THE IMPORTANCE OF GODLY LIVING

Titus - Introduction
Bob Bonner
November 2, 2008

Before Becky and I had children, we were committed to the value of having a quality college education. As soon as our children were old enough to understand the importance of having an education, we explained to them two things we wanted them to have by the time they graduated from college. First was a career that resulted from the training they received in college and second was a skill or trade they could fall back on should their career somehow not work out. We wanted them to be as prepared as possible to provide for themselves and their families when they got older.

Our two sons both decided that the skill or trade they wanted to have in their back pocket was that of being painters. While in high school, both were trained by a Christian whose business was that of painting. When he felt they were qualified enough to run their own business, he encouraged them to get their contractor’s license and go into business for themselves. And they did. I’ve learned some things about painting from both of them. The easiest part of being a painter is the painting. The most difficult and the most important part to ensuring a quality paint job is the house preparation. If you don’t prepare properly, the paint won’t stick or cover as well. If you don’t prepare well, you will have horrible overspray problems or places that are missed and left uncovered. Preparation is always the key to a quality paint job.

Likewise, preparation is always the key to understanding and correctly applying what the word of God says to one’s life. The danger of not preparing properly in studying any book of the Bible is that it can lead to improper conclusions theologically, which will always lead to improper applications practically. For instance, if we do not understand who the writer is, his present circumstances, who his audience is, and the historical, cultural, and religious backdrop they are living in at the time, we typically will read incorrect twenty-first century ideas, politics, morals, and customs into our study of a book, and those preconceived ideas may or may not apply to the Biblical situation at hand.

That’s why, when we begin a study of a new book of the Bible as we are doing this morning, I typically spend at least one introductory message to give you the biographical, historical, and cultural backdrop so that we can better understand what the writer is really saying and better understand how what he writes applies to our lives.

It’s probably best that we begin our study of Titus by first setting the historical backdrop to this letter. We will do that by looking at when in the Apostle Paul’s ministry he wrote it. Secondly, we will look at who Titus was and how he and Paul ended up being co-workers.

According to Acts 27, the first time the Apostle Paul ever stepped foot on the island of Crete took place around AD 59. At the time, Paul was a prisoner being transferred by ship from Caesarea to Rome to stand trial before Caesar and present his case for being wrongly arrested by the Romans based upon the lies of the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem. On the way to Rome, Paul stopped off at Crete. We don’t know how long Paul stayed in Crete this first time, but it is apparent from Acts 27 that his stay was brief. It did not allow him any time for evangelistic activity or teaching the young fledgling church. It wasn’t until three years later, after his release from prison in Rome in AD 62, that Paul returned to Crete and was able to carry on his ministry there as an Apostle. When he did return, two others are believed to have been with him, Titus and Timothy. This would have been around 63-64. This return to Crete afforded Paul the opportunity to size up the church on Crete and begin evangelism and instructional work there. Shortly after this, Paul turned over this ministry to Titus, while Paul and Timothy sailed away to Ephesus.

Paul specifically left Titus on Crete to set the churches in order. After Paul dropped off Timothy in Ephesus to set some things in order for the church there, Paul then was off to Macedonia to check on the various churches in that region. While in Macedonia, Paul wrote two letters: 1 Timothy to Timothy at Ephesus and Titus to Titus on Crete. When one studies both of these, many similarities can be seen in subject matter, yet the two churches presented totally different problems. The church in Ephesus was a well-established church, whereas the church in Crete wasn’t established at all. The church in Ephesus had already understood the basics of the gospel and how it applies to believers, but the church in Crete didn’t understand the basics at all. The Christians in Crete had never been taught how to follow Christ until Paul arrived. Hence, similar subject matter in both letters aimed at different targets and purposes. In 1 Timothy the apostle stresses the importance of sound doctrine. At the time, the church in Ephesus had been invaded from without by false teachers, and Paul was exhorting Timothy to stay the course in teaching sound doctrine, the truth about the gospel. In his letter to Titus, however, he dwells on sound behavior. On Crete they had false teachers, but they were not from outside the church, they were inside, teaching false doctrines that lead to a godless lifestyle. As we come to more of the specific similarities and differences between these two books during our study of Titus, I will make more mention of them at that point.

Titus received his letter from Paul in AD 65. It was brought to him by two other disciples of Paul, Zenas and Apollos, who were with him in Macedonia.

At this point, let’s take a brief look at who this Titus was. In comparison to what we know from Acts concerning Timothy, we know much less about Titus. In fact, Titus is not even mentioned in the book of Acts. From four of Paul’s other epistles (Titus, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, 2 Timothy) we learn that Titus was a Gentile, whose lack of circumcision was a key factor in Paul’s securing the right of the Gentiles to not have to first convert to Judaism in order to be saved. Titus is a New Testament model that the believer today does not get saved as the Judaizers maintained, by living up to a moral law or religious code, but instead as Paul preached, by resting in God’s grace based on the work of Christ on the cross. 

