Beacon Sunday Service: January 12th, 2025

Okay. And it reads, one of themselves, a prophet of their own said, Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons. And this testimony is true. And for this reason, reprove them severely so that they may be sound in the faith, not paying attention to Jewish myths and the commandments of men who turn away from the truth. To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure but both their mind and their conscience are defiled. Let me pray for us. Father, we ask that you would help us this morning to glean much from your word. And we acknowledge at the moment that just how we feel towards your word is of secondary importance. We pray that you would be magnified, that you would be honored through the proclamation of your truth, and that simply we would hear and respond accordingly.

Pray for your just blessings over our time, that our minds would be engaged, that our hearts would be soft, and that everything that you want shared, that it would leave such an indelible impression on our hearts, and that it would reflect on our faces, that you are a God who loves the wicked. So we thank you for our time together, and we pray just for a good time of fellowship and uh uh as we celebrate just your grace. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Go ahead and be seated. So a brother I knew from college is currently pastoring a church up in Northern California. His wife, who I also knew from the same college fellowship, wrote this week about some major conflicts and a crisis that they had at their previous church.

And she wrote, the conflict among the elders began during the COVID-19 pandemic. And when the pandemic first hit, it caused significant disruptions and disagreements in our church. But the death of George Floyd in the summer of 2020 produced the most intense controversies. So my pastor friend and his wife were forced out of that church because the differences were irreconcilable. And it appears that all the events of 2020 both created a lot of new problems in their church, but also brought to the surface biases, preferences, and immaturities that had previously gone unnoticed. You guys all remember 2020 was a while ago now, right? But do you guys all remember the how crazy 2020 was, especially with COVID-19 with the elections, with all the racial tensions?

How much did black lives matter? Did blue lives matter? What about yellow lives? Right? Don't all lives matter? Christians should be doing this, pastors should be preaching that. And people on all sides criticized churches and church leaderships for their responses or for their lack of responses. And you guys remember this, right? Recently, South Korea has also been embroiled in a lot of heartache and conflict. When the South Korean president tried to impose martial law on the country, people in the country went nuts. And there were massive protests on the streets, and the people and the president was eventually impeached. And in the churches of South Korea, there's been a lot of division and chaos in the process, and over the past month, pastors in these South Korean churches have been viciously criticized for either being too vocal or being too silent.

So this begs some important questions. What is the purpose of the church in the world? What is a healthy church like? What does a biblical church do? What are the passions and the stances of a healthy biblical church? How are healthy biblical churches supposed to respond to crises? How political should pastors and churches be? How involved are the churches supposed to be in helping care for the homeless? How vocal are churches supposed to be when legislating change? How are churches supposed to respond when a fire rages and burns acres and acres of land and destroys and ruins homes and kills lives? So it's a very tall task to be an elder or a pastor in a church. Because all of these questions have been posed, have been asked, and have been addressed in one way or other, right?

So we're in verses 12 to 15 in chapter one of Paul's epistle to Titus. And by way of reminder, the main charge to Titus was to establish healthy, doctrinally sound churches on the island of Crete. And that's a very tall task, as the people on Crete are not what you would call good people. Titus was instructed to lay the groundwork for the building up of God-honoring, Christ-centered, healthy churches in the midst of a very pagan, a very barbaric, crisis, and a hostile environment. So Paul gave very specific instructions on what to build, why to build, and how to build for the glory of God their Savior. So and in these four verses that are up here, there's a lot that we can learn today about how to build a biblical church, how to persevere, and how to stay focused while building a Christ-centered and God-honoring church.

So I'm going to give you the outline for verses 12 to 15 in today's sermon. First, what kind of people were the Cretans? And verse 12 gives us a very pretty uh unflattering picture. Um but these two were people for whom Christ died. And that's why Titus is there. Second, what was to be preached among the Cretans? Verses 13 and 14 informed Titus what to steer people away from and what to steer people towards with his reproof. And then lastly, what kind of a response would Titus have among the Cretans? How would they react? Verse 15 gives us an insight into the response. The pure would respond appropriately, but the defiled and unbelieving who are unfit for anything good would not. And that's the outline for today.

