Now we'll turn to Titus again, the first
chapter.
That first chapter, we'll begin with verse 7.
You'll remember that we broke off there, said
it was too much for last week, and
we'll talk a little about what the qualifications
of church leaders.
And it's entirely scriptural if we make this
apply to any church leader.
Paul's talking particularly here about elders, presbyters, bishops.
But any church leader would come under this
description.
And this man of God, Paul, is telling
another man of God, Titus, the qualifications of
a man or men placed in leadership in
the church.
And I ask you to notice one thing
here, which is in glaring contrast to our
usual way of judging things.
Do you notice that intellectual qualifications are completely
missing?
That's strange.
Unless where it says sound in faith, informed,
and with ability to expound and expose, that
would assume at least a fair degree of
intellectual power.
But the qualifications here are not intellectual.
They are not what we would call gifted
men in the human way of looking at
it.
He says that they are to be blameless,
and then he defines blameless as meaning in
our domestic relation, husband or one wife, and
in our homes, having faithful children, keeping a
decent house, and not stubborn, self-willed, not
with a bad temper, and not giving to
wine, and not so physical as to try
to get your way by using your fists.
That seems almost ludicrous here, but it's here.
We remember to whom this is written.
Remember that it was Paul that wrote it
to the Cretans, to Titus, about the Cretans,
and what kind of people they were.
We can understand.
It would be quite understandable for people brought
up as they were, an old deacon to
try to get obedience by slapping somebody around.
Paul said no.
Then, not given to filthy lucre.
We mentioned that, but we'll hook on there.
Not given to filthy lucre.
That shows that he's free from covetousness.
Nobody in the Church, nobody, should have any
place in the Church if it can be
truthfully said about him that he's a lover
of money.
Now, I want you to notice the word
lucre here.
It's a very old word.
Once, it was a good word.
Now, it has been in such a bad
company that it's a delinquent.
But the word gain in the Scripture is
not a bad word, and the Scripture says
that a man should seek gain.
That is, he should work.
He's a farmer.
He should till his soil.
The Book of Proverbs has many sharp things
to say against a man who lies around,
lets the grass grow and the weeds, and
doesn't till his soil.
Paul has some sharp things to say about
the fellow that went from house to house,
loafed around and wouldn't work.
He said everybody ought to work in order
that they might have to give to them
that are in need, the sick, the poor.
So that there's nothing here said against honest
gain.
But when it becomes lucre, then it's filthy.
Honest paycheck isn't filthy.
An honest increase in your farm income isn't
filthy.
But when it becomes lucre, incidentally, that's the
same word from which our lucrative comes.
We say we want our sons or daughters
to have lucrative jobs.
Well, the word lucrative is not bad, but
the word lucre is bad.
Strange how language goes.
But this word lucre here almost means loot.
Not quite, but almost.
It means money which is received beyond the
proper amount, and particularly money received in an
attitude of drooling, covetous delight.
He said that's filthy.
It's not the money that's filthy, it's the
attitude that makes it so.
Well, everybody ought to know that a man
of God, if he loves money, he's not
a man of God.
Jesus said plainly that we weren't to love
it, that we were to ask our Heavenly
Father and He would take care of us.
We were to give freely and not worry
about it.
The Lord knew, and the Father would take
care of us, and He's always done that.
Now, verse 8, it says he's hospitable.
And here is another qualification for a man
in position in a church.
Hospitable, what does that mean?
Well, it follows, according to all that I
can learn, the customs in those days, custom
in those days, the missionaries and workers like
Paul and Silas and Barnabas and Mark and
such traveled from place to place.
Paul names many of them in his letters.
They went from place to place, and they
traveled on a shoestring practically.
They were always under pressure, and there was
never a red carpet rolled out for them.
Somebody grabbed a gray rock instead of a
red carpet and was ready to throw rocks,
and they were always in trouble.
And when they got into a town, they
couldn't go to a hotel, granted there were
any.
