Order, Office, and Sound Doctrine

If you have your Bible open to Titus, we're looking at chapter 1, and tonight we're going to look at verses 5 through 9. This is God's Word to us.

Let's pray. Father, we come to you tonight, and as we look into your Word, Father, a lot of times when we read your Scripture, especially in categories like we see tonight, we read through as an instructional passage, but there is deep truth found in these passages. I pray that your Holy Spirit teach us tonight, teach us your Word, grow us as individual believers, but grow us as a church body, that we may go forth and declare your Word and defend it in a way that brings honor and glory to Christ Jesus. And it's in his name that we pray. Amen.

You may be seated. Last month, we started a look at the book of Titus. I shared that over the next several opportunities I had to preach, I would like to work through the book for the letter from Paul for one specific reason. As Grace Church has been meeting in session and looking at different avenues and many of the members coming up asking how better can we serve, what is it that we can do, Titus is a book that looks at the Christian, the church going out and doing the works of God. And so I believe by looking at the book of Titus, we can get instruction as Grace Church as how best to open the avenues of ministry going out to Harrisburg, going out beyond Harrisburg into other communities.

And so that is why I selected the text through prayer. But what we saw when we started was that this is an instructional letter from the Apostle Paul to, we can call him a preacher, Titus. He's a believer under Paul's teaching.

He is a Gentile convert we saw from Galatians last time, and he is now with Paul in his ministry, and Paul is giving him charge over something that he must do on Crete. We then looked at Titus 1, 1 through 4, and we talked about the foundational greeting that Paul used as he introduced himself to Titus in the letter, but also to the church at Crete in the letter where the letter was to be read out, as we saw in chapter 3, verse 15, where Paul uses the plural of you, meaning that the letter itself was for a wider audience. In that opening greeting, again, we can read a greeting as just a quick salutation, but Paul puts in one sentence some very powerful truths that communicated identity, authority of him as an apostle, the authority that he was handing to Titus as he took over the role of ordering the church, and the foundational truths of the gospel, and the foundational truths of God being true to his word. That leads us tonight to where we begin in verse 5, and Paul is continuing his instruction to Titus coming out of that, saying, Titus, my true child, this is what I want you to do.

I left you in Crete for these reasons. You know, as the church looks at texts like this, and again, it is an instructional letter, and I do not want to take away the original intention, but it's instruction for us also tonight, and it is instruction in several things, but the foundational thing is that it is the means in which God uses, and I want us to remember that as we go through this order, these office calls or qualifications, and this sound doctrine. This is the means that God is using to make the church powerful into a lost, dark world. So as we see Paul instructing Titus on what he is to do, it is also instructing us that these are the means that God is employing for us in order that we can be to Harrisburg the light of Christ, that we can be the salt and the light. And so as we walk through, I want us to make sure that we stay focused on more than just here's the set of things Paul listed we must do.

These are actually the means God is instituting in order for us to have effective ministry as a church, as pastors, but also as believers. So as we look tonight at verses five through nine, we see that Paul identifies two immediate needs to Titus that he must complete. In verse five, he says this, this is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order and appoint elders in every town as I directed you. Paul first tells him, Titus, what you need to do, my time in Crete was short, we have a great beginning of a church in Crete, but it is not completely finished, so I am leaving you here to put into order what must be done.

He follows that up immediately and we know part of the putting into order is the appointment of the office of elder because he follows it up by saying and appointing elders as I directed you. Now there's an importance to that as I directed you and it ties back to Titus 1, 1. Paul, a servant of God, a slave of God, we talked about our identity being in God, in Christ, and that we are his and his slaves, but remember, in the original context, that statement was to a group of Judaizers on Crete and Paul was declaring the same level of authority as the prophets of the Old Testament. And so Paul, when he tells Titus this, saying, I want you to appoint elders, the church is going to read that, he adds, as I commanded. So Titus now is given the authority of one who has made his authority known to that level of the prophets so that the church of Crete would listen as Titus was put into this role, into this action. We see Paul instructing Titus and the church that these important first needs must be completed in order for the church in Crete to move forward in power. We're going to see over the next several messages what this foundational filling of needs of ordering of office and doctrine is going to mean because throughout the rest of the letter, it is because of this that the church is going to be able to silence false teachers. It's going to be because of this that there is going to be growth in the believers in their sanctification and their piety, and it is going to be because of this through the Spirit that the believers are going to be made ready and enabled to go and do the work of God in Crete or wherever called to. Tonight I pray that the Holy Spirit enables us to understand the importance of order, office, and sound doctrine.

