Text -- Titus 3:4 (NET)

3:4 But “when the kindness of God our Savior and his love for mankind appeared,

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Robertson: Tit 3:4

The kindness ( hē chrēstotēs ).

See note on Rom 2:4 for this very word used of God as here.

Robertson: Tit 3:4

His love toward man ( hē philanthrōpia ).

"The philanthrophy of God our Saviour."Old word from philanthrōpos , for love of mankind, in N.T. only here and Act 28:2.

Robertson: Tit 3:4

Appeared ( epephanē ).

See note on Act 2:11 and here as there the Incarnation of Christ. See note on 1Ti 1:1 for sōtēr with theos (God).

Vincent: Tit 3:4

Kindness ( χρηστότης )

Only here in Pastorals. Elsewhere only in Paul. See on Rom 3:12, and see on easy , Mat 11:30.

Vincent: Tit 3:4

Love ( φιλανθρωπία )

Love is too vague. It is love toward men; comp. Tit 3:2. Only here and Act 28:2 : φιλανθρώπως kindly, Act 27:3 (note). While it cannot be asserted that the heretical characteristics noted in the Pastoral Epistles point collectively to any specific form of error, it is true, nevertheless, that certain characteristics of the economy of grace are emphasized, which are directly opposed to Gnostic ideas. Thus the exhortation that supplications be made for all men , supported by the statement that God wills that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth (1Ti 2:1, 1Ti 2:4), is in the teeth of the Gnostic distinction between men of spirit and men of matter, and of the Gnostic principle that the knowledge (ἐπίγνωσις ) of truth was only for a limited, intellectual class. To the same effect is the frequent recurrence of all , for all , in connection with the saving and enlightening gifts of God (1Ti 2:6; 1Ti 4:10; 1Ti 6:13; Tit 2:11). So here: not only has the saving grace of God appeared unto all (Tit 2:11), but it has revealed itself as kindness and love to man as man.

Wesley: Tit 3:4

By the light of his Spirit to our inmost soul.

JFB: Tit 3:4

To show how little reason the Cretan Christians had to be proud of themselves, and despise others not Christians (see on Tit 3:2-3). It is to the "kindness and love of God," not to their own merits, that they owe salvation.

JFB: Tit 3:4

Greek, "goodness," "benignity," which manifests His grace.

JFB: Tit 3:4

Teaching us to have such "love (benevolence) toward man" (Greek, "philanthropy"), "showing all meekness unto all men" (Tit 3:2), even as God had "toward man" (Tit 2:11); opposed to the "hateful and hating" characteristics of unrenewed men, whose wretchedness moved God's benevolent kindness.

JFB: Tit 3:4

Greek, "of our Saviour God," namely, the Father (Tit 1:3), who "saved us" (Tit 3:5) "through Jesus Christ our Saviour" (Tit 3:6).

JFB: Tit 3:4

Greek, "was made to appear"; was manifested.

Clarke: Tit 3:4

But after that the kindness and love of God - By χρηστοτης we may understand the essential goodness of the Divine nature; that which is the spring whence all kindness, mercy, and beneficence proceed

Love toward man - Φιλανθρωπια· Philanthropy. It is to be regretted that this attribute of the Divine nature, as it stands in relation to man, should have been entirely lost by a paraphrastical translation. Philanthropy is a character which God gives here to himself; while human nature exists, this must be a character of the Divine nature. God loves man; he delighted in the idea when formed in his own infinite mind, he formed man according to that idea, and rejoiced in the work of his hands; when man fell, the same love induced him to devise his redemption, and God the Savior flows from God the Philanthropist. Where love is it will be active, and will show itself. So the philanthropy of God appeared, επεφανη, it shone out, in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, and in his giving his life for the life of the world.

Calvin: Tit 3:4

Either the principal clause in this sentence is, that “God hath saved us by his mercy,” or the language is elliptical. Thus it will be proper to supply, that they were changed for the better, and became new men, in consequence of God having mercy upon them; as if he had said, “When God regenerated you by his Spirit, then did you begin to differ from others.” But since there is a complete sense in the words of Paul, there is no necessity for making any addition. He classes himself along with others, in order that the exhortation may be more efficacious.

4.But after that the goodness and love towards man appeared First, it might be asked, — “Did the goodness of God begin to be made known to the world at the time when Christ was manifested in the flesh? For certainly, from the beginning, the fathers both knew and experienced that God was good, and kind, and gracious to them; and therefore this was not the first manifestation of his goodness, and fatherly love towards us,” The answer is easy. In no other way did the fathers taste the goodness of God under the Law, than by looking at Christ, on whose coming all their faith rested. Thus the goodness of God is said to have appeared, when he exhibited a pledge of it, and gave actual demonstration, that not in vain did he so often promise salvation to men.

“God so loved the world”, says John, “that he gave his only-begotten Son.” (Joh 3:16.)

Paul also says in another passage,

“Hereby God confirmeth his love towards us, that, while we were enemies, Christ died for us.” (Rom 5:8.)

It is a customary way of speaking in Scripture, that the world was reconciled to God through the death of Christ, although we know that he was a kind Father in all ages. But because we find no cause of the love of God toward us, and no ground of our salvation, but in Christ, not without good reason is God the Father said to have shewn his goodness to us in him.

Yet there is a different reason for it in this passage, in which Paul speaks, not of that ordinary manifestation of Christ which took place when he came as a man into the world, but of the manifestation which is made by the gospel, when he exhibits and reveals himself, in a peculiar manner, to the elect. At the first coming of Christ, Paul was not renewed; but, on the contrary, Christ was raised in glory, and salvation through his name shone upon many, not only in Judea, but throughout the neighboring countries, while Paul, blinded by unbelief, labored to extinguish this grace by every means in his power. He therefore means that the grace of God “appeared” both to himself and to others, when they were enlightened in the knowledge of the gospel. And indeed, in no other way could these words apply; for he does not speak indiscriminately about the men of his age, but specially addresses those who had been separated from the ordinary ranks; as if he had said, that formerly they resembled those unbelievers who were still plunged in darkness, but that now they differ from them, not through their own merit, but by the grace of God; in the same manner as he beats down all the haughtiness of the flesh by the same argument. “Who maketh thee to differ,” or to be more highly, esteemed than others? (1Co 4:7.)

Goodness and love He has with propriety assigned the first rank to “goodness,” which prompts God to love us; for God will never find in us anything which he ought to love, but he loves us because he is good and merciful. Besides, although he testifies his goodness and love to all, yet we know it by faith only, when he declares himself to be our Father in Christ. Before Paul was called to the faith of Christ, he enjoyed innumerable gifts of God, which might have given him a taste of God’s fatherly kindness; he had been educated, from his infancy, in the doctrine of the law; yet he wanders in darkness, so as not to perceive the goodness of God, till the Spirit enlightened his mind, and till Christ came forth as the witness and pledge of the grace of God the Father, from which, but for him, we are all excluded. Thus he means that the kindness of God is not revealed and known but by the light of faith.

TSK: Tit 3:4

the kindness : Tit 2:11; Rom 5:20,Rom 5:21; Eph 2:4-10

love : or, pity

God : Tit 1:3, Tit 2:10; 1Ti 1:1, 1Ti 2:3, 1Ti 4:10

appeared : Tit 2:11; 2Ti 1:10; Heb 9:26

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Tit 3:4

But after that - Greek, when - ὅτε hote The meaning is, that "when the love of God was manifested in the plan of salvation, he saved us from this state God appeared"after we had sinned in this way, but that when his mercy was thus displayed we were converted from our sins, and made pure in his sight.

The kindness - χρηστότης chrēstotēs - "the goodness, or the benignity."The word is rendered "goodness"and "good"in Rom 2:4; Rom 3:12; Rom 11:22, thrice; "kindness,"2Co 6:6; Eph 2:7; Col 3:12; Tit 3:4; and "gentleness,"Gal 5:22. The act of redeeming us was one of great kindness, or goodness.

And love of God - Margin, "pity."The Greek word is φιλανθρωπία philanthrōpia - "philanthropy - the love of man."The plan of salvation was founded on love to man, and was the highest expression of that love; the notes at Joh 3:16. The Greek of this verse is, "When the kindness and love of God our Saviour to man was manifested, he saved us"Tit 3:5, to wit, from those sins of which we had before been guilty.

Poole: Tit 3:4

Kindnesscrhstoths the word signifies one’ s easiness to do good to another; that native goodness that is in God, rendering him inclinable to love, and prone to do good unto the sons of men. This was in God from eternity, but appeared in his sending Christ, and then his Spirit, and in the application of Christ’ s redemption to particular souls.

Haydock: Tit 3:4

The goodness and kindness. Literally, humanity of our Saviour. By humanity [1] some expound Christ's appearing in his human nature, but by the Greek is meant the love of God towards mankind. (Witham)

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

Benignitas et humanitas, Greek: chrestotes kai philanthropia. See Estius.

Gill: Tit 3:4

But after that,.... After all this series and course of wickedness; notwithstanding all this foolishness, disobedience, deception, bondage to sin, envy, malice, and malignity; or "when" all this was, as the word may be rendered, amidst all this iniquity; when these persons were in the full career of sin, and so had done no preparatory works, or had any previous qualifications and dispositions for the grace of God:

the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared; unto them; and the Ethiopic version adds, "unto us". The apostle takes the advantage of the above character of himself, and others in their former state, to set off and magnify the grace of God in their conversion; so contraries, as black and white, illustrate each other. By "God our Saviour" is not meant the Lord Jesus Christ, though he is commonly designed by our Saviour, and is several times called God our Saviour in this epistle; see Tit 1:3 and who is truly God, and the only Saviour of lost sinners; and whose kindness and love towards them has appeared in many instances; as in his suretiship undertakings for them, in his assumption of their nature, and in his suffering and dying in their room and stead: and yet it appears from Tit 3:6 that God our Saviour here, is distinguished from Jesus Christ our Saviour there; and therefore here must be understood of God the Father; who contrived the scheme of salvation, appointed Christ to be his salvation, and made a covenant with him, in which it secured, and sent him in time to obtain it, and through his blood, righteousness, and sacrifice, saves all his people: it is his kindness and love to men that is here spoken of; and which designs not his general and providential goodness and kindness, which extends to the whole human nature, and to all the individuals of it; but his special love and grace shown in his kindness in Christ Jesus; that good will to men the angels sung of at Christ's incarnation; or that free favour and love of God towards elect men, which is sovereign and special, from everlasting to everlasting, unchangeable and unspeakable, which is better than life; the excellency of which cannot be expressed, and which has shown itself in various instances: it is said to have "appeared"; because it was hid from all eternity in the heart of God, in the thoughts of his heart, in his purposes, counsel, and covenant, and has been made manifest in time; particularly, it has broke forth and showed itself in the mission of Christ into this world, and in redemption and salvation by him; wherein God has manifested and commended his love, and shown forth the exceeding riches of his grace; and also in the effectual calling, which being a time of life, is a time of love, and is owing to the great love of God, and is a fruit and evidence of his everlasting and unchangeable love; and it is this instance and appearance of it, which is here meant, since it follows the account of the state and condition of the saints by nature; and is what was made to them when in this state, by which means they were brought out of it.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Tit 3:4

¹ tn Verses 4-7 are set as poetry in NA²⁶/NA²⁷. These verses probably constitute the referent of the expression “this saying” in v. 8.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

TSK Synopsis: Tit 3:1-15

1 Titus is yet further directed by Paul, both concerning the things that he should teach and not teach.

10 He is to reject obstinate heretics.

12 He appoints him time and place wherein he should come unto him.

Combined Bible: Tit 3:4

But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,

MHCC: Tit 3:1-7

Spiritual privileges do not make void or weaken, but confirm civil duties. Mere good words and good meanings are not enough without good works. They were not to be quarrelsome, but to show meekness on all occasions, not toward friends only, but to all men, though with wisdom, Jam 3:13. And let this text teach us how wrong it is for a Christian to be churlish to the worst, weakest, and most abject. The servants of sin have many masters, their lusts hurry them different ways; pride commands one thing, covetousness another. Thus they are hateful, deserving to be hated. It is the misery of sinners, that they hate one another; and it is the duty and happiness of saints to love one another. And we are delivered out of our miserable condition, only by the mercy and free grace of God, the merit and sufferings of Christ, and the working of his Spirit. God the Father is God our Saviour. He is the fountain from which the Holy Spirit flows, to teach, regenerate, and save his fallen creatures; and this blessing comes to mankind through Christ. The spring and rise of it, is the kindness and love of God to man. Love and grace have, through the Spirit, great power to change and turn the heart to God. Works must be in the saved, but are not among the causes of their salvation. A new principle of grace and holiness is wrought, which sways, and governs, and makes the man a new creature. Most pretend they would have heaven at last, yet they care not for holiness now; they would have the end without the beginning. Here is the outward sign and seal thereof in baptism, called therefore the washing of regeneration. The work is inward and spiritual; this is outwardly signified and sealed in this ordinance. Slight not this outward sign and seal; yet rest not in the outward washing, but look to the answer of a good conscience, without which the outward washing will avail nothing. The worker therein is the Spirit of God; it is the renewing of the Holy Ghost. Through him we mortify sin, perform duty, walk in God's ways; all the working of the Divine life in us, and the fruits of righteousness without, are through this blessed and holy Spirit. The Spirit and his saving gifts and graces, come through Christ, as a Saviour, whose undertaking and work are to bring to grace and glory. Justification, in the gospel sense, is the free forgiveness of a sinner; accepting him as righteous through the righteousness of Christ received by faith. God, in justifying a sinner in the way of the gospel, is gracious to him, yet just to himself and his law. As forgiveness is through a perfect righteousness, and satisfaction is made to justice by Christ, it cannot be merited by the sinner himself. Eternal life is set before us in the promise; the Spirit works faith in us, and hope of that life; faith and hope bring it near, and fill with joy in expectation of it.

Matthew Henry: Tit 3:1-8

Here is the fourth thing in the matter of the epistle. The apostle had directed Titus in reference to the particular and special duties of several sorts of persons; now he bids him exhort to what concerned them more in common, namely, to quietness and submission to rulers, and readiness to do good, and to equitable and gentle behaviour towards all men - things comely and ornamental of religion; he must therefore put them in mind of such things. Ministers are people's remembrancers of their duty. As they are remembrancers for the people to God in prayers (Isa 62:6), so are they from God to them in preaching: I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance, 2Pe 1:12. Forgetfulness of duty is a common frailty; there is need therefore of reminding and quickening them thereto. Here are the duties themselves, and the reasons of them.

