We were created for Good Works. Through Christ we have blessed assurance of His love in Holy Spirit.
By our example others see the goodness of God offered in salvation to sinners.
If we lift up the name of Jesus others will be drawn to Him. It is His righteousness that allows us to represent Him. In ourselves we can do nothing but in Him all things are possible.
To be certain, our all-knowing God never forgets His people and never needs reminders from us, but the use of the word "remember" throughout Scripture highlights (in terms we can humanly understand) how God consistently keeps His promises.
…we have a very precious gift that has sealed God's promise to remember us for eternity: Having believed in Christ Jesus as our Savior, we are "sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory" (Ephesians 1:13-14). God's Spirit within us is our assurance that God will keep His promise to redeem us in Christ. That's what we can remember on our hardest days.
Today, believers in Jesus now have a hope and inheritance as God's people that cannot be lost by our own folly. The Apostle Peter wrote, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time" (1 Peter 1:3-5).
Our hope is kept in heaven, guarded by God Himself. It cannot change, fade, die or be defiled. When all else is swirling on this side of heaven, remember that God is holding our inheritance eternally secure. First5
Jesus loved meals. They knew that. They’d shared so many. Go back through the gospels and see how many of the stories take place at tables, distributing food, or inviting people to supper. Indeed, some have suggested that Jesus primary work was organizing suppers as a way to embody the coming kingdom of God.
Throughout his ministry, Jesus welcomed everyone — to the point of contention with his critics — to the table. Tax collectors, sinners, women, Gentiles, the poor, faithful Jews, and ones less so. Jesus was sloppy with supper invitations. He never thought about who would be seated next to whom. He made the disciples crazy with his lax ideas about dinner parties. All he wanted was for everybody to come, to be at the table, and share food and conversation.
What if Thursday was that? The Last Supper of the Old World. The last meal under Rome, the last meal under any empire. And it is the First Feast of the Kingdom That Has Come. The first meal of the new age, the world of mutual service, reciprocity, equality, abundance, generosity, and unending thanksgiving. Pass the cup, keep it going, hand to hand, filled and refilled, time after time. This night is the final night of dominion, the end of slavery; and this night is the first night of communion, the beginning of true freedom: 'I will no longer call you servants but friends.'
This table is the hinge of history. The table is the point. Thursday is the Last Supper and the First Feast. The Holy Thursday Revolution.
Pull up a chair. Bring a friend.”
(Diana Butler Bass, The Cottage)
Sabbath Moments
Titus
Whereas the letters to Timothy emphasize sound doctrine, the letter to Titus emphasizes good works. There were influential people in the church who were motivated by personal interest and selfish gain. In his letter, Paul exposes the ways this was affecting the doctrine and practice of the church and urges Titus to champion purity, service, and kindness toward others.
Paul reminds Titus that salvation is not based on our own “works of righteousness” but rather is the result of God’s work of kindness and love toward us. We are unable to do good works in our disobedient and selfish state. Salvation in Christ frees us to do good works, and the “washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit” enables us. God wants His people to devote themselves to doing good works.
In his letter, Paul exhorts the believers at Crete to display the testimony of good works to outsiders. While good works are a Christian duty, they are also a gift from God. Through justification in Christ, God declares us righteous. We must have this legal standing in order to qualify before God to do good works.
Redemption removes us from the jurisdiction of Satan by paying the debt incurred by our sins. At the same time, it places us in the family of God so that we might be “His own special people, zealous for good works”.
Paul introduces the theme of the book, good works, in the first verse with the term godliness. Good works or works appears eight times in this epistle. At least two other phrases parallel the good works theme: “reverent in behavior” and “adorn the doctrine of God”.
Paul normally follows a rebuke of false doctrine with an admonition of how the believer should act. Sound means “healthy.” Paul makes frequent use of the term in the Pastoral Epistles. He uses it five times in Titus. Paul views sound doctrine as the root that produces the fruit of sound practice (good works), such as faith, love, and patience as well as sound speech. Right thinking is the raw material for right actions. Our actions will naturally reveal the direction of our thoughts.
Paul highlights the mistaken asceticism of the Cretan false teachers. They had identified certain foods and practices as defiled when in reality it was their minds that were defiled and unbelieving. On the other hand, to the pure all things are pure. Because the Cretan believers had placed their trust in Christ, focusing their minds on Him, they would be empowered by God’s Spirit to lead pure lives. Jesus taught the same principle in Mattew 15:11. Physical objects or external practices do not defile a person, but a mind focused on evil thoroughly corrupts. Although present-day believers are typically not concerned with Jewish ritual observances, the principle is still applicable. We should be more concerned about renewing our mind and focusing it on Jesus than observing a list of rules that have no biblical support.
Twice in this context Paul speaks of Christ’s appearance in history. The first time Christ came in grace to save men from their sins; the second time He will come in glory to reign. The appearance of the grace of God is to produce two results in the lives of believers: First, we are to resist the evil temptations of this world, living godly lives in this present age. Second, we are to look for Christ’s return. Paul reminded Timothy that there is a special crown awaiting “all who have loved His appearing.”
Great God and Savior Jesus Christ is one of the strongest statements of the deity of Christ in the New Testament.
Redeem means “to purchase.” With His death on the Cross, Christ paid the price to release us from the bondage of sin to which every unbeliever is a slave. God’s purpose in redeeming us is not only to save us from hell; He also wants to free us from sin so that we can produce good works that glorify Him. For the third time in this letter Paul strongly commands Titus to confront false teachers.
Since Paul has been exhorting Titus to emphasize good works in his ministry with the Cretans, he wants to make it clear that such works have no value in saving a person. Rather, it is solely on the basis of God’s mercy that we are delivered from the penalty of our sin. Washing of regeneration refers to the work of the Holy Spirit, who in a moment makes a person new by the cleansing of regeneration (the new birth). This new nature is the ground for living the Christian life and performing good deeds. The continual process of Christian living is enabled by the Holy Spirit, resulting in growth in character and good works.
Paul provides another motive for good works by explaining the rationale for the Christian life. The believers were supposed to treat others the way God in His grace had treated them when they were involved in the ungodly activities.
God justifies believers so that they might become coheirs with Jesus Christ in His coming reign.
Good works from a Christian slave would make the doctrine of God very attractive to a non-Christian master. Believing the teachings of Scripture is proper and good, but living those truths will influence the nonbelievers with whom we rub shoulders every day. The NKJV Study Bible
This letter addresses Paul’s colleague Titus, urging him to bring order to the church on the island of Crete, oppose false teachers, and appoint leaders. Paul would have written this letter sometime in the mid-60s ad, between his first and second Roman imprisonments. Paul notes that he plans to send Artemas and Tychicus to Crete, so that Titus can visit him in Nicopolis before winter. This suggests that Paul is on a missionary journey; he may even already be in Nicopolis. Faithlife Study Bible
1 Timothy 1:1–7 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the commandment of God our Savior and the Lord Jesus Christ, our hope,
To Timothy, a true son in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord…
1 Timothy 2:2–4 for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior…
1 Timothy 1:9–12 knowing this: that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for fornicators, for sodomites, for kidnappers, for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine…