So as we prayed, we had a very rough week here in Los Angeles. As you guys know, that the fires are literally still raging. These numbers may not be the most updated, but the palisades and Eton fires have damaged at least now 12,300 structures, burned 23,000 acres of land, and have taken at least 16 lives. And over 200,000 people were told to evacuate their homes. And in such a time of crisis and trauma, unfortunately, there have been many people who saw the chaos as an opportunity to loot evacuated homes. And the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department has made at least 22 arrests since the fires have broken out. In the news and in the social media, there's a lot of blame shifting, a lot of finger pointing.

There's been a lot of politicizing, scams are popping up here and there. And the crazy thing is that the fires have apparently inspired some people to start additional fires. You guys, you guys read about that. And these crazy individuals want to add to and prolong the chaos. And there truly are evil people in the world who want to literally see the world burn. And then you have a lot of self-righteous people. Self-righteousness also exposes its ugly head in times like this. Some people who they donate money, they donate goods, they're quick quick to take a selfie, post it, and then turn around and criticize other people for not doing the same. That happens in every riot and every protest. I'm standing up for black lives, how come you're not?

I'm standing up for blue lives, why aren't you? I'm donating to the poor. What are you doing with your money? That comes out. So catastrophic events, traumas, tragedies, and crises often bring out people's true colors, horrible events and circumstances, bring to light things that are hidden in the recesses of the hearts of men. If you immerse yourself in the scriptures, you won't be shocked by how evil the hearts of men can be, right? Well, I'm not sure if you guys already know this, but today is the 15-year anniversary of one of the most devastating days in all of Haiti's history. I love the country of Haiti, but today's the 15-year anniversary. On January 12th, 2010, at 4.53 p.m., a 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti, and within minutes, the quake took the lives of over 300,000 Haitians, displaced over a million people, destroyed 250,000 homes, 30,000 commercial buildings.

And I don't want to minimize what we're happy, what's happening here in LA, but in 2010 in Haiti, there was chaos exponentially greater than what we've had this week in Los Angeles. And Haiti actually has never fully recovered from this. It's actually gotten worse. And in the months and the weeks following the earthquake, while many were trying to find their family members, find food and shelter, there was violence, kidnapping, trafficking, and rape. According to Amnesty International, 1199 tent cities were set up, but there were constant reports of gunfire, stealing, and violence. And then the cases of rape were widespread in most of these makeshift tent cities, and they increased with each passing month.

Wicked people added to the devastation by exploiting and preying upon those already devastated. So there's so much unthinkable and discussing evil in the human heart. So I'm gonna make a blanket statement here. Human beings are rotten to the core. They have always been rotten to the core. This is the first of the five points of Calvinism, right? The total depravity of man. You and I are totally rotten and depraved to the core. And if it were not for the grace of God, we would consume and eat ourselves alive. We are totally depraved people living among a totally depraved people. And no matter how hard people work to better themselves, to improve themselves, and build a better tomorrow, no amount of zeal or effort can rid the human beings of the rottenness and the depravity that is in the heart.

So it's in the word of God alone, is there truth? In Christ alone, is there any hope? Amen. So a good starting point for the gospel is this. Man is completely unable to save himself, which brings me to Titus 112. One of themselves, a prophet of their own, said, Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons. And this can actually be said of human beings of every culture, every time period, every tribe, every tongue and every nation. Of course, on the visible surface, some are more like this than others. On the surface, in your heart and in my heart, the same the same sin and evil are very present. What sin and evil simply need are opportunities to rear their ugly heads. And in Paul's letter to Titus, Paul quotes a Cretan philosopher, generally believed to be Epimenides, that's his name, Epimenides.

And Epimenides, writing in the seventh or the sixth century BC, he blasted his own people as liars, evil unreasoning beasts, lazy entitled people whose God is their bellies. And this, Epimenides wrote, was not simply an occasional lying, occasional lapses into immorality or occasional laziness and gluttony. They were always this way.

