Speaker: Dustin Scott

Passage: Titus 1

THE BOOK OF TITUS: SPIRITUAL AUTHORITY PT.2

Hey, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover this morning, so let’s dive right in. We’re back in our second week talking about spiritual authority in Titus 1. Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, would you stand with me for the reading of the Scriptures? You knew I would do it. Only in the Book of Revelation will you get an occasional break. 

So, we’re reading from verses 4-9. It says, “To Titus, my genuine child in a shared faith: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior. I left you behind in Crete for this reason, so that you should put in order what remained to be done and appoint elders in every town as I directed you: someone who is blameless, a man of one woman, whose children are believers, not accused of debauchery and not rebellious. For an overseer, as God’s steward, must be blameless; he must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or addicted to wine or violent or greedy for gain, but he must be hospitable, a lover of goodness, self-controlled, upright, devout, and restrained, holding tightly to the trustworthy word of the teaching, so he may be able to both exhort with sound instruction and to refute all those who contradict it.” 

Let’s pray. Lord, this morning as we study Your Word, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing to You. Oh Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer, would Your Holy Spirit whisper what You desire to speak to the church this morning? May we have ears to hear, eyes to see? Would You teach us what it looks like to walk in the humility and the authority of Your royal priesthood? 

God, would You show us what it means to be emissaries of You in our world, in our church, and amongst all the unbelievers who are watching us hungry for You? Would You transform us? Would You continue Your great work of redemption in our minds, our hearts, our thoughts, our attitudes? We give this morning to You. May You be with us in our study. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. You may be seated. 

THE ROLE OF DEACON

Last week, we discussed spiritual authority in chapter 1 of Titus. We studied the role of an elder, which the Greek here is presbyteros. Don’t worry, there is no quiz this morning. And we also did a wider investigation of what spiritual influence and authority should look like in the life of the church. 

This week, we will spend the majority of our time talking about the role of a deacon. It’s this Greek word, diakonos, which is a wider form of leadership and authority within the church. I have about a page of review, but you know what? That’s what podcasts and video recordings are for. 

I don’t want to miss out on the fun part of this passage, so let’s skip right ahead to what truths carry supernatural authority in God’s Kingdom. In verses 6-7, we learn that an elder is not to be accused of debauchery, and not rebellious, not arrogant or quick tempered or addicted to wine or violent or greedy for gain. 

I want us to remember that the only responsibility which distinguishes an elder or a pastor from the role of deacon within the life of the church is one function within the church, and that is the public teaching of the Scriptures and the administration of the one shared faith. 

We learn that in 1 Timothy 3, and here again in Titus 1. Therefore, as we look at this list of qualifications, I would encourage us to view them as something which applies not only to elders, not only to pastors, but to all of us as members of Christ’s royal priesthood. 

I want us to say this together: I am a member of His priesthood. Therefore, we are to live out these Kingdom qualifications for supernatural authority. These are the shared truths necessary for communicating a shared faith. 

QUALIFICATIONS OF AN ELDER

In verse 6, we find that an elder is to be sexually faithful and pure. The phrase here is mias gunaikos andra, which means a man of one woman. That statement has been debated in the life of the Church. 

Some people believe that an elder is called to be monogamous and not polygamous, kind of doubtful, based on the culture of Crete in this time. And others have argued that you can only be married once in order to carry spiritual authority. I don’t find those interpretations likely, because this was a first-century phrase which really denoted sexual faithfulness and marriage. 

In verse 6, we find that an elder is to have a believing family, children who follow God. I think the present tense is really important in this statement because it shows us that our present love, care, and discipline of our children is what demonstrates our Godly integrity. 

Are we drawing them closer to Jesus through the way we parent? Or are we driving them away from Jesus? I do not think Paul would have ever intended to hold parents responsible for the decisions of their adult children. 

Next, we find obedience to authority is necessary for the shared truth of the faith. Why? This is really important. Rebellion against human authority is always a symptom of rebellion against Divine authority. You cannot rebel against the system of authority which God created both for His creation and His Kingdom, without rebelling against the Creator. 

