Titus 1:3

Titus chapter 1, verses 1 to 3, we’re going to be looking at the second part of verse 3. Paul, a servant of God, an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God’s elect, and the acknowledgement, or acknowledging, of the truth which is after godliness, in hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie, promised before the world began. That hath in due times manifested his word through preaching, which is committed unto me according to the commandment of God, our Savior. May God bless to us His sacred and holy word this evening. William Carey has been called the Father of Modern Missions. He served the Lord in India for many years. He underwent a lot of hardships in order to stay on the field and continue working there. for the cause of Christ. When his son Felix began to grow up, he promised that he would become a missionary. After all, he knew well the language, and certainly he knew the land as well. Gradually, William Carey became very concerned, however, about the attitude of his son. It seems that Felix reneged on his vows when he was appointed ambassador by the Queen of England to England, or to Burma, excuse me. Kerry wrote to his friend asking prayer for his son with these words, Pray for Felix. He has degenerated into an ambassador to the British government when he should be serving the king of kings. Many people have low opinions of ministers or preachers of the gospel. Some think that the man enters in the ministry only because he can’t do anything else. The truth is, however, that being a minister of Christ is the highest calling one could possibly have a calling that someone should not enter into lightly, obviously. Yet to be a spokesman for God is a position to which nothing else can compare. Indeed, it would be a step down to do anything else, especially an ambassador for English. Paul explains here that God manifests his word through preaching and that preaching is the means by which God’s elect are called out of the world and into the kingdom of Christ. The apostle now speaks of his own calling to the ministry and in doing so he provides some general teaching, I think, about preaching the gospel of Christ. Let me begin by saying this. You should realize that preaching of the gospel is entrusted to specific men. You’ll notice he said, which is committed unto me. This preaching that he has spoken of is committed unto him. Not everyone, of course, is fit for this important office. It’s not ambition that made Paul a minister. It’s not a matter of financial gain. This is the reason he got into the ministry and pursued the office. Nor was it a matter of honor or prestige that made him do it. Fall found that the preaching of the gospel meant suffering, disgrace, danger, hardship, as he tells us in 1 Corinthians chapter 4. The word committed here means entrusted. Something’s been entrusted. has been entrusted to Paul. If you look back a couple of pages to 1st Timothy chapter 1. Paul explains something here about this ministry that he has in verses 11 to 13. According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God which was committed to my trust, and I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord, who has enabled me, for that he counted me faithfully. putting me into the ministry, who was before a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious, but I obtained mercy because I did it in ignorance, ignorantly, and an unbelief. This implies, of course, that a man must be fit for this particular office. And one of the things, it has to be faithful to the Lord to be in this ministry. And the Lord does not send his message by the hand of a fool. So faithfulness is a necessary qualification. His task is to be an ambassador for Christ, to speak thus saith the Lord. Preaching is not something you thrust yourself into. It’s not an office that you’re really appointed to by men. There are qualifications for this office, as we’ll see in chapter 1 and verses 6 to 10 here in the book of Titus. but one must be chosen to it by God. One must be called to it by the Lord. God saves a man, enables them, gist them, and then places them into this office for the edification of the church and for the calling of the lost. Let no man therefore presume to enter into the office of the ministry on call. There are many who intrude into the office of the minister. There was an advertisement that was printed in one of the major newspapers in our country. Would you like to become a minister? Ordination is without questioning for life. Legal in all 50 states and most foreign countries. Performing at legal marriages, ordinations and funerals. Over 265 ministers have already been ordained. minister’s credentials and license sent, a certificate at a ordination for framing, and an ID card for your billfold. All you had to do is send in the money. Paul complains in Chapter 1 of the book of Philippians that there were some who preached Christ for pretense. Some did it in pretense. Some did it for gain, not sincerely. Today there are many who enter into a church office like this for the purpose. of gain, to make merchandise of people. Someone said one of the fastest way to be a millionaire is to start your own religion. Many claim to be preachers of the gospel, but they’re not faithful the Lord, because while they may have access to God’s message, that’s not what they’re saying. That’s not what they’re proclaiming. In the Old Testament, there was a man named Hananiah, who claimed that he had received a message from God. In the dark days that had fallen upon Israel, that time they had been taken captive by the Babylonians and things were difficult for them. The temple had been ransacked. And Hananiah stood up in the temple in front of the priest and Jeremiah the prophet and all the people and this is what he said. Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, saying, I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two full years will I bring again into this place all the vessels of the Lord’s house. that Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, took away from this place. And I will bring again to this place, Jaconia, the son of Jehoiacim, king of Judah, with all the captives of Judah that went into Babylon, said the Lord, where I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon. And then for dramatic effect, Henaniah went over to Jeremiah, who is walking around with this wooden yoke around his neck. It was a sign from God of the yoke that they would be put. under and he breaks that yoke off the neck of Jeremiah indicating that God is going to break the yoke of the Babylonians. Jeremiah is taken back by this startling message, and he even mentions at that time, you know, that’s not what the prophets before you have said. He said, you know, and he indicated that he hoped that that was the taste, that, yes, that the Lord would do such a thing. But soon the Lord revealed to Jeremiah the truth. Hennonai was a false prophet. He was just telling the people what they wanted to hear. Then said the prophet Jeremiah to Hanna, Hananiah, the Lord hath not sent thee. Thou makeest this people to trust in a lie. This year thou shalt die because thou hast taught rebellion against the Lord. Sure enough, God struck this false prophet debt. And soon, Jeremiah is walking around with an iron yoke around his neck. One so not so easily broken off as the wooden one that he had before. And so not everyone is fit for this office. Not everyone carries out the duties of this office. Now, this office of preaching is a sacred trust. There was a little boy who walked down the beach. He looked over all the people that were congregated on the seashore. and finally he spied a matronly woman under a beach umbrella, and he walked up to her and said, are you a Christian? She said, yes. He said, do you pray? She said, yes. Do you read your Bible? She said yes. And then he asked the final question. Will you hold my quarter while I go swimming? Now that’s a simple illustration of entrusting of entrusting someone with the task. Make sure this person is not going to steal my quarter. Let it be understood here that preachers have a sacred trust that they’ve been given. A minister is a steward of God. You’ll notice in verse 7 here it says for a bishop must be blameless as the steward of God. Now a steward is someone that’s put in charge or entrusted with the affairs of an important person. Recall how Abraham sent his elderly servant with the vital task of going back to the homeland and finding a wife for Isaac, his son. Well, a preacher here is entrusted with God’s word, with God’s message, with the truth that he’s mentioned here earlier in this chapter. This is a precious commodity. It must be carefully handled. The honor of a minister is his faithfulness to diligently and carefully discharge the trust that has been committed to him to please his master. He must preach the whole counsel of God, as Paul did. Keep nothing back which God has spoken. In other words, a minister can’t pick and choose. what he’d like to say. Boy, I like this, but I don’t like this, so I’m not going to say anything about this, but I’m only going to talk about what I like to talk about. He must be sincere. He must not handle the word of God deceitfully. Twisting the scriptures to suit his own purposes. Preaching is in a great and an amazing trust. Think of it. You’re being used to the Lord to proclaim the message by which he is going to call people to salvation and build up his church. What calling could be more wonderful than that. Yes, preaching demands effort and being studious to study, to show yourself approved unto God. The duty of the minister is to explain the meaning of the text and make application of that text to the people. This is why the task is committed. to faithful men by the Lord. So you should realize the preaching of the gospel was entrusted to specific men. It’s been committed to them. Secondly, you should realize the call to preach the gospel comes as a divine command. He says, according to the command of God. We see here the necessity those called to preach to discharge their office. When Paul talks about himself entering the ministry, he says, I was commanded to do it. He didn’t undertake this office of his own free will, so to speak. The word commandment in the Greek here is a military term, the idea of as a military officer, would command or order his men as he pleases in the battle situation. Soldier may be given a direct order to capture a hill or hold back an enemy