Dan said to me, I saw the two O's and the third one bothered me, and I told him I'm just not an alliteration guy, but when I first wrote it down, it was going to be order, office, and orthodoxy. And that's the way we need to think that God uses means, He uses His doctrine, He uses His offices, He uses His order in order for us, the believer, and the church to take the gospel out, not just in a message form, but with power. That when the Word of God is read or spoken, when it is proclaimed, that it goes out as the writer of Hebrews, that it is living and active. That is why Paul gives Titus these important issues of first to do for the church in order for it to go out with this power. We see that order, office, and doctrine are an ongoing and vital need. That order, office, and doctrine are not sterile. We see that order, office, and doctrine are those means that God commands us to use in order to be effective for His work and His kingdom. I'd like us to take a little bit of time and walk through each one of these and see, first and foremost, the importance to grace church tonight as we look at it because we may question, we seem to have good order, don't we?

We're a Presbyterian church in America. There's not, I don't think, a better ordered church. We have a big blue book that's called the Book of Church Order. We're experts at order, but every year we sit and have overtures that are designed to change that Book of Church Order, sometimes for the good, sometimes for the bad. And so we're going to hopefully see tonight that it is an ongoing need that we continually look to staying ordered as a church and as a group of believers. We're going to look at the office, and we're going to touch on it briefly, but the importance of what the office of elder, and I'm not discounting deacon.

Deacon is as an important office to the church as that of elder, but in a text tonight we're only touching on the office of elder, and there is a reason for it because what he is appointing is going to be the front line in opposing false teaching right out of the gate. The final thing that I hope that we can look at is the importance of sound doctrine. If you were here this morning and you heard the teaching of the Lord's table, that is called the doctrine of the sacraments that we heard this morning in our theological lingo. But what you heard was the gospel.

You heard Christ's promises through what he lived, died, and rose again to do. And so the importance of sound doctrine for us is of the utmost as not just a church but as individual believers. Well, let's first look at order, and when I look at order I say this, and I'm going to throw it out there, order in the church testifies the gospel to the world.

What do I mean by that? I've had many conversations with people who come out of non-denominational, more charismatic style churches, they're good friends of mine, and as we sit and discuss things and we talk about the way we do a church service or the way we handle a situation through session, over and over again they'll say to me, you guys are just like bureaucratic. You know, you can't ever accomplish anything because it's either got to go to a committee or you have to have a group come together and try to make a decision when you should just be able to let the spirit lead you and do the things you need to do. I want to lay out why Paul is making this such an important issue. Paul instructs Titus to put in order what remained. We know that part of this ordering was the appointment of elders because it follows right after, and we're not completely sure on the other items specifically in Crete that was still left to be put in order. But we do know this, they were a young body, we also know that by putting it in order they were going to be able to effectively respond to false teaching, to instruct believers in pious living and to equip believers for good works, and we also know that this is not a new or unique instruction by Paul to the church.

We've heard this before, haven't we? If we look at Acts 14, 23 quickly, the writer of the book of Acts on Paul's first missionary journey when he's at the church in Antioch and Derbe, it says, and when they had appointed elders for them in every church with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. So from the very founding of Paul's ministry in his missionary journeys, this need to have office, to have order is primary.