If there was a hotel in the neighborhood,
they couldn't go to it.
So the Christians threw their homes open to
these traveling preachers.
And here is what it's meant.
This doesn't mean invite your relatives in.
That's something to do, but that's good to
do, and it's just taken for granted that's
all right for your relatives to visit and
exchange visits and have them come and go.
That's taken for granted.
But now this hospitable, according to all the
commentators and translators, seems to refer to the
way they did it then, traveling about, and
they threw their homes open to the traveling
preacher.
John, you'll remember, warned against throwing their home
open to the wrong kind of preacher.
He said, if you throw your home open
to a false teacher, you've partaken of his
evil deeds.
You've contributed to his delinquency, John said.
So here is hospitality.
Then there's verse 8.
He's a lover of good, or a lover
of good men.
Sometimes the translators don't know whether an adjective
good or evil means an abstraction or a
personality.
For instance, in the Lord's Prayer, deliver us
from evil.
Translators don't know whether evil is a noun
or an adjective exactly.
They don't know whether that should be deliver
us from the evil one or deliver us
from evil.
In either way, it doesn't matter.
And here again they're troubled.
They don't know whether Paul said a lover
of good men or a lover of good.
But in either case it's all right because
it simply means that the man's one quality
or qualification of a worker in the church
should be that he loves good and naturally
loves good people.
The question is, where is your affinity?
I'd like to ask you that.
Where is your affinity?
Now I don't ask you where you spend
time because some of you spend time working
where everybody's evil and you can't help it.
But where is your affinity?
Where would you go when you're free to
go where you would?
And where do you feel at home?
And what kind of people do you seek?
Whirlings?
If whirlings, it ought to be found out.
And oh, one should be accepted as a
good Christian who finds himself at home among
whirlings.
He may have to go and be among
whirlings.
He may have to do that.
Some of you work in places and you
just have to be present and there are
gatherings to which you have to go.
You go and you don't like it and
you get away as soon as you can
and you don't partake of any evil deeds
but it's a part of your job.
So it isn't a question of where you
have to go sometimes but it's a question
of where do you feel at home?
Where is your affinity?
Where are you at rest?
What's your kind of people?
We ought to ask ourselves that.
Is it among the whirlings or is it
among the lukewarm?
There are Christians that have gone far enough
that they don't enjoy being among whirlings with
their off-color jokes and their liquor but
they don't enjoy being among the saints either.
There's a middle twilight zone of lukewarm people
that they're good, decent people and nothing can
be said against them but they're not going
to embarrass you by talking about the Lord
too much.
They're not going to suggest we pray before
we part and nobody's going to bring up
a Bible question.
They're just going to have a chit-chat
and coffee-clutch style.
If it's women, it'll be the latest sack
or whatever they call them.
And if it's men, it'll be whether the
tail fin is 41 inches high or only
38 and harmless and perfectly harmless but not
spiritual.
Where is your affinity?
Then the saints.
There's another group.
There are some people that are never at
home except among the saints.
Get among people like, say, Tom Hare.
You can't get him to talk about much
of anything else only the Lord and yet,
strangely, he doesn't embarrass you with it.
It just seems a natural thing.
It just seems normal for him to be
talking about the Lord and about what he
calls fith spelled f-a-i-t-h
and seeing the fists of the Lord spelled
f-a-c-e and so he has
fith and sees the fists of the Lord
and he wants to talk about it.
He'll talk about other things and even joke
if he insists but if you let him
alone he gravitates like a needle back to
the fists of God and the things of
God.
Well, is that where you belong?
Is that where you feel at home?
I think that everybody on an official board
in a church ought to qualify as a
lover of good and a lover of good
men.
And I can't see how a church can
hope to have the blessing of God on
it if it tolerates people in places of
leadership who are not lovers of good men
who feel at home among lukewarm or worldliness
and going on sober not flighty, that means
I think it has nothing to do with
liquor they dealt with that above when it
said that he was not to be a
lover of wine not reckless, not irresponsible, and
not excitable.
