the Miller Manor apartments. We parked in front of where the community’s new school will be built. We went to the Patriot Ridge sub-division. We crossed the Greenup bridge and looked at a neighboring community in a neighboring state, but reminded ourselves it’s located just ten minutes from here. We drove past a couple of church buildings where churches no longer meet, a sober reminder of what can happen if God’s people lost sight of their mission. We ended up in front of the old Wheelersburg cemetery and pondered the brevity of life, and while there concluded our trip with another time of calling on God.

I’d like to take a few moments to allow the men to share their perceptions, to answer the question, “What did you see when you began to look at this community from God’s perspective?” Have several men share…

The fact is, God has situated us as a church in a position that is ripe with potential. There are some 33,000 people who live within a fifteen minute drive of our church facility. There are some 100 churches in our area, of all denominational and doctrinal stripes and sizes. If on a Sunday morning, all the church buildings were filled with the people who consider that place "their church," there would be in the neighborhood of 11,000 people in church (and certainly in many of these churches one would not hear the clear teaching of the Scriptures).

Let that sink in for a moment. If the churches were thriving, and few are, only one out of three people in our area would be in church. That means two out of three people living around us do not have a solid commitment to a local church. While we can't be dogmatic, we can assume if a person is not involved in a relationship with a church, which is the Body of Christ, there is at least room to question whether the person indeed has a personal relationship with Christ Himself.

The point is this. There are literally thousands of people around us, individuals within the direct influence of this church, who need to be reached. The potential before us is indeed staggering.

The question is, how are we going to reach them? How should we evangelize this community? I’m grateful we need not resort to pragmatics, for God has answered the question for us. He tells us in His Word how a church can best penetrate a community with the hope-giving gospel of His Son. We find the answer in the book of Titus.

Last week, we began to investigate this epistle, with a sermon in the morning and small group interaction in the evening service. I’ve entitled this series, “Getting Ready to Reach Out.”

Titus is an evangelistic book for in it God specifies what must be true of a local church if it is to accomplish the task of evangelism in its community. In Titus, God refers to Himself over and over as "God our Savior" (see 1:3, 4; 2:10, 13, etc). The True God has a saving agenda—that’s why we are here, He saved us—and He expects those whom He has saved to likewise devote themselves to this agenda. To be saved and then NOT get involved in God’s saving agenda with others is unthinkable.

Not long ago a great tragedy hit the tri-State area when an explosion caused several miners to be trapped in the Sago mine. As you well know, twelve men lost their lives in the accident near Tallmansville , West Virginia . What was amazing was to see how the community, the state of West Virginia , even our nation and beyond, responded when they learned that men were helplessly trapped in a dangerous mine. Folks gathered for prayer at the local church. The governor visited. Rescue workers went into action. People turned on their televisions to keep abreast with the hope that the trapped minors would be freed. When a rescue operation is underway, people want to do something.

Beloved, I remind you that we were once hopelessly lost in the dark pit of sin, hopelessly lost. But God sent His Son into the world on a rescue mission, and because of His death on the cross and triumphant resurrection, God now saves sinners who will repent and believe in Christ. That’s great news, but it wouldn’t have helped us had not someone taken the rescue mission seriously, reached out to us, and introduced us to Christ. Because they did, we are now saved.

But many are still trapped. The rescue mission continues. The need for workers is great.

You say, “I want to get involved. What should I do?” In one sense, the answer is simple. Start telling people about the Deliverer, Jesus Christ! We can all do that. Indeed, we who know Christ must be doing that.

Yet the fact is, God gives us a strategy for outreach in His Word. What would have happened if everybody who heard about the Sago Mine disaster responded by rushing to the mine entrance and tried to go inside to help the trapped men? Their good intentions would have produced dangerous results. A rescue operation requires a strategy. Not everybody does the same thing, but everybody has a part to play and needs to work together for the common goal.

The strategy provided in Titus is quite simple. God’s Word identifies three prerequisites for a church that’s ready to reach out.

All three marks are essential, not optional, if we are going to be a church that's on the cutting edge when it comes to evangelism.

Last week, we considered the first mark and learned that if a church is to fulfill its mission in evangelism, it must have godly leadership. That goes for us. We must have…

--We must have leaders who know and are involved in teaching sound doctrine (9).

--Furthermore, our leadership team must be willing to deal with rebellious, problem-causing people in the church (10-11).

--Our elders must be willing to rebuke whatever harms the testimony of Christ in the church (13).

--Finally, God expects church leaders to deal with people who claim to know God but deny Him by their actions (16).