Titus accompanied Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem to attend the Council of Jerusalem in AD 49, during which the issue of Judaizing was settled once and for all. Titus, in fact, was Paul’s model of a born-again, Spirit-filled Gentile convert, who had no need to identify himself in any way with religious Judaism. Hence, when Titus gets to Crete more than 14 years later and finds the Judaizers are a part of the church, he turns out to be the perfect candidate to set them straight about their false teachings.

In addition, Titus’ ministry resume reveals that he had previously spent one year in Corinth with the church there, serving with Paul. As a result of his ministry experience in Corinth, a very selfish, immature, factional, worldly, and rebellious church, Titus knew firsthand the trials and disappointments of leading such a group of believers. Once again, this made him the best candidate to build the churches in Crete, amidst an even more wild and immoral social culture than the one that existed in Corinth. 

Like Timothy, Titus was an early coworker of Paul’s, who probably began to travel with Paul around AD 48. That means that Titus had worked with Paul in ministry for seventeen years by the time he received this letter from Paul. By this time, Titus had become a veteran of the faith, a trusted compatriot throughout Paul’s life. He was no longer some young green inexperienced intern.  Paul had entrusted to Titus the ticklish situation in Corinth, including the deliverance of a very difficult letter, 2 Corinthians, to them, as well as the gathering of the Corinthian’s financial gift to the famine-stricken church in Jerusalem.

Titus was probably older than Timothy, simply because he hooked up with Paul sooner than Timothy did. In addition, Titus seems to have been of stronger temperament than Timothy. Paul addresses Titus in this letter as a “true (legitimate) child in a common faith”, suggesting that Titus, like Timothy, was led to Christ by Paul. Furthermore, this expression indicates that Titus’ heart mirrors Paul’s heart and passion for the gospel.

Having given you a brief, historical setting behind the author and receiver of this letter, it is time to examine the geographical, cultural, and religious backdrop of Crete, the place to which Titus has been called to minister. The island of Crete is situated just off the boot of Italy, close enough to Rome for the inhabitants of the island to be affected by Greek and Roman culture. The island is some 160 miles long and varies in width from 7 to 35 miles.

Crete’s citizens had gained the reputation for being “liars, evil beasts, and lazy gluttons,” and for good reason, I might add. Much of this has to do with the island’s location. It was well located for sea trade and became a home to piracy. Within the island, there was much competition and intercity fighting among the island’s famous hundred cities that were spread over the island. When one tries to understand the culture and life on this island, one must view it through the lens of lawlessness and the moral debauchery that comes with piracy.

If you have ever seen Disney’s mythical Pirates of the Caribbean, that would be a good representation of the social order on the island of Crete during the first century. Life there was about greed, wine, women, and song. It was a culture built on debauchery, self indulgence, belligerence, and gluttony. Combined with the Greek religion and its worship that included prostitution, this island was a rather wild place to live as a Christian. It led to an almost “anything goes” lifestyle, even among the many uninstructed Christians. Lying was a normal way of life. In fact, so great was its reputation of being an island made up of liars, the word “Cretanizing” became a synonym for lying. To speak of a “Cretan point of view” was to speak of deception. 

Of all the places in the world in this first century, the women on the island of Crete were known for being the most “liberated” women in the world. Crete’s legal code accorded women certain freedoms not enjoyed by women elsewhere in the Greek and Roman world. It was also during this age that out of Rome there came a movement that impacted the women on this island. It was characterized by a throwing off of the modest dress code that had once symbolized respectability, sexual modesty, and fidelity to one’s husband. 

Equally characteristic was the desire of influential women to acquire for themselves and to enjoy the sexual freedoms normally restricted to men, to explore multiple sexual liaisons in association with dinner parties and banquets. This pursuit of sexual freedom required the women to remain unencumbered by children; hence, the ancient literature of this period includes discussions with references to the practices of contraception (which was rare at this time) and abortion. 

Less drastic, but still moving forward in what was once solely a man’s domain was the desire of women to take active roles in public life, in legal contexts sometimes functioning as advocates; but in some cases this simply took the form of speaking up in the presence of men/husbands, offering political opinions, teaching, and philosophizing. Those bold acts of speaking out in public were unheard of Roman culture until this time. All of this represented a breach of the traditional codes of respectability of past ages. Understanding this about the women on the island of Crete helps us better appreciate Paul’s instruction in Titus 2 to older women to teach younger women about godliness. 

