Instructions in Godly Living

 

"Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled.” (Titus 2:2-6 ESV)

As those who profess faith in Jesus Christ, we have biblical guidelines which we are to follow as children of God and as servants of the Lord Jesus. We don’t just “get saved” and now heaven is guaranteed us when we die, but regardless of how we live. Our lives are now to be surrendered to the Lord to do his will and purpose for our lives and to walk in obedience to his commands. Our lives no longer belong to us, but to God, and he is the one now to be directing our steps and showing us the way that we ought to go.

I believe all of the instructions given in this passage of Scripture are self-explanatory and do not need further explanation except in one area, the area of submission. All submission must first of all be to God and to the teachings of the Scriptures and to God’s design and purpose for each one of our lives. So we are never to submit to what is contrary to the will of God and to what is contrary to his moral requirements for our lives. So we are never to submit to sin and anything that opposes God’s expressed will.

Well, there are two other areas, the first of which is faith. Biblical faith is persuasion of God. And God persuades us as to his holiness and righteousness and of our sinfulness, and of our need to repent of (turn from) our sins to now follow him in obedience to his commands. And biblical faith comes from God, is gifted to us of God, and is not of our own doing. So we don’t get to define faith. God does! His word does! And biblical faith results in us dying with Christ to sin and us living to his righteousness, in practice.

[Matthew 7:21-23; Luke 9:23-26; John 1:12-13; John 6:44; Acts 26:18; Romans 1:18-32; Romans 3:23; Romans 6:1-23; Romans 8:1-14; Ephesians 2:8-10; Ephesians 4:17-32; Titus 2:11-14; Hebrews 12:1-2]  

The other is love. This word in the Greek is “agape,” and it means to prefer what God prefers. And what God prefers is all that is honest, faithful, obedient to his commands, morally pure, upright, and righteous in his sight. For us who believe in Jesus Christ with this God-given faith in him, love means we choose to live through Christ, choosing his choices, and obeying them in his power. So when we love God, we will obey him. And when we love God and other humans, we will not deliberately sin against them.

“Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us. Bondservants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything; they are to be well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior.” (Titus 2:7-10 ESV)

And here we have the subject of “good works” again. Now not one us can be saved from our sins and have eternal life with God on the basis of our own fleshly good works. But our salvation from sin and eternal life with God are not absent of “good works.” They are just the works that God prepared in advance that we should walk in them. They are the good works of God which he designed and purposed that we should do, in practice, in his power, and under his guidance and direction. So God does require works of us.

[John 15:1-11; 1 Corinthians 15:58; 2 Corinthians 9:8; Galatians 5:6; Ephesians 2:10; Philippians 2:12-13; Colossians 1:9-14; 2 Thessalonians 1:11-12; 2 Timothy 2:21; Titus 2:11-14; Titus 3:8; James 2:17] 

And if in our teaching we are to show integrity, it means largely that we are making certain, to the best of our understanding, in the power of God, and under the direction of the Holy Spirit, that what we are teaching is indeed the truth of God’s word. And so we will not rely on the teachings of other humans to be what we teach. We can learn from other humans, which is why teaching is one of the gifts of the Spirit, but we must be in the practice of testing whatever we are taught with the Scriptures, IN CONTEXT.

Now, in America (where I live), we don’t normally have “bondservants” as we did in many years past. And I am not saying that they don’t exist, but that I am not aware that this is prevalent in our society today. But a bondservant is usually, from my understanding, one who is willfully employed by another, like we who believe in Jesus Christ choose to be his bondservants when we are crucified with him in death to sin and now raised with him to live no longer as slaves to sin but to God and to righteousness.

Anyway, from a human to human standpoint, I look at bondservants today, in my nation, as those willfully employed by another. And I look at “the masters” as employers (bosses). And if we work for pay in a job where we have a boss over us – which I do not for I work full–time for the Lord, who is my master – then we are to be in submission to our employers. But human to human submission must follow the guidelines of the Scriptures, and so we are never to submit to doing anything against the commands of God. 

But all of us, no matter who we are, and no matter who we work for, if we are of genuine faith in Jesus Christ, we are to be people of integrity who live by the teachings of Christ and of his NT apostles, and who obey the commandments of our Lord under the New Covenant. So not one of us should be servants of sin and in walks of disobedience to our Lord. Not one of us should be living for the flesh in sinful practices contrary to the will of God for our lives. But all of us should be in submission to God in all things.

Teach Them  

An Original Work / May 24, 2012

Based off various scriptures

Open up the blinded eyes of

Those who walk in sin’s darkness.

Turn them to the light of Christ

And to His righteousness.

Turn them from the pow’r of Satan.

Turn them to the peace of Christ,

So they may receive forgiveness

And eternal life. 

Teach them to put off their old selves

And their former way of life,

And to put on their new self,

Reborn to be like Christ;

To not copy worldly customs;

Be transformed in life and mind;

Obey freely His word in them,

Pleasing unto God.

Teach them how to love their neighbors

Truly as they love themselves;

Be a witness; share the gospel;

Satan’s lies dispel;

Comfort all who mourn in sadness;

Share Christ’s love and joy today.

Do this through your life and witness

For your Lord always. 

https://vimeo.com/125485489