I. The duties themselves, which they were to be reminded of. 1. Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates. Magistracy is God's ordinance for the good of all, and therefore must be regarded and submitted to by all; not for wrath and by force only, but willingly and for conscience' sake. Principalities, and powers, and magistrates, that is, all civil rulers, whether supreme and chief or subordinate, in the government under which they live, of whatever form it be; that they be subject to them and obey them in things lawful and honest, and which it belongs to their office to require. The Christian religion was misrepresented by its adversaries as prejudicial to the rights of princes and civil powers, and tending to faction and sedition, and to rebellion against lawful authority; therefore to put to silence the ignorance of foolish men, and stop the mouths of malicious enemies, Christians must be reminded to show themselves examples rather of all due subjection and obedience to the government that is over them. Natural desire of liberty must be guided and bounded by reason and scripture. Spiritual privileges do not make void or weaken, but confirm and strengthen, their obligations to civil duties: "Remind them therefore to be subject to principalities and powers and to obey magistrates. "And, 2. To be ready to every good work. Some refer this to such good works as are required by magistrates and within their sphere: "Whatever tends to good order, and to promote and secure public tranquility and peace, be not backward, but ready, to promote such things."But, though this be included, if not first intended, yet is it not to be hereto restrained. The precept regards doing good in all kinds, and on every occasion that may offer, whether resecting God, ourselves, or our neighbour - what may bring credit to religion in the world. Whatsoever things are true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report: if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things (Phi 4:8), to do and follow and further them. Mere harmlessness, or good words and good meanings only, are not enough without good works. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless, and the widow in their affliction, and keep unspotted from the world. "Not only take, but seek, occasion for doing good, keep fitness and readiness that way; put it not off to others, but embrace and lay hold on it thyself, delight and rejoice therein, put all in mind of this."And, 3. To speak evil of no man: mēdena blasphēmein , to revile, or curse, or blaspheme none: or (as our translation more generally) to speak evil of none, unjustly and falsely, or unnecessarily, without call, and when it may do hurt but no good to the person himself or any other. If no good can be spoken, rather than speak evil unnecessarily, say nothing. We must never take pleasure in speaking ill of others, nor make the worst of any thing, but the best we can. We must not go up and down as tale-bearers, carrying ill-natured stories, to the prejudice of our neighbour's good name and the destruction of brotherly love. Misrepresentations, or insinuations of bad intentions, or of hypocrisy in what is done, things out of our reach or cognizance, these come within the reach of this prohibition. As this evil is too common, so it is of great malignity. If any man seemeth to be religious and bridleth not his tongue, that man's religion is vain, Jam 1:26. Such loose uncharitable talk is displeasing to God, and hurtful among men. Pro 17:9, He that covereth a transgression seeketh love (that is, to himself by this tenderness and charity, or rather to the transgressor); but he that repeateth a matter (that blazes and tells the faults of another abroad) separateth very friends; he raises dissensions and alienates his friend from himself, and perhaps from others. This is among the sins to be put off (Eph 4:31); for, if indulged, it unfits for Christians communion here and the society of the blessed in heaven, 1Co 6:10. Remind them therefore to avoid this. And, 4. To be no brawlers; amachous einai - no fighters, either with hand or tongue, no quarrelsome contentious persons, apt to give or return ill and provoking language. A holy contending there is for matters good and important, and in a manner suitable and becoming, not with wrath nor injurious violence. Christian must follow the things that are conducive to peace, and that in a peaceful, not a rough and boisterous and hurtful way, but as becomes the servants of the God of peace and love (Rom 12:19), Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath; this is the Christian's wisdom and duty. The glory of a man is to pass over a transgression; it is the duty of a reasonable, and therefore certainly of a Christian man, whose reason is improved and advanced by religion; such may not, and will not, presently fall foul on one who has offended him, but, like God, will be slow to anger, and ready to forgive. Contention and strife arise from men's lusts, and exorbitant unruly passions, which must be curbed and moderated, not indulged; and Christians need to be reminded of these things, that they do not by a wrathful contentious spirit and behaviour displease and dishonour God and discredit religion, promoting feuds in the places where they live. He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city. Wherefore it follows, 5. But gentle; epieikeis , equitable and just, or candid and fair in constructions of things, not taking words or actions in the worst sense; and for peace sometimes yielding somewhat of strict right. And, 6. Showing all meekness to all men. We must be of a mild disposition, and not only have meekness in our hearts, but show it in our speech and conduct. All meekness - meekness in all instances and occasions, not towards friends only, but to all men, though still with wisdom, as James admonishes, Jam 3:13. "Distinguish the person and the sin; pity the one and hate the other. Distinguish between sin and sin; look not on all alike, there are motes and beams. Distinguish also between sinner and sinner: of some have compassion, others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, thus making a difference, Jud 1:22, Jud 1:23. Mind these things; the wisdom that is from above is pure and peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated. "Meekness of spirit and demeanour renders religion amiable; it is a commanded imitation of Christ the grand exemplar, and what brings it own reward with it, in the ease and comfort of the disposition itself and the blessings accompanying it. These shall be glad and rejoice, shall be taught and guided in their way, and satisfied with bread, and beautified with salvation. Thus of the duties themselves, which Titus was to put people in mind of: for which,

II. He adds the reasons, which are derived

1. From their own past condition. Consideration of men's natural condition is a great means and ground of equity and gentleness, and all meekness, towards those who are yet in such a state. This has a tendency to abate pride and work pity and hope in reference to those who are yet unconverted: "We ourselves also were so and so, corrupt and sinful, therefore we should not be impatient and bitter, hard and severe, towards those who are but as ourselves once were. Should we then have been willing to be contemned, and proudly and rigorously dealt with? No, but treated with gentleness and humanity; and therefore we should now so treat those who are unconverted, according to that rule of equity: Quod tibi non vis fieri, alteri ne feceris - What you would not have done to you that do not you to another. "Their past natural condition is set forth in divers particulars. We ourselves also were sometimes, (1.) Foolish; without true spiritual understanding and knowledge, ignorant of heavenly things. Observe, Those should be most disposed to bear with others' follies who may remember many of their own; those should be meek and gentle, and patient towards others, who once needed and doubtless then expected the same. We ourselves also were sometimes foolish. And, (2.) Disobedient; heady and unpersuadable, resisting the word, and rebellious even against the natural laws of God, and those which human society requires. Well are these set together, foolish and obedient. For what folly like this, to disobey God and his laws, natural or revealed? This is contrary to right reason, and men's true and greatest interests; and what so foolish as to violate and go counter to these? (3.) Deceived, or wandering; namely, out of the ways of truth and holiness. Man in this his degenerate state is of a straying nature, thence compared to a lost sheep; this must be sought and brought back, and guided in the right way, Psa 119:176. He is weak, and ready to be imposed upon by the wiles and subtleties of Satan, and of men lying in wait to seduce and mislead. (4.) Serving divers lusts and pleasures; namely, as vassals and slaves under them. Observe, Men deceived are easily entangled and ensnared; they would not serve divers lusts and pleasures as they do, were they not blinded and beguiled into them. See here too what a different notion the word gives of a sensual and fleshly life from what the world generally has of it. Carnal people think they enjoy their pleasures; the word calls it servitude and vassalage: they are very drudges and bond slaves under them; so far are they from freedom and felicity in them that they are captivated by them, and serve them as taskmasters and tyrants. Observe further, It is the misery of the servants of sin that they have many masters, one lust hurrying them one way, and another; pride commands one thing, covetousness another, and often a contrary. What vile slaves are sinners, while they conceit themselves free! the lusts that tempt them promise them liberty, but in yielding they become the servants of corruption; for of whom a man is overcome of the same is he brought into bondage. (5.) Living in malice, one of those lusts that bear rule in them. Malice desires hurt to another and rejoices in it. (6.) And envy, which grudges and repines at another's good, frets at his prosperity and success in any thing: both are roots of bitterness, whence many evils spring: evil thoughts and speeches, tongues set on fire of hell, detracting from and impairing the just and due praises of others. Their words are swords, wherewith they slay the good name and honour of their neighbour. This was the sin of Satan, and of Cain who was of that evil one, and slew his brother; for wherefore slew he him, but of this envy and malice, because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous? These were some of the sins in which we lived in our natural state. And, (7.), Hateful, or odious - deserving to be hated. (8.) And hating one another. Observe, Those that are sinful, living and allowing themselves in sin, are hateful to God and all good men. Their temper and ways are so, though not simply their persons. It is the misery of sinners that thy hate one another, as it is the duty and happiness of saints to love one another. What contentions and quarrels flow from men's corruptions, such as were in the nature of those who by conversion are now good, but in their unconverted state made them ready to run like furious wild beasts one upon another! The consideration of its having been thus with us should moderate our spirits, and dispose us to be more equal and gentle, meek and tenderhearted, towards those who are such. This is the argument from their own past condition here described. And he reasons,

2. From their present state. "We are delivered out of that our miserable condition by no merit nor strength of our own; but only by the mercy and free grace of God, and merit of Christ, and operation of his Spirit. Therefore we have no ground, in respect of ourselves, to condemn those who are yet unconverted, but rather to pity them, and cherish hope concerning them, that they, though in themselves as unworthy and unmeet as we were, yet may obtain mercy, as we have:"and so upon this occasion the apostle again opens the causes of our salvation, Tit 3:4-7.

(1.) We have here the prime author of our salvation - God the Father, therefore termed here God our Saviour. All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, 2Co 5:18. All things belonging to the new creation, and recovery of fallen man to life and happiness, of which the apostle is there speaking, all these things are of God the Father, as contriver and beginner of this work. There is an order in acting, as in subsisting. The Father begins, the Son manages, and the Holy Spirit works and perfects all. God (namely, the Father ) is a Saviour by Christ, through the Spirit. Joh 3:16, God so loved the world as to give his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him might not perish, but have everlasting life. He is the Father of Christ, and through him the Father of mercies; all spiritual blessings are by Christ from him, Eph 1:3. We joy in God through Jesus Christ, Rom 5:11. And with one mind, and one mouth, glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Rom 15:5.

(2.) The spring and rise of it - the divine philanthropy, or kindness and love of God to man. By grace we are saved from First to last. This is the ground and motive. God's pity and mercy to man in misery were the first wheel, or rather the Spirit in the wheels, that sets and keeps them all in motion. God is not, cannot be, moved by any thing out of himself. The occasion is in man, namely, his misery and wretchedness. Sin bringing that misery, wrath might have issued out rather than compassion; but God, knowing how to adjust all with his own honour and perfections, would pity and save rather than destroy. He delights in mercy. Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. We read of riches of goodness and mercy, Rom 2:4; Eph 2:7. Let us acknowledge this, and give him the glory of it, not turning it to wantonness, but to thankfulness and obedience.

(3.) Here is the means, or instrumental cause - the shining out of this love and grace of God in the gospel, after it appeared, that is, in the word. The appearing of love and grace has, through the Spirit, great virtue to soften and change and turn to God, and so is the power of God to salvation to every one that believeth. Thus having asserted God to be the author, his free grace the spring, and the manifestation of this in the gospel the means of salvation, that the honour of all still may be the better secured to him,

(4.) False grounds and motives are here removed: Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us; not for foreseen works of ours, but his own free grace and mercy alone. Works must be in the saved (where there is room for it), but not among the causes of his salvation; they are the way to the kingdom, not the meriting price of it; all is upon the principle of undeserved favour and mercy from first to last. Election is of grace: we are chosen to be holy, not because it was antecedently seen that we should be so, Eph 1:4. It is the fruit, not the cause, of election: God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth, 2Th 2:13. So effectual calling, in which election breaks out, and is first seen: He hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling; not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, 2Ti 1:9. We are justified freely by grace (Rom 3:24), and sanctified and saved by grace: By grace you are saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, Eph 2:8. Faith and all saving graces are God's free gift and his work; the beginning, increase, and perfection of them in glory, all are from him. In building men up to be a holy temple unto God, from the foundation to the top-stone, we must cry nothing but Grace, grace unto it. It is not of works, lest any man should boast; but of grace, that he who glorieth should glory only in the Lord. Thus the true cause is shown, and the false removed.

(5.) Here is the formal cause of salvation, or that wherein it lies, the beginnings of it at least - in regeneration or spiritual renewing, as it is here called. Old things pass away, and all things become new, in a moral and spiritual, not in a physical and natural, sense. It is the same man, but with other dispositions and habits; evil ones are done away, as to the prevalency of them at present; and all remains of them in due time will be so, when the work shall be perfected in heaven. A new prevailing principle of grace and holiness is wrought, which inclines, and sways, and governs, and makes the man a new man, a new creature, having new thoughts, desires, and affections, a new and holy turn of life and actions; the life of God in man, not only from God in a special manner, but conformed and tending to him. Here is salvation begun, and which will be growing and increasing to perfection; therefore it is said, He saved us. What is so begun, as sure to be perfected in time, is expressed as if it already were so. Let us look to this therefore without delay; we must be initially saved now, by regeneration, if on good ground we would expect complete salvation in heaven. The change then will be but in degree, not in kind. Grace is glory begun, as glory is but grace in its perfection. How few mind this! Most act as if they were afraid to be happy before the time; they would have heaven, they pretend, at last, yet care not for holiness now; that is, they would have the end without the beginning; so absurd are sinners. But without regeneration, that is, the first resurrection, there is no attaining the second glorious one, the resurrection of the just. Here then is formal salvation, in the new divine life wrought by the gospel.

(6.) Here is the outward sign and seal thereof in baptism, called therefore the washing of regeneration. The work itself is inward and spiritual; but it is outwardly signified and sealed in this ordinance. Water is of a cleansing and purifying nature, does away the filth of the flesh, and so was apt to signify the doing away of the guilt and defilement of sin by the blood and Spirit of Christ, though that aptness alone, without Christ's institution, would not have been sufficient. This it is that makes it of this signification on God's part, a seal of righteousness by faith, as circumcision was, in the place of which it succeeds; and on ours an engagement to be the Lord's. Thus baptism saves figuratively and sacramentally, where it is rightly used. Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling upon the name of the Lord, Act 22:16. So Eph 5:26, That he might sanctify and cleanse us by the washing of water by the word. Slight not this outward sign and seal, where it may be had according to Christ's appointment; yet rest not in the outward washing, but look to the answer of a good conscience, without which the external washing will avail nothing. The covenant sealed in baptism binds to duties, as well as exhibits and conveys benefits and privileges; if the former be not minded, in vain are the latter expected. Sever not what God has joined; in both the outer and inner part is baptism complete; as he that was circumcised became debtor to the whole law (Gal 5:3), so is he that is baptized to the gospel, to observe all the commands and ordinances thereof, as Christ appointed. Disciple all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, Mat 28:19, Mat 28:20. This is the outward sign and seal of salvation, baptism, called here the washing of regeneration.