Likewise, because the men were every bit as debauched as the women, we find instructions in Titus 2 to older men and younger men. All of Paul’s instructions to Titus assume a basic clash between the Gospel and Christian morality and the current mores of first century Crete. The picture painted in Titus is of Christians who refuse to break free from the value system corrupting Crete. These rebellious Christians are the ones who initially became opponents of the apostle Paul and his right hand man, Titus.

This hedonistic lifestyle had so invaded much of the lives of the Christians on the island, that it was hard to tell the Christians from the rest of the Cretans. Hence, Paul instructs Titus to teach the Cretan believers what it means to live a life of godliness and obedience to the Lord. Up until this point in time, the gospel was being rejected by the lost Cretans because of the shameful conduct and lifestyle of the Christians.

How Christians came to be on the island of Crete is a unique story of the first century church. According to Acts 2, there had been some Jews visiting Jerusalem from Crete to celebrate Pentecost. As a result of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit that day, some Cretans were saved, but some of those had mistakenly followed after the teachings of the Judaizers, who demanded that one must first become a Jew before becoming a Christian. Upon their conversion, these new Cretan believers, who were untaught at this point, returned to the island of Crete. Hence, from AD 33 to AD 63, when Paul arrived to teach God’s word to these new believers, 30 years had passed with no spiritual teaching or godly discipleship taking place among the Christians. As a result, there were no spiritually mature Christians, let alone leadership on the island. They were carnal Christians because they knew no other way to live. Before Paul’s ministry on the island of Crete, there is no evidence that there was one single functioning house church on the island.

With this absence of Biblical teaching, it is easier to understand why there was so little difference in the Christian’s lifestyle on the island from that of the other “Cretans.” It’s why it was so common to find, as Paul mentions in his letter, “many rebellious men, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision” within the church, teaching others that it was okay to live ungodly lives. 

Furthermore, this explains Paul’s urgency for Titus to establish elders to supervise the flocks and to teach the word across such a widespread territory. These Christians needed to be taught how to live like Christians rather than like the other immoral pagans on the island. It also explains why Paul does not repeat in Titus, under the qualifications for an elder, the injunction that an overseer cannot be a recent convert. There was nothing else there but relatively immature or new but undiscipled Christians to draw from. As on the mission field, you have to do the best you can with what you have. 

Finally, the condition of the church on Crete explains why the majority of this epistle is basic primer theology and discipleship material appropriate for young believers. The problems in Crete are those expected of a young church in a pagan environment. Paul wants their present salvation from sin to be demonstrated in their morally good deeds as well as the profitable investment of their time and energy.

This little epistle contains more specific instructions per chapter to various groups of people regarding how to live the Christian life than any other epistle in the New Testament. Therefore, it indeed contains a biblical profile for a Christian lifestyle. If you would like a simple outline that gives you an overview of the whole book it follows three contexts of Christian living. Each of these three contexts reveals the strong connection between doctrine and duty in the Christian life. Chapter 1 speaks to the doctrine and duty in the church. Chapter 2 speaks to the doctrine and duty in the home. Chapter 3 speaks to the doctrine and duty in the world.This little letter gives the basics on four general subjects: the appointing of elders, the importance of correct doctrine, the imperative to have a correct lifestyle, and the injunction to be active and effective evangelists. But before evangelism can really take place, the believers themselves must first be grounded in the word of God.

 According to four outstanding commentators, Drs. Philip Towner, John MacArthur, Gordon Fee and William Mounce, as well as others, the overall force of Paul’s letter to Titus was to get the Cretan Christians to clean up their acts to make sure their conduct didn’t detract from the advancement of gospel but did affirm the truth of the gospel.  These four commentators explicitly state that this letter was to teach the church on Crete to fulfill its sole purpose for existing--to reach the lost.

When one comes away from reading this book, one sees that two outstanding principles are taught. The first is this: Loose doctrine makes for loose living. If you don’t learn what the word of God has to say about who you are in Christ, it makes it very difficult to live life as a Christian.

The second is that it is quite impossible to contend earnestly for the gospel when one’s life is lived in a manner not consistent with the godliness effected by the transforming work of Christ. Paul calls it, “the truth which is according to godliness.” Or, to put it another way, effectiveness in reaching the lost for Christ is directly related to one’s godly living amidst an immoral culture.

If someone had followed you around for the past seven days, would they have seen enough evidence from the way you live to be convinced you are a committed follower of Christ? Would they have rejected the Jesus you say you follow because of immoral conduct, or would they have been more open to hear about Christ because of your moral conduct? If there were one area that the Lord is speaking to you about, that you need to deal with because it compromises your witness for Christ, what would that be?

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