To sum it up, if we as a church are to be effective in evangelism, the first prerequisite is that we must have godly leaders who meet the qualifications of Titus 1. The reason is clear. If we’re reaching out as we should, we’ll be bringing in new people all the time, new people who are babes in Christ, new people with enthusiasm but who also often carry ungodly baggage. They’re going to need help getting rid of that baggage, and that’s the church’s job, to help them put off old patterns and put on new Christ-like patterns, with the elders leading the way.

This week, we want to examine the second prerequisite for effective outreach. It’s explained in chapter two.

Before we address the issue specifically, allow me to ask five questions that will provide us with a preliminary overview of Titus 2.

The church in Crete was made up of young Christians. Apparently Paul had been to Crete , introduced some folks to Christ, and then had to leave. He left Titus there for this purpose, as he states in 1:5, “That you might straighten out what was left unfinished.” It was Titus’s job to organize this young church and help it grow in godliness.

That wouldn’t be easy. The people living on this island had a pretty sordid reputation, as verse 12 indicates, “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.” How do you help a group of baby Christians with that kind of background become a godly congregation? By doing this. Its members must be taught the Word of God. That’s what Paul told Titus:

Titus 2:15 “These, then, are the things you should teach. Encourage and rebuke with all authority. Do not let anyone despise you.”

Paul lists five groups in chapter two: older men (2), older women (3), younger women (4), younger men (6), and slaves (9). Older men face certain challenges that younger men don’t. The same is true with older women and younger women. That indicates that a one-size-fits-all approach to teaching won’t cut it.

In short, Christians need to be taught how to live in light of God's truth. Notice verse 1 again, “You must teach what is in accord with sound doctrine.” Titus was to teach doctrine to these young believers (they needed to learn what to believe: about God, sin, Jesus Christ, justification, sanctification, future events, the Holy Spirit, and much more). They needed to learn doctrine. But not just doctrine. They needed to be taught “what is in accord with” sound doctrine. In other words, they needed to learn the kind of character and lifestyle traits that are consistent with good doctrine. The test for whether you really believe something is how it affects your life.

I can say, “I believe in gravity.” But if I jump off a five story building claiming I won’t be hurt, you could question whether I really believed in gravity.

A person can say, “I believe God exists.” But if God makes no difference in his business life or the way he treats his wife, you could rightly question the validity of what he says he believes.

Sometimes there’s a false dichotomy between being an evangelistic church or a teaching church. The fact is, the most evangelistic thing a church can do is to provide solid Bible teaching. Why? Because as people learn the meat of God’s Word and apply it, their lives change and become like neon signs to a world lost in sin.

A specific format is not given. What is clear is that Paul commands Titus to make sure it's happening (verse 1—“you must teach”, and verse 15—“These are the things you should teach”). In fact, Paul concludes verse 15 with a specific charge, “Encourage and rebuke with all authority.” There are some negotiables in the church, but here’s a non-negotiable. A church leader must teach God’s Word and he must insist that those listening obey it, all of it, all of the time.

The last command in the chapter is significant. “Do not let anyone despise you.” That implies that when a church leader teaches God’s Word, people who do not want to submit to the authority of God’s Word will be inclined to discredit the messenger of God’s Word. Don’t let that happen, Paul says to Titus. Don’t let anyone despise you because if they do that, they won’t give their full attention to God’s Word.

With that preliminary overview in mind, allow me to remind you of the central point stated earlier. To be effective in evangelism, the first prerequisite is godly leadership, and the second is related, a godly congregation.

Which raises the question, How can you tell if a congregation is godly? Can you tell by looking at its missions budget, or by seeing how many people come to Sunday School? In our society, we tend to define success in terms of numbers, so we might think that a godly congregation is a "big" congregation with a big budget and a big staff.

Thankfully, in Titus 2, God gives us a definitive, objective measuring-stick for identifying a godly congregation. To qualify as a godly congregation, God says that a congregation must exhibit the following six characteristics:

Here's what Paul told Titus to do with the congregation in verse 1 [KJV], "But speak thou the things which become sound doctrine." The NKJV puts it this way, “But as for you, speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine.”

Why did Paul tell Titus that? The context goes back to what he said in chapter one where he warned Titus about false teachers who were leading churches astray. Now in chapter two, Paul says to Titus, “YOU [the pronoun is emphatic] must teach what is in accord with sound doctrine.” Don't be like the false teachers who teach things they ought not to teach (1:11). Instead, teach the truth of God's sound doctrine.

Don't miss this. A godly church, a church that pleases God, and a church that will be prepared for evangelism, is church that is committed to teaching the Word of God. Again, chapter two both begins and ends with this emphasis on teaching.

God’s kind of church will have a strong teaching ministry. Sometimes we tend to have a narrow view of the importance of teaching, that it's like the icing on the cake, but the fact is, it IS the cake.

