Messy Ministry

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info, visit us at thrive-fl.org. I hope it was a wonderful, joyous, mixed up, restful, messy Merry Christmas for you. What I mean by that is sometimes it's good to give up on perfection and these expectations that are unrealistic about what Christmas is supposed to be and how life is supposed to be, and to live just in resting and reflecting in the goodness and grace of God and knowing that covers everything. I think that's the best part of it all. Much kind of like the Sabbath, when God created the Sabbath, a holy time set aside, that was actually the first day Adam and Eve even knew they were born on the, or grew, or were created on the sixth day, the evening, and the seventh day, the first thing they know is to just rest in God's presence and His goodness, that you've been able to rest in God's presence and goodness during these holy days. That's what holidays are supposed to be, a time that is just where God's presence and goodness and grace are with you. So we're capping off our series, Merry Christmas, today with a message from the letter of Titus. Probably not one that you read or listen to too often, but it's a great summary, actually, of what the Christian life is all about. In Titus chapter 3 that we're going to look at today, there's also a section of chapter 2 we'll look at briefly. This letter was written, the only one in the New Testament that I would say we think, was written to a church planter, someone starting churches. Now there are two letters written to Timothy, but he was at established churches as a pastor, as a leader. Titus was starting churches on Crete, and so in some ways I think Paul was writing to him all the basics that you need to know when a person starts to come into the faith, comes into the faith, starts, and is in Christian community, what it's all about. So the last few weeks I haven't shared any Greek words with you. Today you're going to get a ton of them. I'll try to skip a few, but it's just like every word in this run-on sentence is just amazingly deliberately put there. It's just so much to it. So let's read Titus 3, 3 through 7, and think about it as kind of a retelling of the entire story of the Bible, or the gospel, because it is. 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. 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, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. So we could try to retell the entire story of the Bible with this passage to really unpack it, but we're going to just go through these three points today. We once were what we once were, why Christ appeared, and then how that appearance changes everything. So what we once were, Paul is not really flattering about human nature, let's be honest. It's hard, but it's an accurate description of who we are. What we were, we, notice it's we, it's not what they were, or those people, or some people, but we, yikes. 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. Wow, wow. That kind of hurts, but, because I think human beings, we want to think that we're at least wise sometimes, not foolish, and that we are able to figure life out. We might stumble along the way, but we're basically free, we're able to make good decisions, and yeah, once in a while I need a little help here and there. Maybe it's just I don't know everything I need to know, I need some information, or maybe it's just I'm a little weak in certain areas, I need a little strength to be added. But the Bible says here, and all through the scriptures, it lays out story after story throughout the entire Old Testament into the New, just what we are really like. I think some people are shocked and dismayed when they start reading the Bible to see stories about things like Judah and Tamar, and how Samson acted, even how David acted, or how Abraham acted with his wife. I mean, you name the character in the Bible, and it's like, what? And yet, all of the Bible's doing, it's not a book of virtues that explain how to live a good life, it's a story of the reality of who we are and God's rescue plan. And so these words, I think, describe things well. The first Greek word that is translated foolish is actually a noetos, which actually would be better translated mindless, a, being not, and no, having no noose, having like just clueless, mindless. There's a lot of talk these days about being mindf...