But he's saying they're always this way. And the first thing that they always were were Cretans were always liars. It's quite funny that the island of Crete actually was associated with deception. The Greek word for the island of Crete is Crete. Easy enough to understand. The word for cheating in the language of the Greco-Roman world was Cretizo, to be a Cretan. So Crete was a synonym for cheating. That's how much they could not be trusted or believed. So Satan, the father of all lies, apparently had his way with them. You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him.

Whenever Satan speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. So Cretans had fallen short. They've sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and lying and deception had diseased the heart of every Cretan, every Cretan man, every Cretan woman, every Cretan child. The Cretan's satanic heart was utterly deceitful. It was so deceitful, it was beyond remedy and beyond improvement, as it says in Jeremiah 17 9. It's desperately sick. And out of the overflow of the Cretan hearts, the Cretan mouths spoke. All kinds of evil things, especially things like false witness poured forth for uh poured forth from Cretan mouths. Let me read Matthew 15, 19 to 20. Out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, sexual immoralities, thefts, false witness, slanders.

These are the things which defile the man. But to eat with unwashed hands is not defile the man. It's not an outside in thing, it's inside out. It appears that Cretans didn't become liars because they lied. They lied because they were liars. Their mouth simply revealed what was already in their hearts. Romans 3 says that there was not one single righteous Cretan, not one. And Paul wrote in Romans 3 13, quoting Psalm 5 and Psalm 140, their throat is an open tomb. With their tongues, they keep deceiving.

So that's a very accurate portrayal of the Cretans. This was a description of the Cretans. One of the descriptions, that they were always liars. Epimenides also called the Cretans evil beasts. And the evils of Crete were very well documented. Ancient writers like Polybius, he described the people of Crete as incredibly rude and very wild. They were barbaric in their behavior. So the Cretans were the pirates and the assassins of the times. They had excessive and uncontrolled appetites. They act exercised no self-control, no gentleness, no uprightness, and they would do pretty much anything if there was any monetary reward or pleasure behind it. What's interesting is that on the island of Crete, there has never been any large wild animals native to the land.

And that's documented from 8th century BC. Plutarch, a Greek philosopher and a temple priest at Delphi of the first century BC, he wrote this about the Cretans.

So objectively, on the tier of like history's like most horrible people, it seems that Crete would fall toward the bottom of the rankings. Their lusts went unchecked, they did whatever they pleased, their pleasure was in evil. They weren't just beasts, animals driven by just instinct. They were evil beasts, creatures bent on evil. They were creatures that craved evil, creatures that celebrated and delighted in evil. Cretans were like creatures who had set additional fires to cities that were already burning. They were like creatures that would rape young girls that had just recently been orphaned. Cretans were like creatures that would laugh and sneer in the face of the victims while they're being taken away to jail.

They were like the boastful, carnal, blaspheming folks that Jude, the Lord's brother, wrote about in his short epistle. But these men, they blaspheme the things which they do not understand, and the things which they know by instinct, like unreasoning animals, it is by these things that they are destroyed. So Cretans were one, they were always liars. Cretans were always unreasoning beasts, evil beasts acting on instinct. And thirdly, they were to call you a lazy glutton, that would not make you feel happy, right? So the King James translates it as slow bellies. Alright, so the literally, it means Cretans hated to work, they love to eat. Hate it to work, love to eat. So their mouths, they were like a big belly.

They were, they're like a walking belly. Their mouths are open, but their hands were laying idle, and they were always just waiting for someone else to put food into their mouths. So they were self-indulgent, they loved to be entertained, their gods were their bellies, their minds were on earthly things. Have you ever heard the quote, eat, drink, and be merry for what? You guys all know this, right? Tomorrow will be tomorrow we die. So that's not from any poetic book of the Bible. Okay, that's not King Solomon. That's actually like a quote from the Greek philosopher Epicurus, who emphasized that the pursuit of happiness, that's the goal of human existence. But that was a Cretan motto: eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.