Please notice. If a church is going to be prepared for evangelism, it must have a solid teaching ministry. The verb in verse 1 is a command, “You must teach,” which literally means ‘talk’ [Greek laleo] and can indicate informal communication.

What does verse 1 imply about godliness? I see a couple of things. The first implication is that if we do what comes naturally as people, we're in serious trouble. We need to be taught. The ‘natural’ man doesn't please God, nor does a church full of people who live life by doing what comes naturally.

The second implication from verse 1 is that Christians need to be taught what they are to be as well as what they are to do. The Living Bible puts it this way, “But as for you, speak up for the right living that goes along with true Christianity.”

It just makes sense that a congregation that is prepared for evangelism must be committed to the study of sound doctrine. Why? Because what a person believes is the key to how a person behaves. A congregation that's brining in new people through evangelism will soon be in utter chaos if it is not teaching people how to live in light of God's truth. A godly congregation is one that is committed to the study of sound doctrine.

A lot of churches are like the cross-eyed discuss thrower who didn't set any records, but sure kept the crowd awake! How so? They teach the Scriptures, but they don't have a purpose in mind. Church members come week after week, sit in the pew, and listen to their Sunday School teacher or pastor teach the Bible. Then, when the service is over, they mumble, "Good message," and go home until the next week.

What's missing? The teaching did not change their lives. Why not? The fault could lie in two places. It could be the teacher's fault—he may be teaching the Bible just like a college professor would teach a Bible history lesson, with little attention given to relevant application. On the other hand, it could be the hearer's fault. The reason his life was not changed was because he didn't come intending to have his life changed by God's Word.

Listen carefully. If we are to be a church that's effective in evangelism, we must be a people who come to church services with this thought on our hearts, “We are here to be changed by the teaching of the Scriptures.”

How do I know that? Because of the rest of chapter 2. Beginning in verse 2 Paul gets pretty specific about the fact that Titus’s teaching ministry in the church at Crete was supposed to produce something.

By the way, in case you are wondering, this is one of the main reasons we have been using a different format on Sunday evenings recently. One of the goals of the “242” night (which comes from Acts 2:42) is to follow the example of the early church who “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching.” That verse indicates the early church members did more than merely listen to sermons. They took time to discuss the implications of the apostles’ teaching and how to apply it to their lives.

That’s what we are doing on Sunday evenings. By using small group interaction, we’re seeking to come to grips with the life-changing implications of the morning message. In the words of Titus 2:1, we’re seeking to “teach what is in accord with sound doctrine.” Right now you’re hearing sound doctrine. This evening we’ll seek to identify in practical terms what is in accord with that doctrine.

Now let’s look closer at this second characteristic of a godly congregation. A godly church is one that provides a teaching ministry that produces changed lives. The teaching ministry shows up in the transformation of five groups found in the church.

Paul tells Titus to teach sound doctrine with this aim in mind, verse 2, “Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, in love and in endurance.” Titus was to target the older men, and make sure that biblical doctrine was showing up in their lives.

Who classifies as an “older” man? In classical Greek usage, Philo used the word to refer to men between the ages of 50-56! It’s likely that Paul has in mind the gray-beards of the church, the men whose children are grown and whose testimony is vital to the ministry of the church.

My intent in this study is merely to get the “big picture” of the chapter. Titus was supposed to invest time teaching God’s Word to the older men so that they were “temperate” (restrained, particularly referring to alcohol), “worthy of respect” (honorable), “self-controlled,” “sound (healthy, accurate) in faith, in love, and in endurance.” Simply put, the aim was to help older men become godly men who led by godly example.

That’s exactly what a church needs if it’s going to be prepared for evangelism. It must make sure it's teaching its older men in such a way that God's truth is seen in their lives. The teaching ministry is to show up in a second group as well.

Notice verse 3, “Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent [religious, worthy of reverence] in the way they live, not to be slanderers [accusers, using one’s tongue to hurt others] or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good.”

Who are the older women? Paul doesn't tell us, but I guess we'd have to say those over 39 since that's where many stop keeping track (not really)! Actually, based on the comment in verse 4, “older women” probably refers to those who have raised their children and now have an empty nest.

Like the older men, so the older women should be taught to set an example of godliness in the church. That’s significant. No matter how old a person is, he or she must still be committed to being changed by the Word of God. Daily. We never arrive. Paul says a church must make sure its older women are learning and living in light of biblical doctrine.

Don't miss the change in the pattern in verse 4. Titus was to have a direct teaching ministry with the older men, and older women, and likewise would have the same with the younger men and servants. But Paul did not tell him to teach the younger women. Whose responsibility was that to be?

