Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. Not one of us could ever have thought of composing anything that would remain equally relevant everywhere, every time, for thousands of years, but that is what you have given us in giving your word. It was an occasional letter you moved Paul to write. He wrote it for a specific occasion of a church in Crete, and yet you constructed by your providential wisdom and your Sovereign Lordship, you constructed a situation there in which in directing Titus, the Apostle Paul directed all of us for all time. He spoke a word that is equally applicable and equally needed here in Houston as it was in Crete nearly 2,000 years ago. Father, we thank you for your living Word and for the wisdom it has. We thank you for the vital instruction of these letters which tell us something that No branch of psychology would get right. No branch of science or philosophy would get right. Tells us truth about ourselves and you that none of us would guess or reason our way to. So, Father, grant us ears to hear and grant your word power in the way it comes across to us that each of us might receive your message, your truth as it truly is the word of God. We pray in Christ's name. Amen. As we finish this first chapter of Paul's letter to Titus, we come to the last two verses, and these are really a hinge point in the letter. They are positioned as a hinge in the turn of Paul's thought. Even so far in a dozen different ways, Paul has underscored the fact that there's One gospel. There's one truth of God. There's one word from God. He has embraced this gospel and it's changed his life and he's become a messenger of it. And he, Paul the Jew, writes Titus the Gentile and says that he shares that same faith. And as a result, they have a unity. They have a connection between the two of them that is deeper and other than a racial connection, an ethnic connection, skin color, language or anything else. It's something that transcends all of those. And in fact, he's forming common cause with this formerly despised Gentile against fellow Jews who are corrupting the truth of God and teaching false doctrine. So it's for the promulgation and defense of this gospel that Paul left Titus and Crete in the first place. And he directed him to find exemplary Christian men who have a firm grasp on the gospel, who grasp the Word of God for themselves so firmly that they can both urge others to embrace it and to live according to it. And they can expose false teachings and denounce and warn against and in fact silence those false teachings, those perversions of God's truth. So Paul told Titus to find men like this and appoint them as elders of the churches in Crete. and then mobilize them, as we saw last week, to shut down the teaching of these apostates, these Cretan apostates who once professed faith and now have turned from it. And all of this that he sends Titus to do and commissions the church to do is counter-cultural. It is counter to the Cretan culture that is made up of men and women who are always liars, evil beasts, lazy, idle bellies, as he said in verse 12. And they were to counter this culture, not by legislation, not by social programs, not by charities or programs of good human works, but they were to counter this culture by the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ and by the eternal Word of God and by the transforming power of the Gospel. So in these, the last two verses of chapter one, Titus 1, 15 and 16, we're going to find out what is fundamentally wrong with these false teachers. And in finding that out, we're going to find out what's fundamentally wrong with our race. I don't mean the white race, the black race. I don't mean the Asian race, the Hispanic race, I mean the human race. In finding out what's wrong with them, we'll find out what's wrong with us. In verse 16, we'll see the miserable effects of what's wrong with them. But first, we'll look at verse 15, where we will find the problem's cause. And there I encourage you to use the outline, unless you have a more effective way, but to use the outline we've given you. And the word that goes in the blank there is cause, the problem's cause, verse 15. I've translated it for you. All things are clean to those who are clean, but to those who have been defiled and are faithless, nothing is clean. But both their mind and their conscience have been defiled. So let's get some definition of terms. He throws a lot of words there that are simple words, but he uses them in a particular sense. And we've got to understand what he means by them. For instance, here's this word clean that he uses three times. All things are clean to those who are clean, but to those who have been defiled and are faithless, nothing is clean, clean, clean, clean. In the Bible and in Paul's thinking, clean has two aspects. First of all, there's the ceremonial or ritual aspect. Clean defines that which is acceptable in the sight of God. Now, in the law of Moses, there was a. system of dietary and behavioral rules that define what were clean foods or unclean foods, what was clean behavior or defiling behavior. If somebody partook of what was unclean, then he would be unable to approach the presence of God. He'd be disqualified from public worship. He would be defiled. That's what that does to turn from the clean to the unclean. It would defile the person to eat, as we all famously know, to eat pork, for instance. No bacon, very sad. But if a Jew were to have a couple of strips of bacon, bacon, lettuce, tomato sandwich, then he would be unclean. He'd be defiled. And that ritual sense was a picture of a deeper reality, which is the moral or spiritual sense that had its roots not in what you ate or what you did, but what you were, that had its roots in the heart. And so Paul here actually uses the word in two senses when he says, all things are clean to those who are clean. What he means is for the Christian, there is no such thing as a list of banned foods. There is no ritual list such as in the law of Moses that one may very well say, I don't want this because it's high carb or I don't want this because it's high fat or I don't want this because it's yucky. That's