Careful to Maintain Good Works

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Well, it has taken me years to learn and it has taken my wife years to learn that I am not a great multitasker. Some of you make it look easy. I am not one of those people.

When we first got married, I realized she can do about seven things at one time and do them all well. And I don’t relate to that at all. She would get frustrated with me early on.

you know, why can’t you, I need you to do this. I’m already working on the last three things you gave me and I can do one, one and a half things at a time. Okay.

Meaning I can do one thing well and another thing not so well. And you know, sometimes I think that might be generous to say, I can do one and a half things. Friday night, I was trying to put some shelves together, They’re trying to get my workshop cleaned up so I can build her a kitchen table.

And so I was trying to get these shelves put together, and there are these little lines on the shelf, and you have to get real close and count how many up to go to put the brackets on and make sure they’re even. So I’m trying to count these brackets, which is already taxing because I’ve had to take some of them off because I’ve got them wrong. And I’m trying to count these brackets, and then Benjamin walks up and starts wanting to ask questions.

So I’m trying to count the brackets and answer his questions, and I can feel the gears in my brain start to squeal like somebody’s tires peeling out. I’m on overload here. It just did not work.

Frequently, I have to pause the TV when Charla talks to me. Some of you women may be nudging your husband saying, why don’t you do that? But I know there’s going to be a test later on what she said.

And if I don’t pause the TV, I’m not going to hear it. And she and her mother tease me all the time about if they’re talking to me, if they’re just in the kitchen talking or whatever, and they talk to me, they’ve learned that they have to say, Jared, and get my attention. Because they would be talking to each other, and then they’d talk to me, and then they’d talk to each other, and then they’d talk to me, and then they’d ask me a question, and I wouldn’t respond.

I’d say, didn’t you hear any of that? Any of what? and early on I told him you weren’t talking to me my mother always taught me not to eavesdrop I just tune it out I’m doing something else I can’t multitask and focus on what I’m doing and your conversation at the same time and it frustrated her but she’s learned to I won’t say she’s learned to live with it she’s learned to work around it and so she’ll get my attention I’m just terrible at trying to do two things at one time a lot of us are terrible at trying to do two things at one time you know what, a church a lot of times is going to be terrible at trying to do two things at one time.

And I realize there are several facets to our mission. Our mission is to glorify God and make disciples. And there are several ways that we accomplish that.

But if we’re trying to focus on more than one mission at a time, we’re not going to do either of them well. So if we’re trying to, if we’re trying to focus on that mission and meanwhile make ourselves the most attractive church to the community, the church that just, that might happen. God might send us boatloads of people.

But if we’re trying to do this really well and trying to do this really well, or we’re trying to, you know, we’re trying to build up the biggest bank account or we’re trying, anything else other than this mission is going to distract from this mission. We’re not going to be able to accomplish both of them at the same time as well as we could if we just focused on one and did it the best we could. And Paul in the book of Titus writes about this need for the church to focus on one thing.

Now his focus of his text isn’t necessarily on focusing and doing one thing, but he tells the church you have a choice to make here between what God’s put you here to do and what you’re wanting to do. And you need to focus on one or the other because you’re not going to accomplish both. You can only, much like me, the churches in Crete could not accomplish both of these things.

And so we’re going to be in Titus chapter 3 tonight. Titus chapter 3, if you would stand with me as we read together. Titus chapter 3, we’re just going to look at a few verses tonight.

Starting in verse 8. Titus chapter 3, starting in verse 8. This is a faithful saying, and these things I want you to affirm constantly, that those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works.

These things are good and profitable to men. But avoid foolish disputes, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law, for they are unprofitable and useless. Reject a divisive man after the first and second admonition, knowing that such a person is warped and sinning, being self-condemned.

And you may be seated. If you’re wondering there, where do you get the part about not multitasking? Because in verse 8, He says, here’s what you do.

And then starting in verse 9, He says, and you can’t do it while you’re doing this. Do these things, but avoid these. Because if we’re doing the things that are listed in verses 9, 10, and 11, we’re not going to be focused on doing what’s found in verse 8.

He says, do this, avoid this. And when people go for the things that are listed in verses 9 through 11, it leads to division. It leads to division in the church.

It leads to division in the spirit. And what we see is that division in the church usually arises when we pursue our own agendas instead of obedience to God first. And I want to preface all of this tonight by saying much like with my lesson on Nehemiah Wednesday night, I’m bringing this to you tonight not because of any problem I’m aware of, not to correct you about anything, but because we’re studying through the book of Titus and this was the next thing Paul addressed. But I’ll say this too, that just because something isn’t an issue now doesn’t mean that it won’t ever be an issue.