We see it in the first missionary journey itself. If we jump over to 1 Corinthians 14, I think Eugene just preached on this, but verse 40 is the culmination of instruction to the Corinthian church concerning their order in worship and the Lord's Supper primarily, but the use of the gifts in worship for the benefit of the congregation, but also if unbelievers would walk in, that they would be hearing the word and giving honor to God in prophecy and not rejecting it because of seeing an uninterpreted tongue, and Paul finishes that teaching to the church in Corinth by saying in verse 40, but all things should be done decently and in order. Finally, for a quick reference of Paul and order, in Colossians chapter 2 verse 5, Paul commends the church for its order.

He says, for though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ. So we see, though we're not sure exactly all that Titus has to do, this is not some kind of new command to the church just for this small island with many cities that is going to have churches established in all of them or have them in need order, but this is an ongoing reference to all churches, including us today. So why this concern for order? In Corinth, the need for order was especially seen in worship, and it resulted in the building up of the body. 1426 says, What then, brothers, when you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up.

So as he's talking about doing it decently and in order, it is for the reason of building up the body. It is for the salvation of the lost in 1424 and 25 in 1 Corinthians. But if all prophesy and an unbeliever and outsider enters and he is convicted by all, he is called to account by all. The secrets of his heart are disclosed. And so falling on his face, he will worship God and declare that God is really among you in this orderly worship, in the use of the means of God and in the orderly worship using sound doctrine. What happens to the unbeliever? The Holy Spirit uses the word and changes him that he knows who God is. And finally, we see that it demonstrates the peace of God.

1 Corinthians 14, 33. For God is not a God of confusion, but of peace. So when you enter into a church, when we come together as a church body and there is order and decency in what we are doing, it takes away confusion like the gentleman who asked me why we don't do it that way.

And I say, but when you do it that way, why does it result in these issues? Why do you have factions in your church follow this prophet and this man, but will have nothing to do with this man and this man's preaching the gospel? Whenever we don't have order, whenever we don't have order to the doctrine that is before us, we can be led into error easily or we can be led away by charismatic personalities. Order is what God uses as a means for us to be able to walk through what he teaches us, not what Jay or Doug or Eugene or Will or Larry teaches.

It is the word of God and it is God's use of the means, not ours. In Colossae, Paul applauds order and faith as protectors against false teaching. If you read the whole of chapter two in Crete, we see the same in this order, along with sound doctrine that rebuked false teaching and it helps to sanctify. And so order becomes that that helps us testify the gospel to the world. It moves us then to office.

An office can greatly, greatly be misunderstood at times. Paul instructs Titus to appoint elders as part of this bringing to order, but it is a separate piece. That is why he says that I need you to bring what remains into order and appoint elders. And as he tells him to appoint elders, he gives him basically the same qualifications we find in Timothy.

There are some differences, but they are basically the same. And I'm going to read them again, verses 5A through 8 say this, or 5B, I'm sorry. And appoint elders in every town as I directed you. If anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination. For an overseer is God's steward, and we're going to focus there. For an overseer is God's steward must be above reproach.

He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined. When we go through a list like that, these qualifications, there is a weight and a gravity that God puts on the office of elder. There is also a weight and a gravity that God puts on the office of deacon.

And again, it's not in our text tonight, and that's why I'm not going there. Both offices are of great importance. But this weight and gravity of these qualifications, I want you to hear them. Above reproach, meaning that no accusation can stick.

An accusation can be made, but an accusation cannot take hold of that man's reputation or his life. A husband of one wife, father of obedient and faithful children, not arrogant, not quick-tempered, not a drunkard, not greedy for gain. As you look at it, and some of the commentaries that I read said, that's only ill-gotten gain. And I thought, are you saying then I can be greedy for good gain? We're not to be greedy, definitely not in any sense to make money, ill-gotten. Filthy lucre, as the old translations say it. I like that word.

But in all honesty, not greedy for gain across the board. Our role as officers in the church is Christ's gain, Christ's honor, Christ's glory. Must be hospitable, must be a lover of good, must be self-controlled, must be upright, holy, disciplined, must hold firm to the gospel. I have a question to the men sitting here tonight.