all fine. You could even say, well, the law of Moses has wise principles that I personally respect and and I'm taking it as a bit of advice. What you can't say is people who eat these are acceptable to God. People who eat these are not acceptable to God. The Lord Jesus said that he declared all clean, all foods clean in Mark, chapter seven. And so Paul says all things are clean to those who are. And here he uses the second sense, those who are morally, spiritually clean. But then he says defiled. And that's the opposite of clean. The word defiled. He uses that twice. Those who have been defiled. And then he says their mind and their conscience have been defiled. And that word simply means to be dirty, to be stained, to be unclean. And again, you can use it in two senses. Defiled in the Old Testament sense means you can't approach God. Defiled in the moral sense means the inner reality of the heart. So he says those who have been defiled and are faithless. And that word does double duty. It means two things in Greek. It's used two different ways. Faithless means unbelieving. And then it means somebody who's unbelievable, somebody who's unreliable. And the way he specifically uses it here is he's saying that the false teachers are faithless in that they don't believe the gospel. And that makes them faithless in the sense of unreliable. They're not faithful guides. They're not trustworthy guides to truth because they've rejected the word of God and they've rejected the truth. So because they're faithless towards God, they're faithless as guides. They're unreliable. And then he says their mind and their conscience have been defiled. Well, the mind is where we do our thinking. It's where we process information. It's where we make sense of the world. It's where we assign meaning to things. Our mind is what we think of. It's the intellectual aspect of our nature. And then the word conscience. is our moral self-consciousness, our moral self-consciousness. It is the moral awareness by which we weigh things as to being not just large or small, but good and bad. That's what the conscience does. It evaluates the information that the mind gives it, and then it either disapproves or approves of an action. It's moral self-judgment. It's moral self-awareness. That's what it means. You say, well, it's like we're done. You just explain all the words in that verse. No, I've got more to say about it. Let's talk about this defilement that Paul talks about. And obviously he's he's when he says that that they are defiled as to their mind and their conscience, that's fairly sweeping. He says they're so defiled that nothing is plain to them. So you get the idea of, well, if you're old enough or probably young enough, you think of the character Pigpen. And peanuts, right? Constant dirt generator. And he could make a snowman in a field of snow and the snowman would be grubby. Why? What's wrong with the snow? Nothing. It's pig pen. He brings his own dirt wherever he goes. And whether you say with Charlie Brown that it might be the dirt of ancient civilizations, it's still dirt and it gets everything dirty. And that's the kind of description Paul makes of man. Well, why are we that way? I've heard some people try to mock Christianity and they always do it by misrepresenting the Bible, saying, well, it's like God made everybody bad. Is that the case? Are we all defiling because we were created wrong? No. Let's talk about the historical root of this problem. And regulars will know right where I'm going to go. I'm going to go back to Genesis chapter three. Basically, if you understand the first three chapters of Genesis, you're ready to understand the rest of the Bible. Don't and you aren't. It's just about as simple as that. So Genesis chapter three is the historical root of this problem. What do we find in Genesis chapter three? Just to summarize what we've seen in the number of sermons in the past, Genesis one, we see that man is created to operate as a theocrat. He is created and designed to operate as ruled by God. That's what a theocracy is. It's a rule by God. And so a man was to be ruled by God. He was to have a relationship with God, love Him, adore Him, listen to Him. And when given directions and prohibitions, he was to obey. He was to do what God said to do and stay away from what God said to stay away from. But in his rebellion, he opted instead to become an autocrat, to become somebody who ruled himself. That was the sales line of the serpent in the Garden of Eden. There was this tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and God had said not to eat it. And the day you eat it, you will surely die, God said. But the serpent said, after God said, this is the only fruit in the universe you don't ever need, Satan said, this is the one fruit in the universe you absolutely do need. Because in the day you eat it, your eyes will be open and you'll be as God, knowing good and evil. Now, what that means is that they would be able to determine for themselves what was good and evil. No longer would they be under the lordship of God, learning from God what was good and evil, experiencing it by rejecting the evil and embracing the good. Now they become their own authorities. They become their own little gods. That was his bid. That was a sales line. And that appealed to Eve. She was taken in by it. So she ate the fruit and Adam, standing by the dolt that he was, went along even though he knew that it was a lie. He went along with her. His guilt is that great. So that is the root of it. And let's take a look at what we find out about the fruits. Number three in your outline. How did this work out in history? This was the The birth of the origin of the rebellion was in Genesis chapter three, but you just need to stay there in chapter three. Hope you've turned there as I asked. And you'll see that the fruits are depicted in terms of mind and conscience, just as Paul says. You see the fruits, first of all, in terms of conscience. Look at verse seven. They ate the fruit and then verse seven says what? The eyes of both of them were open. Well, that's just what the serpent promised, isn't it? Yeah, not exactly. Their eyes were open, as he