Observe verse 4, “Then they [i.e. the older women] can train the younger women to love their husbands and children.” In a day when marital corruption is creeping into the church, we need to pay careful attention to Titus 2:4. If you are a godly older woman, and your children are gone, God has a special ministry opportunity for you. He wants you to teach younger women how to be faithful at home.

“But how can I?” you ask. “I've never taught a class before.” Who said anything about teaching a class? The type of teaching verse 4 has in mind takes place best in a relationship, not a classroom. If you have a godly reputation, a solid understanding of biblical truth, and a willing heart, you can have a teaching ministry with younger women. In fact, God commissions you and we need you to do so.

What do younger women need to learn? To adorn God’s Word by being faithful wives and mothers. Does that mean young women shouldn’t work outside the home? Not necessarily. It does mean their home should be a higher priority than their job (that goes for men, too).

You get the idea from Titus 2 that biblical teaching in the church ought to be practical, and ought to result in changed lives. That's right. The church is to have a teaching ministry that touches five groups, and here are the final two.

Younger Men who live self-controlled lives that are free from criticism by non-Christians (6-8)

Verses 6-8 state, “Similarly, encourage the young men to be self-controlled. In everything set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching show integrity, seriousness and soundness of speech that cannot be condemned, so that those who oppose you may be ashamed because they have nothing bad to say about us.”

What do young men need to learn? Time doesn’t permit us to examine this instruction in detail, but the bottom line is clear. They need to be taught how to be self-controlled instead of sense-controlled (see how this type of practical teaching had occurred in the church in Ephesus; Eph 4:20-24).

The final group Paul identifies were the servants (read verses 9-12). Verses 9-10—“Teach slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please them, not to talk back to them, 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.”

Did you realize it's biblical to teach Christians how to behave on the job? Churches are supposed to instruct their members how to make the teaching about our Savior attractive when they're on lunch break.

So if a church is going to have a godly congregation, God says it must have a solid teaching ministry. Godliness does not just happen. To be godly, a congregation must be taught. But it takes more than teaching, as the next characteristic indicates.

The church consists of people who live godly lives separated from sinful practices (12).

Let's read verses 11-12, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.”

Notice that godliness is linked to right choices. A godly congregation is comprised of people who make daily choices to say no to sin and yes to holiness. It's also linked to grace (though our lives are to be different from the world, we have no reason for pride).

We need to camp on this truth, and chew on it for a moment. Many of us hold to false theology and don't even realize it. We know the Christian life began by grace--we were saved by grace. And we know the Christian life will end by grace--we will be glorified by grace. But we tend to think the present Christian life is a bunch of works.[2] Work, work, work. We live as though the present Christian life is up to us, that we succeed by our own merit. But that's not true. Jesus said, “Abide in Me, for without Me you can do nothing (John 15:4).”

Beloved, grace is the basis of the entire Christian life—past, present, and future. There's no room for pride in the Christian life, no place for a haughty attitude that says, “I've got my life in order. Why don't you?” It's only by grace, my friend.

A truly godly congregation is made up of people who understand grace, and who demonstrate this understanding by living godly lives separated from sin.

The church members give evidence that they are waiting for Christ to return (13).

V 13 states, “…while we wait for the blessed hope—the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.” We get so excited about certain things. Ball games, vacations, retirement, the end of school. May I ask you a question? Are you looking forward to the return of Christ? Are you really looking? Did you think about it this past week? To be a godly congregation we must be looking for His return.

In verse 14 we find a key theme in Titus, the theme of "good works." “…who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.”

Few things capture the attention of non-Christians more quickly than Christians exhibiting Christlike, good works. There's one final characteristic given of a godly congregation.

The church members willingly submit to and respect the authority of God’s Word (15).

In verse 15 Paul sums up what Titus was to do with the congregation in Crete. Here’s the KJV rendering, “These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise you.” Show me a congregation that is willing to submit to and respect the authority of the Word of God, and I'll show you a godly congregation.

Yes, the potential for evangelism before us is great. How are we going to be effective when it comes to reaching this community? Is the answer to be found in a program? No. The answer, although profound, is quite simple. We must have godly leadership and we must have a godly congregation. There's a third mark, which we'll consider next week.

Beloved, the rescue mission is underway. The Deliverer has come. His salvation is sufficient to rescue any sinner from the dark pit of sin. But the fact remains. Many sinners all around us are trapped in that pit. I ask you a question…

To be a godly congregation we each individually must resolve to take seriously the charge of Titus 2. Then we’ll be ready to reach out!

**Note: This is an unedited manuscript of a message preached at Wheelersburg Baptist Church. It is provided to prompt your continued reflection on the practical truths of the Word of God.

[2] I’m indebted to Leroy Eims for this observation.