So the apostle Paul had a run-in with a group of these slow bellies in Athens. They were called the Epicureans, those who follow the teachings of Epicurus. And also some of the epicurean, Ian and Stoic philosophers were converse with him, Acts 17, 18. Some of them were saying, What would this idle babbler wish to say? Others, huh? He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities. Because Paul was proclaiming the good news of Jesus and the resurrection. So keep this one in mind. So he's confronting these guys whose motto is, eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die. Okay. Epicurus was from Athens, but his philosophies were well known all throughout the Greco-Roman world. And my guess is that his teachings were very well received by the itching ears of the lazy glutton Cretans.

So what kind of people were the Cretans? According to Epimenides, a Cretan himself, one, Cretans were always liars. They were evil beasts, they were lazy gluttons, and they were always this way. That's a very condescending way for a philosopher to describe his own people. And that seems like such a broad sweeping overgeneralization. It's almost like that has to be an exaggeration, right? Aren't there any good people there? Like Sodom and Gomorrah. Was everybody like this? Can a group of people truly always be this way? It appears that Paul was in full agreement. This testimony is true. For this reason, reprove them severely, so that they may be sound in the faith. Not paying attention to Jewish myths and commandments of men who turn away from the truth.

So Paul says, this testimony is true. It's so interesting that he doesn't just say this quote from a Greek philosopher, he actually calls it a testimony, right? It holds a lot more legal weight. Paul agreed that the people on Crete were always lying, they were always evil, self-centered, entitled lazy gluttons who hated to work, and who were all about the YOLO life, the Y O L O, right? You only live once. They were all about that life. So because of that reason that Cretans were always lying, evil beasts, lazy gluttons, Titus is given a command, and it's to reprove. And he's left on the island of Crete to appoint elders in the churches who will also reprove. And these future elders, how are they supposed to reprove?

Ooh. I reprove you, like severely, right? Now, when we read a passage like this, we want to make sure we understand the author's intent and meaning, and that we're not just interpreting the passage through like the lenses of our own like biases and stuff, right? Because if you've been abused at a church, you're gonna be like, dude, that's a little bit strict. So we don't want to put meaning into the text. We want to take it out. So we exegete a text like this. We interpret what the author is actually saying. Okay, we don't ever want to isegate a text, which means we are interpreting it like we want it to say. Does it you guys does that you guys does that make sense? Like sense? Okay. So what does Paul mean when he says, reprove them, these guys, severely?

Does Paul want them to be publicly shamed? Like Titus is supposed to go have a debate, right? Go on a like the Facebook wall of the times and just blast them on their like comment side. Is that what he wants them to do? Does Paul want Titus to debate them, to put them on blast? Does severe mean harsh? What does Paul mean when he says reproof severely? And it's a very important that we get this interpretation of this passage correctly, because for passages like this, if we don't, it can actually open the door for all kinds of abuse in the church in the name of righteousness. You guys can see how that happens, right? Well, the Bible says for me to rebuke you severely, so I'm gonna like you have to understand what he actually is saying.

So the word for severely is the word apatamos, apatamos. Repeat after me. Apatamos. Apatamos, it's almost like a Spanish word, apatamos. Okay. Apatamos, it means severe, relentless, enclosed, final, or absolute. They all mean slightly different things, right? It's actually been used in describing gladiator combats in other Greek literature. So gladiators fighting, think of that image. The word apatamos has been used saying to the death. So gladiators, when they are fighting, they're fighting to the apatamos. So is Paul endorsing some kind of doctrinal fight to the death? That's pretty intense. In the entirety of the New Testament, the word apatamos is used only one other time. In 2 Corinthians 13 10, the apostle Paul uses it in reference to the final and absolute authority that Jesus Christ had himself given to Paul.

Okay? So 2 Corinthians 13 10, for this reason I am writing these things to you, Corinth, while absent, so that when present, I don't need to use severity in accordance with the authority which the Lord gave me for the building up and not for tearing down. Apatamos for the building up and not for tearing down. In context, it is not saying severe as in a mean-spirited, harsh, abusive, or violent. Bad Bible scholars, bad pastors who read the word severe in this and who apply it severely, they're bad students of the Bible. Okay. So it doesn't mean mean, harsh spirited or violent. Later in Titus chapter 3, verse 2, Paul writes that the saints, all the saints were to demonstrate all gentleness toward all men.