said, and they knew as he said they would, but they didn't know what he said they would. They knew they were naked. Now, they'd been naked before and being naked was never a problem. They were looking at the same selves that had been there before, the same bodies that had been there before. But there was a difference now. Now, when they looked at themselves, what they saw were guilty rebels, not people created in the image of God, enjoying fellowship with God, but guilty rebels. And when they regarded themselves, although they were not so sophisticated that they could have explained this to you, they looked at themselves now with pain. They looked at themselves now with shame. They had an immediate instant instinct that something needed to cover them up, that they needed to hide. that they were now, they'd been beautiful, they'd been acceptable, they'd been glorious, now they were shameful, they were reproachable, they were worthy of judgment. And so immediately their conscience was defiled, as Paul puts it in Titus 1.15. What about their mind? Well, in v. 7 we see where shame is born. And in v. 8 we see where stupid is born. Every stupid thought you've ever done Every stupid thing you've ever done, every stupid thing you've ever seen in society has its origin right here. The first catastrophically stupid thing a person ever did was when Adam and Eve thought it was a good idea to disobey God. When they thought it was a good idea to listen to the serpent, when they thought it was a good idea to decide for themselves what was right and wrong instead of submitting to the lordship of their creator, that was indescribably stupid. And that was the origin of stupid. So here you see the effect to their mind. They have seen God before as someone to be. Well, let me put it this way. Let me back up a half step. You're in the Garden of Eden. You hear the sound that tells you that God is approaching. Now what does that mean? That means that the most adorable person in the universe is approaching. The most beautiful, worthy person. Your creator, your Lord, your designer, the one who loves you like no one else ever has loved you, ever will love you. The person who has no evil, no shadow, no twist in him, that person is approaching. He's coming towards you. What do you want to do? Well, what did they want to do? They did not see him as someone who was adorable and towards whom they should flee. They saw him as someone that they should flee. They heard the sound of the Lord God, verse eight, walking in the garden. And the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. So they saw him as someone who should be fled, not someone who should be adored and run towards, but someone from whose face they should. They couldn't stand to look at their own nakedness. They didn't want him to look at their nakedness. because they felt that guilt. So now they totally misestimate God. I mean, it's as if you were to look at a hamburger, assuming you like hamburgers, and suddenly now it looks repulsive and horrible to you. Now this wonderful, adorable person looks like somebody from whom they should flee. So they have totally gotten God wrong. And that's a mental, intellectual issue. So they see him as someone who should be fled, but it gets even worse. They see him as someone who can be fled. I mean, again, verse eight says they hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God were among the trees of the garden, the trees of the garden that we read about the trees before. Yeah. Back in chapter one, verse 11, where God created them. So they think they can hide from the creator of the trees behind the trees he created. How stupid is that? But that's what sin does. It makes you stupid. Now, the worst thing about it is it makes you feel really smart, which is all the worst stupid. I mean, the worst kind of stupid person in the world is the person who thinks he's smart. The Proverbs warns against the fool who's wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can give a smart answer, a wise answer. Well, that's what sin does to every one of us. So they imagine they can hide from him physically by hiding among these trees that he had created. And they imagine that they can use speech that he had created to hide from him relationally. What do I mean? In verse 11, he said to Adam, who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat? Fairly straightforward, simple question. What's Adam's response? Verse 12, the woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree and I ate. How stupid is that? Now, is he even answering God's question? He's not even answering God's question, is he? He's shifting as if he thinks that he can redirect God's attention like you've got a little baby who's reaching out for something that he shouldn't have. So you bring out your keys and you dangle them and the baby watches the keys and you drop your keys and baby plays with the keys and forgets about the thing that he wasn't supposed to. Like God can be done that way. Like God can be treated that way. God asks question A and Adam answers response Z as if God's going to be fooled by that. Now, that's an intellectual problem to think that the person who designed the power of speech can be fooled by the power of speech, by communication. He can hide behind a tree. He can hide behind a lame excuse. He can hide behind a dodge. He can hide behind a rationalization. He can be He can hide behind trying to blame God for giving him a defective wife and trying to blame it on his wife. He thinks this is going to work. How stupid is that? But before we get too harsh on him, every dodge today is just as stupid. Every dodge from the truth of God is just as stupid. It's just that just like Adam, we don't feel as stupid as we are. But there is nothing stupider than unbelief. There just is nothing stupider. But this is the birth of it. Nothing stupider than sin. This is the birth of it. So what do we see then? We see the mind and the conscience defiled, just like Paul says, stained. dirty, unclean because of rebellion and unbelief. So that's the historical fruits. The nature of the fruits touches the mind and the conscience. The extent of the fruits. Think of how many