Day #225: Titus 3:8

Titus 3:8 (NIV)
8 This is a trustworthy saying. And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone.


The things Paul wrote were true so Titus ought to constantly insist on them from his congregation. The believers must show their beliefs through their conduct. They must be careful to do good deeds all the time. Sound doctrine must manifest itself in good works. Such teaching and action profits the believers as well as the unbelievers to whom the church witnesses.

Titus should stress these things in order to promote godly behavior in his listeners. Twice before Paul had instructed Titus to teach these things in accordance with sound doctrine (Titus 2:1, 15), and this exhortation is his final reiteration of what is probably the central thrust of the entire epistle. Paul was deeply concerned that God’s people devote themselves to doing what is good because these things are excellent and profitable for everyone. Titus was to promote good works, for they go hand in hand with sound doctrine.


SO WHAT? (what will I do with what I have read today?)

This idea that our faith ought to impact our conduct is foundational. If we claim to know Christ, we must live like Him. We must be about the buisness of doing good works. Good works don't save us (Ephesians 2:8-10) but they show that we are saved.

In light of this foundational truth, I want us to go back and look at what does it really mean to be a real believer – real Christianity.

There are the eight things. They’re all out of the book of Acts, chapter 2. We'll cover four today and four tomorrow.

#1. Real Christianity has supernatural power.

They don’t just talk about God, they experience God. This is what makes the church different from every organization. We have the Holy Spirit. Microsoft does not have the Holy Spirit. The United States government does not have the Holy Spirit. The Red Cross does not have the Holy Spirit. No other organization has the power of God in it. God has not promised his Spirit to help anybody or anything else except his church.

The background of the birth of the church is in Acts 1. “For forty days after his crucifixion, Jesus met with his followers many times [In other words, after he rose from the dead he hung around for another forty days] and he proved in many ways that he was truly alive. [One time he met with five hundred people.] He talked to them about the Kingdom of God. One time while eating a meal with them, Jesus told them, ‘Do not leave Jerusalem until the Father sends you the Spirit he promised.’”

He said I’ve got some stuff for you to do and I’m going back to heaven, but don’t dare try to do it until you’ve got the power and it’s going to come in my Spirit. I’m with you now, but I’m going back to heaven and I’m going to come back in Spirit form and I’m going to be in you, not just with you.

In Acts chapter 1 verse 8 it says this: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you… And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria and to the ends of the earth.” We’ve talked about this before. Jerusalem was the city they were in. So he says start in your own city. Then go to Judea – that’s like Contra Costa County. The he says go to Samaria. That’s like Northern California, the county next door with all kinds of different people. Then he says go to the whole world. You expand in increasing circles.

He said the Holy Spirit is going to give you the power you need to do what I want you to do. So for the next ten days, Jesus goes back to heaven after forty days, and for the next ten days all the people do is wait. They meet and they wait and they pray. And they wait and they pray. And they wait and they pray, for God’s Spirit to give them the power that they need for the life that he wants them to live.
Here’s the connection. There’s a direct connection in your life with power and prayer. The amount of spiritual power you have in your life is in direct proportion to the amount of time you spend in prayer. Much prayer, much power. Little prayer, little power. No prayer, no power. If you don’t ever pray, I guarantee you you’re not seeing any miracles in your life. You’re not seeing any supernatural power in your life. You don’t have the energy to get everything done that God wants you to get done. Prayer is the connection point. It is the point that you get the power.

#2. The second mark of real Christianity. It uses everybody’s language.

We see that in the next verse. Acts 2:4 “They all began to speak different languages so the Spirit gave each of them the power to express themselves.” You need to understand: this is not talking about speaking in tongues here. Speaking in tongues is a spiritual gift talked about in 1 Corinthians 12-14. It is a private prayer language that says it’s for your own edification for you to talk to God when you’re going, God, I don’t even know what to say. I can’t even think of what to say. I’m hurting so much inside and … That’s a special gift that God gives to some people.

That’s not what he’s talking about here. These are real languages. People actually heard –speaking in French, speaking in Farsi, speaking in Swahili, speaking in German, speaking in Korean. Whatever it was. This was not for growth, this was for their mission.

