Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to Growing in Grace with Pastor Victor Morrison. This is a ministry of First Baptist Church located at 1700 Milam Street, Columbus, Texas. We are praying that God will bless you as you listen to this message.
Speaker: If you would like additional information on worship times and ministries at FBC Columbus, you can find out more at our website, fbccolumbustx.org. And now, take your copy of God's timeless Word as Pastor Victor gives today's message.
Speaker: Welcome to Growing in Grace. My name is Victor Morrison. I'm the pastor at First Baptist Church in Columbus, Texas, and it's a joy to be with you again today. I wanted to point you in the direction of the New Testament book of Titus.
Speaker: Titus ah chapter three is where we're going to be. Titus chapter three, verse five, is one of my favorite verses if I wanted to tell someone else how to become a Christian, how to be saved, how to place their faith in Christ. Let me read that verse. It says, he saved us.
Speaker: not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit.
Speaker: We're going to look at that verse and a few others that go right along with it in Titus chapter 3. If you've never discovered this chapter, I recommend it wholeheartedly. My brother-in-law owns a kitchen and bath remodeling business, in a part of Houston known as Webster, Webster, Friendswood, and so forth.
Speaker: But Randy and his crew specialize in taking the kitchen that someone has and renovating it into the kitchen they wish they had.
Speaker: In some ways, I guess you could say they make dreams come true for their customers. Uh, Some who contact them, they come into their shop and they say, you know what?
Speaker: I just feel like I need a change. Well, that construction company in some ways parallels what Christ does in a person's life.
Speaker: He takes away the old life and brings in a totally new life. 2 Corinthians 5.17 promises us, therefore, if anyone is in Christ alone,
Speaker: He's a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. Do you know anyone who's ready for a complete change in their life?
Speaker: They should turn to Jesus for salvation. That's where they can find it. Now, what I really like best about this chapter is that it contains three biblical photographs of salvation.
Speaker: The following three pictures are true of every believer, and it enables a new Christian to understand what salvation means. Perhaps you will even see your own life in the following three biblical pictures of salvation.
Speaker: So you may weave what you're about to hear of your transformation into sharing the gospel of referring to this passage found in Titus 3.
Speaker: But I love it and I recommend it wholeheartedly. The first photo that we will see is what our life was like spiritually before Jesus changed us.
Speaker: That's what we'll see in verse 3. The second photograph will remind us of how someone trusts in Jesus Christ for salvation. That'll be found in verses four through eight.
Speaker: But the third in this series of salvation photographs will observe how a man or a woman should live after they've trusted Christ as their personal Lord and Savior.
Speaker: So let's get started. Let me begin with verse three. Here's what it says. For we ourselves were, notice past tense, for we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray,
Speaker: Wow, that's lot right there, isn't it?
Speaker: hated by others and hating one another wow that's a lot right there isn't it Do you know that the Bible says before we place our faith in Christ, this is Jesus himself in John 8, verses 31 to 36. The Bible actually says that we're in bondage to sin.
Speaker: We need someone to set us free. And so verse 3 gives us just six, let's say, random things. spiritual jail cells that once ah we once lived in without Christ. We couldn't get out of that those kind of ah jail cells or prisons.
Speaker: But Jesus sets us free. It's like he opens the gate and says, I have died on the cross so that you could come out of that jail cell of sin.
Speaker: So I wanted to just briefly give some kind of explanation of those six jail cells. The first one was deception. Have you ever seen anybody that's in a pre ah prison of deception?
Speaker: He talks about before Christ, there's foolishness. We are deceived. Then it goes on to describe a second ah prison, the prison of disobedience.
Speaker: Have you ever seen anyone led astray? And you're thinking, but it's so clear. It's right there in the Bible. Can't you see that God wants this direction, not that direction?
Speaker: Well, why do we do that? It's because of the sin nature. It's because we're, as a human race, we're in defiance of all of God's standards and ways. So we've seen there's a prison of deception, another one of disobedience, but how about a prison of dissatisfaction?
Speaker: He describes how before he received Christ, he was serving various lusts and pleasures, I believe that when we come to know Jesus Christ personally, it's the first time we can finally say, ah, finally, I've found the source of true inner satisfaction.
Speaker: I believe until that moment, we just keep wanting more and more and more. And we don't realize that Jesus is who is going to finally quench that thirst that we have.
Speaker: But he also talks about living in malice. You know, if we don't watch it, malice can actually push us in the direction of danger. So we could be in a prison of danger of our own making.
Speaker: And yet now we have to live in it. And then, of course, a prison of desire, when it speaks of envy. There are some people who always envy. They always covet what someone else has. And yet I think God,
Speaker: will help us to grow in contentment where we, instead of wishing we had what others have, we and we begin to say, thank you, God, for what you have given to me.