So he is not contradicting himself. The word apatamos means that there is a sternness with authority behind it, with God's authority behind it. It's almost like a father saying to his kid, because I said so. You guys follow?

It's severe as in stern, final, last word, unmovable authority. So Titus was to speak things in accord with sound doctrine with the word of God, and in so doing, he would be speaking the very authority of Jesus Christ himself. So God's authority itself would be behind this reproof. Paul touches upon this final severe authority to Titus in every chapter of this letter. Okay, so there's authority here. 215, these things speak and exhort and reprove with all authority, let no one disregard you. Titus 3 8. This is a trustworthy saying, and concerning these things, I want you to speak with authority, with confidence, so that those who have believed God will be intent to lead in good works.

These things are good and profitable for men. Speak severely with the, because God says so, authority, and let no one disregard you. So Titus was to reprove with the utmost, ultimate, the most extreme, and the severest authority, and he is authorized to do this even to the extent that he can reject, excommunicate, and even condemn someone who is continuing to propagate divisive and bad doctrine. Titus 3, a little bit after, verse 10. Reject a factious man after a first and second warning. And this is somebody who engages in just like he's just causing trouble in the church. Knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning, he is self-condemned. So that's some pretty strong authority. It's severe.

So Titus and the elders, they better make sure that their doctrine is actually God's doctrine. Right? Otherwise, they'd be guilty of using the Lord's name in vain. So when Titus is reproving with sound doctrine with the Lord's words, he has the authority of the Lord behind his reproof, he just better make sure that it is sound when he is speaking. It was true that Cretans were always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons, and for that reason, Titus was commanded and commissioned to reprove with what? The word.

So that the Cretan could be saved. You guys tracking?

Because the God he served was a God who desires all men to be saved and come to the full knowledge of the truth. 1 Timothy 2.4. So what were Titus's priorities? What will be central and of greatest importance for the elders that Titus would set up? Titus was not primarily exhorted to try to legislate for any change. He was not told to try and improve the life of the poor. What is Titus told? He's told to hold fast to the word.

Okay. Sound doctrine was to be the basis for exhortation. Sound doctrine was to be the standard for everything that Paul's uh the Titus spoke, chapter 2, verse 1. Sound doctrine was to be purely taught and modeled by Titus, chapter 2, verse 7. Sound doctrine was to be adorned by every worker, employee, every slave. It's supposed to be adorned by submission and good works, chapter 2, verse 10. So what was Titus supposed to preach incessantly, unwaveringly among the deceitful, evil, lazy glutton in Crete? He's supposed to preach sound doctrine in season and out of season, no matter what the response. So the gospel of Jesus Christ and the sanctifying truth of the holy scriptures, and the message of repentance was to be preached without any compromise among the Cretans.

Why sound doctrine? Because it's the only thing that's effective. Do laws have the ability to change the human heart? Do laws have the ability to change the human heart? Can you legislate racism out of the human heart? Can you legislate greed out of the human heart? Can you legislate lust out of the human heart?

You can curb the abuses in the extremes of it. You can get people to conform out of fear of punishment. You cannot legislate any sin out of a human heart. Right? The only way to change a stone-called human heart is to crucify it to its death and then replace it with a spirit-filled heart that has been made completely new. So circumstantial improvements have no power to change the human heart. Right? Change circumstances, never change people for the good. It reveals what's inside. But change of circumstance, and we're always looking foolishly for the change of circumstance. Oh, if this happens, then I will be like this. If this happens, then I will be happy. That's utter folly. Change circumstances, never change my heart for the good.

Only the gospel, only the word of God working in and through the power of the Holy Spirit has a power to change. Amen. Nothing can exempt a person from the first death. Whether you die in a wildfire, whether you die in an earthquake, or you are shot in the head, or you die of cancer, or you die being aborted in the womb, or you die by just old age. Nothing can exempt the person from the first death. But only the gospel can save a person from the second, the eternal, and the way more significant second death. You guys, you guys understand that? And that was a primary thing that Titus and all of the future elders and the uh of the churches in Crete, that's what they're supposed to unwaveringly preach.