I've talked this over with some of my
friends in days gone by here and there
pastors know this people, gifted people, good people
and yet irresponsible people that you just can't
trust with leadership the church can't trust them
with leadership they're irresponsible they think it's freedom
but it's not freedom, it's irresponsibility they will
not wear a yoke take my yoke upon
you and they will not wear a yoke
now you can't say they're going to hell,
they're not they'll go to heaven by the
grace of God the way we'll all go
but they are unbroken colts a colt is
lovable and lively but no good because it
has not yet worn harness or a saddle
and there are Christians that are a long
way from being colts that just will not
wear any harness they won't they say that
they don't believe they should because that's contrary
to Paul's doctrine of liberty but Paul was
very careful to teach that while we had
all kinds of liberty we must lay a
lowly responsibility on ourselves for Christ's sake and
for the sake of the church but there
are those who are not willing to do
that so they're irresponsible reckless, somewhat excitable somewhat
flighty and while you like them, you can't
trust them and there are thousands of them
in the churches then he says, just verse
8 that is honest toward every man holy,
verse 8 that is their relation to God
and temperate, verse 8 that is your relation
to yourself and there we have again that
famous triangle to which I call attention so
often our relation to God, to ourselves, and
to our fellow men Paul calls it soberly,
righteously, and godly further on in his epistle
here he calls it just, holy, and temperate
the temperate man is a man who's in
right relation to himself the holy man is
one who's in right relation to God and
the just man is one who's in right
relation to every man did you say I
haven't always been?
well, start now start this communion service and
get in right relation to every man you
can't hope, you can't even hope to go
back and undo all you've done but you
can start now and I love that beautiful
part about the scripture behold, he maketh all
things new begin here, begin now and Eckhart
says the man who turns to God God
will trust him as if he'd never done
anything wrong starts now, God starts now now
is the accepted time God's nows so the
just man is the man who's honest toward
his fellow man the holy man is right
in his relation to God and the temperate
man is right in relation to himself then
sound in faith and according to Paul here,
verse 9 he's got to hold fast the
faithful word we must remember that Paul was
not a technical man that is, he wouldn't
crucify you on a technicality but he also
was not a careless man this is the
age of creedless religion we don't believe in
anything particularly we just love people just love
people, just love everybody and love the Lord
and love everybody and so Jews, Catholics, Christians
and Buddhists all gathered together around this simple
place of worship, fellowship and all going the
same direction so they said but Paul said,
holding fast the faithful word of sound doctrine
Paul was a doctrinarian, don't forget it he
said love was everything but he also made
doctrine to be the direction love took and
out of doctrine sprang love so the leader
in the church has to be man who
holds fast the faithful word no loose ideas,
no personal interpretations but the faithful word that
he may be able by sound doctrine I
said there was no intellectual qualification mentioned here
unless it was this one that he may
be able by sound doctrine to exhort and
to convince the gainsayer he had to be
able to do two things he had to
be able to expound and expose he was
an informed man who knew the scriptures with
ability to expound and expose expound is the
positive, expose is the negative expound is to
tell what the scripture says expose is to
show where teachers are wrong and if you
want an example of that go to Galatians
or Colossians or 1 John there were some
pretty sharp exposes showed up people for what
they were so a good leader of the
church has got to be informed and then
he's going to have to have ability to
expound, that is teach in some degree and
to show what is wrong so that people
don't end in the wood just as sure
as you live a church that gets careless
about its doctrine will land in the same
place that a man will who gets careless
about watching the signs if he's traveling across
the country he'll end up somewhere in a
dead end street in a farmer's backyard and
that's the sound doctrine is the clear marked
highway and while it isn't everything it leads
to God and it is so vastly important
that it dare not be neglected every church
should be doctrinally sound and never should we