assault or charge forward under… fierce fire or retreat or wherever the case may be, the soldier must not disobey his orders, or he will face court-martial or worse. Paul speaks about being a good soldier of Jesus Christ. And indeed, he himself was extraordinarily drafted, if you would, into the ministry. He might even say against his will. He was thrust to the ground, completely struck blind, could not eat or drink for three days so that he might become an extraordinary vessel to preach the gospel that he once hated. He put it this way in 1st Corinthians 916, for though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of. For necessity is laid upon me, yea, woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel. You know, God never asked to me, and would you like to enter into the ministry? Would you like to preach? his call comes as a direct order. There is a command. You will preach the gospel. This is what I have raised you up to do. When Paul didn’t know what the Lord wanted them to do, God said, arise, go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. It wasn’t a matter of what you might want to want to think about doing. This is what you must do. And he will be sent as a missionary, of course, to the Gentiles. I’m reminded when Moses was called, you recall that to lead Israel, that he was on the backside of the desert, taking care of the sheep. And we have the burning bush episode. And the Lord appears to him at that point. And Moses is commanded to bear God’s message to the enslaved people of God in Egypt and to Pharaoh, who is the king of Egypt. And you remember how reluctant Moses was to go. Remember all the excuses that he came up with. First, he complained that no one would believe that the Lord had actually sent him. No one’s going to believe this. And remember, God gave him three signs. The first sign was he, when he cast his rod down, it would turn into a serpent, and when he touched it, picked it up by the tail, would turn back into the rod again. The second sign was he took his hand, he put it in into a rod, garment and pulled it out, it would be leprous. And when he put it back in and pulled it back out again, it would be perfectly cleared up. And then he was given the ability to turn water into blood. Then Moses said, well, you know, I’m really not eloquent enough to do this. Why don’t you find someone who can speak well? As he put it, I’m not eloquent. I am slow of speech and slow of time. And then God says to him, well, who made the tongue? Didn’t I make the tongue? Have I not the Lord? Thou therefore go. I will be with thy mouth and teach thee what thou shalt say. And he says, I’ll tell you what, I’ll send Aaron, your brother. I know he can speak well. Finally, we got down to Moses basically saying, Lord, could you just send somebody else? I don’t really want to go. And God got angry with Moses and commanded, go, return to Egypt. You see, he didn’t have a choice in the matter. He was called to do this, and he was going to have to do it. What choice did he have? I could talk to you about Jonah tonight, and I could tell you about his reluctance. We know the whole story of what happened to him. He ended up preaching, you know, he didn’t want to preach. He didn’t even want them to listen to what he had to preach. He didn’t want them to respond positively to what he preached. But God sent him. Jeremiah was fearful. He said, I’m just too young. go and what did God say to him? I raised you up. I created you in a womb. I raised you up for the very purpose of being a prophet to me. I’ll be your spokesman. I’ll speak through you. So they were elected, but God commanded them. So this whole matter comes back to the issue of master’s servant, doesn’t it? Paul, a servant of God. You know, the servants don’t get a choice. You know, they don’t say, I don’t know, I don’t want to clean the windows today. I’d rather vacuum on the floor. You don’t get that choice. The master or the house says, this is what I want you to do, and that’s what you do. When God calls you to preach, you really don’t have any other option. If he selected you to do the job, that’s the job. You’re going to end up doing. And so we see the necessity of those called to preach to discharge their office. We see the disobedience, then, of those ministers who replied. place preaching with other things. If God is committed to us with sacred trust, and that sacred trust is to preach his word, and we’re supposed to be his servants, and we’re not doing that, that’s a disobedience to his command. It pleased the Lord by the foolishness of preaching, what men call foolishness, to save them that belief. Paul wrote Timothy, these solemn words in 2 Timothy chapter 4. I charge thee before God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, here he’s putting them, him under a very sacred charge here, who shall judge the quick and the dead in his appearing his kingdom, preach the word. The instant in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering, and doctrine. Now that’s a pretty serious commitment that he’s been given here. And the commitment. commitment that he has is to preach the word. But what has happened today? We have all sorts of activities that have been substituted for the preaching of the word of