delusions were built into Adam and Eve's behavior and thought. They miscalculate everything. They miscalculate themselves as being ready for Godhood. Wrong. They miscalculate God as being unworthy of love, unworthy of worship, unworthy of adoration, unworthy of faith. They miscalculate God as being deficient in his worth, deficient in his knowledge, deficient in his power, deficient in his immensity as if he can be fled from. Horrible, fundamental miscalculations. Sins ruined the way they think. Well, is there any place that is safe? Any place that we can run away from the effects of the defilement? You know, if we go off to a monastery in the desert or this or that social institution? For instance, marriage is this intimate relationship between a man and a woman, this relationship of love. Is this a safe refuge from sin? Well, look at the first married couple. How did that work out in their marriage? First thing Adam does when God confronts him is what? Blame God and blame his wife. He blames his wife. Now look, have you ever thought about this? For all Adam knows, he is exposing his wife to the wrath of God and content to watch her get it, just so long as it's not him. Just so long as it's her and not him. Sin has created a rift between the first married couple. It shows a defiled mind and a defiled conscience. He should be her protector. He's hiding behind her skirts, hoping that the gunman shoots her and not him. How about family? Is the family a refuge from the effects of sin? Well, let's see how the first boy and the second boy get along. First son, second son. First son murdered the second son. That didn't work out so well. Families, no shelter from sin. How about government? It never ceases to amaze me how many people think that government is free from the effects of sin and folly. You know, you say that something is government approved like that makes it because, you know, the very best people in the whole universe tested this and came up with a gleaming, infallible conclusion about it. Is government free? And I see the trouble with government is it is manned by people. And people are defiled in mind and conscience. And the Bible gives us hundreds and hundreds of years of human history of all sorts of human rulers. And they're very different men of very different temperaments and very different times. But you know what they all have in common? They're all defiled in their mind and conscience. They're all sinners, not a one of them solves the problem of sin, even the righteous ones sin and the people under them sin. So, no, government is not a solution to the effects of this defilement. Well, what are some of the attempted remedies for the fruits? Number three in your outline, what attempted remedies? have we come up with? Well, the fact is, we've always attempted to come up with remedies. You see that in the first couple, don't you? What do you see? You see the first two seamstresses there in the garden sewing fig leaves together to cover their nakedness. There, that'll take care of the problem. Get me a big leaf, honey. That'll take care of this misery and this pain and this agony that we're feeling in our souls. And it didn't work. But you know what? We've been sewing fig leaves together ever since. Every human effort to deal with our guilt and shame, just so many fig leaves. That's all it is. Just so many fig leaves. Moral fig leaves. Spiritual fig leaves. Ritual fig leaves. They're just fig leaves. God reveals this in redemptive history by exposing the inadequacy of each possible remedy one by one. Think of some. Could this problem in human nature be remedied by changing society? That's the problem. We're in a bad atmosphere. We're in a bad society. We've got bad parents and bad friends. And if we just got in a better environment, everything would be fine. So what does God do? He takes the one righteous man and his family, puts them in a big floating box and wipes everybody else out. And then this righteous, believing family comes out to repopulate the earth. And how does that work out? The man who he saved gets drunk. And his son shames him and disrespects him disgracefully. And then once again, every descendant of theirs shows the same pattern, the same defilement, because changing society doesn't alter the fact of defilement. Why? Because society is made up of people. And people are defiled in our mind and our conscience. And so we defiled people don't change that defilement. We don't have the power to do it. Pitting the efforts of defiled people doesn't change the defilement. Can we change this by more law? Maybe that's just it. We just need more rules, more specific rules. If we, you know, and parents think this and reformers think this, you know, the trouble is people just need to explain to them. We just explain what's right to them. Then, you know, just tell kids that drugs are bad for you. They'll stop doing that. And having sex outside marriage is bad for you. Well, they'll stop doing it right away. Smoking, it can kill you. Well, there you go. We'll just stop smoking and just more. That's all we need to do is explain things to people. Well, God sent someone with a bunch of laws, about 613 laws. He sent Moses to Israel with laws before giving them all to Him. He told Israel to obey. What did Israel say? Yep! Everything the Lord says, we'll do. And God gives His Ten Commandments and then calls Moses up into the mountain to get more revelation. And what are they doing while He's in the mountain? Getting more revelation about God's will. We've studied this Wednesday night. He's up there getting here. They haven't even gotten the whole law. And they set to work breaking every rule that they've been given. They break the rule against idolatry, against spelling down other gods, yada yada. They start going down the list. They just get interrupted, I guess, by Moses coming down or they would have gone over all ten. That's human nature. Law did not. Kirsten law just further defined sin. It gave more opportunities for this defilement and Aaron sins and Moses sins. And so in years to come, more prophets bring more revelation from God. And the more God speaks, the more people disobey. The more God