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Titus 2

“Proclaim these things; encourage and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you.” Titus 2:15

What exactly is Paul telling Titus to “proclaim?”  Everything that he has just written.  It’s both the practical instructions for living, and the Gospel that empowers and motivates our behavior.  My natural tendencies, however, are to modify my behavior through discipline and lounge in the comfort of grace. While I work to keep them separate, Paul shows us that theology and practice are never separated. So, when he tells Titus to ‘proclaim these things’ in verse 15, he means both the practical instructions for living AND the gospel that empowers them.Titus 2 is not about behavior modification; it’s rooted in the reality of Christ’s redemption and the transforming power of grace.

Do you feel the motivating power of God’s grace, or does it just make you comfortable?
Grace is more than a comforting idea; grace is the manifested reality of Jesus Christ entering human history.

• Grace saves us
• Grace teaches us
• Grace transforms us

Paul roots every command that follows in this truth: what we do flows from what Christ has done.  I love the way Timothy Keller says it.  He writes, “grace does not merely forgive, it changes us.  It is not opposed to effort, but to earning.”

Because of Christ’s redeeming work, we are now His people, purified, treasured, and eager for good works (Titus 2:14). Our obedience is not the cause of His acceptance, but the result of His transforming grace.

As much as I’d like to lounge in the comfort of God’s grace, Paul won’t allow it.  He couples practical instruction with it, that is powered by grace.

• Grace calls us to renounce ungodliness
• Grace enables us to turn from worldly passions
• Grace helps us live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives
• Grace points us toward Christ’s return
• Grace gives us confidence to walk as a purified people as His possession
• Grace compels us to do good works

This is not self-improvement. It is Spirit-empowered formation, through grace. We live differently because we are different.  We are redeemed and renewed in Christ.

Psalm 113

I can’t put a number on how many times the family and I go to church on Sundays and am either reminded by the pastor or simply sitting in my seat reminding myself how it isn’t just on Sundays for an hour or so that I should be talking with Him and praising Him.  We all know the correct answer…..it’s ALL THE TIME.  All the time, whenever we have a second, put the phone down and tell Him, Thank You! I Love You.  I Have Nothing Without You in my Heart.  That is what Psalm 113 describes.

Verses 1-3: Praise the Lord at all times, from everywhere

Verses 4-6: God is above everything, yet still cares about us

Verses 7-9: God lifts people up and gives hope to the hopeless

This Psalm is pure worship.  It reminds us that we cannot even begin to comprehend how amazing He truly is. He should be admired for His greatness and worshipped for His compassion as well.  To continue to worship Him at times when we don’t NEED something is so important, not just when we have a request following shortly after.  I am absolutely guilty when it comes to taking those many moments throughout the whole day and not once thinking about using those moments to give Him at least a little praise.  Sure, I spare some time in the morning before the day starts, then again at night when my head hits the pillow, but I am truly missing out on all those opportunities.

So many times, my mom calls me at whatever point in the day.  She asks me what I am doing.  Without thinking, I tell her I’m busy.  Half of the time, I am probably not.  I am either driving to the next stop or sitting in front of my computer working on something that can be put on hold for 5 minutes.

What if God called me on my cell phone?!  Think about this….what if God started calling you on your cell phone tomorrow??  What if he called you a few times a day, even during a work meeting, just to check in.  I don’t know what the reason could possibly be that we don’t answer that call every time. Can you even grasp at the idea to have the opportunity to hear his voice and get a chance to have a few words with Him just once?!

Psalm 113, God deserves nonstop praise at all times, from everywhere, because He is both incredibly powerful and incredibly caring and beyond anything we can comprehend.

Psalm 111

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” — Psalm 111:10

Wisdom doesn’t begin with age, education, or experience. According to Scripture, it begins with something far deeper: a right posture toward God. When the psalmist says, “the fear of the Lord,” he’s not talking about terror or shrinking back. He is describing a reverent awe—an awareness of God’s holiness, power, and authority that shapes how we live. It is the recognition that God is God… and we are not.

This kind of fear anchors us. It pulls our hearts into alignment with God’s truth and steadies our steps when the world feels unstable. When we stand in awe of who God is, we begin to see life differently. Decisions become clearer. Temptations lose some of their appeal. Priorities shift. Wisdom grows not because we suddenly know all the answers, but because we trust the One who does.