There are elders sitting here. If we were to take these qualifications, separate as they are, and say this is the bar, if you feel as a man sitting here tonight you meet these qualifications, raise your hand. It is weighty to realize how far short we are of the qualification God calls for his office. But for an overseer as God's steward, meaning the slave who manages his property, we have one hope, what do these qualifications bring to your mind when you read them?

Jesus Christ. It is the man who is in Jesus Christ and walking in him and him only that can hold this office. Doug said this morning as he invited us to the table that if we are looking to see if we are perfect or good enough to take it, none of us are. There is not a man sitting here tonight that meets the qualifications outside of Christ.

We read these texts and we can fall into two ditches quickly. We can sit and say, oh, the Bible is telling us that there are men on their own who have sinless perfection because they can meet these qualifications or the other ditch that we can fall into where there is no difference in a man after salvation. So therefore, man has no chance of ever being qualified to fill the office. But the middle is that sound doctrine. And that sound doctrine is that the gospel of Jesus Christ was preached, that the Holy Spirit applied that gospel to the man's heart, and he has changed that man and now abides in him, and when we see men who can reflect these qualifications, we are seeing Jesus Christ in them.

But folks, I am going to tell you we are still men and we can fall. As we read down through here, Doug, Eugene, Dan, Alvin, Scott, Jay, Dave, Jim, the deacons, anybody that I miss that holds office, we are being attacked like you by sin continually. The church's response should be prayer for those who are in office already for God to continually protect these men, their minds and their testimonies, and also to raise up men within the church who have these qualifications to continue to lead this church for years to come. We are called in this by what Paul is instructing Titus to do to put his church in order and to use the means of office.

We are called to understand that we are to be in prayer, that God is saving men before us and changing them to the point that we see Christ actively walking in them. And then we see men who are qualified for the diaconate and qualified for the session. The only men that can be seen as meeting these qualifications must walk in the identity that Paul talks about in Titus 1.1. Dan Nicholas, a servant, a slave of God. Doug Agnew, a servant, a slave of God.

If you see the qualifications in the man, you are not seeing Dan, Doug or Jay. You are seeing Jesus Christ, and it should be His honor and His glory that is given, not ours. How do we know that this middle, that it's Christ, and He can bring us and allow us to meet these qualifications, Colossians 1, 13 and 14? He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sin.

Unless that has been done, there is no hope that any man show any of these qualifications. But then in Colossians 3, 1 through 10, we read, If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above where Christ is. Seated at the right hand of God, set your minds on the things that are above, not on the things that are on earth, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. That's through verse 4. We can go to Romans 3 and read, None is righteous, no, not one, not one seeks him. But after the Holy Spirit regenerates a man or a woman, a believer, and brings Himself to Him, we are given the ability through Christ, by His grace, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, to live as Christian men and women. We are able to say no to sin, not in our own being, but in and through Christ. That's what Eugene is working through in Sunday School and John Owen, the mortification of sin.

Jay will not kill his sin, but Christ in Jay will. So we see that we are changed and made able by God in order to walk in these qualifications. And why must we walk in these qualifications? Because God uses these stewards to manage and protect His church, to maintain the order, and to keep the doctrine. That is what the stewardship is that we are given. We are given a stewardship as elders in the church of protecting the Word, God's truth, God's doctrine to us of what He is, who He is, and what He's done, and to manage and keep order amongst the brethren. It is important for us as a church, as members, as believers that we continually keep in prayer these men who God call and give this office of steward, of managing slave.

You ever think of it that way? If you're a deacon, if you're an elder, we are a managing slave of God. We do His will, we do it for His good and not that of ourselves. We finally move then to this orthodoxy or sound doctrine, and we see that in this it is the builder and defender of faith and of God. Verse 9 in our text says that this man must hold firm to the trustworthy word is taught.