The church's priority is souls, not change circumstances in people's lives. Again, the priority of the church is to salvation of souls, not a change of circumstance that's just temporary for a person's betterment. So here's an argument when I say something like that, that's commonly posed. Okay. Well, Bible thumping does nothing for people's immediate needs. If you just preach doctrine, doctrine, Bible, Bible, it doesn't help anybody. I would absolutely disagree. That is a statement of the stupid who never read the Bible, but who have lots of opinions on it. Bible thumping has always led the way in meeting people's needs. Historically, it was always the Christians that led the way. Those who got Bible thumped that led to change of lots of things.

So here's what happens when the word of God feeds and fuels the people of God, right? When the word of God is accurately preached, and when they're realizing that this is not my home, right? I am a heavenly, or I'm a kingdom of the, I'm a citizen of the kingdom of heaven. This is what happens when those people are fueled and fed. Love happens, Christ-likeness happens, humility happens, compassion happens, good works happen. Good works in the letter to Titus are placed on the level of supreme importance. You're gonna see in a bit, not for salvation, but because of salvation. Paul thumps the Bible to Titus, and in doing so, he thumps good works. Okay, let me show you. Titus 1.16. Good works is evidence and fruit of one's knowledge of God.

You can read that with your eyes, right? And you can understand that. Titus 2, 14. Jesus purified for himself a people. Why? So that they would be zealous for good works. Titus 3 1. While living among pagan rulers and pagan authorities, the Cretan Christians were encouraged to be exemplary citizens, subject to rulers, obedient to rulers, and what? Ready for every good work. Cretans who believed God were to be Titus 3.8. Intent to lead in good works. Is good works central to a Christian's life? Absolutely. Apotamos. Not for salvation, but because of it. The saved Christian's heart cannot but be for good works.

Why? God's DNA is in the Christian, beating it for the purpose of good works, not to earn salvation, but as a result of it. You guys tracking? And especially in what areas? Verse 14. Our people. And this is right after the context of support the missionaries. That's what Paul is saying to Titus. Artemis, Xenos the lawyer, support them. Make sure that they have nothing that they need. Verse 14. Our people, Christian Cretans, or all Christians, must also learn to lead in good works to meet urgent pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful, because fruit is required by God. He delights in good fruit from his people. John chapter 3. So for the pressing needs in the Cretan world, Cretan believers were to lead in good works to meet those needs.

Guess what happens when you have a barbaric people? There are a lot of victims. The church was supposed to be the rallying point to really tend to their needs. Okay. But man's greatest pressing need is not physical. Amen. Man's greatest pressing need is not social. Oh, they feel like they're like they're so outcasted, and they probably feel very bad about themselves. They have low self-esteem. Who cares? You know what'll fix that? God. You don't go outside in, oh we love you, you're accepted, you're one of us. That's not love. That's just perpetuating their disease. The greatest pressing need is also not emotional. Sick emotional people can do damage because emotional hurt people hurt people, but that's not the most pressing need.

It's not financial. All the people who have lost their homes financially, they're gonna be strained for a while, but is that the most pressing need? The Cretan's greatest pressing need is and has always been spiritual. Amen. So sound doctrine, biblical Christ-centered teaching, always has to come first in every church. I would rather have you saved than have you feel good about yourself and then go to hell. I would rather have you saved than see you continue in sin and prove yourself apostate and non-Christian. Sound doctrine must always come first because when the double-edged sword of the Holy Spirit, the Word of God sanctifies the church, purifies, and grows a church, good works will follow.

They cannot but follow. Good works again, not for salvation, but because of it, not to earn salvation, but as a response to it. So Paul, the doctrine thumper, he absolutely hates workspace salvation. You guys know this, right? He hates a legalistic understanding of righteousness. The do's and don'ts of religiosity, disobedient, false teachers preach that on all sides of the spectrum, whether they preach antinomism as last week, or legalism, they preach all kinds of stuff. Paul hates that. And he tells Titus to exhort the elders of the future churches or the future elders of the churches to pay them no mind. Not paying attention to Jewish myths and commandments of men who turn away from the truth.