And so I think sometimes the best time to talk about these things is before they become an issue and know what God’s Word says so we can avoid those things. So when we pursue our own agendas in the church, whether it’s you or whether it’s me, it a lot of times will lead to division if we’re focused on that instead of obedience to God first. Now what do I mean by an agenda? I mean, the things that I want and want to fight for.

I had a man a few years ago come to me just complaining about the way a vote went at a business meeting. I think it had something to do with the time we were starting Wednesday night services. And we changed it or changed it back.

Anyway, I really don’t remember all the details of it now, but he wasn’t happy with the schedule. I said, look, this was a vote of the church. And I had my preference.

I didn’t get my preference. Well, I don’t like it. And I said, I don’t like that they voted to do that.

I said, I’m the pastor here and I don’t always get my way. So none of us do. And it should be that way.

It should be where, you know, nobody’s getting their way all the time. But I said, you know, I think with this particular whatever we were doing, I was on the, I didn’t vote because I was moderating the meeting. But I said, you know, my preference was not the one that won the day either.

I said but when I listened to their reasons for you know we should move the starting time of Wednesday night back because we’ve got people we’d like to invite and they don’t get off work until five and I said they had valid reasons and I realized my preference didn’t matter there was something more important here and so that when I say our agendas I mean the things that that we want to see happen and the things that we want to push for that really aren’t all that important and they detract from what we’re really supposed to be focused on. We all have them. I have them.

You have them. The main thing is that we don’t try to make them the main thing. All right.

So he tells us some things here to avoid foolish disputes, genealogies, contentions, and strivings about the law. Now we need to look at what, what each of these means. Foolish disputes would be the things where I’d say it’s majoring on the minors.

And you probably all heard that expression before. You probably could all tell stories, if we stopped and did that tonight, about a time you’ve seen somebody major on the minors and it caused trouble at church. I’ve seen people get upset about the order of service for the Lord’s Supper.

I’ve seen somebody along the same lines. There’s a verse when Paul wrote to the church at Corinth about the Lord’s Supper that says, do you not have houses to eat and drink in? because the church at Corinth was turning the Lord’s Supper into a big drunken party.

And so he was arguing against that. It’s supposed to be a worship service. But based on that verse, I’ve known of a man who got very upset and quit going to a church because they had potlucks.

Like, well, you shouldn’t have been Baptist in the first place, but if that was a non-negotiable for you. He said, well, Paul said you have homes to eat and drink in. Like, I better not catch you in a restaurant.

You have homes to eat and drink in. Paul said so. That’s not what he was talking about.

But for him, that’s a minor thing, whether or not we have potlucks. There’s nothing. As a matter of fact, it says they broke bread from house to house.

They got together and they ate, as well as did the Lord’s Supper. But getting mad at the church because they had potlucks, I’d call that a minor issue, and yet it became a major issue for him. And I’ve seen these things split the church.

I’ve seen these things, even if they’re not doctrinal disputes. I’ve told the story many times, and I think people don’t believe me, but I was there and I saw it, and I don’t have a track record of lying. I was there, and in my very first church, somebody took a swing at somebody else during a business meeting over who got the mail.

All right, I’m not exaggerating. That really happened. I had to get between these two.

Just about everybody here is taller than me already. These guys were tall. I had to get between them and just pray they didn’t crush me if they came after each other.

Somebody took a swing at somebody else. Foolish disputes, majoring on the minors, taking things that are not essential and treating them like they are the end of the world. And sometimes that can be our preferences about how we do things.

Sometimes we make up biblical justifications for that. Sometimes it’s a pet doctrine that is some austere point that we’re not entirely sure about, but we can get involved in these foolish disputes. And genealogies, verse 9.

Now this probably isn’t as much of an issue for us as it would have been for them. Some of them had come from that Jewish background that they were concerned about what tribe they were from and who they were descended from. This morning I talked about their descent from Abraham, and that was a big thing for them because it’s our connection to Abraham that’s brought us into the covenant with God, when in reality it’s the relationship with Jesus Christ that brings us into the covenant we want to be in with God.

But they were concerned about what tribe they were from. Paul wrote in one of his letters talking about, you know, I was a Pharisee. I’m from the tribe of Benjamin.

I was circumcised on the eighth day. Talked about all these things that he used to boast in. And there were people that would boast in that day and they would serve their vanity by trying to establish this link to others.