Why? So that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it. Some of the same people that I sit and have conversations with, one of their critiques of our church, not just Grace Church, but the Presbyterian Church of America, or any church that really loves doctrine is, and I've heard it a million times, you guys are just too much into doctrine. And I was like, I don't know what that means. And they said, well, you know, it's just so dry and it's stale.

And I said, you know, I've been a respiratory therapist for 30 years, over 30 years now, and I've been in an intensive care room and I've been working a ventilator, breathing for a patient, and never once did anybody look at me and say, you're really too much into the teaching of respiratory. They sort of want that. They want me to know when I push this button what it does to him, because if that button doesn't do something good, I shouldn't be doing it. And that's all doctrine means. It means the teaching. And the teaching in a church is a teaching that if you're saying that it's dry and stale, I would contend that you either have the wrong doctrine or you're not understanding the doctrine of the scripture. This doctrine, Paul is telling Titus that this one qualification is going to be necessary for a very, very needed building of the body in Crete and the refutation of false doctrine, the stopping of wrong teaching. And, you know, to sit and say that doctrine is dry and stale, Psalm 119, 171 through 175 says this, My lips will pour forth praise, for you teach me your statutes. My tongue will sing of your word, for all your commandments are right. Let your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen your precepts. I long for your salvation, O Lord, and your law is my delight. Let my soul live and praise you, and let your rules help me.

Does that sound like dry, stale, useless? Psalm 49 through 10, I have told the glad news of deliverance in the great congregation. Behold, I have not restrained my lips. As you know, O Lord, I have not hidden your deliverance within my heart. I have spoken your faithfulness and your salvation. I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness from the great congregation. Paul, when he wrote to the church in Rome, chapter 1, verse 16, very familiar, for I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation, or for salvation, to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. I am not ashamed of the gospel, the doctrine, the teaching of Jesus Christ, that He is God, the second person of the Godhead who became man, who lived a perfect life, who died in my place, who rose again and who is coming again. That doctrine is the power of God.

How can that be dry and stale? 2 Timothy 3, 16, all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. Not only is it the power of God unto salvation, but it is the power of God through the Holy Spirit by His grace to take us out into the world and be the salt and the light that it needs. So when we sit and look at order, office, and orthodoxy, sound doctrine, it is not just a technical thing the church must meet. It is the means by which we take the gospel from this body to the neighborhoods to the world, and the world is changed by Jesus Christ. And so when Paul writes to Titus and we're going to see as we walk in, as Titus is doing this ordering the appointment of officers and they're founded in Christ and founded in His word, the very next thing that we see that we're going to talk about is the refutation of false teaching. Every church faces it.

The PCA faces it. I came out of the Methodist background. They are in the middle of a just hellaciously ugly split because they will not hold. They have a book of order.

They have officers. They didn't hold sound doctrine. That is why I said it's important for you to pray for all of us all the time. Our adversary is wise and attacks and attacks and attacks. Christ is greater and defends and protects and keeps. But we need to be founded continually in Christ. These men who meet these qualifications that hold to the sound doctrine so that they can build and they can rebuke are Christs and Christs alone. That is where we must be as a church. We must be ordered. We must honor Christ through our office as stewards, and we must keep the truth as He's given it to us and not change it to our liking. Let's pray. Father, when we look at a text like Titus tonight, we can skim through it and take wrong thoughts of this is an impossibility for a man to hold this office, or we can take thoughts that anybody can hold the office.

It's not that important. We can skate over order. But Father, ultimately, sound doctrine we have to be stayed at, and in that sound doctrine is these very teachings of order and office. So Lord, we thank you. We thank you that you so much interact with your church, that we're not here alone, that you have given us all that we need, that we may be effective witnesses of Christ Jesus. You call us, go into the world and make disciples, teaching and baptizing. Lord, and you provide exactly what we need to do that. Father, I just pray that you give this church the Spirit in a strong way, that we desire to take this sound doctrine, that we desire to glorify and honor Christ and be salt and light in this community, and Lord, that you receive the glory and honor due your name. And it's in Christ Jesus we pray. Amen.