speaks, the more people rebel. And so along come the Pharisees and Sadducees, and they think that they can do the law one better. They take those 613 laws and they add some more specifications of their own. And what's the net effect of that effort? What does Jesus say? Whitewashed sepulchers. Oh, there's something to stick in your mind. What's he saying? Real pretty on the outside. Dead, rotting corpses inside. That's human nature, according to Jesus. That's what a bunch of rules did to us. It gave pretty outsides, corrupt, rotting, smelly, dead insides. More laws don't remedy the defilements because laws have to be obeyed by people. And people are defiled in mind and conscience, and so they can never change that defilement. So what's the resultant package? What is human nature post Adam? Turn from Genesis three to Romans three. I will wait. Genesis three. Now turn to Romans three. And here is God's. This is not a government sponsored study. This is a God sponsored study. I think that's better. novel thought, unpopular thought. Here's the way God looks at us, and here's God's psychology book of human nature. It's a book in abnormal psychology because that's the only kind we've got. Romans 3, verse 9, Paul asks the question, What then? Are we better than they? Not at all. For we've already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin. All, Paul? All under sin? What do you mean? As it is written, there is none righteous, not even one. Well, you know, now there's the fallacy of looking at human behavior and trying to derive norms from human behavior. He says all human behavior is abnormal. You get that? There's none righteous. What is righteous? Conformity to God's standards. God's standards are the norm. He says nobody conforms. All psychology is abnormal psychology. You can't get normal psychology by averaging out human behavior. You're just averaging out abnormal behavior. God gives the standard. Paul says all men deviate from that standard. None righteous, not even one. Wow, that's emphatic. Like the none wasn't enough. He adds not even one. There is none who understands. Well, that's that's intellectual. That's defiled mind. There's none who seeks for God. Well, that's spiritual defilement. It means that although even many well-meaning Christians say, oh, everybody's searching for God, Paul says, nobody's searching. Everybody's searching for God like Adam was searching for God. He was searching for a place to hide from God. And that's normal human nature, according to the apostle, according to the Bible. Verse 12, they've all turned aside. Together they've become useless. There is none who does good. There's not even one. There again, he needed to underscore that. Their throat is an open grave. With their tongues they keep deceiving, like these false teachers in Crete. The poison of asps is under their lips, like these false teachers overturning whole households we saw last week. Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. What's the abortion rate today? How many are being aborted during this sermon? Destruction and misery are in their paths and the path of peace. They have not known. And then here is the kicker. Here is the climax. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Well, you know, that's where we came into this story. That's what we see in Adam and Eve. They never would have taken that fruit if they had feared God, if they'd remained in the fear of God. But they stopped fearing God. They stopped revering and respecting Him and began revering and respecting themselves. And that's what human nature is. This corruption we're talking about is total corruption. This depravity we're talking about is total depravity. The package is wholly and entirely corrupt. We're corrupt in the way we process information. We're corrupt in the way we devise values. We're corrupt in what we decide to love and cherish and pursue. It is an endemic problem of human nature. And so somebody says, all I'm hearing is hopelessness. Is there anything that can change that defilement? Yes, there is. But we're not there yet, so nobody leave. We will get there, Lord willing. This is the problem with the false teachers, though. They knew what God's remedy was. They had heard God's remedy. At one point, they'd said they believed in God's remedy. But now they've turned from it. And they were advocating something different. So where did that leave them? That left them where we're all born. Defiled in mind and conscience. You see, there is only one remedy. You turn your back on that one remedy and your only other option is slavery to a defilement of mind and conscience that affects the way we see and respond to everything. What's the remedy? We'll look at it in just a bit. Let's talk about the problem's effects in verse 16. Paul says they profess to know God, but by their works they deny him because they are abominable and disobedient people and are disqualified for every good work. So let's see first what the lips say. That's what goes in the blank of number one there, what the lips say. What do the lips say? Paul says they profess to know God. So they make an orthodox profession. That's a perfectly fine profession right there. If I were to make to say something a little funny sounding, if I were to make kind of a literal paraphrase of the Greek here, I would say God is the one about whom they say they know the truth. Because the word God is right up front in the sentence. It is God that they confess that they know the truth about. They know the facts about God. That's what they say. And there's nothing wrong with making a profession. Paul's not anti-profession. In fact, it's necessary to make a confession of faith. It's absolutely necessary. Jesus says in Matthew 10, 32 and 33, Therefore, everyone who confesses me before men, I will also confess him before my father who is in heaven. But whoever denies me before men, I will also deny him before my father who is in heaven. That was Matthew 10, 32 and 33. Or to take one of many others, Romans 10, 9. Paul says that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. So that was Romans 10, 9. Paul is far from denouncing confession. He's pro confession. It's a good thing