(7.) Here is the principal efficient, namely, the Spirit of God; it is the renewing of the Holy Ghost; not excluding the Father and the Son, who in all works without themselves are concurring; nor the use of means, the word and sacraments, by which the Spirit works; through his operation it is that they have their saving effect. In the economy of our salvation, the applying and effecting part is especially attributed to the Holy Spirit. We are said to be born of the Spirit, to be quickened and sanctified by the Spirit, to be led and guided, strengthened and helped, by the Spirit. Through him we mortify sin, perform duty, walk in God's ways; all the acts and operations of the divine life in us, the works and fruits of righteousness without us, all are through this blessed and Holy Spirit, who is therefore called the Spirit of life, and of grace and holiness; all grace is from him. Earnestly therefore is he to be sought, and greatly to be heeded by us, that we quench not his holy motions, nor resist and oppose him in his workings. Res delicatula est Spiritus - The Spirit is a tender thing. As we act towards him, so may we expect he will to us; if we slight, and resist, and oppose his workings, he will slacken them; if we continue to vex him, he will retire. Grieve not therefore the Holy Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed to the day of redemption, Eph 4:30. The Spirit seals by his renewing and sanctifying, his witnessing and assuring work; he distinguishes and marks out for salvation, and fits for it; it is his work: we could not turn to God by any strength of our own, any more than we can be justified by any righteousness of our own.

(8.) Here is the manner of God's communicating this Spirit in the gifts and graces of it; not with a scanty and niggardly hand, but most freely and plentifully: Which he shed on us abundantly. More of the Spirit in its gifts and graces is poured out under the gospel than was under the law, whence it is eminently styled the ministration of the Spirit, 2Co 3:8. A measure of the Spirit the church has had in all ages, but more in gospel times, since the coming of Christ, than before. The law came by Moses, but grace and truth by Jesus Christ; that is, a more plentiful effusion of grace, fulfilling the promises and prophecies of old. Isa 44:3, I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground. I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thy offspring: this greatest and best of blessings, an effusion of grace, and of the sanctifying gifts of the Spirit. Joe 2:28, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; not on Jews only, but Gentiles also. This was to be in gospel times; and accordingly (Act 2:17, Act 2:18, Act 2:33), speaking of Christ risen and ascended, having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth (says Peter) this that you now see and hear: and Act 10:44, Act 10:45, The Holy Ghost fell on all those that heart the word, Gentiles as well as Jews. This indeed was, in a great measure, in the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost, but not without his sanctifying graces also accompanying many if not all of them. There was then great abundance of common gifts of illumination, outward calling and profession, and general faith, and of more special gifts of sanctification too, such as faith, and hope, and love, and other graces of the Spirit. Let us get a share in these. What will it signify if much be shed forth and we remain dry? Our condemnation will but be aggravated the more if under such a dispensation of grace we remain void of grace. Be filled with the Spirit, says the apostle; it is duty as well as privilege, because of the means which God in the gospel is ready to bless and make effectual; this is the manner of God's communicating grace and all spiritual blessings under the gospel - plentifully; he is not straitened towards us, but we towards him and in ourselves.

(9.) Here is the procuring cause of all, namely, Christ: Through Jesus Christ our Saviour. He it is who purchased the Spirit and his saving gifts and graces. All come through him, and through him as a Saviour, whose undertaking and work it is to bring to grace and glory; he is our righteousness and peace, and our head, from whom we have all spiritual life and influences. He is made of God to us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Let us praise God for him above all; let us go to the Father by him, and improve him to all sanctifying and saving purposes. Have we grace? Let us thank him with the Father and Spirit for it: account all things but loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of him, and grow and increase therein more and more.

(10.) Here are the ends why we are brought into this new spiritual condition, namely, justification, and heirship, and hope of eternal life: That, being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. Justification in the gospel sense is the free remission of a sinner, and accepting him as righteous through the righteousness of Christ received by faith. In it there is the removing of guilt that bound to punishment, and the accepting and dealing with the person as one that now is righteous in God's sight. This God does freely as to us, yet through the intervention of Christ's sacrifice and righteousness, laid hold on by faith (Rom 3:20, etc.): By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified; but through the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all those that believe, whence (Rom 3:24) we are said to be justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ, whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins, that he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus. God, in justifying a sinner in the way of the gospel, is gracious to him, and yet just to himself and his law, forgiveness being through a perfect righteousness, and satisfaction made to justice by Christ, who is the propitiation for sin, and not merited by the sinner himself. So it is here: Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, that, being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. It is by grace, as the spring and rise (as was said), though through the redemption that is in Christ as making the way, God's law and justice being thereby satisfied, and by faith applying that redemption. By him (by Christ) all that believe are justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses, Act 13:39. Hence the apostle desires to be found in him, not having his own righteousness, which was of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith. Let us not trust therefore in our own righteousness or merit of good works, but in Christ's righteousness alone, received by faith for justification and acceptance with God. Inherent righteousness we must have, and the fruits of it in works of obedience; not however as our justifying righteousness before God, but as fruits of our justification, and evidences of our interest in Christ and qualification for life and happiness, and the very beginning and part of it; but the procuring of all this is by Christ, that, being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs. Observe, Our justification is by the grace of God, and our justification by that grace is necessary in order to our being made heirs of eternal life; without such justification there can be no adoption and sonship, and so no right of inheritance. Joh 1:12, Whoever received him (namely, Christ), to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to those that believed on his name. Eternal life is set before us in the promise, the Spirit works faith in us and hope of that life, and so are we made heirs of it and have a kind of possession of it even now; faith and hope bring it near, and fill with joy in the well-grounded expectation of it. The meanest believer is a great heir. Though he has not his portion in hand, he has good hope through grace, and may bear up under all difficulties. There is a better state in view. He is waiting for an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for him. How well may such comfort themselves with these words! And now all this gives good reason why we should show all meekness to all men, because we have experienced so much benefit by the kindness and love of God to us, and may hope that they, in God's time, may be partakers of the like grace as we are. And thus of the reasons of equal and gentle, meek and tender behaviour to wards others, from their own bad condition in time past, and the present more happy state into which they are brought, without any merit or deservings of their own, and whereinto by the same grace others may be brought also.

III. The apostle, having opened the duties of Christians in common, with the reasons respecting themselves, adds another from their goodness and usefulness to men. Observe, When he has opened the grace of God towards us, he immediately presses the necessity of good works; for we must not expect the benefit of God's mercy, unless we make conscience of our duty (Tit 3:8): This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly (this is a true Christian doctrine of highest importance, and which ministers must most earnestly and constantly press and inculcate), that those who have believed in God do not think that a bare naked faith will save them; but it must be an operative working faith, bringing forth the fruit of righteousness; they must make it their care to maintain good works, not to do them occasionally only, and when opportunities come in their way, but to seek opportunities for doing them. These things are good and profitable unto men: these good works, say some, or the teaching of these things, rather than idle questions, as follows. These things are good in themselves and the teaching of them useful to mankind, making persons a common good in their places. Note, Ministers, in teaching, must see that they deliver what is sound and good in itself, and profitable to those that hear: all must be to the use of edifying both of persons and societies.

Barclay: Tit 3:3-7

The dynamic of the Christian life is twofold.

It comes first from the realization that converts to Christianity were once no better than their heathen neighbours. Christian goodness does not make a man proud; it makes him supremely grateful. When he looks at others, living the pagan life, he does not regard them with contempt; he says, as Whitefield said when he saw the criminal on the way to the gallows: "There but for the grace of God go I."

It comes from the realization of what God has done for men in Jesus Christ. Perhaps no passage in the New Testament more summarily, and yet more fully, sets out the work of Christ for men than this. There are seven outstanding facts about that work here.

(i) Jesus put us into a new relationship with God. Till he came, God was the King before whom men stood in awe, the Judge before whom men cringed in terror, the Potentate whom they could regard only with fear. Jesus came to tell men of the Father whose heart was open and whose hands were stretched out in love. He came to tell them not of the justice which would pursue them for ever but of the love which would never let them go.

(ii) The love and grace of God are gifts which no man could ever earn; they can only be accepted in perfect trust and in awakened love. God offers his love to men simply out of the great goodness of his heart and the Christian thinks never of what he has earned but only of what God has given. The keynote of the Christian life must always be wondering and humble gratitude, never proud self-satisfaction. The whole process is due to two great qualities of God.

It is due to his goodness. The word is chrestotes (5544) and means benignity. It means that spirit which is so kind that it is always eager to give whatever gift may be necessary. Chrestotes is an all-embracing kindliness, which issues not only in warm feeling but also in generous action at all times.

It is due to God's love to men. The word is philanthropia (5363), and it is defined as love of man as man. The Greeks thought much of this beautiful word. They used it for the good man's kindliness to his equals, for a good king's graciousness to his subjects, for a generous man's active pity for those in any kind of distress, and specially for the compassion which made a man ransom a fellow-man when he had fallen into captivity.

At the back of all this is no merit of man but only the benign kindliness and the universal love which are in the heart of God.

(iii) This love and grace of God are mediated to men through the Church. They come through the sacrament of baptism. That is not to say that they can come in no other way, for God is not confined within his sacraments; but the door to them is ever open through the Church. When we think of baptism in the earliest days of the Church, we must remember that it was the baptism of grown men and women coming directly out of paganism. It was the deliberate leaving of one way of life to enter upon another. When Paul writes to the people of Corinth, he says: "You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified" (1Co 6:11). In the letter to the Ephesians he says that Jesus Christ took the Church that "he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word" (Eph 5:26). In baptism there came to men the cleansing, re-creating power of God.

In this connection Paul uses two words.

He speaks of rebirth (paliggenesia, 3824). Here is a word which had many associations. When a proselyte was received into the Jewish faith, after he had been baptized he was treated as if he were a little child. It was as if he had been reborn and life had begun all over again. The Pythagoreans used the word frequently. They believed in reincarnation and that men returned to life in many forms until they were fit to be released from it. Each return was a rebirth. The Stoics used the word. They believed that every three thousand years the world went up in a great conflagration, and that then there was a rebirth of a new world. When people entered the Mystery Religions they were said to be "reborn for eternity." The point is that when a man accepts Christ as Saviour and Lord, life begins all over again. There is a newness about life which can be likened only to a new birth.

He speaks of a renewing. It is as if life were worn out and when a man discovers Christ there is an act of renewal, which is not over and done with in one moment of time but repeats itself every day.

Barclay: Tit 3:3-7

(iv) The grace and love of God are mediated to men within the Church, but behind it all is the power of the Holy Spirit. All the work of the Church, all the words of the Church, all the sacraments of the Church are inoperative unless the power of the Holy Spirit is there. However highly a Church be organized, however splendid its ceremonies may be, however beautiful its buildings, all is ineffective without that power. The lesson is clear. Revival in the Church comes not from increased efficiency in organization but from waiting upon God. Not that efficiency is not necessary, but no amount of efficiency can breathe life into a body from which the Spirit has departed.

(v) The effect of all this is threefold. It brings forgiveness for past sins. In his mercy God does not hold our sins against us. Once a man was mourning gloomily to Augustine about his sins. "Man," said Augustine, "look away from your sins and look to God." It is not that a man must not be all his life repentant for his sins; but the very memory of his sins should move him to wonder at the forgiving mercy of God.

(vi) The effect is also present life. Christianity does not confine its offer to blessings which shall be. It offers a man here and now life of a quality which he has never known before. When Christ enters into a man's life, for the first time he really begins to live.

(vii) Lastly, there is the hope of even greater things. The Christian is a man for whom the best is always still to be; he knows that, however wonderful is life on earth with Christ, the life to come will be greater yet. The Christian is the man who knows the wonder of past sin forgiven, the thrill of present life with Christ, and the hope of the greater life which is yet to be.

Constable: Tit 1:5--3:12

II. INSTRUCTIONS FOR SETTING THE CHURCH IN ORDER 1:5--3:11

As in 1 Timothy, Paul plunged into the business of his letter immediately since he was writing a trusted colleague. This partially explains the absence of a thanksgiving section in these two epistles. The serious threat of false teaching may be another reason. By contrast, 2 Timothy is more personal, and it contains a thanksgiving.

Constable: Tit 3:1-11

2. The behavior of all in the church 3:1-11

Paul broadened the focus of his instructions to clarify the responsibilities of all Christians in view of God's grace.

Constable: Tit 3:1-8

Individual responsibility 3:1-8

"After a brief exhortation to Titus (2:15) to teach these things' (at least 2:1-14), Paul returns in this section to the major concern of the letter--'good works' (i.e., genuinely Christian behavior) for the sake of the outsider (3:1-8) and in contrast to the false teachers (3:9-11)."⁶⁸

Constable: Tit 3:3-8

Rationale 3:3-8

3:3 To motivate his readers to obey these commands Paul encouraged them by reminding them of the way they used to be. They had already come a long way. Each characteristic he mentioned in this verse contrasts with one he had urged his readers to adopt earlier in this epistle. They--Paul included himself--had been foolish, not sensible; disobedient, not submissive; deceived, not enlightened; and enslaved, not free and self-disciplined. Moreover they had been malicious, not peaceable; envious, not considerate; and hateful, not loving.

3:4-5 The appearance Paul referred to is the sending of Jesus Christ to die for us, the Incarnation. That was the greatest revelation of God's kindness and love for humankind. God took the initiative. God does not save people because they behave righteously but because He is merciful (cf. Rom. 3:27-28; 4:4-5; Gal. 2:16-17; Eph. 2:8-9; 2 Tim. 1:9). The salvation He provides consists of rebirth that Paul likened here to washing off sin's filth (John 3:3-8; Rom. 6:4; Eph. 5:26; 1 Pet. 1:3, 23) and renewal by God's Holy Spirit (2 Cor. 5:17). He did not mention human faith because his emphasis here was on God's grace in providing salvation.

"He came to tell men, not of the justice which would pursue them for ever until it caught up with them, but of the love which would never let them go."⁷²

In verse 5 "washing" could refer to conversion and "renewing" to the coming of the Holy Spirit on the new believer. Another view is that "washing" could refer to baptism with "regeneration" and "renewing" describing what the Spirit does in salvation. Probably "washing" is a metaphor for spiritual cleansing rather than for baptism with the emphasis in the entire phrase being on the Spirit's cleansing, regenerating work.⁷³

Note the reference to the work that all three members of the Trinity accomplished in our salvation in these verses.