Speaker: So there's this natural ah bent toward gratitude to God for his blessings that he's already given to us. There's also a prison of destruction that I think he describes at the end of verse three, when he talks about how before Christ, we can be hateful and we can spend our whole life hating one another.
Speaker: Have you ever known any families that were sort of eat up by hatred for other people or hat hate they were hating hating one another perhaps? But I just tell you, they're out there.
Speaker: But it can all be different. And that's what we have to realize at the very beginning. We have to look and say, take my picture, Lord. Show me what does my heart, what does my life truly look like?
Speaker: And what he shows us, that first biblical photograph, is that we all fall short. Yeah, maybe you'd say, I don't hate anybody. I'm not envying anybody. That's great.
Speaker: But none of us are perfect. And in order to be in God's family, in order to go to heaven when we die, without Jesus, we would have to be perfect. And so we have to say, whoa, wait a minute. I'm not saying I'm never selfish. I'm never prideful. you know like I think all of these things remind us of our need for salvation.
Speaker: That's one role of the Holy Spirit. is he wants to convict us. So don't resist when God's Holy Spirit is trying to convict you of sin.
Speaker: Why don't you lean into it and say, okay, God, I don't want to push away from the table. I want to pull up to the table. I need what you're offering because I have all of these things operating in my life.
Speaker: But there's such good news in this one chapter. If we read in verses 4 through 8, then we'll see the wonderful gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ in real time.
Speaker: And what's amazing is it can happen in the blink of an eye. It's like all that I'm about to read in verses 4, 5, 6, 7, and of Titus chapter It's like all of this happens in an instant.
Speaker: Whenever someone says, Lord, I am truly sorry for my sin. I want to put my faith and trust in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross.
Speaker: I know I don't deserve heaven. I know I don't deserve salvation. I don't deserve forgiveness, but please, Lord, have mercy on me. Listen to what it sounds like in real time when someone gets saved.
Speaker: All of these things, like I say, they happen instantly, but it's like the Holy Spirit put the Apostle Paul in slow motion. And so watch what happens as we see salvation as it's taking place in a moment of time.
Speaker: 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, so that being justified by His grace,
Speaker: 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.
Speaker: These things are excellent and profitable for people. Wow, just a few verses there, verse four through verse eight of Titus chapter three, but I'm telling you, it covers a lot of ground that happens in a moment of time. So let me tell you four things that stood out to me.
Speaker: The first thing I think we realize is that God actually cares about us in Christ. Before we ever placed our faith in Christ, we were already loved.
Speaker: You know, John 3, 16 tells us, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. And Romans 5.8 says, but God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. And there's so many verses that remind us, you know what?
Speaker: God loves you. And that's exactly what verse four is all about. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God, our Savior appeared,
Speaker: You know, when you get saved, when you become a Christian, that's what happens. It's like the loving kindness and the mercy of God, the goodness of God suddenly dawns on you.
Speaker: And you realize God's been loving me all my life. That's where you start. That's one thing that happens, but that's not the only thing that happens. Let's go to the second thing that happens in verse five. Not only does God care about us in Christ, God covered us in Christ.
Speaker: Covered us with what? What did he cover? He covered our sin. Do you know that the Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament was placed at first in the tabernacle?
Speaker: And you know, that that the Ark of the Covenant had a lid on top of it. And in the Bible, you know what it's called in the Old Testament? It's called the mercy seat.
Speaker: And it's like in Romans 3.25, God tells us, now the blood of Christ is covers us, it covers our sin. The blood of Christ atones for our sin.
Speaker: Isn't it wonderful to know that your sins and my sins, that when we turn in repentance and place our faith and trust in Christ, our sins are forgiven.
Speaker: It's wonderful. That's why we call it good news. The good news is God cares about us in Christ. The good news is God has provided a covering for us in Christ through the shed blood of him.
Speaker: But then there's the third thing. God also changes us in Christ. Listen to verses five and six. How does that change take place? Well, it's miraculous really.
Speaker: Because it says, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior.
Speaker: See, when it all starts is when we turn to him for salvation as our Savior. All of our past sins are washed away. And you know what comes into our life?
Speaker: New life, just like that you know renovation shop that I was describing that my brother-in-law owns and operates. Hey, maybe you're saying, i wish there was a way that I could get rid of all this stuff that I've done in my past.
Speaker: That's exactly what the Lord does. He makes us brand new. On the inside, He comes in and completely changes us and gives us a new start in life.
Speaker: I love that. But then also, verse 7 says a fourth thing. God also cleared us in Christ. Do you know that without Christ, we're guilty before God because of our sin? i mean, we can try to claim that we're not guilty, but you know what? God's word, it's so truthful.
