September 10, 2017
Scripture:
Ezekiel was living with the people of Israel in captivity. He couldn’t find a man to stand in the gap. The Lord was that man: God sent his Son to stand in the gap for us.
Hymn 355 - Safe in Christ, the weakest child
Prayer
Today we have an example of what NOT to be. It’s a behaviour that we’ve seen before in Proverbs: slothfulness.
Proverbs 24:30-31. This fellow was out traveling, and saw the field, the vineyard, and the wall of the slothful. The field and vineyard were full of weeds, and the stone wall was broken down. It wasn’t a good scene.
As we said, the owner of this field, vineyard, and wall was slothful, and void of understanding. Sloths are slow animals, and slothful people are lazy. Being void of understanding means that you don’t make good decisions. This is not what we want to be.
Proverbs 24:32-34. The writer of Proverbs tried to learn from what he saw. We can be good at making excuses if we don’t want to do something. Or we might say, “I’ll do it tomorrow,” but tomorrow never really comes. Then the job just gets bigger and bigger, and we don’t want to do it at all.
There was once a boy who didn’t want to study his spelling lessons, so he skipped them and went outside to play. He had a new pocketknife, and started carving a boat. It went so well that he made six or so little boats.
That next Saturday, he set up a little stand with a sign, and tried to sell the boats. One of his friends walked by and gave his sign a funny look. Then some girls went by and giggled. That was strange, but he figured girls were always giggling. However, they came back, with some more girls, and started to take his boats!
“Hey, you can’t just take them,” said our fellow, “You have to pay for them!”
“Well,” said his friend, who was walking past again, “You’ll have to learn to spell before you can sell!” Instead of writing BOATS FOR SALE, the boy had written BOATS FOR SAIL. That’s what the girls were going to do; sail the boats. The boy decided that he had better be more diligent in studying his spelling lesson!
The man in our verses was sleeping when he should have been working. Because of this, he would become poor. Maybe you don’t have to provide for a family yet, but it’s good to learn to be diligent when you’re young. Colossians 3:23.
Proverbs 20:4. This fellow wasn’t diligent, and would have nothing at harvest time. We know from other passages that sluggards make all sorts of excuses to get out of work, saying things like “There’s a lion outside!” and more.
We don’t want to be a sloth in our spiritual lives, and let them get overgrown. Someone said we could change Proverbs 24 to read something like, “I went by the life of young Mr. Lazy, and his Bible was covered with other books, and layered with dust, and his prayer life was broken down.” Sins are like weeds, and they will hinder our spiritual growth. We don’t want our opportunities for bearing fruit to be taken away.
Proverbs 13:4. Diligence in reading God’s word is important. Maybe we’re sleeping too late, like this sloth, instead of waking up and reading our Bible. II Peter 1:5. It takes diligence to grow in grace, and not let weeds take over our lives. May we be diligent in both our regular and spiritual life.
Titus 1:10-16
You wonder if the people Paul’s describing are those in the assembly? The description sounds like a contrast to the elders. It’s a list of some weaknesses identified by Paul. You wouldn’t want these people as elders. It’s written, though, as if Titus was supposed to deal with it. He was to rebuke them. This makes us realize that here are characteristics that must be dealt with in the assembly, but we can’t change the world. I would be surprised if this was in the meeting, but Paul was exhorting Titus to do something.
What is unruly? In scripture there are guidelines for behavior. Vain talkers are people who have a lot to say, but it doesn’t amount to anything. We need to consider our manner of life in this way. We need to be ruly. We are to speak in a suitable way so as not to deceive others.
Crete was a place of Gentiles. Those of the circumcision would be Jews. In this case they happened to be worse than those who weren’t of the circumcision. From verse eleven it seems some didn’t know the truth or didn’t give it when they should have. They just did it for money. It might have been Jews who were still trying to keep the ceremonial law. But in the next chapter we see Paul promoting grace in a beautiful way. Paul might have been near the end of his life. Seeing this situation he pleads with Titus to get things going right.
These vain talkers could affect families and get them off track. They disqualified themselves from being elders, but they were also doing damage to the assembly. Darby calls filthy lucre, base gains. They were doing it for their own ends.
A liar doesn’t value truth, but that’s what this is all about. Darby has verse twelve as, “One of themselves, a prophet of their own, has said, Cretians are always liars, evil wild beasts, lazy gluttons.” It sounds like the sluggard in Proverbs. A wild beast doesn’t have much respect or regard for authority. And the glutton had more of an appetite for food than God’s work. Paul tells Titus that what the prophet said was true. What was Titus to do about it? Rebuke them sharply.
“Sound in the faith” is another big contrast. In the assembly sometimes it might not be a rebuke that is needed, but rather a bit of instruction. Some do things in ignorance and need to be built up. Many of them apparently hadn’t grasped the truth or used it for personal gain. It is important to be established in the truth. It’s not popular today. Abdu Murray said that people are not after truth any more. They just want to feel good. If you’re not built on truth you’ll make shipwreck. It’s not the difference of faith and feelings, but truth and feelings. If you can grasp truth you can have assurance. Many of the Cretians were not sound in the faith. Maybe we are back there today.
Purity and holiness should be characteristics of a Christian. There is a lot of impurity in the world. Today things once considered moral don’t matter any more. Authorities don’t seem to be worried about a person’s conscience.
May the Lord preserve us. Titus had quite a job. I don’t know if he held a Bible like us, but we do have sound doctrine. We can be thankful we’re not forced to go against the truth. May we be unashamed to speak of these things.
Hymn 215 - Happy they who trust in Jesus
Prayer