3:6-7 God poured out His Holy Spirit on believers richly. He did this first at Pentecost (Acts 2), but He does it since then whenever individuals experience conversion (cf. Rom. 5:5). His grace always exceeds our need. God has not only graciously declared us righteous, but He has also graciously made us the heirs of eternal life. Paul's whole emphasis was on the grace of God. We owe everything to God's grace.

Note that in verses 5-7 Paul explained what God did (saved, washing, regeneration, renewing, justified), its basis (God's mercy), its means (the Holy Spirit), and its goal (hope of eternal life).

3:8 The "trustworthy statement" (1 Tim. 1:15; 3:1; 4:9; 2 Tim. 2:11) Paul referred to is probably what he had just written in verses 4-7. The first "these things" in this verse are the things that he had just described in those verses. Titus was to speak about these great truths confidently (cf. 2:15). The intended result was to be that those who have trusted God for salvation would practice good works (cf. Eph. 2:8-10; James 2:14-26). The second "these things" in the verse refers to these good works. This verse summarizes the point Paul made throughout this epistle. Good works, he added, are essentially excellent as well as profitable for everyone on the practical level.

"The best way a local church has to witness to the lost is through the sacrificial service of its members."⁷⁴

College: Tit 3:1-15

TITUS 3

IV. STANDARDS FOR CHRISTIAN BEHAVIOR (3:1-11)

A. RESPECT FOR GOVERNMENT AUTHORITIES (3:1)

¹ Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, ² to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and to show true humility toward all men.

Paul now returns to the "good" works of 2:14 to emphasize the need for these deeds for the sake of the outsider (vv. 1-8). He then contrasts the Christian life and its works with that of the false teachers (vv. 9-11).

3:1 Remind the people

Paul's instruction for Titus to "remind" (literally "keep on reminding") the people is a natural transition from his instructions to "teach, encourage, and rebuke" in 2:15. The material Titus is to present is not new to his audience; he is to point out the implications of the gospel.

to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient,

The people are "to be subject" (cf. 2:5, 9) "to rulers and authorities" and "to be obedient" (peiqarcei'n , peitharchein , literally "to be persuaded by" or "to listen to the advice of"). Although "rulers and authorities" may be used of angelic powers (Eph 3:10; 6:2; Col 1:16), here the phrase refers to secular governmental officials (cf. Luke 12:11). Paul expressed a similar concern for civic authorities in 1 Tim 2:2. Paul never addresses the issue of how the Christian should respond to officials who are hostile to and attempt to suppress the Christian faith. He is likely reflecting on a time when the government was relatively tolerant of Christianity (cf. Rom 13:1-8). Christians are called "to obey," or better perhaps "to heed" the laws of the land as long as those laws do not contradict the laws of God.

to be ready to do whatever is good,

Christians are "to be ready to do whatever is good" (literally "to be prepared for every good work"; cf. 2 Tim 2:21; 3:17). While some see this obligation as directed toward civic duty, i.e., good citizenship, others would see the instruction as more general in nature. Perhaps it is best to follow the lead of Knight and say that "the immediate context is with the government but the statement is not meant to be confined to that." The obligation does provide the perfect transition to v. 2 and obligations "toward all men."

B. RESPECT FOR ALL (3:2)

3:2 to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate,

Christians are "to slander no one" (cf. 1 Tim 6:5), a stark contrast with the false teachers who are involved in "foolish controversies" and "arguments" (v. 9). They are to be "peaceable" (ajmavcou" , amachous , better "uncontentious"; see discussion at 1 Tim 3:3) and "considerate" (or perhaps "conciliatory"), in contrast to the quarrels about the law (mavca" nomikav" , machas nomikas ) of the opponents to the gospel.

and to show true humility toward all men.

The final phrase may well be seen as the "key" to the Christian lifestyle in a pagan world. "Humility" (prau?th" , praütçs ; cf. 1 Tim 6:11; 2 Tim 2:25), often rendered "meekness," "may best be understood by contrast to its opposites, roughness, bad temper, sudden anger, brusqueness." In the original the word "humility" is qualified by the word "all" producing the "true humility" of the NIV. This humility is to be shown "toward all men," i.e., toward the world in general, toward Christians and non-Christians, toward enemies and friends.

C. THE THEOLOGICAL BASIS FOR LIVING

WITH NON-CHRISTIANS (3:3-8)

³ At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. ⁴ But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, ⁵ he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, ⁶ whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, ⁷ so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. ⁸ This is a trustworthy saying. And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone.

Paul now gives the theological basis for his earlier call for Christian living. The motivation for this life will be the believers' conversion experience.

3:3 At one time we too

The NIV does not translate the Greek word (gavr , gar ) "for" which provides the link to the previous section. The "we too" of v. 3 in no way indicates that the non-Christian lifestyle described there was characteristic of his Jewish background. Fee asserts, "One should note that whenever Paul is moved to speak about the gospel he takes up the personal self-identification of 'we too' (cf. 2:11-14; 2 Tim 1:9-10; Gal 1:4; etc.)." The "we too were" may well be intended to imply that the outsiders still are bearing the sinful qualities that follow (i.e., "we too were . . . just as they now do").

were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.

The pre-Christian life was "foolish" ("without spiritual understanding"), "disobedient" (cf. 1:16), "deceived" (or "led astray"; cf. 1 Tim 4:1-2; 2 Tim 3:13), and "enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures" (cf. Paul's description of the bondage of sin in Rom 6:6-7). The pre-Christian life was characterized by "malice" (or "badness") and "envy" (cf. 1 Tim 6:4). They were "being hated" (or "detestable") and "hating one another."

3:4 But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared,

In v. 4 Paul begins the contrast between the pre-regenerate life and the life of the Christian by rehearsing what God had done in Jesus. "Appeared" here refers to the incarnation of Christ (see discussion on 2:11). The incarnation demonstrates "the kindness" (in the list of the "fruit of the Spirit," Gal 5:22) and "love" (filanqrwpiva , philanthrôpia , literally "love for mankind," cf. the English word "philanthropy") "of God." See the discussion of "God our Savior" at 1:3.

3:5 he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy.

God had, in the appearance of his "kindness" and "love," saved us. Paul paints the picture of that salvation much as he would in any of his letters. First Christians are saved "not because of righteous things [they] had done" (cf. Rom 4:4-5; Eph 2:8-9; Phil 3:9; 2 Tim 1:9). Salvation is rather "because of his mercy" (1 Tim 1:12-16). Paul generally talks of God's "grace" rather than his "mercy" as the cause of salvation, but the idea is really the same (cf. "his grace" in v. 7).

He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit,

This salvation is then accomplished "through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit." There has been considerable discussion in scholarly circles of this last phrase due to some grammatical ambiguities. If the word "through" (diav , dia ) had been repeated with the second phrase, "renewal by the Holy Spirit," interpretation would have been relatively easy. Paul would then have been referring to two events: a "washing of rebirth" and a "renewal of the Holy Spirit."

Since, however, the word "through" does not appear before renewal of the Holy Spirit, two options exist. (1) Paul may be saying that God has saved us "through the washing," which is characterized by "rebirth and renewal," a washing which is accomplished "by the Holy Spirit." (2) Or, Paul may be understood as saying that God has saved us through an event that can be described both as "the washing characterized by rebirth" and as "renewal" either "characterized by or given by the Holy Spirit." The second option does have a sense of balance in its favor - two genitive words or phrases understood together before "and" (washing; rebirth) and two after (renewal; the Holy Spirit). The first option has much to be said in its favor. "Rebirth" is clearly dependent upon "washing." Considerable debate has occurred over whether "washing" (loutrovn , loutron ) should be seen as a reference to baptism or merely a metaphor for the cleansing of the Holy Spirit. If "washing" is seen as a clear reference to baptism, then it is relatively easy to argue that "rebirth" and "renewal" are accomplished at that point. If, however, "washing" is taken as initial cleansing from sin and "renewal" as sanctification which can be deemed progressive, then the second option above is more reasonable. Since "washing," even understood metaphorically, would have been seen by Paul as connected to baptism, it seems reasonable to assume that Paul had baptism in mind.

Since the word "rebirth" (paliggenesiva , palingenesia and not ajnagevnnhsi" , anagennçsis ) really does not convey the idea of birth, but rather of a "new genesis," Knight has suggested that the phrase should be translated "the washing of a new beginning" or "the washing of conversion." The word "renewal" (ajnakaivnwsi" , anakainôsis ) need not be seen as a process; it rather indicates "a making new." "Rebirth" and "renewal" are thus "nearly synonymous metaphors." However one understands "washing, rebirth, and renewal," emphasis clearly falls on the Holy Spirit as the source of the new life God has made available to believers.

3:6 whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior,

In this verse Paul continues his discussion of the role of the Holy Spirit in the conversion and life of the believer. God has "poured the Holy Spirit out on us generously" (plousivw" , plousiôs , literally, "richly" or "abundantly") "through Jesus Christ our Savior." It is significant that the Holy Spirit is given by God "through Jesus." Paul's description of Jesus as Savior after using the term of God earlier in the chapter (v. 4) follows the alternating pattern of describing God and Jesus as Savior already noted in Titus (see discussion on 2:13).

3:7 so that, having been justified by his grace,

At this juncture Paul describes salvation using his common forensic or legal metaphor of justification: "having been justified by his grace." Christians have received a not-guilty verdict on the basis of God's "grace" and not on the basis of their own works, a theme common to Paul (Rom 3:24; 5:1, 9; 1 Cor 6:11; Gal 2:16-17; 3:24).

we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

The Spirit's work in the Christian's life has an eschatological or future, end-time effect: "that . . . we might become heirs" (cf. Gal 4:7; Rom 8:17) "having the hope" (see Titus 1:2; 1 Tim 4:10) "of eternal life" (see the discussion at 1 Tim 1:6; 6:12; Titus 1:2).

3:8 This is a trustworthy saying.

Here Paul proclaims the section above, likely 3:4-7, as another of the "faithful" or "trustworthy" sayings of the Pastoral Epistles (cf. 1 Tim 1:15; 3:1; 4:9; 2 Tim 2:11). Paul's statement that the saving work of God in Jesus is accomplished by grace is reliable, and the Christians on Crete must live accordingly.

And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good.

The "these things" which Titus is "to stress" (also used by Paul of the false teachers in 1 Tim 1:7 where the NIV renders the verb "confidently affirm") is used at least in reference to vv. 4-7 and perhaps in reference to all of the good works Paul has called the Christians on Crete to do, i.e., the whole of the Christian lifestyle as prescribed in this letter. Paul's goal for Titus' preaching is "that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good" (literally "good works," the very purpose of God's redemptive act, 2:7, 14; 3:1).

These things are excellent and profitable for everyone.

Again one must decide to what "these things" refers. Although it is possible to see Paul as referring to the kindness of God and the gift of the Holy Spirit, it is more reasonable to see a reference to "doing what is good" in the previous sentence, i.e., "good deeds," a theme which runs throughout. Such deeds are intrinsically "excellent" (literally "good"), and they are "profitable" (or "beneficial") "for everyone" (literally "for human beings"). The Christian life lived in a pagan world has a positive effect on non-believers.

D. FINAL WARNINGS CONCERNING

FALSE TEACHERS AND THE DIVISIVE (3:9-11)

⁹ But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless. ¹⁰ Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him. ¹¹ You may be sure that such a man is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned.

Paul now turns in vv. 9-11 to warn Titus and the church on Crete of the corrupting influence of false teachers whose deeds are not "excellent and profitable" (v. 8) but rather are "unprofitable and useless" (v. 9).

3:9 But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless.

Although the imperative "avoid" is second person singular addressing Titus, Paul's instructions are intended for all the Christians on Crete. He begins by spelling out four of the "unprofitable and useless" deeds of the false teachers from which Christians must steer clear: "foolish" (cf. 2 Tim 2:23) "controversies" (cf. 1 Tim 6:4; 2 Tim 2:23); "genealogies" (see the discussion of this term in 1 Tim 1:4); "arguments" (literally "strifes"; see discussion 1 Tim 6:4); and "quarrels about the law" (cf. 2 Tim 2:23; see also the discussion of "not quarrelsome" in v. 2 and 1 Tim 3:3; of "word battles" in 1 Tim 6:4; 2 Tim 2:14). The mention of "the law" here, of "the circumcision group" in 1:10, and of "Jewish myths" and "commands" in 1:14 help to establish the makeup of the false teachers as Hellenistic Jewish Christians.

3:10 Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him.

After outlining the deeds of the false teachers that Titus, along with the other Christians on Crete, were to "avoid," Paul instructs Titus how he is to respond to the teachers themselves. Paul describes them as "divisive" (aiJretikovn , hairetikon , thus the KJV translation "heretic"). Paul's use of this adjective does not indicate the nature of their teaching but rather their behavior (cf. 1 Cor 11:19; Gal 5:20 where the noun is used). He is concerned about the destructive nature of their teaching and their behavior (cf. 1:1). Titus is to "warn" (or "admonish") "a divisive person once" with the hope of redeeming them (the normal reason for correcting or taking disciplinary action in Paul; cf. 1 Tim 1:20; 2 Tim 2:25-26; 2 Cor 2:5-1; 2 Thess 3:14-15). The "divisive" are then given a second chance to repent. If that attempt is to no avail, Titus and the church are to "have nothing to do with him" (literally "reject"; see 1 Tim 5:11 where the same verb is used but rendered "do not put them on such a list" by the NIV). The phrase "have nothing to do with him" represents a single Greek word (paraitou' , paraitou ). It is used in the same sense in Hebrews 12:25.

3:11 You may be sure that such a man is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned.

Paul wants Titus to realize that, without a doubt, divisive people are "warped" (a perfect tense verb in Greek, meaning "has gotten off track and remains so") "and sinful" (a present tense verb in Greek, probably intended by Paul to indicate "keeps on sinning"). Such a person is "self-condemned," i.e., his continued sinful behavior and rejection of correction indicate that he has put himself on the outside. Such a one is without excuse and is, therefore, to be rejected by Titus and the church.

V. PERSONAL DIRECTIONS AND

CLOSING SALUTATIONS (3:12-15)

¹² As soon as I send Artemas or Tychicus to you, do your best to come to me at Nicopolis, because I have decided to winter there. ¹³ Do everything you can to help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way and see that they have everything they need. ¹⁴ Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives.

¹⁵ Everyone with me sends you greetings. Greet those who love us in the faith.

Grace be with you all.