Verse 5 “There were religious Jews staying in Jerusalem [at this time] who had come from every country in the world.” Isn’t that convenient? God had brought them all back together at the day of Pentecost on the day he’s going to start the church. “When they heard this noise, a large crowd gathered. They were all excited, because all of them heard the believers talking in their own languages. [Like, “I’m from Ethiopia and you’re speaking Ethiopian. Why is that?] In amazement and wonder they exclaimed, ‘These people are talking like this are just Galileans! [In other words they’re Jews, they’re Hebrews. They only know Hebrew. How in the world do they know Ethiopian? How do they know that? ] How is it then that all of us hear them speaking in our own native languages? [Verse 11] All of us hear them speaking in our own languages about the great things God has done.”

What’s going on here? This is the miracle of multi-channel and multi-cultural communication. God is saying on the first day of the church, I’m going to do a miracle that shows the good news is for everybody. It’s not just for Jews. It’s not just for red or yellow, black or white; all are precious in his sight. It’s amazing grace for every race. So I’m going to give these guys a special gift on the first day of the church, and we’re going to expand by saying everybody hears the good news in their own language.

What is God doing here? He’s doing the exact opposite of what he did in Genesis 11. He reverses Genesis 11. If you go back to the Old Testament thousands of years earlier, there was a time when people said, we don’t want God to be God any more. We want to be our own God. We’re going to run our own lives. We’re going to do our own things. We don’t need God. So we’re going to build a giant tower to ourselves. It’s going to go all the way up to the heavens. We’re going to call it the Tower of Babel. The word “babbling” comes from this word. Like a baby babbles. That comes from mixing up the language.

The tower of Babel is built and God said, As long as they can all speak the same language, that’s not a good thing because nothing they do will be impossible for them. So let’s just go down and confuse their language. So God comes down and he changes Babel [by the way Babylon comes from this] he changes their names and he changes the languages.

All of a sudden he confuses all the languages. Some of the people speak a certain language – they head off for Europe. They can’t understand each other anymore. Others moved away to Africa. Others moved away to Asia. They all spread out and the languages spread out.

What God is doing thousands of years later is the exact opposite, when he starts the church. He says, Now instead of confusing languages, I’m going to clarify it. Because I want everybody to know how much I love them. I’m reversing it.

God brought you here to this church because there are people only you can reach. And there’s a language that you speak that will reach those people. You say, but wait a minute. I just speak English or Spanish or Vietnamese or Korean. I’m not talking about your international language. I’m talking about the other languages you speak.

For instance some of you speak MOPS – Mothers of Preschoolers speech. If you’ve ever been around mothers of preschoolers, they’ve got their own lingo. Jumpy jumper and baby diapers and bottles… they might as well be talking hip hop. I have no idea what they’re talking about. In fact, some of you do speak hip hop. You can talk and reach people who speak hip hop.

Some of you speak CEO. Some of you speak accounting. Some of you speak truck driving. You know mechanical terms. Some of you speak retirement because you are retired. Some of you speak the languages of art and some of you speak the language of music. And some of you have a craft or hobby and you know all the phrases and terms of that hobby. Or you speak the language of sports, or golf terms or whatever. Everybody’s got their own language.

God says real Christianity, everybody’s language gets used, whether it’s a sport or a hobby or a stage of life or whatever. You use your language to reach people only you can reach with the good news.

#3. Real Christianity uses everyone’s gifts.

It uses everybody’s gifts and we’ve all got different gifts. In Bible times, there was no such thing like what we’re doing right now, where one guy talks to a huge group. That just didn’t happen. There were no audiences; there was only an army. There were no spectators; there were only participators. There were no consumer Christians who come to church, listen, go home and do nothing about it. No consumer Christians. Everybody was a contributor. The audience was an army. The speculators were participators. One hundred percent participation. Every age group, every race, every gender, all stages of life. It was multi-cultural, multi gender church. Everybody was involved.