God. We have religious drama. We have puppet shows. We have Christian films. We have Christian bands. We have Christian weightlifters. We’ve got religious comedians. All taking the place of the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Years ago. And we went to a family reunion with regard to my wife. And came up on the Sunday, I said, well, what are we, you know, what’s going to happen here? They wanted to have some type of service. I said, well, what are you going to do? Oh, we’re just going to have a puppet play. I said, I can’t stay here with my family. You know, we’re going to have to go with just a preaching of the gospel. And you know, they reluctantly, and I mean reluctantly gave me 15 minutes. minutes to preach. So I used that occasion to preach the gospel to the family. But it was like, it was like, you know, it was, they were just, it was like a disgusted, okay, you know, all right. I’m thinking, this is what we, this is what we’re supposed to be doing. All these people were going to church, but what kind of churches were they going to? What kind of idea do we have that preaching is just so past, you know, we’re so past, you know, we’re so past, We need to leave that behind and go to something better. People don’t want to hear any serious preaching of the Word of God. Holy Entertainment is the hot item. I remember it wasn’t that long ago when the Passion of Christ came out. People were stopping their church services and going to the theaters to see what I would classify as a blasphemous film. It’s supposed to be religious. What have we come to? what you have in in some of the faithful churches, is there more like dinosaurs? Just about extinct. Many times I’ve been asked, why don’t you change things? When I first go to the ministry, I’ll never forget, people say, why don’t you do something different on Sunday nights instead of preaching? Why don’t you show a Christian film on Sunday night? We can get more people in. At the time, I wasn’t really fully knowledgeable of the regative principle of worship at the time, and I was, young and I thought about it. I thought, well, you know, should I do this or not? But something just didn’t sit well with me. And I thought, you know, we ought to be preaching the Word of God. So I just preached the Word and didn’t go on into these other things. This great deal of pressure to conform to the modern concept of the end thing to do regarding church service. What’s going to draw people in? I remind you, the Berg’s. I went to 22 reformed churches in the area trying to find people, someone who was doing expository preaching, or teaching through books of the Bible. 22 reformed churches. That’s shocking to me. Look again at the words of Paul here. Can I ignore what my Lord has command me to do? Preach! Am I not going to have to stand before the Lord at the final judgment? Am I not going to have to have to answer whether I preach the word faithfully, in season and out. Even when it’s not popular, many ministers today are going to have to give an account because they have disobeyed a direct command by the Lord about their responsibility. Yes, the day has come, men will not endure sound doctrine. It’s too demanding, to withering demands pride, to convicting of sin. But the sacred trust of preaching is something that we must not violate. Woe unto them. As Paul said, woe unto me if I preach not the gospel. Woe unto them if they preach not the gospel. And claim to be Christ ministers. So this office of preaching is a vital trust. We have a command and we shouldn’t disobey it. The third point tonight is this. You should realize the preaching of the gospel carries with it great authority. It is the commandment of God, our Savior. You are not to receive the word of God simply as the word of men. Now, God, our Savior, could refer to God the Father, or it could refer to God the Son. But I think the context clarifies the matter completely for us. Remember, Paul said that he was an apostle, a set one, of Jesus Christ. In verse 1, and was directly commissioned by Jesus Christ, as Acts chapter 9 tells us. Verse 4 refers to the Lord Jesus Christ as Our Savior. As He tells us, Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, the very final phrase of that verse. So I think when he’s talking about God, our Savior, he has to be speaking of Christ, it would seem to me, in this passage of Scripture. So not only we have an argument here for the deity of Christ, but we also should recognize the power behind the preaching, the authority that kind of God. comes behind the preaching. Those people on Crete, who profess to be believers, need to be reminded that the message sent to them was not just Paul’s opinion about what they should do. This comes from the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ himself. They needed to receive Paul’s rebukes and his exhortations as coming from the Savior. I like what Paul said in 1st Thessalonian. 