Feeling Better?

This morning we will be looking into the book of Titus. Titus was written by Paul to Titus. Titus was tasked with replacing unruly and selfish leaders that were taking over the church. These leaders were trapping their congregations in genealogies and meaningless arguments. Titus was tasked with looking for and replacing these leaders so that the church could begin to grow in the way that it was intended to grow. In the beginning of Titus we find Paul discussing the meaningless talk of circumcision and how these people were stopping the growth of the church. Today we will be looking into three topics that Paul addresses in the 3rd chapter and how we fall into one of those three areas of life. We will look first at The Hurt, secondly at The Healing, and thirdly at The Hope. As we enter this passage we will take an in depth look at where each of us are and what the next steps are for each of us as God is calling us to move forward in our dedication and faith. Lets look first at The Hurt.

The Hurt

Titus 3:1–3 ESV

Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people. For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

Have you ever been sick or around someone who is sick? There are different levels of sick right? There is the flu sick, the terminal illness sick, and the man flu sick. Whatever the level of sick we have all been there at one point or another. Watch this video with me. “Man Flu Video from Youtube”. Now this is a very funny video and undeniably accurate for some of us. The point is that we have all been sick and while physical sickness whether terminal illness or a perceived illness none of these are as deadly as the illness of Sin. You see sin on ones life leads to many complications. The first complication that sin leads to is the inability to see. Sin clouds our judgement and our own vision of ourselves compared to the Glory of God. Sin will cause us to be lofty in our own image and to deflate the authority and power of God.

Proverbs 13:5 ESV

The righteous hates falsehood, but the wicked brings shame and disgrace.

Not only will Sin cause us to be spiritually blind but it will lead to troubles in our families, work, and our ability to live a satisfying life.

Isaiah 57:21 ESV

There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.”

But not only will Sin lead to a lack of satisfaction and vision in life it will ultimately lead to death of the body and soul.

Romans 6:23 ESV

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

In the first passage in Titus 3 we are reminded that sinners are disobedient, do not perform good works, speak evil of others, quarrel, and are not gentle. Does this sound like you? Do you need to get out of this place of hurt in your life? There is hope for you, you can leave the hurt today and I encourage you to find a place of peace and joy. Not a place of perfect finances, pretty houses, and perfect lawns. Salvation will call you to lay down your own desires for the needs of others. Maybe you are here today and you are already a Christian. Titus 3:3 reminds us that we should not think of ourselves as better than anyone but we should have compassion on the sinners and desire that they come to a full knowledge of Christ. We were once sick and needed healing that we could not do for ourselves. This leads to The Healing

The Healing

Titus 3:4–6 ESV

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior,

Some in here have had God’s wonderful hand of physical healing fall on them and have been healed from things such as cancer or chronic pain. There are many emotions that come along with being healed and while it is a struggle for many coping with the feelings one of the overwhelming feelings in a remission diagnosis is joy. This joy is the cause of the person realizing that they were once given a death sentence with a diagnosis and have now been given the joy of life. In verses 4-6 we are told of the great healing that God sent through His Son. We were all lost in our sin and did not deserve healing. There is nothing we can do to earn salvation .

Ephesians 2:8–9 ESV

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Galatians 2:21 ESV

I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.

Romans 8:3 ESV

For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,

The Healing of God is a free gift and it is open for all. If you are not saved this morning I encourage you to take the step today. Understand the healing that God has for you today. He wants to bring you out of death into life. It is not hard to accept the gift of God.

Romans 10:9–10 ESV

because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

God gave us all his healing free and without strings attached. God’s healing is not like a timeshare. Have you ever done one of those “free” vacations? You sign up you go get into your hotel room and are immediately ushered into a room where you are interrogated and pressured into signing a contract for something that you don’t want. There is nothing free about this vacation and it almost always leaves the participants feeling more drained than when they arrived for their relaxing vacation. God’s healing is not this way. The healing that God gives, brings us hope.

The Hope

Salvation brings a Hope that we cannot contain inside ourselves. Salvation that is genuine and growing will result in lives that are outwardly reflective of the love of Christ.

Titus 3:7–11 ESV

so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things, so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works. These things are excellent and profitable for people. But avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable and worthless. As for a person who stirs up division, after warning him once and then twice, have nothing more to do with him, knowing that such a person is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned.

When we receive the free gift of salvation we are given a hope and a future. This is not a promise of a struggle free life but is a promise of a life full of Hope and Joy. Paul tells us that we were justified by the grace of Jesus that we are now heirs of the Hope of Eternal life. We are healed and given a sentence of everlasting life with Christ. This Hope must be renewed daily and continually brought to the forefront of our minds. You see the devils trick is not to make sinners worse of sinners but to make Christians content with not living in the Hope of our salvation. We have all been here, we accept Christ in our hearts and we are overjoyed and excited. We are telling everyone we know about the Hope that Christ gave us and we are so excited to tell everyone. But then we slowly fade back into our sinful habits. We begin to use foul language at work or when we don’t think anyone else is listening. We begin to turn our Christian music off in our desire for music that promotes our earthly desires of money and fame. We go back to having our bad attitudes and losing our compassion for others. Let me ask you this if you were diagnosed with cancer and you were miraculously healed, would anyone in here go back to the doctor and say, can I have a little of the cancer back? You know I understand that it would kill me but now since im healed can I just get a little bit of it back. I don’t want to look like a cancer patient again you know. I want just the stuff that no one can see. I need everyone to think that outwardly I’m perfectly fine but inwardly where they cannot see I would like to have some of those deadly cells back in my body. No one in their right mind would say something so foolish or want something so devastating. Why is this? First because it is bad for them. The cancer will lead to death and even just a few cells will cause other cells to become damaged and will cause the cancer to spread and eventually will lead to death again. This is the same way that sin in a believers life works. Just a little bit of hidden sin will eventually lead to other sins that we think we can hide and then before you know it we cannot differentiate ourselves from a sinner. Secondly, it is bad for their families and friends. It is said that most of the struggle for terminal illness patients is thinking about what pain their friends and families will go through. Sadly though we do not have the same mindset towards our sin. Paul told the church to avoid the divisions and people who cause division among them with their quarrels about the law and told the church that such people who refuse to leave these sinful things behind do not care about anyone but themselves and are warped and sinful and must be removed. As Christians we must never be ok with going back to our sinful nature and asking to live in our sickness just a little bit. When we allow sin back into our lives it will lead to our death but will also affect those around us. If you would not want to live in sickness that you have been healed from then why would you want to live in sin that you have been freed from. So what is the answer? We must live in the Hope of salvation. Daily take up our Cross

Luke 9:23 ESV

And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

Everyday we should begin our days with Christ. I am as guilty as anyone in this room of letting the hectic life I live get in the way of the most important relationship I have and that is my relationship with God. This is the most important relationship because if I am not in a close relationship and following God’s will for my life then I will never have the correct perspective for anyone in my life. Do you have a personal and intimate relationship with God? Are you living in the hope of your salvation daily? Have you allowed just a little bit of the sickness back in? It is time for the church to take a stand and to make God the most important person in out lives and to quit living like we are sick. We are healed and it is time to shed the coats of sin that weighed us down and take up our Cross daily and find the hope, peace, and joy in our salvation.