Speaker: God says, no, you do stand guilty before me because of your sin. All of us, i'm myself included, But going back to that term, the good news of the gospel, the good news is that in Christ, we're cleared and we're cleansed of our sins. God no longer looks at us and says, you're guilty.
Speaker: You know what he looks at us and says? you're justified. I remember hearing Billy Graham say, many years ago when I was just a teenager, I was trying to learn how can all of my sins that I've done, how can they be forgiven?
Speaker: And he said, you need to learn what justified means. in In the Bible, the word justified means just as if I'd never sinned.
Speaker: That's how God sees us. In the perfect cleansing blood of Christ, He sees us completely free, cleared of all that guilt, of all that shame.
Speaker: That's what Christ does for us. And all of that happens in that short instant. So it's like in one moment of time, we realize first, God cares about me.
Speaker: Second, God has provided for me to have covering in Christ for my sins. He can change my life. And he certainly wants to clear me in Christ of all those past things that I've done wrong.
Speaker: Friend, that's such good news. And so if you've never gone through that salvation process right there, I encourage you to study this passage carefully and closely, and you'll be so blessed with what you discover in this passage.
Speaker: So let me go next to that third biblical photograph. You know, we looked at what life is like before salvation. We looked at what life is like during salvation, when we're actually being saved in that exact moment.
Speaker: But I want to close with this last one. What should we look like after salvation? What is our growth trajectory? What is it that the Lord would look at us and say, here's what I want you now to be growing in the direction of. The Lord's gonna be in us. He's gonna be helping us to accomplish these things, but we're not on our own.
Speaker: So let me just give you a few random things that are mentioned in this one chapter. For example, what if we look at verse one? What is it that after we become a Christian, what should we be doing?
Speaker: Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work. Well, there's a couple of things I thought about. One is submissive toward laws.
Speaker: Christians should try to obey the laws of their country. Even the apostle Peter included this in his epistle as well in 1 Peter 2, verses 13 through 17.
Speaker: The Bible doesn't want us to be causing a lot of trouble with all the laws of the land. Now, it's different if the government ever asks us to disobey the Lord, then we must choose a higher loyalty to Christ as demonstrated by the apostles in Acts chapter 4, verses 17 through 21, where they were actually commanded not to tell anyone else about Jesus.
Speaker: And they were simply saying, you know what? We're going to have to stay with what Jesus has told us to do. I'm sorry, but we cannot do that. But the second thing I noticed in that same verse one was where he says to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, ready for every good work.
Speaker: You know, out of gratitude for our salvation, every Christian should look for ways to serve the Lord. So we should say, okay, Lord, help me be submissive to the laws of the land, but also help me to serve the Lord.
Speaker: The Bible calls these acts of service good works. Now we're not saved by our good works. I think that's made clear when you go back to verse ah five, I believe it is. He saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness. So we're not saved by the works.
Speaker: But once we are truly saved, once we're born again, once we have Christ in our lives, we will desire to work for the Lord in our local church.
Speaker: So I wonder what skills, what gifts, what talents do you possess that you could use to simply serve the Lord that you now know personally?
Speaker: I love that. You know, ah verse 14 says something quite similar. It says, and let our people learn... to devote themselves to good works So as to help cases of urgent need and not be unfruitful so what should salvation look like in a life, anybody's life?
Speaker: Well, the first thing, they should be trying to be submissive toward the laws of the land. They should also try to serve the Lord with the gifts and abilities that he's given to them. Let me give you a third one.
Speaker: We should be growing in how we speak with love. Listen to verse two carefully. To speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.
Speaker: Man, don't you wish you could just put that on a banner out there so that everybody in our nation would be able to hear that? Another change, see, that takes place when someone comes to faith in Christ is a change in the way they speak to other people.
Speaker: Christ changes the way that we use our words. I love that. And I pray that God will help me to use my words in a way that will be a blessing to other people and not set them back.
Speaker: You know, he says again in verse nine, but avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law for they're unprofitable and worthless.
Speaker: And so we don't want to ah use our words in some negative way. Even in verse 15, we hear a positive way of using our words. He said, all who are with me, send greetings to you.
Speaker: Greet those who love us in the faith. Grace be with you all. See what he's doing? He's using his words to build up and not tear down. you know, to create and ah to strengthen and not destroy.
Speaker: There's something else I think that we do as followers of Jesus Christ. Perhaps you've heard this term before, missionaries. We send out missionaries. We send out those who will take the good news from where we live and go to areas where others are living who maybe have never heard the gospel or never, let's say, seen the gospel. And so we need to send out laborers. Listen to verse 12. Do you see what's happening?