213. He says, for this cause also, thank we God without ceasing, because when you receive the word of God which you heard from us, you received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that belief. You heard us preaching, but you didn’t just look upon that message as coming from men. You look beyond the person speaking to the fact that God was sending this message to you. This is why the preacher needs to speak with boldness and authority. Because if the message comes from God, when we proclaim the word of God, Lord Jesus Christ is behind that message. You have to see that it’s God’s voice that comes through His Word. It was a famous German artist, Herkimer, who was born in the Black Forest, and his father was a simple woodchopper. Herkimer was a gifted artist. His reputation grew, and he moved to London to open a studio there in London. He sent for his age father, and his dad came, and he helped him work there making beautiful bowls and bases. So the father and the son worked together in this particular studio. But as the years passed, the old man’s ability deteriorated. At the end of the day, he went upstairs, and he seemed to be sad because he felt his work was not up to snuff, that it was inferior. Herkimer’s sharp eye detected this. He would wait for his father to go to bed, and he’d go back down, pick up the pieces that his father had worked on that day, and remold them or reshape them in some fashion, so that they still sold, and they were still productive. And so we find with regard to the Lord, not only does he use people that perhaps are not the most eloquent orators. Maybe we can’t preach as the Apostle Paul. Maybe we have our defects and our faults. But what is important is that we’re preaching the Word of God. And God will take the word that we speak with all its fault, and all its weaknesses, molded and shape it and use it for his purposes to accomplish his ends. And this is why we have to be faithful to what the Word of God said. So you are not to receive the Word of God simply as the Word of Men. Mistreatment then of a true minister would arouse God’s anger. If people realized that the authority of the preacher came from the Lord himself, perhaps faithful ministers would not be so readily. abused, the Galatians said they would pluck out their eyes and give him the Paul. They were certainly willing to receive him as an angel of the God or even as Christ himself at one point. But they were in the minority. Often people don’t like the message, so they shoot the messenger who brings it. And down through history, that’s been the sad case. Remember how Jesus explained this in the parables that he told, in the parable of the marriage feast. There’s a certain king that prepares a marriage feast for his son. He sends forth his servants and commands them to come to the feast. However, they made light of it, and abused his messengers. They took his servants and entreated them spitefully and slew them. Jesus tells how the king heard of this became very angry, sent forth his armies, and destroyed their murderers, and burned up their city. Of course, that was a very very angry. Of course, that was Jerusalem in 70 AD. In the parable of the vineyard, the vineyard owner rents out the vineyard and the wine press travels into a far country, and then he sends servants back to get some sampling of the wine that is being produced. But they abuse and they kill the servants. And so he finally says, I’ll send my son. Surely they’ll honor him. But when he sends his son, they kill him. and we read this and the husbandmen took his servants, the husbandmen that he rented it to, took his servants and beat one and killed another and stone another, but at last of all he sent under them his son, saying they were reverence my son, but the husbandman saw the son. They said among themselves, this is the heir. Come, let us kill him, let us seize his inheritance. Jesus then asked the chief priest and the scribes and the Pharisees and the elders there what is the owner going to do to these men that abused his servants and his son? And the answer, well, he’s going to miserably destroy those wicked men. Their own mouth would condemn them in saying such a thing. Because this whole story came about because these Jewish leaders questioned Christ’s authorities, authority, spoke against Christ, plotted to kill Christ. Both parables are prediction of the doom that awaits those who oppose God. servants. When the President of the United States, an ambassador to a country, and that ambassador’s has his message rejected and he is mistreated personally, what will happen? Well, the President’s anger will be aroused, even the anger of the country, and it could lead the war. Well, in a spiritual sense, that’s what God is indicating to us. Touch not the Lord’s anointed, do his prophets. No harm. harm. William Carey, the missionary, was disgusted with his son Felix because he had degraded himself by taking an ambassarship to Burma from the British government. Most people have a low opinion of faithful ministers, but it is really a high calling, and we should recognize that. But he entrusted with the gospel to be committed to this work by divine command. And therefore, we have to look beyond the man who is often weak and frail and has many different things about him that you could certainly would look upon his flaws. Look at the message that’s being proclaimed. Remember, if you’re a mystery to faithful minister, God will hold you accountable for that, for he is not one who would take lightly the abuse of his ambassadors. Well, let us close with a word.