And why does that matter so much? We are called to reveal Jesus in our positions of authority, and we are also called to reveal Jesus to those who are in authority over us. We find humility, emotional stability, sobriety, and contentment are all necessary shared truths for spiritual authority. 

And why do these qualities matter? A life enslaved to sexual passion, rebellion, hypocrisy, pride, rage, addictions of substance and habit, a craving for material possessions, these things are not under His control, and a life which is not governed by Jesus isn’t revealing Jesus. If you aren’t being led by Him, you cannot lead others to Him. A life of authority requires submission to His authority. 

THE SHARED LIFE OF THE FAITH

So, this is the part I’m excited for: the shared life of the faith. And we’re going to break into it in verse 8. What kind of life carries supernatural authority in God’s Kingdom? It says in verse 8, “But he must be hospitable.” 

You guys know I’m a nerd for the Greek text. And there’s a conjunction here in the Greek, it’s the word alla, which we would translate as but, and it indicates that Paul is making a shift in topic here. 

He begins this new section by stating that spiritual authority is rooted in a shared life of hospitality. The term is philoxenos, and it really means to be a lover of the other or a lover of the stranger. 

As evangelical believers, I think this is an area of significant weakness, both in our church family and in our wider tradition. I don’t think we often do community well. I don’t think we partner in the Kingdom with those who are different from us well. 

And I would like to joke that there are really three types of believers in the modern church. Carry with me, you’ll see what I mean. The first one I would call the reeling recluse. This person would say, I’m lonely, I’m siloed by a busy life, and I’m absolutely desperate for belonging. Would someone please hang out with me? Who here feels like a part of that subgroup from time to time, any of us? 

The next I would like to call the sociopathically social butterfly. This person says, I love people. People are amazing. Can I please be around people? Can I hang out with them all the time? 

C.S. Lewis would tell it this way: he was speaking of a member of a church community he knew, and he said, “She lived for others. You could always tell the others by how hunted they looked.” Who here would say, I’m a bit of a sociopathically social butterfly? I just love people. 

The next one– I don’t want you to raise your hand, and I definitely don’t want you to point to your neighbor. We’re not going to do that here because this is the crotchety lone wolf. This person would say, People are great, and by great, I mean they’re actually terrible. Would they please leave me alone? 

You see, American individualism has really diluted the church. We often treat these lifestyles as personality types. We use our temperaments as excuses to isolate ourselves from others and from the shared life of the faith. 

We call ourselves introverts. We call ourselves extroverts. We do all kinds of free personality tests online where we assign each other numbers, rather than saying, Hey, I’m a follower of Him. He gets to define the way I share my life, not my temperament. 

And Paul says here that hospitality is a must in the life of the church, and if we go to Acts 2, the early church held the regular sharing of meals in equal significance to public teaching, corporate worship, participation in the sacrament of bread and cup, and even prayer. The Book of Hebrews will say that the regular meeting together in chapter 10 is a necessary safeguard against apostasy. 

Why? Because when we meet with others, when we live this communal life of giving and receiving, of providing accountability and support and encouragement to one another. What does that do? It keeps us focused on Jesus. 

And this shared life of faith is so much wider than a Sunday morning gathering because if we were to practice the faith as the early church did– corporate worship and the gathered receiving of the bread and cup together– it would be the culmination of our shared life, the climax of our shared life. 

It would not be a substitute for our shared life, deep study of the Scriptures, the building up of marriages, the inclusion of widows and single persons, the discipling of our children, the providing of Godly counsel and wisdom, the hearing of confession. These are weekly activities, not Sunday-only activities. These are to also be devotions of our homes, not just our corporate worship on Sundays. 

PASTORS AND DEACONS

I want to look at verse 8, “But he must be hospitable.” It’s here that I perceive another danger within our evangelical tradition. I’ve seen it in YouTube videos, I’ve read it in books, and it really demonstrates the danger of a proof text. 