to make an outward, formal statement of your faith. So the act of confessing good, what they confessed was good as far as it goes. So what's the problem? What the lips say is fine. What's the problem? Problem is what the life says. Number two in your outline. What the life says, but by their works they deny him, Paul writes. By their works they deny him. The lips profess to know God, but by their works they deny him. Turn to one of the scariest sections in the Bible, Matthew chapter 7. This is the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount. People say, oh, the Sermon on the Mount, it's all about love and wonderfulness and puppies. Yeah, there's no puppies, but there's, well, there's dogs. You're not supposed to throw your pearls to them, but no puppies. There's love in this. Yeah. But look at the look at the climax of this sermon, Matthew 7, verses 21 through 23. Jesus says, Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name cast out demons and in your name perform many miracles? Well, what's what is going on here? He says, not everyone who says, Lord, Lord, is there anything wrong with saying, Lord, Lord? No, he doesn't say that anyone will get into heaven who doesn't say, Lord, Lord, saying, Lord, Lord, is a good thing. There's no problem with that. How about doing things in his name? He says that three times. There's nothing wrong with that. What's the problem, though? Verse twenty three. And then I will declare to them, I never knew you depart from me. You who practice lawlessness. What the lip said was fine, but verse 21 says, he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Verse 23 says, practice lawlessness. And verse 23 also says, I never knew you. There was never any relationship. There was never any reality. And the life bore that out. So how does that work out then? What is Paul saying? What is Jesus saying? Well, let's look at the reality. The reality in what Titus 1.16 says. He says, by their works they deny him. The life contradicts the lips. The lips say one thing. The life says another thing. Now, Jesus says each tree is known by its own fruit. Luke 644. Luke 644. Each tree is known by its own fruit. So the sign may say apple tree, but if you look up and you see a bunch of round orange things hanging from the branches, it's not an apple tree. Or if you see kind of strange sickle shaped yellow things hanging from its branches, it's not an apple tree. It's something else. The fruit don't lie. The sign might. The life doesn't lie. The lips might. When the life consistently says the opposite of what the lips say, not occasionally. There is no somebody who's no, but no person whose life doesn't occasionally, but consistently says the opposite of the lips. Believe the life. That's what Jesus says. That's what Paul says. They profess to know God, but by their works, they deny him. How so? Well, again, he says in this verse, because they are abominable and disobedient people. Now, this is going to give us a lot of insight into what he's talking about. They're abominable. What that means is disgusting. It means repellent. And what he's talking about is that they're still detestable to God. that they're still rejected, they still discussed, they're still repellent to God. God still rejects them. They're still under God's wrath. So they've never been reconciled to God. If they had been in Christ, they would be forgiven. They would be reconciled. They'd be loved. They'd be seen as righteous. But they're none of those things. They're still detestable. So that means they've never known the salvation that is in Christ. And probably the key to that is in the second term. They're abominable and disobedient people. And we're going to see that that means they did not submit to God's one way of salvation. God provided one way to be set free from the defilement of mind and conscience, and they would not take that one way. So, let me break this out more for you. God called them, as God calls you and me, to abandon all hope in redeeming ourselves. To abandon all hope in remedying our own problem. Abandon all hope sewing together enough fig leaves that our original breach with God can be fig leafed over. Abandon all hope of that project. Abandon all hope of the project of trying to be adequate gods for ourselves. Turn away from that. Give up on the thought that ever, ever you can be as God by your own rebellion, by your own self-ruled reason. Abandon all hope, God says. Turn from this hopeless project. And instead, turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe in Him. Trust in Him. Know Him as your Savior and Lord. And you will be freed from that defilement. You will be forgiven. You will be transformed. You will be reconciled to God if you trust in Jesus Christ and His work alone. And they wouldn't do it. They were convinced that their dietary plan would do it for them. They were convinced that their system of rules and regulations, that their improvements on the stories of the Bible by adding their own stories, their own myths, their own creative embellishments of genealogies, that would do the trick for them. They didn't really need Christ that badly. And in so doing that, they turned from the only hope for reconciliation, redemption, and that left the only option, the only alternative, which is continued slavery to defilement. And so Paul goes on to say they are disqualified for every good work. In other words, since they rejected God's Messiah, since they rejected the one mediator between God and man, since they rejected him who is the way, the truth and the life, then that made them still God's enemies. They're still defiled in mind and conscience. And so, since the fountain is foul, all the water flowing from it is still foul. So whatever they do, whatever charity, whatever ritual, whatever religiousness, it's still repulsive in God's eyes because it's done by His enemies in a self-oriented attempt to horizontally redeem myself. And as I said at the beginning of this series, all human religion amounts to that. down up, starting with man and trying to build our own tower of Babel by regulation, by ritual, by philosophy, and thus redeem ourselves. Whereas God's one way of redemption