Kind of like when I was in grade school and kids would brag to each other. Well, yeah, well, I’m related to George Washington. Well, I’m related to Sequoia.

Y’all aren’t related to anybody famous. You know, knock it off. Somebody said, I’m George Washington’s great, great, great grandson.

I remember this like in second or third grade. I grew up and learned George Washington didn’t have any biological children. So I’m not really sure how that happened.

But building themselves up with these genealogies, with these links to other people. The closest I’ve seen to this in our churches is when pastors will kind of brag about their pedigree. Well, I was saved and baptized in this church when so-and-so was pastor.

And I spoke at this church where so-and-so was pastor. And I thought, nobody’s impressed by that. I don’t know if y’all have ever heard that or not, but preachers tend to brag when they get together.

And I don’t know if that gene skipped me or what. I just, I don’t care. I don’t.

It’s great. You know, I talk to Jesus every day. That’s what I come back with.

But they would fight over these genealogies. Well, I trained under so-and-so. I attended so-and-so’s.

Nobody cares. You’re fighting over that. You’re fighting over the people you have allegiance to.

And Paul wrote about that and he said, some people are claiming, well, I’m a follower of Paul. I’m a follower of Apollos. And he said, you should be followers of Jesus.

And he’s one of the ones they were talking about following. But he said, you should be following Jesus. And then there are these contentions and strivings about the laws.

Now this ties in a little bit with the idea of the foolish disputes that we already see in verse 9. But I think it deals more with the methods of the disagreement than the substance. The substance of the disagreement would be the foolish disputes.

You know, we’re fighting over these minor details. And I see this still goes on with these strivings about the law. I was reading about a court case recently that has to do with whether or not a Jewish community somewhere in New Jersey, I believe, could string wires across a street.

Because there are these provisions in the law, or maybe the oral law, that deal with being able to travel so far on the Sabbath and carry certain things on the Sabbath within your dwelling.

And so the rabbis have gotten together and come up with the idea that your dwelling, and I’ve just drawn a blank on the name, if you string up wire or fencing around a certain amount of city blocks, you can consider that your greater dwelling and you can carry within that and but not everybody agrees with that or you then there are these strivings about does it have to be a fence or can you hang a telephone wire across the street and they argue about what what comports with the law and we can we can think that’s silly but we I’ve seen the same thing happen in baptist churches but when we get down to this idea of the contentions and strivings about the law one of these words really means kind of a public fight. And one of these words means scheming behind the scenes. And it’s easy to find both of those in churches sometimes.

Sometimes we’ll scheme behind the scenes to get our way. Sometimes we just come right out in the open and fight about it. And the result of all of this in verse 10 is a divisive man.

I don’t think Paul just skipped ahead to another subject. I think the result of verse 9 is verse 10 where he talks about this divisive man and he says, reject a divisive man after two or three after the first and second admonition. It’s not even a three strikes and you’re out thing.

The result of it is a divisive person. Somebody who sows discord in the church because they’re so busy fighting for their own ideas instead of being obedient to what God told us to do, instead of focusing on the mission of the church, instead of focusing on representing Christ to the world outside. And so the church then comes and ideally deals with that.

Says, hey, you’ve got to stop this. You’ve got to knock this off. We need unity in the body.

Brother Rick talked in Sunday school this morning about unity within the church. We studied Psalm 133, I believe it is, that says how good and pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity. And so ideally a church would look at something like that and nip it in the bud, as Barney Fife used to say.

Somebody that needs admonition repeatedly, and sometimes even those admonitions don’t work. It says reject them if after the first and second admonition, they’re still carrying on about it. At some point, you put them out of the church for the sake of the body.

So he’s warning about all this division that can come up when we’re focused on our agendas. When I’m focused on, hey, I’ve got this idea, and everybody needs to fall in line with my idea. Because when we get right down to it, effort that we put into fighting over our own agendas as effort we take away from advancing the gospel.

And I’m not saying that there’s never a time to have a dispute about theology. I’m not saying there’s never a time to have a dispute. Sometimes the Bible tells us to speak out against open sin.

The Bible tells us to challenge heresy when it’s taught in the church, when it’s introduced to the church. That’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about these little minor piddly things that people get mad at each other about.

And the more time we spend focused on those things, it’s time and it’s effort we take away from our main calling, which is to advance the gospel. And he presents these two things as a binary choice. We’ve got verse 8 or we’ve got verses 9, 10, and 11.

We can do one or the other. We can’t do both, at least well. we can either focus on our agenda or we can focus on Jesus’ agenda.