Paul follows his normal custom of giving some final personal instructions and greetings at the end of his epistles. As Fee has noted, while both 1 Timothy and Titus are "all business," in Titus he takes time for the personal, something missing from the closing of 1 Timothy even though 1 Timothy has more frequent personal exhortations. This may indicate that the situation at Crete is less urgent and that Paul's goal is preventing fires rather than putting them out.

3:12 As soon as I send Artemas or Tychicus to you,

Despite all his instructions to Titus about dealing with the Christians on Crete, Paul apparently intends for Titus to be replaced by either Artemas or Tychicus soon after he receives this letter which is likely carried by Zenas and Apollos (v. 13). As he writes this letter, Paul is uncertain who will replace Titus. Artemas appears nowhere else in Scripture. Tychicus travelled with Paul in Acts 20:4 and is mentioned in two of the prison epistles as one who will deliver the letter and bring news (Col 4:7; Eph 6:21). From 2 Tim 4:12 it is clear that Tychicus was sent by Paul to Ephesus and in 2 Tim 4:10 that Titus went to Dalmatia up the coast from Nicopolis. From this data one would assume that Artemas likely served as Titus' replacement.

do your best to come to me at Nicopolis, because I have decided to winter there.

Paul's desire was that Titus make every effort to join him at Nicopolis, where he had "decided to winter." It is impossible to know with any certainty where Paul was as he wrote Titus, but it is clear that he was not yet in Nicopolis. There are several ancient cities which bear the name "Nicopolis" ("victory city"). The most likely location is the one which served as the capital of Epirus. It would suit the mention of Titus being in Dalmatia in 2 Tim 4:10. The city was about 200 miles northwest of Athens. Spending the winter on land was the reasonable thing to do since travel by sea in winter was difficult if not impossible (see Paul's own travel pushing the fall envelope, Acts 27:12; 28:11).

3:13 Do everything you can to help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way and see that they have everything they need.

Apparently Zenas and Apollos have been with Paul and will be traveling through Crete. They are apparently carrying the letter (cf. v. 14). Titus is to help them and see that their needs are met, a normal way to deal with traveling missionaries (cf. Acts 15:3; 21:5; Rom 15:24; 1 Cor 16:6, 11; 2 Cor 1:16; 3 John 6). Paul describes Zenas as "the lawyer" indicating that he serves as a Roman jurist. Apollos is undoubtedly the famous Alexandrian preacher (Acts 18:24-19:1; 1 Cor 1:12; 3:4-22; 16:12).

3:14 Our people must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives.

Paul instructs Titus that "our people too [a word not translated in the NIV] must learn to devote themselves to doing what is good." The untranslated "too" (kaiΙ , kai ) indicates that the people of the church must be devoted "to doing what is good" (again literally "good works") as Paul has instructed Titus to do with regard to Zenas and Apollos. Paul gives two reasons for these good works: to "provide for daily necessities," i.e., the pressing needs; and to "live lives" that are not "unproductive" (literally "unfruitful").

3:15 Everyone with me sends you greetings. Greet those who love us in the faith.

Grace be with you all.

The letter ends with the normal greetings: first from "everyone with" Paul to Titus, and then from Paul to "those who love" him and his fellow workers "in the faith." Fee suggests that Paul's use of "those who love us in the faith" may be "an indirect reference to the fact that some in Crete have proven themselves disloyal to Paul and his gospel." Paul closes with the normal farewell: "Grace be with you all" (cf. 1 Tim 6:21), a clear indication that Paul intended for the letter to be read by the church on Crete as well as by Titus.

-College Press New Testament Commentary: with the NIV

Introduction / Outline

Robertson: Titus (Book Introduction)

The Epistle to Titus

Probably 66 or 67 Apparently From Nicopolis

JFB: Titus (Book Introduction)

GENUINENESS.--CLEMENT OF ROME quotes it [Epistle to the Corinthians, 2]; IRENÆUS [Against Heresies, 3.3.4] refers to it as Paul's; THEOPHILUS OF ANTIOCH [To Autolychus, 3.14], quotes it as Scripture. Compare CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA [Miscellanies, 1, p. 299]; TERTULLIAN [The Prescription against Heretics, 6].

TIME AND PLACE OF WRITING.--This Epistle seems to have been written from Corinth [BIRKS], subsequently to his first imprisonment, when Paul was on his way to Nicopolis (Tit 3:12) in Epirus, where he purposed passing the winter, shortly before his martyrdom, A.D. 67. BIRKS thinks, from the similarity of the Epistle to Titus and First Timothy, that both were written from the same place, Corinth, and at dates not widely apart; First Timothy shortly after coming to Corinth, before he had planned a journey to Epirus, the Epistle to Titus afterwards. The journey to Crete and Ephesus for the bearers of his letters would be easy from Corinth, and he could himself thence easily pass into Epirus. He had shortly before visited Crete, wherein a Church existed (though without due organization), the first foundation of which he may have partly laid at his former visit (Act 27:7, &c.), when on his way to his first imprisonment at Rome. That he returned to the East after his first imprisonment appears most probable from Phi 2:24; Phm 1:22. However, there may have been seeds of Christianity sown in Crete, even before his first visit, by the Cretans who heard Peter's preaching on Pentecost (Act 2:11).

OCCASION OF WRITING.--Corrupt elements soon showed themselves in the Cretan Church, similar to those noticed in the Epistles to Timothy, as existing in the Ephesian Church, Judaism, false pretensions to science, and practical ungodliness. Paul, on his late visit, had left Titus in Crete to establish Church government, and ordain presbyters (deacons are not mentioned). Titus had been several times employed by Paul on a mission to the Corinthian Churches, and had probably thence visited Crete, which was within easy reach of Corinth. Hence the suitableness of his selection by the apostle for the superintendence of the Cretan Church. Paul now follows up with instructions by letter those he had already given to Titus in person on the qualifications of elders, and the graces becoming the old, the young, and females, and warns him against the unprofitable speculations so rife in Crete. The national character of the Cretans was low in the extreme, as EPIMENIDES, quoted in Tit 1:12, paints it. LIVY [History, 44.45], stigmatizes their avarice; POLYBIUS [Histories, 6.46.9], their ferocity and fraud; and [Histories, 6.47.5], their mendacity, so much so, that "to Cretanize" is another name for to lie: they were included in the proverbial three infamous initials "K" or "C," "Cappadocia, Crete, Cilicia."

NOTICES OF TITUS.--It is strange that he is never mentioned by this name in Acts, and there seems none of those mentioned in that book who exactly answers to him. He was a Greek, and therefore a Gentile (Gal 2:1, Gal 2:3), and converted by Paul (Tit 1:4). He accompanied the apostle on the deputation sent from the Church of Antioch to Jerusalem, to consult the apostles respecting the circumcision of Gentile converts (Act 15:2); and, agreeably to the decree of the council there, was not circumcised. He was in company with Paul at Ephesus, whence he was sent to Corinth to commence the collection for the Jerusalem saints, and to ascertain the effect of the First Epistle on the Corinthians (2Co 7:6-9; 2Co 8:6; 2Co 12:18), and there showed an unmercenary spirit. He next proceeded to Macedon, where he joined Paul, who had been already eagerly expecting him at Troas (2Co 2:12-13, "Titus my brother," 2Co 7:6). He was then employed by the apostle in preparing the collection for the poor saints in Judea, and became the bearer of the Second Epistle to the Corinthians (2Co 8:16-17, 2Co 8:23). Paul in it calls him "my partner and fellow helper concerning you." His being located in Crete (Tit 1:5) was subsequent to Paul's first imprisonment, and shortly before the second, about A.D. 67, ten years subsequent to the last notice of him in Second Corinthians (2Co 12:18), A.D. 57. He probably met Paul, as the apostle desired, at Nicopolis; for his subsequent journey into Dalmatia, thence (or else from Rome, whither he may have accompanied Paul) would be more likely, than from the distant Crete (2Ti 4:10, written subsequently to the Epistle to Titus). In the unsettled state of things then, Titus' episcopal commission in Crete was to be but temporary, Paul requiring the presence of Titus with himself, whenever Artemas or Tychicus should arrive in Crete and set him free from his duties there.

Tradition represents him to have died peaceably in Crete, as archbishop of Gortyna, at an advanced age.

JFB: Titus (Outline)

• ADDRESS: FOR WHAT END TITUS WAS LEFT IN CRETE. QUALIFICATIONS FOR ELDERS: GAINSAYERS IN CRETE NEEDING REPROOF. (Tit. 1:1-16)
• DIRECTIONS TO TITUS: HOW TO EXHORT VARIOUS CLASSES OF BELIEVERS: THE GRACE OF GOD IN CHRIST OUR GRAND INCENTIVE TO LIVE GODLY. (Tit 2:1-15)
• WHAT TITUS IS TO TEACH CONCERNING CHRISTIANS' BEHAVIOR TOWARDS THE WORLD: HOW HE IS TO TREAT HERETICS: WHEN AND WHERE HE IS TO MEET PAUL. SALUTATION. CONCLUSION. (Tit 3:1-15)

TSK: Titus 3 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Tit 3:1, Titus is yet further directed by Paul, both concerning the things that he should teach and not teach; Tit 3:10, He is to reject obstinate heretics; Tit 3:12, He appoints him time and place wherein he should come unto him.

Poole: Titus 3 (Chapter Introduction)

CHAPTER 3

MHCC: Titus (Book Introduction)

This epistle chiefly contains directions to Titus concerning the elders of the Church, and the manner in which he should give instruction; and the latter part tells him to urge obedience to magistrates, to enforce good works, avoid foolish questions, and shun heresies. The instructions the apostle gave are all plain and simple. The Christian religion was not formed to answer worldly or selfish views, but it is the wisdom of God and the power of God.

MHCC: Titus 3 (Chapter Introduction)

(Tit 3:1-7) Obedience to magistrates, and becoming behaviour towards all, are enforced from what believers were before conversion, and what they are made, through Christ.

(Tit 3:8-11) Good works to be done, and useless disputes avoided.

(Tit 3:12-15) Directions and exhortations.

Matthew Henry: Titus (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Epistle of St. Paul to Titus

This Epistle of Paul to Titus is much of the same nature with those to Timothy; both were converts of Paul, and his companions in labours and sufferings; both were in the office of evangelists, whose work was to water the churches planted by the apostles, and to set in order the things that were wanting in them: they were vice-apostles, as it were, working the work of the Lord, as they did, and mostly under their direction, though not despotic and arbitrary, but with the concurring exercise of their own prudence and judgment, 1Co 16:10, 1Co 16:12. We read much of this Titus, his titles, character, and active usefulness, in many places - he was a Greek, Gal 2:3. Paul called him his son (Tit 1:4), his brother (2Co 2:13), his partner and fellow-helper (2Co 8:23), one that walked in the same spirit and in the same steps with himself. He went up with the apostles to the church at Jerusalem (Gal 2:1), was much conversant at Corinth, for which church he had an earnest care, 2Co 8:16. Paul's second epistle to them, and probably his first also, was sent by his hand, 2Co 8:16-18, 2Co 8:23; 2Co 9:2-4; 2Co 12:18. He was with the apostle at Rome, and thence went into Dalmatia (2Ti 4:10), after which no more occurs of him in the scriptures. So that by them he appears not to have been a fixed bishop; if such he were, and in those times, the church of Corinth, where he most laboured, had the best title to him. In Crete (now called Candia, formerly Hecatompolis, from the hundred cities that were in it), a large island at the mouth of the Aegean Sea, the gospel had got some footing; and here were Paul and Titus in one of their travels, cultivating this plantation; but the apostle of the Gentiles, having on him the care of all the churches, could not himself tarry long at this place. He therefore left Titus some time there, to carry on the work which had been begun, wherein, probably, meeting with more difficulty than ordinary, Paul wrote this epistle to him; and yet perhaps not so much for his own sake as for the people's, that the endeavours of Titus, strengthened with apostolic advice and authority, might be more significant and effectual among them. He was to see all the cities furnished with good pastors, to reject and keep out the unmeet and unworthy, to teach sound doctrine, and instruct all sorts in their duties, to set forth the free grace of God in man's salvation by Christ, and withal to show the necessity of maintaining good works by those who have believed in God and hope for eternal life from him.

Matthew Henry: Titus 3 (Chapter Introduction)

Of duties which concern Christians more in common, and the reasons of them (Tit 3:1-8). What Titus in teaching should avoid, and how he should deal with a heretic, with some other directions (Tit 3:9-14), and salutations in the close (Tit 3:15).

Barclay: Titus (Book Introduction)

A GENERAL INTRODUCTION TO THE LETTERS OF PAUL

The Letters Of Paul

There is no more interesting body of documents in the New Testament than the letters of Paul. That is because of all forms of literature a letter is most personal. Demetrius, one of the old Greek literary critics, once wrote, "Every one reveals his own soul in his letters. In every other form of composition it is possible to discern the writercharacter, but in none so clearly as the epistolary." (Demetrius, On Style, 227). It is just because he left us so many letters that we feel we know Paul so well. In them he opened his mind and heart to the folk he loved so much; and in them, to this day, we can see that great mind grappling with the problems of the early church, and feel that great heart throbbing with love for men, even when they were misguided and mistaken.

The Difficulty Of Letters

At the same time, there is often nothing so difficult to understand as a letter. Demetrius (On Style, 223) quotes a saying of Artemon, who edited the letters of Aristotle. Artemon said that a letter ought to be written in the same manner as a dialogue, because it was one of the two sides of a dialogue. In other words, to read a letter is like listening to one side of a telephone conversation. So when we read the letters of Paul we are often in a difficulty. We do not possess the letter which he was answering; we do not fully know the circumstances with which he was dealing; it is only from the letter itself that we can deduce the situation which prompted it. Before we can hope to understand fully any letter Paul wrote, we must try to reconstruct the situation which produced it.

The Ancient Letters

It is a great pity that Paulletters were ever called epistles. They are in the most literal sense letters. One of the great lights shed on the interpretation of the New Testament has been the discovery and the publication of the papyri. In the ancient world, papyrus was the substance on which most documents were written. It was composed of strips of the pith of a certain bulrush that grew on the banks of the Nile. These strips were laid one on top of the other to form a substance very like brown paper. The sands of the Egyptian desert were ideal for preservation, for papyrus, although very brittle, will last forever so long as moisture does not get at it. As a result, from the Egyptian rubbish heaps, archaeologists have rescued hundreds of documents, marriage contracts, legal agreements, government forms, and, most interesting of all, private letters. When we read these private letters we find that there was a pattern to which nearly all conformed; and we find that Paulletters reproduce exactly that pattern. Here is one of these ancient letters. It is from a soldier, called Apion, to his father Epimachus. He is writing from Misenum to tell his father that he has arrived safely after a stormy passage.