Speaker: arteuss orticchicus to you do your best to come to me at nicopolis for i've decided to spend the winter there do you see what's happening You know, I believe that each church should look for ways to send out church planters and missionaries to other areas that need to hear the gospel message and see, well, where are more churches needed?
Speaker: Paul knew that he could send out two men, Artemis and Tychicus, to help Titus on the island of Crete. Would you be willing for your church to send out some on a short-term mission trip?
Speaker: That's kind of the idea that I'm talking about. The last short-term mission trip that our church sent a group ah to was to Tulaksack, Alaska. And so there's a couple there that went out from our church and we wanted to support them. And so we went and helped to build a church and to encourage them. And I just think that's a wonderful thing that we should all do.
Speaker: But how about verse 13? One last thing. Share the load. Share the load. Submissive toward laws. Serve the Lord. Speak with love.
Speaker: Send out labors. But verse 13, share the load. share the load New believers may feel that there's no way that they could assist their local church, since there are still many things that they have to learn about the Lord's work.
Speaker: They can, however, help their church to share the load in providing food for ah or other necessities for those who are called to serve the Lord, such as pastors and missionaries and staff and so forth.
Speaker: Paul urged the church to support the work of Zenos and Apollos so that they lacked nothing. Let me read that verse to you, verse 13. He says, "'Do your best to speed Zenos the lawyer and Apollos on their way.
Speaker: See that they lack nothing.'" See that they lack nothing. Isn't that neat? It's like he's saying, why don't you stand with them and help share that load? Are you giving to the church where God has you growing?
Speaker: Wow. I think that we should say, Lord, I want to be a part of helping ah other people to grow in Christ. there was a man named John Harper. He never forgot what it was like to be lost.
Speaker: See, John died when the great ship, the Titanic, sank in 1912. The White Star office in Liverpool, England, had two lists with updates on the passengers.
Speaker: One list said, known to be saved, while the other list said, known to be lost, One survivor said that John Harper gave another desperate passenger his inflatable life vest and led him to Christ right there in the freezing water of the Atlantic Ocean.
Speaker: After that, the survivor said that John Harper was gone. He could no longer tread water and slipped into the depths of the ocean. His name eventually appeared on the known to be lost list in Liverpool.
Speaker: But heaven had another list on which John Harper's name appeared, namely the list written with the blood of Christ in glory, saying, known to be saved.
Speaker: Listen, friend, I've given you three biblical photographs. Which one is a picture of you? Which list are you on? Which photograph are you like? Are you still in that group that's you know experiencing that that restriction from sin in your life? Sin's causing so much trouble. It's bullying you around. It has you locked up in its chains.
Speaker: There's good news. Remember, we did go from life before Christ to life during Christ. Whenever we begin to turn our lives over and we release our lives from sin into God's hands, but when the goodness and loving kindness of God, our Savior, appeared, He saved us.
Speaker: 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. It all starts with faith.
Speaker: It all starts with a trust. And then once we trust him, we saw so many different things that would tell the Lord and others around us and give us assurance, you know what?
Speaker: I'm on the saved list. God knows my name. When I die, I have assurance that I'm going to go to be with Him in heaven. Boy, that's that's exactly where I want you to be.
Speaker: I want you to know with assurance that you've turned from sin, placed your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, and now you're growing. Are you on that list? Are you on the growing in Christ list? That's where we wanna be. We wanna be growing in grace. Yes, we know we're saved by grace, but now that we are saved by grace,
Speaker: We want to keep growing in grace. I love Titus 3 because it's so practical in what it says that we should do for the laws of the land, what it says that we should do on the work of the Lord, what it says that we should be like in terms of our speech and how we talk to other people.
Speaker: There's so many wonderful things that this chapter has to offer. I hope that you'll take time to go back to this chapter, review it, look at those three biblical photographs again. And then when you have an opportunity to tell someone else about Jesus,
Speaker: Maybe you would say, hey, I want to share a verse with you, Titus 3, 5. That's if you just have a very short amount of time. If you've got more time, then why don't you say, let me introduce you to three biblical photographs of salvation.
Speaker: Why don't we pray together? Lord, thank you so much for Titus chapter 3. It's so clear. Even Titus chapter 3, verse 5 by itself is just so clear. But I thank you for just how comprehensive this one chapter is in the Bible.
Speaker: It helps us know what we were like before salvation, how salvation took place in our lives, and what we should aim for now that we have experienced salvation and we're growing in grace.
Speaker: In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Thank you so much for listening today. I pray that God blessed you and you have a great day in Jesus.
Speaker: This is a ministry of First Baptist Church located at 1700 Milam Street, Columbus, Texas.