allow a smiling countenance or a friendly broad
religious latitudinarianism the broad expansiveness of thought that
takes in everybody never allow that to lead
you astray if you take in everybody pretty
soon we'll all be down on the same
level and we'll all be without God and
without sound faith so he says the church
leader has got to have faithful word and
sound doctrine and follow what he's been taught
in the word of God and be able
to expound it so others can get it
and to defend it so that the gainsayers
and vain talkers in verse 10 will not
upset the children of God now that's all
for this morning for really that's an addenda
or a PS on last week's talk as
we're going as Newell would say verse by
verse through the scripture and since this is
communion Sunday I ask you now to just
let that lie in your minds and turn
to think of something else for just a
minute and that is as we prayed yesterday
something came into my mind the three preachers
were in prayer and something came into my
mind and it just occurred to me that
I should tell you this today although of
course it's old to you this communion Sunday
we gaze look, look, look says the scripture,
look and this communion Sunday we look three
ways backward to the cross upward to the
throne and onward to his coming now that's
the three directions don't look all at the
same time we meditate some on the cross
then we meditate on the throne and then
we meditate on his coming these are the
three directions this morning it's backward to the
cross the cross if we look backward to
the cross too much we tend to religious
morbidity if we do not look backward to
the cross then we tend to religious liberality
without the cross we must look backward to
the cross often and much and meditate often
but we mustn't forget to look upward to
the throne for the Christ who died on
the cross is not now on the cross
the Christ who was dead is not now
dead I think some of our friends of
other certain other groups meditate on the death
of Christ so much that they forget the
life of Christ they know it if you
ask them they say oh sure he rose
from the dead that's taught in our church
but that's not where the emphasis falls the
emphasis falls on the dead Christ if I
were in a hospital and my last end
had come and I knew I had but
a few hours and somebody stuck a crucifix
in my hand I would be depressed so
I'd become gloomy two dead men there in
the bed two dead men Jesus and me
how could we help each other?
only a live man can help a dead
man he died but he's not dead but
we gaze for a while upon his cross
but we don't stop there we turn our
eyes to the open tomb and to the
throne and the Christ we adore is a
living Christ alive forevermore and I want to
know he died if I'm dying for I
want to know that he I can follow
his footsteps into the gloom as they say
but when you get into the gloom you'll
find it all shiny with light but I
also want to know he came out of
that gloom and he's in a position to
help me a live man can help the
dead man the two dead men in the
bed can't help each other so don't give
me a crucifix when I'm dying then we
look onward to his coming onward to his
coming we do show forth the Lord's death
till he come now the choir is going
to sing for us we haven't forgot them
we just changed the order a little and
I want you reverently to listen and please
don't listen to the music and don't listen
to know whether they're on pitch they will
be but if somebody shouldn't be don't let
that bother you we're not listening this is
not a music hall this is a church
so this morning the choir is going to
sing a number I have long loved and
I asked Brother McAfee whether it wouldn't be
nice if I'd read it and he said
it would written by Paul Gerhardt a German
brother Paul Gerhardt was a Moravian and he
wrote this O sacred head once wounded with
grief and shame bowed down now scornfully surrounded
with thorns thine only crown O sacred head
what glory what bliss till now was thine
yet though despised and gory I'd joy to
call thee mine what thou my lord has
suffered was all for sinners gain mine mine
was the transgression but thine the deadly pain
lo here I fall my savior tis I
deserve thy place look on me with thy
favor vouchsafe to me thy grace what language
shall I borrow to thank thee dearest friend
for this thy dying sorrow for pity without
end O make me thine forever and should
I fainting be Lord let me never never
outlive my love for thee be near me
be near me when I'm dying O show
thy cross to me and to my succor
flying come Lord and set me free these
eyes new faith receiving from Jesus shall not
move for he who dies believing dies safely
through thy love we gaze back to the
cross we gaze up to the throne we
gaze onward to his coming