"Apion sends heartiest greetings to his father and lord Epimachus.

I pray above all that you are well and fit; and that things are

going well with you and my sister and her daughter and my brother.

I thank my Lord Serapis [his god] that he kept me safe when I was

in peril on the sea. As soon as I got to Misenum I got my journey

money from Caesar--three gold pieces. And things are going fine

with me. So I beg you, my dear father, send me a line, first to let

me know how you are, and then about my brothers, and thirdly, that

I may kiss your hand, because you brought me up well, and because

of that I hope, God willing, soon to be promoted. Give Capito my

heartiest greetings, and my brothers and Serenilla and my friends.

I sent you a little picture of myself painted by Euctemon. My

military name is Antonius Maximus. I pray for your good health.

Serenus sends good wishes, Agathos Daimonboy, and Turbo,

Galloniuson." (G. Milligan, Selections from the Greek Papyri,

36).

Little did Apion think that we would be reading his letter to his father 1800 years after he had written it. It shows how little human nature changes. The lad is hoping for promotion quickly. Who will Serenilla be but the girl he left behind him? He sends the ancient equivalent of a photograph to the folk at home. Now that letter falls into certain sections. (i) There is a greeting. (ii) There is a prayer for the health of the recipients. (iii) There is a thanksgiving to the gods. (iv) There are the special contents. (v) Finally, there are the special salutations and the personal greetings. Practically every one of Paulletters shows exactly the same sections, as we now demonstrate.

(i) The Greeting: Rom_1:1 ; 1Co_1:1 ; 2Co_1:1 ; Gal_1:1 ; Eph_1:1 ; Phi_1:1 ; Col_1:1-2 ; 1Th_1:1 ; 2Th_1:1 .

(ii) The Prayer: in every case Paul prays for the grace of God on the people to whom he writes: Rom_1:7 ; 1Co_1:3 ; 2Co_1:2 ; Gal_1:3 ; Eph_1:2 ; Phi_1:3 ; Col_1:2 ; 1Th_1:1 ; 2Th_1:2 .

(iii) The Thanksgiving: Rom_1:8 ; 1Co_1:4 ; 2Co_1:3 ; Eph_1:3 ; Phi_1:3 ; 1Th_1:3 ; 2Th_1:3 .

(iv) The Special Contents: the main body of the letters.

(v) Special Salutations and Personal Greetings: Rom 16 ; 1Co_16:19 ; 2Co_13:13 ; Phi_4:21-22 ; Col_4:12-15 ; 1Th_5:26 .

When Paul wrote letters, he wrote them on the pattern which everyone used. Deissmann says of them, "They differ from the messages of the homely papyrus leaves of Egypt, not as letters but only as the letters of Paul." When we read Paulletters we are not reading things which were meant to be academic exercises and theological treatises, but human documents written by a friend to his friends.

The Immediate Situation

With a very few exceptions, all Paulletters were written to meet an immediate situation and not treatises which he sat down to write in the peace and silence of his study. There was some threatening situation in Corinth, or Galatia, or Philippi, or Thessalonica, and he wrote a letter to meet it. He was not in the least thinking of us when he wrote, but solely of the people to whom he was writing. Deissmann writes, "Paul had no thought of adding a few fresh compositions to the already extant Jewish epistles; still less of enriching the sacred literature of his nation. He had no presentiment of the place his words would occupy in universal history; not so much that they would be in existence in the next generation, far less that one day people would look at them as Holy Scripture." We must always remember that a thing need not be transient because it was written to meet an immediate situation. All the great love songs of the world were written for one person, but they live on for the whole of mankind. It is just because Paulletters were written to meet a threatening danger or a clamant need that they still throb with life. And it is because human need and the human situation do not change that God speaks to us through them today.

The Spoken Word

One other thing we must note about these letters. Paul did what most people did in his day. He did not normally pen his own letters but dictated them to a secretary, and then added his own authenticating signature. (We actually know the name of one of the people who did the writing for him. In Rom_16:22 Tertius, the secretary, slips in his own greeting before the letter draws to an end). In 1Co_16:21 Paul says, "This is my own signature, my autograph, so that you can be sure this letter comes from me." (compare Col_4:18 ; 2Th_3:17 .)

This explains a great deal. Sometimes Paul is hard to understand, because his sentences begin and never finish; his grammar breaks down and the construction becomes involved. We must not think of him sitting quietly at a desk, carefully polishing each sentence as he writes. We must think of him striding up and down some little room, pouring out a torrent Paul composed his letters, he had in his mindeye a vision of words, while his secretary races to get them down. When of the folk to whom he was writing, and he was pouring out his heart to them in words that fell over each other in his eagerness to help.

INTRODUCTION TO THE LETTERS TO TIMOTHY AND TITUS

Personal Letters

1 and 2 Timothy and Titus have always been regarded as forming a separate group of letters, different from the other letters of Paul. The most obvious difference is that they, along with the little letter to Philemon, are written to persons, whereas all other Pauline letters are written to Churches. The Muratorian Canon, which was the earliest official list of New Testament books, says that they were written "from personal feeling and affection." They are private rather than public letters.

Ecclesiastical Letters

But it very soon began to be seen that, though these are personal and private letters, they have a significance and a relevance far beyond the immediate. In 1Ti_3:15 their aim is set down. They are written to Timothy "that you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God." So, then, it came to be seen that these letters have not only a personal significance, but also what one might call an ecclesiastical significance. The Muratorian Canon says of them that, though they are personal letters written out of personal affection, "they are still hallowed in the respect of the Catholic Church, and in the arrangement of ecclesiastical discipline." Tertullian said that Paul wrote "two letters to Timothy and one to Titus, which were composed concerning the state of the Church (de ecclesiastico statu)." It is not then surprising that the first name given to them was Pontifical Letters, that is, written by the pontifex, the priest, the controller of the Church.

Pastoral Letters

Bit by bit they came to acquire the name by which they are still known--The Pastoral Epistles. In writing of I Timothy Thomas Aquinas, as long ago as 1274, said, "This letter is as it were a pastoral rule which the Apostle delivered to Timothy." In his introduction to the second letter, he writes, "In the first letter he gives Timothy instructions concerning ecclesiastical order; in this second letter he deals with a pastoral care which should be so great that it will even accept martyrdom for the sake of the care of the flock." But this title, The Pastoral Epistles, really became affixed to these letters in 1726 when a great scholar, Paul Anton by name, gave a series of famous lectures on them under that title.

These letters then deal with the care and organization of the flock of God; they tell men how to behave within the household of God; they give instructions as to how Godhouse should be administered, as to what kind of people the leaders and pastors of the Church should be, and as to how the threats which endanger the purity of Christian faith and life should be dealt with.

The Growing Church

The supreme interest of these letters is that we get in them a picture of the infant Church. In those early days it was an island in a sea of paganism. The people in it were only one remove from their heathen origin. It would have been so easy for them to relapse into the pagan standards from which they had come; the tarnishing atmosphere was all around. It is most significant that missionaries tell us that of all letters the Pastoral Epistles speak most directly to the situation of the younger Churches. The situation with which they deal is being re-enacted in India, in Africa, in China every day. They can never lose their interest because in them we see, as nowhere else, the problems which continually beset the growing Church.

The Ecclesiastical Background Of The Pastorals

From the beginning these letters have presented problems to New Testament scholars. There are many who have felt that, as they stand, they cannot have come directly from the hand and pen of Paul. That this is no new feeling may be seen from the fact that Marcion, who, although he was a heretic, was the first man to draw up a list of New Testament books, did not include them among Paulletters. Let us then see what makes people doubt their direct Pauline authorship.

In them we are confronted with the picture of a Church with a fairly highly developed ecclesiastical organization. There are elders (1Ti_5:17-19 ; Tit_1:5-6 ); there are bishops, superintendents or overseers (1Ti_3:1-7 ; Tit_1:7-16 ); there are deacons (1Ti_3:8-13 ). From 1Ti_5:17-18 we learn that by that time elders were even salaried officials. The elders that rule well are to be counted worthy of a double pay and the Church is urged to remember that the labourer is worthy of his hire. There is at least the beginning of the order of widows who became so prominent later on in the early Church (1Ti_5:3-16 ). There is clearly here a quite elaborate structure within the Church, too elaborate some would claim for the early days in which Paul lived and worked.

The Days Of Creeds

It is even claimed that in these letters we can see the days of creeds emerging. The word faith changed its meaning. In the earliest days it is always faith in a person; it is the most intimate possible personal connection of love and trust and obedience with Jesus Christ. In later days it became faith in a creed; it became the acceptance of certain doctrines. It is said that in the Pastoral Epistles we can see this change emerging.

In the later days men will come who will depart from the faith and give heed to doctrines of devils (1Ti_4:1 ). A good servant of Jesus Christ must be nourished in the words of faith and good doctrine (1Ti_4:6 ). The heretics are men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith (2Ti_3:8 ). The duty of Titus is to rebuke men that they may be sound in the faith (Tit_1:13 ).

This comes out very particularly in an expression peculiar to the Pastorals. Timothy is urged to keep hold of "the truth that has been entrusted to you" (2Ti_1:14 ). The word for that has been entrusted is paratheke (G3866). Paratheke means a deposit which has been entrusted to a banker or someone else for safe-keeping. It is essentially something which must be handed back or handed on absolutely unchanged. That is to say the stress is on orthodoxy. Instead of being a close, personal relationship to Jesus Christ, as it was in the thrilling and throbbing days of the early Church, faith has become the acceptance of a creed. It is even held that in the Pastorals we have echoes of the earliest creeds.

"God was manifested in the flesh;

Vindicated in the Spirit;

Seen by angels;

Preached among the nations;

Believed on in the world;

Taken up in glory" (1Ti_3:16 ).

That indeed sounds like the fragment of a creed to be recited.

"Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, descended from

David, as preached in my gospel" (2Ti_2:8 ).

That sounds like a reminder of a sentence from an accepted creed.

Within the Pastorals there undoubtedly are indications that the day of insistence on acceptance of a creed has begun, and that the days of the first thrilling personal discovery of Christ are beginning to fade.

A Dangerous Heresy

It is clear that in the forefront of the situation against which the Pastoral Epistles were written there was a dangerous heresy which was threatening the welfare of the Christian Church. If we can distinguish the various characteristic features of that heresy, we may be able to go on to identify it.

It was characterized by speculative intellectualism. It produced questions (1Ti_1:4 ); those involved in it doted about questions (1Ti_6:4 ); it dealt in foolish and unlearned questions (2Ti_2:23 ); its foolish questions are to be avoided (Tit_3:9 ). The word used in each case for questions is ekzetesis (compare G1567 and G2214), which means speculative discussion. This heresy was obviously one which was a play-ground of the intellectuals, or rather the pseudo-intellectuals of the Church.

It was characterized by pride. The heretic is proud, although in reality he knows nothing (1Ti_6:4 ). There are indications that these intellectuals set themselves on a plane above the ordinary Christian; in fact they may well have said that complete salvation was outside the grasp of the ordinary man and open only to them. At times the Pastoral Epistles stress the word all in a most significant way. The grace of God, which brings salvation, has appeared to all men (Tit_2:11 ). It is Godwill that all men should be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (1Ti_2:4 ). The intellectuals tried to make the greatest blessings of Christianity the exclusive possession of a chosen few; and in contradistinction the true faith stresses the all-embracing love of God.

There were within that heresy two opposite tendencies. There was a tendency to asceticism. The heretics tried to lay down special food laws, forgetting that everything God has made is good (1Ti_4:4-5 ). They listed many things as impure, forgetting that to the pure all things are pure (Tit_1:15 ). It is not impossible that they regarded sex as something unclean and belittled marriage, and even tried to persuade those who were married to renounce it, for in Tit_2:4 the simple duties of the married life are stressed as being binding on the Christian.

But this heresy also issued in immorality. The heretics even invaded private houses and led away weak and foolish women in evil desires (2Ti_3:6 ). They professed to know God, but denied him by their deeds (Tit_1:16 ). They were out to impose upon people and to make money out of their false teaching. To them gain was godliness (1Ti_6:5 ); they taught and deceived for base gain (Tit_1:11 ).

On the one hand this heresy issued in an unchristian asceticism, and on the other it produced an equally unchristian immorality.

It was characterized, too, by words and tales and genealogies. It was full of godless chatter and useless controversies (1Ti_6:20 ). It produced endless genealogies (1Ti_1:4 ; Tit_3:9 ). It produced myths and fables (1Ti_1:4 ; Tit_1:14 ).

It was at least in some way and to some extent tied up with Jewish legalism. Amongst its devotees were those of the circumcision (Tit_1:10 ). The aim of the heretics was to be teachers of the law (1Ti_1:7 ). It pressed on men Jewish fables and the commandments of men (Tit_1:14 ).

Finally, these heretics denied the resurrection of the body. They said that any resurrection that a man was going to experience had been experienced already (2Ti_2:18 ). This is probably a reference to those who held that the only resurrection the Christian experienced was a spiritual one when he died with Christ and rose again with him in the experience of baptism (Rom_6:4 ).

The Beginnings Of Gnosticism

Is there any heresy which fits all this material? There is, and its name is Gnosticism. The basic thought of Gnosticism was that all matter is essentially evil and spirit alone is good. That basic belief had certain consequences.

The Gnostic believed that matter is as eternal as God; and that when God created the world he had to use this essentially evil matter. That meant that to them God could not be the direct creator of the world. In order to touch this flawed matter he had to send out a series of emanations--they called them aeons--each one more and more distant from himself until at last there came an emanation or aeon so distant that it could deal with matter and create the world. Between man and God there stretched a series of these emanations, each with his name and genealogy. So Gnosticism literally had endless fables and endless genealogies. If a man was ever to get to God, he must, as it were, ascend this ladder of emanations; and to do that he needed a very special kind of knowledge including all kinds of passwords to get him past each stage. Only a person of the highest intellectual calibre could hope to acquire this knowledge and know these passwords and so get to God.

Further, if matter was altogether evil, the body was altogether evil. From that, two opposite possible consequences sprang. Either the body must be held down so that a rigorous asceticism resulted, in which the needs of the body were as far as possible eliminated and its instincts, especially the sex instinct, as far as possible destroyed; or it could be held that, since it was evil, it did not matter what was done with the body and its instincts and desires could be given full rein. The Gnostic therefore became either an ascetic or a man to whom morality had ceased to have any relevance at all.

