Titus 2:11-14
Only the Peculiar Would
Notice the flow of this chapter:
\\#1\\ Paul spoke to the readers, all Christians, with commands of
how they should behave.
a. It tied behavior to doctrine.
b. If we believe like we should, we will live like we ought.
\\#2-10\\ Paul got very specific, speaking to each group of
Christians.
a. \\#2\\ Older men
b. \\#3-5\\ Older women
c. \\#4-5\\ Indirectly, to the younger women.
d. \\#6-8\\ Younger men
e. \\#9-10\\ Servants
All of the things that Paul told these people to do were dealing with
their personal lives.
a. To the men, he said things like be sober, be temperate, be
patient.
b. To the women, he said be loving, be discreet, be obedient to
your husbands.
At this point, what Paul said is not what I want you to note. What I
want you to see is twofold:
a. The degree of change that Paul spoke of here.
(1) This is personal, private, everyday type behavior.
(2) Paul did not speak just to the men but to the women also,
not just to the women but to the servants also.
(3) There were no boundaries.
b. Paul’s reasoning for saying these things.
(1) \\#14\\ It is because we are a peculiar people.
(2) Peculiar means different, strange, even odd.
(3) It is obvious that God has created something new and
different out of the saved people of this world.
(4) I wrote the following statement:
God is re-creating a ruined people by His mercy and grace that is
better than the original.
(5) I believe that is a true statement.
(a) God is re-creating something better than what He
first created.
(b) There was nothing wrong with Adam and Eve, but they
were not perfect. They failed to live up to God’s
desire.
(c) God is recreating something better.
A few thoughts:
I. This re-creation is by God’s mercy and grace.
A. Mercy is not mentioned in our text.
1. It is mentioned \\#Tit 1:4, 3:5\\, but not here.
2. Mercy is what kept us alive long enough for God’s grace
to reach us.
3. Mercy is God hold back what we deserve.
B. \\#11\\ Grace is mentioned.
1. Grace is God working in us and through us to accomplish
God’s will.
Php 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both
to will and to do of his good pleasure.
2. Grace is God working.
a. God sent Jesus to pay the price for sin.
b. God created and ordained the church to give the
gospel to us.
c. God makes us willing to hear.
d. God gives us a choice of heaven of hell.
3. You can take God’s name out of those sentences and put
grace in to better understand what grace does.
to you
II. What have mercy and grace done to make us peculiar?
A. Mercy and grace made us a people that would choose God over
sin.
1. The choice is always the same. It is either God or sin.
One cannot choose both. There is no fence between these
which can be straddled.
2. Man, left to himself, will usually choose sin.
a. To give Adam and Eve due credit, they did not make
this choice right out. Eve was deceived
\\#2Tim 2:14\\ and Adam, I believe, chose Eve out of
love.
b. Yet, that is the way the choice occurs for most moral
people. Satan does not come straight at them with the
choice of sin or God, but he shades it. It still
ends the same.
c. Then there are some who just chose sin over God,
repeatedly.
d. But Peter pointed out that is not true of the
believers.
1Pe 4:4 Wherein they think it strange that ye
run not with them to the same excess of riot,
speaking evil of you:
3. A saved person will chose, consistently and repeatedly,
God over sin.
4. Only a peculiar person would do that.
B. Mercy and grace made us a people forgiven and saved.
1. \\#14\\ Grace is what brought Jesus to die.
2. Grace is what brings us to God.
3. Grace is what gives us a choice between heaven and hell.
4. \\#11\\ Grace does those three things for every person;
however, not every person will make the right choice.
Matt 7:13 Enter ye in at the strait gate: for
wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that
leadeth to destruction, and many there be
which go in thereat:
14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is
the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there
be that find it.
5. Consider a world of around 7 billion, with another 7
billion who have already lived and died.
a. Few had the opportunity to hear.
(1) Grace caused Jesus to die for them all. Grace
even brought awareness and conviction of sin to
all.
(2) However, few ever heard of God’s goodness.
(3) That was not God’s fault. It was ours.
(4) God did three things to see that every man would
hear so that they could respond.
(a) God gave the truth to Adam and Eve.
(b) God gave the truth to Noah and his family.
(c) God created and called Israel to be a nation
of priests the remainder of the world.
(5) Sadly, man kept choosing sin over God.
(a) They still are.
(b) The church was making some headway in
evangelizing the world but the world has
pretty well stopped that.
(c) The church let them pull us out of the
education, healing, and helping ministries
until we became irrelevant.
b. Few who heard would listen.
c. Few who would listen would chose God.
6. But those who have, have been forgiven and saved.
Rev 7:9 After this I beheld, and, lo, a great
multitude, which no man could number, of all
nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues,
stood before the throne, and before the Lamb,
clothed with white robes, and palms in their
hands;
10 And cried with a loud voice, saying,
Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the
throne, and unto the Lamb.
13 And one of the elders answered, saying unto
me, What are these which are arrayed in white
robes? and whence came they?
14 And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And
he said to me, These are they which came out of
great tribulation, and have washed their robes,
and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
7. Only the peculiar would!
C. \\#2-10\\ Mercy and grace has made us into this peculiar
people.
1. We are using a text from Titus, a book with four chapters.
2. Two of these chapters deal with our behavior, 3-4.
3. As already noted, Paul specifically told men, women,
young women, young men, and even servants how to behave.
4. Although the world might think it strange, Paul did not!
5. Proper behavior, righteous behavior is only the logical
end of being taught sound truth.
a. \\#5\\ To younger women
b. \\#6-8\\ To the younger men
c. \\#9\\ Even to the servants — obey their masters,
please their masters, not answering back. We are 200
years removed from slavery in this country and we get
get the people born free to do these things.
6. Only the peculiar would!
D. \\#13\\ Mercy and grace has caused us to look to the skies.
1. We are looking for Jesus’ return.
a. This phrase does not mean to be half-heartedly
checking to if Jesus has returned.
b. To watch for Jesus’ return means to be living in such
a way that we will not be caught off guard when it
happens.
2. That would require us:
a. To live the obedient life that Paul was speaking of.
b. To be consistently, repeatedly choosing God over sin.
c. To be sending treasure to heaven instead of storing it
all here.
3. Only the peculiar would!
If you have been marked by mercy and grace, you are peculiar. If you
are not peculiar, you have not been marked by mercy and grace.
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