Has anyone ever heard the term proof text before? So, proof texting is when we take one verse of Scripture, we isolate it from its context, we pull it out of the position in which it was communicated, and we extrapolate it into this huge theology without understanding its truth within the light of all of Scripture. 

And what does this proof text sometimes say? From verse 8, I’ve heard it said, My pastor is called to be my source of weekly community. The problem is, the New Testament doesn’t teach that pastors are called to facilitate and example the shared life of the church. 

Pastors, as members of God’s royal priesthood, are called to walk in this calling together with the wider church, but pastors are not called to be the shared life of the church. Why? Because when pastors become the focal point of our community, cults of personality subvert our pure devotion to Jesus. 

And if you look at the news lately, cults of personality are absolutely destroying the reputation of the church in our time. And I say this humbly because this is a place of personal weakness for me. Why? Because, as a person, I have some profound insecurities. These insecurities would lead me to be helpful, to want to be liked, to feel important in the lives of others. 

But the problem is, the life of the church cannot be sustained by pastors alone. Elders are appointed to teach and administer the faith. They’re called to disciple deacons– other spiritual leaders in the faith– but it is deacons who are called to be the frontline spiritual ministers, the people of God. Why? Because we are a royal priesthood. Everyone matters. Everyone has a place. Everyone has a responsibility within this common life. 

So, who are deacons? Some occupy formal office here at Vintage. We have ministry leaders. We have financial trustees, who we call our board of deacons. We have team members. Some of you are team members. You serve on our Wednesday nights and our Sunday morning gatherings. 

But I think it would be easy to isolate the role of deacon to those specific offices. Why? Because there are deacons who occupy relational roles. They lead home groups. They mentor young believers. They provide spiritual direction. They minister to marriages. They visit the sick. They host meals within their homes. 

In the priesthood of believers, unlike the priesthood of the Old Testament– the Levitical priesthood– there is no distinction of identity. There is no one within the priesthood of believers who is closer to God and has opportunity to get closer to God, except Christ, our royal High Priest. 

That means the only distinction between us, whether we’re a pastor, whether we’re a deacon, whether we’re a member of God’s royal priesthood, is this: we have different roles. Someone’s got to wash the dishes, someone has to cook the food, someone has to lead the dinnertime conversation. That’s it. We’ve all been made equal in Him because He is our identity, not our title, our position, or our role. 

So, why are deacons important? Without deacons, the shared life of the church collapses into visionless disarray. Marriages and families suffer alone. Single persons lack belonging. The elderly are neglected. The poor are ignored. Relationships unravel, and needs are left unmet. 

We find one very such incident within the early church in Acts 6. It says, “Now, during those days when the disciples were increasing in number, the Hellenists complained against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food. And the twelve called together the whole community of the disciples and said, ‘It is not right that we should neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables. Therefore, brothers and sisters, select from among you seven men of good standing, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may appoint for this task, while we, for our part, will devote ourselves to prayer into the serving of the word.’” 

RESPONSIBILITIES IN THE PRIESTHOOD

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 12:11 that the Holy Spirit gives spiritual gifting and purpose to every member of the church individually, which means everyone has a place and everyone has a responsibility within this priesthood. And we have a lot of work to do. 

If I were to highlight the community, the shared life of our church, I think there’s some places where we’re really strong. Our DTS ministry on Sunday night is a great exemplar of this shared life. 

Caleb Culture, a place of belonging for those of us who are in the more elderly years, is an incredible witness to this shared life. I think our Men’s bonfires are rock and roll at this. If I was to point to one of our small groups, Teresa Martinson, Jeanne Davison, the Mirowskis, the Bassetts, they are incredible at this. 

But where are some areas of needed improvement? Where do we need to grow in the shared life of the church? I don’t think we have great community for marriages. I don’t think we have great community for families, and I know that this is a season-of-life issue. I’m aware every time my toddler throws food at me. 

But we as pastors are seeking the Lord’s wisdom and strategy on how to better facilitate this shared need, because as elders, we are responsible for equipping deacons, we are responsible for equipping the wider spiritual leaders of our church. 