Still further, if the body was evil, clearly there could be no such thing as its resurrection. It was not the resurrection of the body but its destruction to which the Gnostic looked forward.

All this fits accurately the situation of the Pastoral Epistles. In Gnosticism we see the intellectualism, the intellectual arrogance, the fables and the genealogies, the asceticism and the immorality, the refusal to contemplate the possibility of a bodily resurrection, which were part and parcel of the heresy against which the Pastoral Epistles were written.

One element in the heresy has not yet been fitted into place--the Judaism and the legalism of which the Pastoral Epistles speak. That too finds its place. Sometimes Gnosticism and Judaism joined hands. We have already said that the Gnostics insisted that to climb the ladder to God a very special knowledge was necessary; and that some of them insisted that for the good life a strict asceticism was essential. It was the claim of certain of the Jews that it was precisely the Jewish law and the Jewish food regulations which provided that special knowledge and necessary asceticism; and so there were times when Judaism and Gnosticism went hand in hand.

It is quite clear that the heresy at the back of the Pastoral Epistles was Gnosticism. Some have used that fact to try to prove that Paul could have had nothing to do with the writing of them, because, they say, Gnosticism did not emerge until much later than Paul. It is quite true that the great formal systems of Gnosticism, connected with such names as Valentinus and Basilides, did not arise until the second century; but these great figures only systematized what was already there. The basic ideas of Gnosticism were there in the atmosphere which surrounded the early Church, even in the days of Paul. It is easy to see their attraction, and also to see that, if they had been allowed to flourish unchecked, they could have turned Christianity into a speculative philosophy and wrecked it. In facing Gnosticism, the Church was facing one of the gravest dangers which ever threatened the Christian faith.

The Language Of The Pastorals

The most impressive argument against the direct Pauline origin of the Pastorals is a fact which is quite clear in the Greek but not so clear in any English translation. The total number of words in the Pastoral Epistles is 902, of which 54 are proper names; and of these 902 words, no fewer than 306 never occur in any other of Paulletters. That is to say more than a third of the words in the Pastoral Epistles are totally absent from Paulother letters. In fact 175 words in the Pastoral Epistles occur nowhere else in the New Testament at all; although it is only fair to say that there are 50 words in the Pastoral Epistles which occur in Paulother letters and nowhere else in the New Testament.

Further, when the other letters of Paul and the Pastorals say the same thing they say it in different ways, using different words and different turns of speech to express the same idea.

Again, many of Paulfavourite words are absent entirely from the Pastoral Epistles. The words for the cross (stauros, G4716) and to crucify (stauroun, G4717) occur 27 times in Paulother letters, and never in the Pastorals. Eleutheria (G1657) and the kindred words which have to do with freedom occur 29 times in Paulother letters, and never in the Pastorals. Huios (G5207), "son," and huiothesia (G5206), "adoption," occur 46 times in Paulother letters, and never in the Pastorals.

Moreover, Greek has many more of those little words called particles and enclitics than English has. Sometimes they indicate little more than a tone of voice; every Greek sentence is joined to its predecessor by one of them; and they are often virtually untranslatable. Of these particles and enclitics there are 112 which Paul uses altogether 932 times in his other letters that never occur in the Pastorals.

There is clearly something which has to be explained here. The vocabulary and the style make it hard to believe that Paul wrote the Pastoral Epistles in the same sense as he wrote his other letters.

PaulActivities In The Pastorals

But perhaps the most obvious difficulty of the Pastorals is that they show Paul engaged in activities for which there is no room in his life as we know it from the book of Acts. He has clearly conducted a mission in Crete (Tit_1:5 ). And he proposes to spend a winter in Nicopolis, which is in Epirus (Tit_3:12 ). In Paullife as we know it that particular mission and that particular winter just cannot be fitted in. But it may well be that just here we have stumbled on the solution to the problem.

Was Paul Released From His Roman Imprisonment?

Let us sum up. We have seen that the Church organization of the Pastorals is more elaborate than in any other Pauline letter. We have seen that the stress on orthodoxy sounds like second or third generation Christianity, when the thrill of the new discovery is wearing off and the Church is on the way to becoming an institution. We have seen that Paul is depicted as carrying out a mission or missions which cannot be fitted into the scheme of his life as we have it in Acts. But Acts leaves it quite uncertain what happened to Paul in Rome. It ends by telling us that he lived for two whole years in a kind of semi-captivity, preaching the gospel without hindrance (Act_28:30-31 ). But it does not tell us how that captivity ended, whether in Paulrelease or his execution. It is true that the general assumption is that it ended in his condemnation and death; but there is a by no means negligible stream of tradition which tells that it ended in his release, his liberty for two or three further years, his reimprisonment and his final execution about the year A.D. 67.

Let us look at this question, for it is of the greatest interest.

First, it is clear that when Paul was in prison in Rome, he did not regard release as impossible; in fact, it looks as if he expected it. When he wrote to the Philippians, he said that he was sending Timothy to them, and goes on, "And I trust in the Lord that shortly I myself shall come also" (Phi_2:24 ). When he wrote to Philemon, sending back the runaway Onesimus, he says, "At the same time prepare a guest room for me, for I am hoping through your prayers to be granted to you" (Phm_1:22 ). Clearly he was prepared for release, whether or not it ever came.

Second, let us remember a plan that was very dear to Paulheart. Before he went to Jerusalem on that journey on which he was arrested, he wrote to the Church at Rome, and in that letter he is planning a visit to Spain. "I hope to see you in passing," he writes, "as I go to Spain." "I shall go on by way of you," he writes, "to Spain" (Rom_15:24 , Rom_15:28 ). Was that visit ever paid?

Clement of Rome, when he wrote to the Church at Corinth about A.D. 90, said of Paul that he preached the gospel in the East and in the West; that he instructed the whole world (that is, the Roman Empire) in righteousness; and that he went to the extremity (terma, the terminus) of the West, before his martyrdom. What did Clement mean by the extremity of the West? There are many who argue that he meant nothing more than Rome. Now it is true that someone writing away in the East in Asia Minor would probably think of Rome as the extremity, of the West. But Clement was writing from Rome; and it is difficult to see that for anyone in Rome the extremity of the West could be anything else but Spain. It certainly seems that Clement believed that Paul reached Spain.

The greatest of all the early Church historians was Eusebius. In his account of Paullife he writes: "Luke who wrote the Acts of the Apostles, brought his history to a close at this point, after stating that Paul had spent two whole years at Rome as a prisoner at large, and preached the word of God without constraint. Thus, after he had made his defence, it is said that the Apostle was sent again on the ministry of preaching, and that on coming to the same city a second time he suffered martyrdom" (Eusebius: Ecclesiastical History, 2.22.2). Eusebius has nothing to say about Spain, but he did know the story that Paul had been released from his first Roman imprisonment.

The Muratorian Canon, that first list of New Testament books, describes Lukescheme in writing Acts: "Luke related to Theophilus events of which he was an eye-witness, as also, in a separate place, he evidently declares the martyrdom of Peter (he probably refers to Luk_22:31-32 ); but omits the journey of Paul from Rome to Spain."

In the fifth century, two of the great Christian fathers are definite about this journey. Chrysostom in his sermon on 2Ti_4:20 says: "Saint Paul after his residence in Rome departed to Spain." Jerome in his Catalogue of Writers says that Paul "was dismissed by Nero that he might preach Christgospel in the West."

Beyond doubt a stream of tradition held that Paul journeyed to Spain.

This is a matter on which we will have to come to our own decision. The one thing which makes us doubt the historicity of that tradition is that in Spain itself there is not and never was any tradition that Paul had worked and preached there, no stories about him, no places connected with his name. It would be indeed strange if the memory of such a visit had become totally obliterated. It could well be that the whole story of Paulrelease and journey to the west arose simply as a deduction from his expressed intention to visit Spain (Rom 15 ). Most New Testament scholars do not think that Paul was released from his imprisonment; the general consensus of opinion is that his only release was by death.

Paul And The Pastoral Epistles

What then shall we say of Paulconnection with these letters? If we can accept the tradition of his release, and of his return to preaching and teaching, and of his death as late as A.D. 67, we might well believe that as they stand they came from his hand. But, if we cannot believe that--and the evidence is on the whole against it--are we to say that they have no connection with Paul at all?

We must remember that the ancient world did not think of these things as we do. It would see nothing wrong in issuing a letter under the name of a great teacher, if it was sure that the letter said the things which that teacher would say under the same circumstances. To the ancient world it was natural and seemly that a disciple should write in his mastername. No one would have seen anything wrong in one of Pauldisciples meeting a new and threatening situation with a letter under Paulname. To regard that as forgery is to misunderstand the mind of the ancient world. Are we then to swing completely to the other extreme and say that some disciple of his issued these letters in Paulname years after he was dead, and at a time when the Church was much more highly organized than ever it was during his lifetime?

As we see it, the answer is no. It is incredible that any disciple would put into Paulmouth a claim to be the chief of sinners (1Ti_1:15 ); his tendency would be to stress Paulholiness, not to talk about his sin. It is incredible that anyone writing in the name of Paul would give Timothy the homely advice to drink a little wine for the sake of his health (1Ti_5:23 ). The whole of 2Tim 4 is so personal and so full of intimate, loving details that no one but Paul could have written it.

Wherein lies the solution? It may well be that something like this happened. It is quite obvious that many letters of Paul went lost. Apart from his great public letters, he must have had a continuous private correspondence; and of that we possess only the little letter to Philemon. It may well be that in the later days there were some fragments of Paulcorrespondence in the possession of some Christian teacher. This teacher saw the Church of his day and his locality in Ephesus threatened on every side. It was threatened with heresy from without and from within. It was threatened with a fall away from its own high standards of purity and truth. The quality of its members and the standard of its office-bearers were degenerating. He had in his possession little letters of Paul which said exactly the things that should be said, but, as they stood, they were too short and too fragmentary to publish. So he amplified them and made them supremely relevant to the contemporary situation and sent them out to the Church.

In the Pastoral Epistles we are still hearing the voice of Paul, and often hearing it speak with a unique personal intimacy; but we think that the form of the letters is due to a Christian teacher who summoned the help of Paul when the Church of the day needed the guidance which only he could give.

FURTHER READING

Titus

D. Guthrie, The Pastoral Epistles (TC; E)

W. Lock, The Pastoral Epistles (ICC; G)

E. F. Scott, The Pastoral Epistles (MC; E)

E. K. Simpson, The Pastoral Epistles

Abbreviations

CGT: Cambridge Greek Testament

ICC: International Critical Commentary

MC: Moffatt Commentary

TC: Tyndale Commentary

E: English Text

G: Greek Text

Barclay: Titus 3 (Chapter Introduction)

The Christian Citizen (Tit_3:1-2)

The Double Dynamic (Tit_3:3-7)

Cause And Effect (Tit_3:3-7 Continued)

The Necessity Of Action And The Danger Of Discussion (Tit_3:8-11)

Final Greetings (Tit_3:12-15)

Constable: Titus (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Historical background

Paul may have visited Crete more than once. It seems unlikely that he would have had time to plant a church in Crete on his way to Rome as a prisoner (Acts 27:7-13, 21). One may have already been in existence then (cf. Acts 2:11). Perhaps Paul returned to Crete following his release from his first Roman imprisonment. In any case, he had been there and had instructed Titus to remain there when he departed (Titus 1:5).

Evidently Paul wrote Titus after he wrote 1 Timothy. Titus 3:12 seems to indicate that his plans were more settled than when he wrote 1 Timothy 3:14.¹

Titus was a Greek Gentile (Gal. 2:3). He had probably become a Christian under the influence of Paul and had become one of the apostle's protégés (Titus 1:4). Titus had been with Paul since the apostle's early ministry. He accompanied Paul and Barnabas on their mission of mercy to the Jerusalem church when Paul was laboring in Antioch of Syria, Titus' home. This happened before Paul's first missionary journey (Gal. 2:1; Acts 11:27-30). Titus was also Paul's special representative to the Corinthian church during Paul's third missionary journey. He carried the "severe letter" from Ephesus (2 Cor. 12:18; cf. 2 Cor. 2:3-4; 7:8-12) and returning to Ephesus through Macedonia met Paul in Macedonia (2 Cor. 7:6-16). He was, in addition, the leader of the group of men Paul sent to the churches in Macedonia and Achaia to pick up the collection for the poor saints in Jerusalem (2 Cor. 8:6, 16, 23).

"Tradition has it that Titus, having become first bishop of Crete, died there in advanced years. His successor, Andreas Cretensis, eulogized him in the following terms: The first foundation-stone of the Cretan church; the pillar of the truth; the stay of the faith; the never silent trumpet of the evangelical message; the exalted echo of Paul's own voice'."²

Paul left Titus in Crete to set the church there in order (Titus 1:5).³ However, he planned to send Artemas or Tychicus to relieve Titus so Titus could join Paul in Nicapolis for the winter (3:12). There were several towns with the name "Nicapolis" in Paul's arena of ministry. This one was probably the one in Illyricum (parts of modern Yugoslavia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and northern Albania) that lay east of northern Italy across the Adriatic Sea. When Paul wrote 2 Timothy, Titus was with him (2 Tim. 4:10, Dalmatia being another name for Illyricum). Perhaps Paul also wrote this letter from Nicapolis or maybe from Macedonia (1 Tim. 1:3) or some other place. A date between 62 and 66 A.D. seems a safe estimate for the time of its composition. Zenas and Apollos may have delivered this letter to Titus on Crete (Titus 3:13).

The churches on the island of Crete were unorganized, though there appear to have been Christians in many of its cities (1:5). Titus' task of setting the churches in order included dealing with false teachers (1:10-11). The Cretans had a reputation for being idle and somewhat corrupt (1:12). These traits apparently characterized some of the faithful as well as the false teachers (3:14). Part of Titus' task consisted of motivating them to change.

"Nowhere else does Paul more forcefully urge the essential connection between evangelical truth and the purest morality than in this brief letter."⁴

"The dominant theme in Titus, therefore, is good works (1:8, 16; 2:7, 14; 3:1, 8, 14), that is, exemplary Christian behavior and that for the sake of outsiders (2:5, 7, 8, 10, 11; 3:1, 8)."⁵

Message⁶

By way of review, in 1 Timothy we saw that the purpose of the local church is to be the supporting pedestal of God's truth. To fulfill this function each church needs proper organization. In Titus, Paul emphasized the importance of church organization. In 2 Timothy he emphasized the importance of church leadership.