There's religiosity there. Preaching the word in and out of season, placing the Bible first is not legalism. Amen. That's not Phariseism. It's not judgmentalism. That is what saves a person's soul. It's the only thing that saves a person's soul. And how a person responds to the truths of God is actually very telling of where they are in their standing before God. And that's the point of verse 15. Some people read verse 15, they're confused because it doesn't seem to like fit the logic, but this is what it is. To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure. Both their mind and their consciences are defiled. So what is our greatest priority among today's Cretans?

It's to preach the gospel. An imputed righteousness that comes through faith alone, by grace alone, in Christ alone, that's gonna sound foolish to many people. That's gonna elicit a hostile response from many people. When you preach the exclusivity of Jesus, that's gonna cause a lot of people to hate you, right? But that is what we're supposed to preach. The church does not prioritize a preaching pushing for equity and justice. A church doesn't preach how we're supposed to make the world a better place. We don't preach how to become a better you. What the church is supposed to preach is repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. Jesus is the only way in the truth and the life. No one is restored to his creator apart from him.

Amen. So we preach the gospel. We're not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation for this for everyone who believes. Right? That's Romans chapter one. We don't change the gospel to make it more palatable. We don't distort the gospel or leave certain things out because we're discouraged that more people aren't coming to church. Right. The elect of God, the pure of God, will believe. And they will respond in purity of belief. The different responses that the Cretans will have toward the proclamation of the word of God is the point in verse 15. And I'm gonna read this without the chapter and the verse, but when you have a chance, look up the use of the word pure. Pure, pure, pure, purity, pure, purify.

That happens throughout Titus. Alright? So I'm gonna read this without the word pure the address of the Bible passage. The Lord purifies for himself through a pure and unadulterated doctrine, and elect people who are eager, ready, and zealous for pure works. That's what healthy churches are supposed to produce in Crete with the power of God, with the with the grace of God. I want to read this again.

To the pure, all things are pure. Do you guys understand? But to those who are defiled and unbelieving, the spiritual Cretans who remained always lying, evil beasts, lazy gluttons, nothing was pure. Nothing is pure. Nothing will ever be pure, and their response to the preaching of the gospel, to any reproof, will always be hostile and detestable. Why? Because both their minds and their consciences are forever defiled. It doesn't make sense. Are you trying if you try to teach Chinese to your dog, will it understand it? No. If you're trying to speak, or if you're trying to train your cat to speak and understand Spanish, will he understand? No. They don't function like that. For a spiritual Cretan, the word of God is what?

It makes no sense. But Titus is to preach the word and to live the word in season and out of season. And he and all the elders after him were to preach and model the word in season and out of season, no matter what the response. Amen. Our responsibility is not the response. Our responsibility is the faithfulness of the handling of the word. The church's purpose is not to grow the number. God will do that. The purpose of the church is just to be faithful to whatever he says. Cover to cover. So physical and spiritual Cretans will always respond in hostility, mockery, and hatred. We preach the word of the cross no matter what the reception of our preaching. Why? Because there's no other thing that has the power to change the human heart.

There's no other thing that has the power to save. First Corinthians 1 18, for the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are defiled and unbelieving. You guys say you understand why I said that. But to us who are being saved, it's the power of God. You know what's super comforting? There's almost a guarantee, okay, that there will always be the elect of God out there who will respond appropriately to sound doctrine. It's guaranteed. It will rarely be the majority. The crusades that draw tens of thousands. Let's look at the fruit. But the word of God promises that there will always be the elect of God who hear the shepherd's voice, they come to the fold. We have no control over that.

John 3 8, it says it's like the movement of the wind, whom the Spirit saves. We hear the stuff, but we don't know where it's coming from or where it's going. That's how the Spirit moves and saves through the proclamation of his word. The Spirit moves where he pleases. There is no human strategy that can get Cretans saved. You guys follow? There's nothing we can do to change the human heart. We can change stuff to make ourselves feel better. Would I be want well, would I want to have a 500 people church? Not really, but if God blesses us with that, that's not something that I should manipulate by changing the PR of our church. No soul can be humanly manipulated or argued into belief.