is an up down. God's so loving the world that he sent his only begotten son to the world to be born as a man, bear our sins, make atonement for our sins and reconcile us to God. So we see here then that the reality is When the lips and the life contradict each other, you've got to believe the life. And the reality is that knowing God is not merely intellectual. Knowing God is not a mere matter of knowing truths about God. Demons do that. Satan does that. They know truths about God. It is not necessarily informational, knowing facts. But in fact, it is necessarily transformational. Embracing those truths, submitting to the Lordship of God in Jesus Christ, and being transformed through those truths. Demons don't do that. Satan doesn't do that. That's what takes an enemy of God and makes him into a friend of God. That's what takes a rebel against God and makes him a child of God. submitting to the Lordship of God in Jesus Christ, the one Savior. So, somebody says, well, I believe in Jesus. Well, great. That's necessary. That is all-important. And that's a good profession to say, I believe in Jesus. That's exactly well said. So, if you believe in Jesus, then you believe He's the Son of God. You believe He's the Lord. You believe He's God incarnate. He's all-wise. He's all-glorious. He has all truth. You believe these things about Jesus. And so that means that you believe that what Jesus says about you is true, is wise, that there's nothing better. That what Jesus says about your life, your behavior, your priorities, your relationships, it ought to take precedence over what you think. And so that if you believe that, that's necessarily going to have an effect on behavior. Faith affects behavior. A behavior doesn't create faith. Faith affects behavior. So somebody says he believes in Jesus. But Jesus says an awful lot about our sex life. Jesus says an awful lot about our thoughts, about our mouth, about our time, about our relationships. He says a lot about these things. If we believe in Jesus, then it's going to make a difference what he says about these things. We believe in him, then that will have to transform the way we think and the way we handle those areas. And if there's no effect, then we don't believe in Jesus. We don't really believe Him. We may believe a thing or two about Him, but we don't really believe Him. We don't believe that He's who He says He is. That He's our Lord. That He's our life. That He's our Master. Well, this is what Paul says. They profess to know God, but by their works they deny Him. In other words, their works say that's a false profession. Their lifestyle says they don't really believe the God they say they believe. So what's the real problem? Number three, the real problem. Well, reading both verses together, all things are clean to those who are clean, but to those who have been defiled and are faithless, nothing is clean, but both their mind and their conscience have been defiled. They profess to know God, but by their works they deny him because they are abominable and disobedient people and are disqualified for every good work. Like all sons of Adam, they're totally depraved. That doesn't mean they're as bad as they could be, but they're as bad off as they could be. It means that sin touches every aspect of their life. Their mind and conscience. How they think. How they form values. And every attempt at me reforming me has the same problem. What is it? Me. Me. than when trying to do the reforming. So how do I change when I am the problem? How do I change myself when the I who must change myself is the problem? So for me to be rescued, the source that rescues me has to be perfect, not like me, has to be external, not me. has to be mighty and powerful to overcome my natural insistence on botching everything. And it has, in fact, to be not dependent on me in every way, in any way. See, this is what I came to see myself back in 1972, 1973. I was being ashamed and appalled at things I was discovering about myself, my attitudes, my actions, things I was finding inside myself. And again and again, I was being embarrassed and I was being appalled. Most of this just things going on between my ears. But the more I saw, the more horrifying it was. And then came the realization the trouble was not the things that I did. The trouble was me. It was the me who did the things that I did. And what could deliver me from me? That's when I finally began looking for something that wasn't in me to deliver me from me. So what is the remedy? What is the real remedy? Paul opens it up in one more chapter 3. We looked at Genesis 3. We looked at Romans 3. Now look at Titus 3. This very letter. Titus chapter 3. And here's where we will rest today. Titus 3 is the remedy. What's the problem? We are all of us defiled as to mind and conscience. What's the remedy? Titus 3, verses 5-7. He saved us. Well, I could just preach the rest of it on that. Not He helped us save ourselves. Not He showed us how to save ourselves. Not He gave us an opportunity to accept getting ourselves saved. But He saved us. Not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness. Thank God, because there's none of those. If it had been on that basis, then there was none that could have hope, including Paul. Not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit. whom he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior, so that being justified by his grace, we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. What Paul says here is that Jesus Christ saves us from all the miseries we've just discussed. The basis is never the deeds we do. It couldn't be. We're defiled. Look, he says through the washing of regeneration that addresses the defilement. That's what a defiled person, a stained person needs. He needs washing. And Paul points us to washing. He says the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit. And you see what he does there is he doesn't enable us to turn over a new leaf. He makes us a new plant. He turns us into something new. The washing of regeneration means that being born again cleanses me from defilement and renewing by the Holy Spirit. So God the Father, through God the Holy Spirit, makes