It is significant that this letter deals with a church in a very difficult place, Crete (1:12-13a). It is also noteworthy that in this letter Paul revealed that Christians in this difficult place could adorn the doctrine of God (2:9-10). Even those Christians in the most trying of circumstances in that difficult place (i.e., slaves) can adorn the doctrine of God. To show the true spiritual power of the church God selected the most difficult soil. In this way the Holy Spirit teaches us that the church can fulfill its purpose in the most dark, desolate, difficult places on earth. He can do so even through people whose situations in life are the most trying.

The subject of revelation in the epistle is the true church of Jesus Christ. What Paul said about the church is that it must be orderly. We could write, "Let everything be done decently and in order," (1 Cor. 14:40) over this book.

First, Paul revealed the motive of church order, why the church must be orderly. It must be orderly because people must come to the knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness (1:1; 1 Tim. 3:16). Godliness is the end product of the gospel. The mystery of godliness is what the church supports and displays to the world. The business of the church is to correct and convict those who speak against godliness (1:9). It does this by revealing God's truth. Its business is to counteract the influence of evil people (2:12).

The Cretans were liars (1:12). Christians are to live sensibly (2:12). Cretans were evil beasts. Christians are to live righteously. Cretans were lazy gluttons. Christians are to be godly. Negatively Christians do this by denying ungodliness and worldly lusts (2:12).

Second, Paul revealed the method of church order, how the church can be orderly. It is by the oversight of overseers (1:7). An overseer (elder) is by definition one who sees clearly what is going on. An overseer in the church needs to see three things clearly.

He must see God's truth clearly (1:9). He must know the Word of God.

He must also see the conditions in which the people under his care live. An elder who does not know what is going on in the lives of the Christians in his church cannot exercise oversight (1:9).

He must also see clearly the method of oversight God has prescribed. His duties include enunciating the truth (teaching), applying the truth (exhorting), and urging obedience to the truth (reproving; 2:15).

Third, Paul revealed the might of church order, what the church has that enables it to be orderly (2:11-14). The power of an ordered church lies in two "appearings." The first is the appearing of grace at the first advent. The second is the appearing of glory at the second advent. The revelation of the grace of God in the Cross should motivate the church. The revelation of the glory of God when Christ returns for us at the Rapture should also motivate the church. We gain motivation as we look backward and forward at our Lord's two appearings.

The appeal of Paul in this epistle is that the church be true to Jesus Christ. The church as a whole, individual Christians, and the church overseers each have a responsibility to this end.

First, the responsibility of the church as a whole (all Christians in a local church) is to adorn the doctrine (2:10). Paul commanded this of slaves. If they could do it, all others can. "Adorn" is a translation of the Greek word kosmeo from kosmos meaning order and beauty. The verb also occurs in Matthew 25:7 where it reads "trimmed." When we remove the burned off part of a wick, the flame burns brighter. Just so when we trim a life or a church of sin and encumbrances, it bears a brighter witness to Christ. This process of trimming is what it means to adorn the doctrine. To adorn means to set forth attractively, as a musician does who plays a piece of music beautifully. This is a corporate as well as an individual responsibility.

Second, the responsibility of the individual Christian is to maintain good works (3:8). This does not refer just to charity or philanthropy. It refers to doing truly noble and beautiful works from the best of motives (cf. Eph. 2:10).

Third, the duty of the overseer is to affirm the essentials of the faith confidently (3:8). G. Campbell Morgan wrote, "We do not help men and women to adorn the doctrine when we debate our doubts in their presence."⁷ We should preach our convictions, not our questions.

By way of application this epistle teaches several things.

First, the church will be powerful in the world to the extent that it reveals God's truth. Its influence does not lie primarily in its ability to lobby for political change. Its influence lies mainly in its ability to proclaim and demonstrate God's truth to the world.

Second, it teaches that church leaders must be people who are under the rule of God's truth. We should not select them because of their business experience, social influence, or wealth. It is the spiritual life of a man mastered by the truth of God that qualifies him for church leadership.

Third, this epistle teaches that the power of an overseer is that of God's truth, not that of his office. No real power comes because a person fills an office. Real power comes as a result of a person's example and words. A church's elders should be her most spiritually influential men.

Fourth, Titus teaches that the measure of the success of a church's overseers is the extent to which the church members fulfill their function in the world. The measure of success is not the number of people attending services. It is the number and effectiveness of people proclaiming God's truth in the world by their godly lives and verbal witness. How much ministry are the saints carrying on during the week?

The church then must be orderly so that it can fulfill its function, namely to proclaim God's truth in the world. This is a statement of the message of the book.

Constable: Titus (Outline)

Outline

I. Salutation 1:1-4

II. Instructions for setting the church in order 1:5-3:11

A. The appointment of elders 1:5-9

B. The correction of false teachers 1:10-16

C. The conduct of the saints 2:1-3:11

1. The behavior of various groups in the church 2:1-15

2. The behavior of all in the church 3:1-11

III. Conclusion 3:12-15

Constable: Titus

Titus

Bibliography

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Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

Haydock: Titus (Book Introduction)

THE

EPISTLE OF ST. PAUL, THE APOSTLE,

TO TITUS.

INTRODUCTION.

The design of this epistle is much the same as in the two former to Timothy. He had made this his beloved son Titus, chief bishop of Crete; in which island were formerly a hundred cities, on which account it was called Hecatompolis. It is now called Candy. We have a commentary of St. Jerome on this epistle, tom. iv, p. 409. E. B. (Witham) --- Titus was an uncircumcised Gentile: we know not on what occasion he attached himself to St. Paul. It is however certain that he was a great utility to St. Paul in the government of the Church. --- St. Paul having preached the faith in the island of Crete, left his beloved Titus there to finish the work which he had begun. Afterwards the apostle, on a journey to Nicopolis, a city of Macedonia, wrote this epistle to Titus; in which he directs him to ordain bishops and priests for the different cities, shewing him the principal qualities necessary for the bishop, also gives him particular advice for his own conduct to his flock, exhorting him to hold to strictness of discipline, but seasoned with lenity. It was written about thirty-three years after our Lord's ascension. (Challoner)

====================

Gill: Titus (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO TITUS

Titus, to whom this epistle is inscribed, was a Greek, an uncircumcised Gentile, and so remained; nor did the apostle circumcise him, as he did Timothy, when he became his companion; nor did the apostles at Jerusalem oblige him to be circumcised, when Paul took him with Barnabas along with him thither, Gal 2:1. He was a man of great grace, and large gifts, and very dear to the apostle: he calls him his brother, his partner, and fellow helper, and says he walked in the same spirit, and in the same steps, 2Co 2:13. He was employed by the apostle much, and sent into various parts, on different occasions: he sent him to Corinth, to finish there the collection for the poor saints at Jerusalem, 2Co 8:6 and to Dalmatia, to know the state of the saints there, and to confirm them in the faith, 2Ti 4:10. As he was a Greek, so his name is a Greek name, yet used among the Romans, as Titus Vespasian, and others ^a; and among the Jews, so we read of R. Chijah bar ojyj, "Titas" ^b, and of R. Judah ben Titas ^c: when and where this epistle was written, is not very easy to determine; some think it was written between the first and second time the apostle was in bonds at Rome; and certain it is, that he was not in bonds when he wrote it, for he desires Titus to meet him at Nicopolis, Tit 3:19 from whence some have supposed it to be written, as the subscription shows; but others think it was wrote much earlier, and when the apostle was at Ephesus, towards the close of his three years stay there, before he went into Macedonia; but it seems rather that it was written when he returned from Macedonia into Greece: he left Titus at Crete, and staying in Greece three months, he intended to have sailed to Syria, but was prevented by the Jews lying in wait for him, upon which he steered his course to Macedonia again; and as he was going there, or when there, writes this letter to Titus, to come to him at Nicopolis. The occasion of it was partly the judaizing preachers, and false teachers, that got into that island, and were corrupting the principles of the people; and partly the unbecoming conversation and practices of some professors of religion: and whereas the apostle had left Titus in Crete, to finish what he had begun, and to put the churches in order, and see that they had proper officers, particularly pastors over them, that they might be taken care of, both with respect to doctrine and practice; the design of this epistle is to lay before Titus the several qualifications of a pastor, which might be instruction to him, and to the churches, in the choice and ordination of them; and to stir him up to zeal and diligence in refuting false teachers, and dealing with heretics; and to put him upon exhorting the saints to the discharge of their duty, in every branch of it, from the best principles, by arguments taken from the grace of God, and the doctrines of it. This epistle is supposed to be written about the year 55.

Gill: Titus 3 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO TITUS 3

In this chapter the apostle exhorts Titus to press various duties incumbent on Christians, with arguments engaging to them; gives him some directions about dealing with heretics, and some instructions about private matters, and particular persons, and closes it with salutations. And first, he charges him to put his hearers in mind of their duty, to be subject to civil magistrates, and readily perform whatever is right and proper for them to do; and to abstain from blaspheming and brawling, and to exercise gentleness and meekness to all men, Tit 3:1. The arguments inducing thereunto are taken partly from their former state and condition, while unregenerate: when they were as ignorant and as wicked as other men, they are exhorted to behave well to; and partly from the consideration of the salvation they were now partakers of, Tit 3:3 which leads on the apostle to give an account of its causes and means: the moving cause of it is the love and mercy of God; the way and means in which it is brought about, are not works of righteousness done by men, but the regenerating and renewing grace of the Spirit, which is plentifully bestowed through Jesus Christ the Saviour, and justification by the free grace of God, by virtue of which men become heirs unto, and have an hope of eternal life, Tit 3:4 which several blessings of grace should be constantly insisted on in the ministry of the word, in order to engage believers carefully to perform good works; and because such doctrines are good in themselves, and profitable to men; whereas questions, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law, are foolish, vain, and unprofitable, and to be avoided, Tit 3:8, wherefore an heretical man should be rejected from all Christian conversation and communion, after he has been admonished at least twice, seeing he is off of the foundation, has sinned, and is self-condemned, Tit 3:10. Next the apostle desires Titus to meet him at Nicopolis, where his design was to pass the winter, upon sending two ministering brethren to Crete, who are mentioned by name, Tit 3:12 and that he would accommodate two others, who are also named, with everything convenient for their journey, Tit 3:13 and charges him to exhort the brethren under his care to learn to be diligent and industrious in the performance of good works, which have their necessary uses, and prevent unfruitfulness, Tit 3:13. And the epistle is concluded with salutations, and the apostle's usual benediction, Tit 3:15.

College: Titus (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION

PLACE OF ORIGIN AND DATE

At the time of writing Titus, Paul was in or on his way to Nicopolis where he planned to spend the winter (3:12). Titus had been left at Crete to complete the work which he and Paul had begun (1:5). The only other reference to Crete in the New Testament occurs when Paul spent time at the harbor of Fair Havens (Acts 27:8). Because of the brevity of that stay, it is unlikely that Paul engaged in evangelistic work at that time. While it is possible that Paul completed evangelistic work in Crete during some of the gaps in Acts (cf. the details in 2 Cor 11:23-29 which are not narrated in Acts), it seems probable that Titus - like 1 Timothy - occurred after Paul's release from the "house arrest" of Acts 28:30 but before the later arrest assumed by 2 Timothy.

While Robinson argues for a date of A.D. 57 for Titus with Paul writing the work on his way to Jerusalem, thus finding a place for the book within the chronology of Acts, few scholars find this suggestion plausible. Those who hold that Titus is pseudonymous date the book in the second century (see on The Place of Origin and Date of 1 Timothy). Those who hold to Pauline authorship date the book before 2 Timothy and in the same time period as 1 Timothy, the mid 60s.

DESTINATION AND AUDIENCE

In contrast to the work at Ephesus where Timothy was working with an established church, Titus' task was to grow a church in a climate that was less than desirable. Timothy's task was to maintain a healthy eldership, but Titus was called upon to appoint elders for a young church.

Titus himself is not mentioned in the book of Acts. He was a Gentile and became Paul's test case for circumcision, securing for Gentiles a gospel separate from the law (Gal 2:1, 3). In all likelihood he was one of Paul's converts (Titus 1:4). He was probably a co-worker with Paul from the early years of Paul's ministry and, as such, was trusted with some very difficult situations (2 Cor 2:3-4, 13; 7:6-16; 8:16-24). After Titus and Paul had evangelized the island of Crete, Titus had been left to set things in order in the churches. He was soon to be replaced by Artemas and to join Paul in Nicopolis (Titus 3:12).

As Titus ministered to the church in Crete, he confronted hostile environs. This small island in the Mediterranean Sea was, at best, an outpost. Its inhabitants were known for their lying, gluttony, and laziness (Titus 1:12, 13).

THE CONTRIBUTION OF TITUS

Titus is very much like 1 Timothy. Only two passages (2:11-14; 3:3-7) have no corresponding material in 1 Timothy. Fee has noted that "Titus has often been viewed as a miniature 1 Timothy and, except for 2:11-14 and 3:3-7, has been treated with benign neglect." There are, however, some striking differences between Titus and 1 Timothy. First the church at Crete had only recently been established while the church at Ephesus had been in existence for some time. As Fee has noted, even the lack of urgency in terms of Paul's instructions to the young evangelist and in terms of the false teachers may indicate that he is preparing the evangelist and the church for what they may face rather than what they are already facing.

The dominant theme in Titus is good works (1:8, 16; 2:7, 14; 3:1, 8, 14). These good works will provide this young church and its minister with a means of affecting outsiders (2:5, 7, 8, 10, 11; 3:1, 8).

-College Press New Testament Commentary: with the NIV

College: Titus (Outline)

OUTLINE

I. SALUTATION - 1:1-4

II. APPOINTING ELDERS - 1:5-16

A. Qualification of Elders - 1:5-9

B. Elders' Duty to False Teachers - 1:10-16

III. INSTRUCTIONS FOR VARIOUS GROUPS - 2:1-15

A. Behavior and Sound Doctrine - 2:1

B. Instructions for Older Men - 2:2

C. Instructions for Older Women - 2:3

D. Instructions for Younger Women - 2:4-5

E. Instructions for Younger Men - 2:6-8

F. Instructions for Slaves - 2:9-10

G. The Theological Basis for the Christian Life - 2:11-15

IV. STANDARDS FOR CHRISTIAN BEHAVIOR - 3:1-11

A. Respect for Government Authorities - 3:1

B. Respect for All - 3:2

C. The Theological Basis for Living with Non-Christians - 3:3-8

D. Final Warnings Concerning False Teachers and the Divisive - 3:9-11

V. PERSONAL DIRECTIONS AND CLOSING SALUTATIONS - 3:12-15

-College Press New Testament Commentary: with the NIV