Stress Love, Not Someone's Grandpa

God, please make all of these Your Words. May You be Glorified through them and their teaching. May they serve Your purposes and allow You to reach out to us all and change us.

Titus 3:1-11 says,

Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men.
At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived, and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. This is a trustworthy saying. And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone. 
But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless. Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him. You may be sure that such a man is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned. 

Paul opens this passage by asking Titus to remind the people to be obedient, to do good, to not slander, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility to all men. Paul's beginning of this passage of the letter is reminiscent his other letters in that, he is giving his teaching that God has given him to those around him. In this case, Paul is giving them to Titus, his true son in common faith. Paul changes the tone immediately to going to a contrast of his and other Christian's pasts before God's Call. 

Paul writes that they were foolish, disobedient, deceived, enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures, and lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating each other. They saw no good in each other and they lived according to their sinful natures. They were sinful and had no love for others. They were slaves to sin and were not interested in giving up themselves. We all start the same way in our sin. We are all naturally evil and hateful beings. We chase after our own pleasures and seek what we want. We don't see brokenness when we look in the mirror. We see something that is perfectly healthy and rich, not the naked and dying creature that we actually are.Our eyes are covered and we have no interest in cleaning them. But then one day it all changes.

The word "But" in the very next sentence separates the parts of this passage and changed the entire tone of the writing.  But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us.... And so our whole world gets turned upside down. We become a completely different creation by God's Mercy. He looks at us and everything we've done, good and bad, and says that none of it matters. The bad doesn't matter, and the good doesn't matter either. In His Mercy, God takes our sin, forgives us, and then, having been justified by His Grace, He pours out the Holy Spirit on us to transform us with rebirth and renewing. God gives us the Promise of an eternal life with Him after death by allowing us to take part in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We become fellow heirs through Faith. God gives us all of this without our doing anything but believing in Him and allowing Him to change us and wash over ourselves. This changes us and makes us new. It makes the opening of the passage possible, to Love others and be obedient and to do good. Paul writes that this is a trustworthy saying. Paul writes that we need to stress these things so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. This means we need to constantly talk about them, wear them on ourselves, impress them on our children, and bring them up in all our conversations. Passively mentioning, "I go to church" isn't enough anymore. If we really believe this, then we wouldn't stop stressing it. I need to believe wholeheartedly. Doing this not only causes the other Christians around us to devote themselves to good, but causes us to do so as well. As we constantly stress these things it just reminds us over and over that God has saved us. That He have forgiven us in His Mercy be declaring everything we have done is worthless. God has taken over forever. In exchange we submit and receive even more through rest and peace and Joy and Love. He gives us more and more. And then we can stress these other examples of what He's given us and draw closer to Him and be more devoted to doing good in His Name. That is why these things are excellent and profitable for everyone. God is willing to bless us all more and more through this if we submit. 

Paul gives a warning though. He ends the passage with a warning to avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law. He writes that they are unprofitable and useless. Why is it that these are unprofitable? When was the last time any of us saw a debate bring someone to Christianity? Or helped encourage a fellow Christian? Or glorified God? The argument is the need to defend God and our faith in Him. But that is no reason at all. God is Almighty, He can defend Himself much better than we can. And as for our faith, we know what we believe, and God knows what we believe, and if they can see that already, their is no need to argue it. Our faith is set in something greater than stone, it's set in the Book of Life. There is no profit to debating these things. It hides God's Love behind a hostile argument that turns people away. Talk about useless. We must stress the salvation God has given us through His Mercy, not who the great great great great great great grandfather of King David was. Showing God's Love around us is what will show others, and ourselves, the Power and Love of God. Paul also writes that if we find a divisive person stirring up these debates, we must warn them. And then we must warn them again. If they still do not listen then it is clear that they are warped and sinful and self-condemned. I was the divisive person that was easily pulled into a debate. All it took was a small statement and I was turning the Bible into a weapon of anger and malice. I regret those arguments and times I could have been Loving people instead of hurting them. If not for God's Grace I would suffer greatly for those times, I know it. Those who live in debating the Bible do not have Love. We think we do because the subject is Christianity, but the truth is that we just want to win an argument. The fact is that we can't in the first place. We barely understand what it is we are arguing because it is the God who made everything. We can't understand Him in any measurable amount, how can we give a proper argument about Him? But we know His Love for us and His Mercy and Sacrifice, so let us talk about that. Let us sing about it and stress Love instead. 