Verse 14 says “Then Peter [the apostle Peter,] stood up…” [and he starts to explain what’s going on. All these people have seen people speaking in languages they didn’t understand an hour ago, they’ve got these little flames over their heads and they hear this loud noise.] “Peter stood up and said ‘These people are not drunk as you might suppose. It’s only nine o’clock in the morning! [This is actually quite humorous. It’s only nine a.m. The bars aren’t open yet. These guys aren’t drunk. They may act like they’re drunk, but they’re not drunk. This is the Holy Spirit.] God says, ‘I will pour out my Spirit on everyone. [Circle “on everyone”] Your sons and your daughters will proclaim my message; [In other words everyone is going to be a preacher.] your young men will see visions, and your old men will have dreams. Yes, even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will all [circle “all”] proclaim my message. [Everybody is a messenger. Everybody is a missionary. Everybody is a minister.] Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
Circle some things here. Circle “sons and daughters.” He says your sons and daughters are going to proclaim my message. Circle “young and old.” Visions and dreams from the young and old. Circle “men and women.” Sons and daughters, young and old, men and women.

Question: who does that exclude? Martians. That’s about it! It includes everybody. You’re never too old to be used by God. You’re never too young to be used by God. You have gifts and abilities and talents God has put in you and everybody is going to be used.

In this comig decade at COV we’re going to - we must - mobilize every person, every age group and every gender. Every woman will be mobilized. Every man being mobilized. (every member is a minister). Your kids are ministers. Your spouse is a minister. You are a minister. Not everybody is a pastor, but the Bible says God calls everybody.

This is how the first church in Acts grew from a hundred twenty people to dominating the Roman Empire in three hundred years. Just a little group of people. Why? Because everybody was involved. Everybody was included.

#4. Real Christianity offers life changing truth.

Real Christianity offers life changing truth. That is the truths that transform people. We don’t offer pop psychology in this church. We don’t offer self help in this church. We don’t offer polite little moralisms and inspirations in this church. We offer the gospel. It is God’s Word that changes you. Jesus said “It is the truth that sets you free.”

Only the truth will set you free. Until you know the truth about you, the truth about God, the truth about life, the truth about death, the truth about what matters in life, until you know the truth in every area, you’re enslaved. You’ll be a slave to the culture, a slave to the expectations of others, a slave to people’s approval, a slave to peer pressure. You’ll be a slave to habits, addictions and all kinds of things. It is the truth that sets you free.

The church offered the truth of God, which you can’t get anywhere else. It was transforming truth. No other organization, no other group of people has the truth that says your past can be forgiven, you get a purpose for living, you get a home in heaven. Where else are you going to get that? Nowhere. No other message changes lives like the good news. No other message changes a guy from a wife beater, to being a loving, responsible husband. It’s when that truth gets in from God, he changes.

Peter in Acts 2 gives the very first Christian sermon, at the very first day of the very first church. In verses 14-40 is Peter’s sermon. I don’t have time to get into it. I could spend a couple hours just on that sermon. But let me just summarize it for you. Notice in verse 14, “Peter… addressed the crowd: [He says,] let me explain this to you... [He sees everybody talking in other languages, what’s going on here? Let me explain this to you.] Listen carefully to what I say. This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. [Joel had said this:] ‘I will show wonders in the heaven above, signs on the earth below and everybody who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’”

Who is Joel? Joel is a prophet in the Old Testament, near the end of the Old Testament. He’s got a very short book, just a couple chapters. I want you to go home today and read the book of Joel. I want you to read it so that when you get to heaven you’re not embarrassed. I don’t want Joel to come up to you and say, how did you like my book? And you go, Mr. Joel, I didn’t even know you were in the Bible! So you need to go home and read these guys so at least when you get to heaven you’re not embarrassed. “Oh yeah, Joel! Loved the book! Loved the book. Great book.”

Joel had predicted hundreds of years earlier what was going to happen on the day of Pentecost when God sends his Holy Spirit and the church, the Christian church begins. He says there’s going to be all kinds of signs and wonders and miracles. When Peter gets up to speak he says, “You guys, you see what’s going on right now. This is that. This is that! This is what Joel was talking about a hundred years ago, predicted it was going to happen. It’s happening. This is that.”

How does this relate to your life?

You will never understand what God is doing in your life until you know how God has worked in the past. This is why we study the Bible. This is why we look at church history. You don’t have the slightest idea how God is going to work in your life until you know how he’s done it in other peoples’ lives in the past. That’s why we study the Bible. Then you go, “Oh! That’s how God does it!”

My question to you and me today - when is the last time the Word of God transformed your life? Let it start anew again today. I love you guys. Stay faithful. Stay the course.