Nonetheless– and this is a big nonetheless– we learned it a few weeks ago when we talked about the devotion of giving a portion of the church family can never sustain the whole of the church family’s needs. There isn’t a leadership model, a corporate strategy, and as much as I love him, there’s not a John Maxwell book, which can substitute for a shared Scriptural devotion of the church. 

Why? Because everyone has a place, and everyone has a responsibility. And the vocation of deacon extends far beyond the four walls of our corporate gatherings on Sundays. And the role of a deacon is so much more than a formal position on a church’s staff. Deacons are all those who facilitate the lifestyle of Jesus. 

If we look at verse 8, through their goodness, their self-control, their devotion, their moderation, and so they bring vision, safety, and spiritual fervor to smaller communities of discipleship within the church. 

I think the Scriptures envision leaders throughout the whole of the church, leading in prayer, officiating ceremonies like weddings and funerals, shepherding small communities, providing counsel to the married, operating as spiritual parents to those who are single and called to a life of celibacy, visiting and praying for the sick, functioning as unofficial chaplains within their workplaces, serving on teams, sharing prophetic words, and performing the wider work of ministry in alignment with God’s whole church. 

These are not the professional responsibilities of a few religious experts. These are the Scriptural responsibilities of Christ’s royal priesthood, and that includes all of us. That’s how the Kingdom expands rather than stagnates. 

So, if we’ve adopted a perspective which says, When I go to church, I go to attend and observe, I won’t participate, then we are living out of a private, powerless religion. We are not participating in the one shared faith of the Scriptures. 

We must all decide that the weekly gathering together, which includes both our homes and our corporate gatherings within the church, are not just optional, they’re not just privileges, it’s not just an add-on to our religious life. These are essential for our shared faith. 

I think God wants to perform the supernatural, wouldn’t you agree, within our corporate worship on Sundays, within our study of the Scriptures together, within our receiving of the sacrament? 

But I also think God wants to do the supernatural in the conversations which happen over our dining room tables, over the bonfires which are in our backyards, in those times of worship and prayer when some guy who’s maybe not that great at guitar grabs a guitar and starts singing and everyone joins in and prays within a living room. These are the places of the shared life of the church. 

And if we go back to Paul’s beginning statement in verse 4 to Titus, “A genuine child and a shared faith.” If we look at Paul and Titus’ relationship alone, this relationship didn’t proceed from some vague belief in God; it proceeded from a shared truth. And it didn’t proceed from a once-a-week encounter at church on Sundays; it was formed within a shared life. 

Paul and Titus studied the Scriptures together. They combated false teaching together, like they did at the Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15, in the church of Corinth. They advanced the Gospel together. 

Likewise, they met regularly together. They traveled together. They did ministry together. They found support and accountability in one another throughout approximately fifteen years of relationship. Spiritual authority is purposed unto extending the truth and the life of the one shared faith through relationship. 

WHERE HAS GOD PLACED US?

So, I have some questions: where has God placed us to share our lives in the church? Have the courage to ask yourself– I need to have the courage to ask myself– Have I failed to find community? Because in truth, I haven’t actually tried to. If I’ve tried to and I’ve failed, could it be that God is leading me to establish something new, to step into this role of a deacon, a spiritual leader within His church? 

Maybe I’m in a trying season of life, like when your toddler throws spaghetti at you, and it takes twenty minutes just to clean up from dinner. Have we considered all the options? Have I considered options like pooling my resources together with other parents to hire a babysitter? 

Because we’ve decided that this shared life isn’t just possible, it’s essential. How is God inviting us to take ownership, to join in community, and share in this common life? 

How do I find community? I would submit we look for it. Did you know that the church, the communal life of the church, thrived for about nineteen hundred and fifty years, without websites, without church center apps, without pages where you could find buffets of small groups? The church has thrived in this area through the centuries. 

How do you do it? Talk to someone in the same season of life. Are you a struggling parent? I understand, I work in our kids ministry. It is not that hard to find other parents who are struggling, who need friendship, who need discipleship, who need other believers to come alongside them in love. 