And so as I read through this, I see that the church’s agenda should always be how do we glorify God and point others to Jesus. You know, I should not come in here and say, how can I bend them to my will today? I think I told you all at the Q&A we had.

I come in with the agenda of for a good long while, I’m just getting to know how things work here. I would be foolish to come in and say, I like this church, but I really prefer my idea for what I think this church could be. I think you’ve got to love the church where they are and see where God leads you.

And that’s my focus right now is getting to know you all and learn to work with you. But I’m saying I should not come in here saying, all right, how can I totally remake Central in my own image? It’d be kind of a scary church.

If I remade central in my own image. No, my agenda should be to help the church accomplish what its agenda should be. How do we glorify God and point others to Jesus Christ?

I’m convinced if we take care of that, if we focus on that, a lot of the other stuff will take care of itself. Or it just won’t seem as important. Because he told them in verse 8, those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works.

And we know from elsewhere in Scripture that the purpose of those good works is to glorify God. The purpose of our good works is not to glorify us. We are not told anywhere in Scripture to do good works so that everybody will think how wonderful we are.

Not that I recall are we told that anywhere. We are certainly never told anywhere in Scripture, do good works so that maybe God will like you. No, we are told, let your light so shine before all men that they may see your works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

So when we do these good works, when he tells us to maintain good works because we have believed in God, the end result is that who gets glorified? Come on, it’s not a trick question. God, thank you.

Just making sure you’re awake. Those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works. He tells us instead of focusing on all these little things, do what verse 8 says, and focus on glorifying God by the way you live your life.

by instead of fighting and squabbling, commit yourself to good works, to good things that glorify God. He says in verse 8, these things are good and profitable to men. And I read through that a few times this week and thought, which men is he talking about?

But he doesn’t say anybody specifically. He just says they’re profitable to men. By the way, that includes ladies as well.

It’s not just males. It’s profitable to mankind. You know what?

when we focus on glorifying God by our good works, it’s profitable to us, it benefits us, because we are first of all getting to live out the calling that He’s put on us. We’re getting to do what we were created to do. But I also do believe we feel His pleasure when we glorify Him.

It’s good for us, but it’s also profitable to the world outside of us, to the world outside of here, because they need to see those good works and they need to glorify God. They need to see the change that God can make in people. They need to see what God has done in our lives.

They need to see who God is shaping us into as He loves them through us, as we are the body of Christ and we act as His hands and feet in the community. They need to see that and be able to glorify God because Jesus said, if the Son of Man is lifted up, He’ll draw all men to Himself. These things are good and profitable.

They benefit us and they benefit those who need to hear the gospel. when we’re focused on glorifying God through our good works. And we need to understand too that this is not a one-time thing.

This is an ongoing call He’s given us. The reason I know that is because He starts verse 8 by saying, this is a faithful saying, and these things I want you to affirm constantly. It’s not something we do one Sunday a month when we feel like it.

Go out and live in a way that glorifies God. He says, I want you to affirm these things constantly. And sometimes we hear that word affirm and we think, okay, I’m agreeing with it.

This is, I’m agreeing that this is a good idea. I don’t think that’s what Paul meant when he said affirm here. I think he meant affirm it by the way we live.

Affirm it by acting it out. And he wants us to do this constantly. Now that’s a pretty tall order, isn’t it?

To try to glorify God constantly. I’m not there yet. I assume you’re not there yet either.

But it’s something that we grow in and become more capable of doing as the Holy Spirit lives in us and works in us and grows us to be more like Jesus Christ. and so I realize that I have talked a lot about four short verses tonight so I want to leave you with this closing thought what it what it really is calling us to do is to make a conscious effort to let our light shine as I pointed to in that verse from Matthew chapter 5 where he where Jesus said let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father in heaven those who believe should be careful who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works. We’ve got to realize that as we, the second half of the book of Titus here deals with the way the church portrays itself in the world as it lives out its gospel witness.

So in other words, what kinds of things are we supposed to show the world as we’re trying to point them to Jesus? One thing they need to see is not squabbling and fighting. And again, I don’t, I’ve not seen that we have a problem with that here, but what they need to see is not squabbling and fighting.

they need to see that we love each other and that we love God. And that because we love God, we love each other, we love them, we act out that love for God through our good works. And our good works glorify Him.

They give Him the glory He deserves and they point others to Jesus. So if I could sum this passage up tonight in just one short statement, it would be to make the conscious effort constantly to let your light shine before other people. so that they could see what God has done in us so that God could be glorified.