us a new person, removing the defilement or giving us a new nature that is not a slave of that defilement. And so being justified by his grace means that I have a legal standing before God, bought and paid for by Jesus Christ. That God regards me as righteous in Christ because of the person and work of Christ. So you see, by denying the gospel, they lock themselves into the defilement that they preached freedom from. By removing the gospel, they remove the only hope for regeneration, for freedom, for the real remedy to our real problem. By denying the gospel, they removed from themselves and from all these families that they were tearing apart the real and only hope that God has provided for man. So you see, it's a big deal. You may think, oh, false doctrine, schmachtrin. No, it's a matter of life and death. It's a big deal when somebody corrupts this message. It dooms the teacher and it dooms everyone who listens to him. It spreads death and misery and withholds the key to life. And, to bring it back to the context in Titus, it's the job of the elders to make sure that doesn't take root inside of the congregation over which they have care. Elders are responsible for the teaching that's going on. Elders are responsible for the families under their care to make sure they're not giving ear to such teaching or that nobody in the congregation is drifting aside to such teaching. So you should expect your elders to be interested in what you're reading and listening to because they've cut the job of making sure that poison doesn't get into your food. And if you want to teach in a church, you should expect your elders to talk to you and interview and make sure that you've got a firm grasp on the gospel and on these truths. Don't resent it when that takes place. It's our job. It's an important thing. It really matters. So these verses really search our hearts. What do my lips say? If I never profess faith, well, that is a problem. I need to profess faith if I'm a believer. But even if I have made a claim to faith, I've got to ask myself the question we looked at, guided by the Apostle Paul in our New Year's sermon. I've got to ask myself, what does my life say? I should test myself. The Apostle John says it's possible to say I know God and still be a liar. If my lips say Jesus is Lord, Lord, Lord, but my life consistently says I am Lord, Lord, Lord. Well, there's a problem. So what does Jesus say? Jesus says, his first sermon recorded, repent for the kingdom of God is at hand. Jesus says, come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Jesus says, the one who comes to Me, I will absolutely not cast out. Jesus says, I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall not hunger. And he who believes in Me shall never thirst. Jesus says, if anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me. And let the one who believes in Me drink. Just as the Scripture says, from within him will flow rivers of living water. I wonder how you're hearing this. I wonder how these words hit home to you. Do you think, well, I can see now that really my life says that I don't have any faith in Christ. I haven't come to that point of really knowing Jesus as my Lord. But what I would say to you is I would say, come, what would possibly keep you? Come. This is a day of grace. Come to Jesus today. Talk to me. I'd be happy to give any of the help that I can to you. Come. Suppose you say, well, I do believe in Christ, but I look at my life and I don't see things as they are. It's not as consistent as it should be. Well, what I'd say to you is I would say, come to Christ. Come to Christ. Christ is the one who works in us to work and to will for his goodwill. He's the one who gives us the ability. He's the one who gives us the grace to live the Christian life. We can't live it independently. We need Jesus to live the Christian life. And suppose you're a happy soul who's able to say honestly and truthfully, I look at my life and I do see the marks of grace in my life. I see the work of Jesus in my life. Well, what would I say to you? I'd say the same thing. Come to Christ. Come to Him and praise Him for His grace. Come to Him and praise Him for His long suffering and His patience. You might hear me and say, it sounds like you think the answer to everything is to come to Christ. That's right. That's right. I think that's the answer to everything. I think working it out. can be a very involved matter, but at bottom, you've just got the heart of my ministry. If I'm here another 30, 40 years, that's what I'm going to be saying for 30, 40 years. If I'm teaching Exodus, Proverbs or Titus, the bottom line is going to be we need to come to Christ. We need to come to him for life, for forgiveness. We need to come to him for wisdom, for guidance. We need to come to him for grace. We need to come to him with praise, with thanksgiving, with love. And we need to go out and tell others about him. But yes, that is what I'm saying. The answer to everything. Come to Christ. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your word and its clarity, and thank you for your grace and mercy. Thank you for taking pity on us sinners who are in a misery made of our own devising, our own invention, our own imagination that we were sufficient apart from you. Our first Father, took us down that path, and we've chosen that path ever since. And Father, yet you sent your son to redeem people from their sin. And Father, I pray that the Spirit of God will bring this word across with power to everyone here. Those who know the grace of Christ, may they all the more praise you and glorify you for that grace. Those of us who struggle, and we all struggle at some point or another, may we still rejoice in that grace and come to Jesus for more. Come to Jesus to drink more. Come to Jesus to know more of His grace. And for those who've come in with no relationship to Christ, perhaps imagining that they did, perhaps knowing that they didn't. We pray that this gospel will come with power, that they'll hear the voice of Christ calling to them, saying, come, and that they will run to Him for life and salvation and pardon. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.