We do not completely understand God's Love, but we know enough to share Him with those around us at any time. God called us to share the Gospel to spread His Kingdom and Glorify Him. God wants us to Love those around us and we can best do that by telling them about the Gospel and not stopping. Bringing up church isn't enough in this world. We need to be active Christians living in Love. We can't do that in our sin or in debates, only in God and His Love.

Thank You For Reading

Long Live Jesus Christ

Amen 

Forgiving Encouragement

LORD God, please make these Your Words. These are what we need to hear the most. Thank You.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-18

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words.

What is the point of all of this? Why should I keep doing this anymore? I don't get anything out of it, so why should I take part? There's nothing for me in it. If I'm just gonna keep messing up then why continue since it just makes me feel bad? Why shouldn't I just give in and live the way I want? Why shouldn't I just end it now?

At some point we hear these words from someone who is having troubles and doubts with God. In fact there are probably times where we say them ourselves. I have found myself uttering every one of them at some point. The reason is that we live in a broken world that is constantly attacking us. On top of that, we are part of that broken world. We have sinful natures in our flesh that cause us to sin. And as we read the Bible we find that we sin in more and more different ways. We do recognize that God, in His unfailing Love, sent Lord Jesus Christ to die for our sins and pay for them. But because of that Love we can feel discouraged instead because we see two things in our sin: 1 We are hurting the God and Father that Loves us by sinning so much, and 2 We drift from God more and more as we commit the sins again and again. These are always going to be true in sin, but the discouraging part comes in when we only focus on those two things. When we decide that we have done something too wrong and need to feel guilty and suffer because of what we've done, even if it means hurting ourselves emotionally, verbally, or physically. We start seeing God's Love and Forgiveness as something too beautiful and good for us to take. We treat it with contempt and only accept it when we think we've suffered enough. But clearly, that's not what it's about. If it was, God would pour out His Wrath on us and we would truly feel guilty. But He doesn't do that. God forgives us through His Son and wants us to Love Him back. God wants us to rest in Him, no wallow in self-loathing. 

Because we think making ourselves feel guilty and suffer is the right thing to do as a Christian, we start losing desire and Joy in being a Christian. We get so discouraged that we think God sees us the same way we see ourselves, an evil creature that cannot be forgiven. And so we ask, "What is the point?" I'm thankful that God didn't let me leave it at that. He wrestled with me to get me to see. It's been a long process to learn this, and yet it's the easiest thing to see in the Bible. The reason we all call ourselves Christian and believe in this in the first place, Lord Jesus Christ died for us and forgave us. As the passage says, we will be with the Lord forever. The reason for being discouraged is that we lose sight of this truth and believe what we find by our own faulty human logic. We think God sees us with human as as we see our reflection in the mirror. But God doesn't see us that way. He Loves us and He proved it. The problem we face, is letting Him. I haven't been letting Him because I think I make the choice of who I am.

God is the Judge. And through Faith, He has pardoned us of our sins. He made the choice to do so. It doesn't make it right to sin just because He forgives us, but it's also not about condemning ourselves in guilt. Paul felt freed of his sins and even said that he wouldn't let other men judge him nor would he judge himself because he knew it was only God's place to do so, and He does so with Mercy and Love. So yes we should feel sorry that we sin, but we should not condemn ourselves. God has already decided our sentence, and it's being forgiven and living forever in Him. That is our encouragement, that we are freed of our burden. We are able to repent of our sin and then immediately turn to God and praise Him for forgiving us the next minute. God wants us to do this too. Because if we turn to God in praise, it is then that we see Him with Thankfulness and Joy and desire to live for Him more. If we dwell on our sins, then we see only our sins and it will be inevitable that we will sin again. But if we accept the forgiveness and praise God in thanks, then we see God only and are better able to live for Him. 

The encouragement of God is that we are saved forever. It can be easy to forget this for some people. It is for me. God showed me this and Him alone and that is even greater Joy for me. But I can't help but feel that if someone had asked me about it, or if I had been willing to ask for help it could have been solved sooner. But it is my Joy and encouragement now. But now I can't help but think about the others who live this way too. Some may not want to bring it up either. They are not some people who believe the same thing we do, they are our brothers and sisters in God our Father who formed us all and has watched us grow. God wants us to encourage each other with these words, as Paul said above. So be vigilant and look for those who need encouragement, because sometimes people don't listen to God's last effort to encourage them back, and those people end up leaving Christianity. Accept His forgiveness and tell others about it at all times, because God might take the opportunity to use you right there for the other person.

Thank You For Reading

Long Live Jesus Christ

Amen