The word of God does the work. We need to trust the sufficiency of the scriptures to restore the lost to Christ. Amen. So remember those epicureans? We talked about the epicureans, and Paul encountered in Acts 17, the YOLO guys. Okay, let's eat and drink and be merry for tomorrow we die, lazy gluttons, like those guys, right? Paul preached the gospel to them. The defiled and unbelieving among them, they scoffed and they sneered. But through Paul's preaching, I believe that some of them got saved at the Areopagus. Let's read this together. Acts 17, 30 to 34. Therefore, having, this is Paul's preaching, overlook the times of ignorance, God is now commanding men that everyone everywhere should repent.

Because God has fixed the day in which he will judge the world in righteousness through a man whom he determined, having furnished proof to all by raising him from the dead. Imagine, I mean, this this, if I preach this on the street, I'm gonna get yelled at. Paul's doing this. Verse 32. Now, when they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer. There's nothing new under the sun. But others said, Huh, we shall hear you further concerning this. And in this way, it was probably a little chaotic. Paul, Paul took off. Paul went out of their midst. But some men joined him and they believed, among whom, and I don't exactly know who these guys are, but they're significant, and that's why they're mentioned in the book of Acts, whom also were Dionysius, the Areopagite, and a woman named Demeris, and others with them.

The world is growing ever darker, wickedness is increasing, the love of many, even in the pews is growing colder. Should we be shocked by that? No. Read Matthew 24. It's supposed to happen. The Lord Himself taught his disciples that that would happen. But he also said that the gospel will be preached through all the nations. There's just gonna be a big baton pass into every crevice and every tribe on the earth. And the Lord will succeed in calling the elect unto himself. Gonna happen. So in the midst of all of this, what do we do as a church ministering in our modern-day spiritual Crete? How do we combat all this evil and just the deceit and the entitled laziness around us? First we stay calm.

We don't overreact. When everyone puts a black dot on their Facebook profile to identify with someone supporting a movement, we just stay chill. If someone overreacts and says, How come we're not doing more? We just we stay sober, we stay calm. There's nothing new under the sun. But we first and foremost preach the gospel. We preach the word of God, we preach sound doctrine, Genesis to Revelation, and then we model it to the best of our ability. We give evidence for what we believe with our good works. We show compassion towards those around us. We're patient with people. And at the end of the day, we let the word do its work. Amen. No matter what the response, you guys, for the most part are hearing the word and saying, ah, that's what we're supposed to do.

A non-Christian who's been at church all his life, who's been taught that God doesn't care that he's a sinner, but he loves him because of his sin. Stuff like that. They're gonna hear this and they're gonna hate it. But the elect of God, no matter what their background, no matter what their PhD status or like whatever they're uneducated in, no matter what, the elect of God will hear the voice of the shepherd, John chapter 10, and they will move. So we just don't get in the way of distorting the voice of the shepherd. We just help people to hear it clearer to the best of our ability, and we handle it faithfully and let the word of God do the rest. Amen. We're living in spiritual Crete. You could say this about any people.

All they need is an opportunity to let loose their evil. But we live among an evil people, and the only thing that has saved us is the grace of God. But you know how you've been saved? It's not your tears. If all you have for your salvation testimony is, oh, I needed like help, I cried, and then God saved me. I actually would encourage you to test to see really, did you come to know the Lord? Or did you just have an emotional venting session? The word of God will go forth and will not return void because the elect will hear it and will always respond appropriately in obedience and worship. Okay. So we preach and we preach Christ and Him crucified, and that's all we do. Let's pray together. Father, help us to never stray from this task.

The same task you've entrusted to Titus through Paul, through the elders of Crete, Lord, we know that we've been entrusted with the same task. And we pray that men and women will come to know Jesus here at this church, that men and women will come to be saved at this church, will come to be equipped at this church, will be trained to save and equip others at this church. Ultimately, not for any renown of beacon church, but Lord, for your glory alone. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.