Maybe you’re here and you’re a young adult. I’ll give you a hint. If you’re looking for other young adults, find the people who don’t have gray hair yet. It might be an indication that they’re young. 

Are you fifty and older? Find the guy with the epic mustache, the retired fire chief. His name’s Randy. He’s awesome, and I’m pretty sure all you would have to do is whisper Caleb Culture under your breath, and he would find you and invite you to one of their Saturday gatherings. 

Next– and this is a bee in my bonnet, it’s a real irritant to me– find someone in a different walk of life. If we go to the Book of Revelation, it says the Church is an uncountable multitude from every tongue, tribe, people, and nation. It is the diversity of the Church, the uniqueness of every believer as they gather together, which makes us who we are. 

Community isn’t just finding other people who look and act and sound just like us. The Church isn’t Five Guys. You can’t go to church and look at a believer made in the image of God, restored in Christ, and say, Hey, I don’t like you. Can I order another, please? It is those often who are most different from us in age, personality, ethnicity, culture, income, and temperament who draw us closer to Him. 

So maybe, if we’re struggling to find community, could it be that our expectations for this shared life are more rooted in American consumerism than they are in the character of His Kingdom? Got a busy life? I get it. We get it. I’m sure everyone in this room could raise their hand. Start small. Find one fellow believer to get coffee with once a month. 

Maybe you’re a younger believer, and you need discipleship. You need to understand the Scriptures. You’ve been reading through Genesis. It’s been this exciting adventure with some crazy sin. You’ve been in Exodus. Moses is leading the people out of Egypt. It’s awesome. And then suddenly you’re reading these regulations that say don’t cook a baby goat in its mother’s milk and don’t wear mixed fabric. And you’re like, What on earth is this book? 

Find that older believer who looks like they’ve been taking notes for three thousand years. Find that older believer who has been walking with Him for decades, who can help you, who can disciple you, who can instruct you in the faith. 

Maybe you’re here and you’re older, and you’ve said, Hey, I have nothing to give. That isn’t true in Titus. It is a Scriptural command that the older are to teach the younger. It’s not an option; it’s not a privilege. It’s not an extra credit exercise; it’s absolutely necessary. 

Community is organic; it’s built through relationship, not formulas or systems or programs, but at the same time, community is intentional. It takes ownership. We have to find others. There’s no guarantee that they are going to find us. 

So, why does this matter? Why is Paul hounding these points? Why is this shared life essential? Because Paul knows that the truth of the Gospel changes the world, and the lifestyle of the Gospel changes the world. Changed people change people. 

And there was a poet, he was a real wretched man, so I don’t know if I’d look him up. His name was Charles Bukowski, and he would say, “There’s a loneliness in this world so great that you can, well, you can see it in the slow movement of the hands of a clock, people so tired, so mutilated, so hopeless.” 

That’s our world. They are starving for Him. They are starving for belonging. They are starving for the self-giving, generous love of God. And they are starving for a people to belong to. 

The Lord has placed us here to reveal Him through relationship, supernatural authority carried by those who model His love with everyone who is above them, beside them, and below them, because it’s these proper relations of love that invite the lost into God’s generous plan of salvation. 

So, my question for us is this: we’ve talked a lot about shared truth. Are we ready to dive into the shared life of the faith? Would you stand and pray with me? 

Holy Spirit, thank You for the gift of the Scriptures. Thank You that truths communicated to a church over twenty centuries ago can still be so relevant and so practical to us today. Lord, thank You that while the Scriptures were written to these specific communities in Crete, this Book of Titus, it was written for us to advance our salvation. So, use this book to equip us in Your truth, to equip us in Your life, and make us a generous, hospitable people who reveal You. 

Thank You for all the places where community is thriving within this church, where discipleship is happening. And Lord, over the places where we’re weak, we know that Your Word says Your strength is made perfect in weakness. So, would You bring strength, wholeness, and power to us as a church family? We give this study of the Scripture to You this morning, in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. Amen.