True wisdom is lived, not merely learned. Psalm 111:10 reminds us that “all who follow His precepts have good understanding.” Wisdom is revealed in obedience—in choosing God’s ways, even when they are countercultural, inconvenient, or costly. The more we walk with Him, the more we recognize His faithfulness, and the deeper our reverence becomes.

Today, ask God to renew within you a holy awe for who He is. Let His greatness humble you, His goodness draw you near, and His Word guide your steps. Wisdom begins where self-confidence ends and God-confidence begins.

May your reverence lead you into clarity, strength, and a life firmly rooted in Him.

Psalm 108

The psalms were written as songs that should be meditated on. As I read and reread this psalm, the first line keeps coming back to me. David opens the psalm with, “My heart is confident in you, O God; no wonder I can sing your praises with all my heart!” (NLT). As I meditate and fill my mind with this scripture, I keep coming back to one word: confidence. David did not find his confidence or his steadfastness in himself or his own abilities, his confidence was in God. From that confidence in God and His character, David could rightly sing with all his heart.

We can have confidence that God is the same today as He was yesterday and as He will be tomorrow. God is steady, a firm foundation your feet can stand upon. David goes on to mention a few attributes of God’s character that we can be steadfast on. First, David praises God for His mercy. David uses the Hebrew word Hesed. This word means a little more than just our common English understanding of mercy. This word has the meaning of God’s loyal, unfailing love for His people. David uses hyperbole to try and describe this love as higher than the heavens (v. 4). God has a loyal love for His people, even when He disciplines. Not only does God have a loyal love, but He is faithful and true (v. 4). God is a man of His word. He does not pull back on His promises. He has fulfilled all his past promises and will fulfill all his future promises. 2 Peter 3:9 states, “The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent.” Lastly, we see a final attribute of God being His holiness. God is holy, set apart, and righteous (v. 7).

You can be confident in these attributes of God because He doesn’t change. He is a good, caring God. David was confident in these truths, so he left vengeance up to the Lord. David trusted in the Lord to be a just God as he stated, “With God’s help we will do mighty things, for he will trample down our foes” (Ps. 108:13).

What do you need to trust the Lord with? Maybe you are switching jobs and need to trust God will make the decision clear. Maybe you are being tempted that God really isn’t real, and you need to come back to what you know is true about God. Maybe you have a decision to make and are trusting in your own abilities instead of finding your confidence in God. He is a trustworthy God. Find confidence in what you know about Him.

Today’s Reading: Psalms 106

One of the quotes that I  heard this past Thanksgiving was “ We give thanks for the things that we remember”.

Memories are not just for us, but for our past selves , our present selves, and our future selves. 

When we share the things of our past through stories and anecdotes we create a picture of the past. For me, some of the most profound memories that I have are from stories that were given to me by my family and ancestors.  I never met either one of my grandfathers, but I saw their lives through the stories.  The stories and the legacy that we give from our memories will shape our future memories in others. 

In this passage, Psalms 106,  we are called to give thanks for the memories of the past and then continue to share these memories to help the future.  God is asking us to REMEMBER all the things that he has done and cherish them. 

“Remember me, O Lord, when you show favor to your people; help me when you save them, that I may look upon the prosperity of your chosen ones, that I may rejoice in the gladness of your nation, that I may glory with your inheritance. 

Both we and our fathers have sinned; we have committed iniquity; we have done wickedness. 

Our fathers, when they were in Egypt, did not consider your wondrous works; 

they did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love, but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea. 

But they soon forgot his works; they did not wait for his counsel. 

They forgot God, their Savior, who had done great things in Egypt, 

Many times he delivered them, but they were rebellious in their purposes and were brought low through their iniquity. 

Nevertheless, he looked upon their distress, when he heard their cry. 

For their sake he remembered his covenant, and relented according to the abundance of his steadfast love.”

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Psalm‬ ‭106‬:‭4‬-‭7‬, ‭13‬, ‭21‬, ‭43‬-‭45‬ ‭ESV‬‬

God is merciful and generous.  His time span is infinite to ours.  A millennium to us is a blink in time for Him. God allows us to remember Him through His Spirit and through his relationship with us. 

We remember him through our stories that have been given to us over the generations. 

We remember the love that He gives us.

 We remember through the miracles that have been performed. 

We remember because of His goodness to us.

 Let’s pray that we will not forget his goodness to us. Let us not forget to share his love with others.

 

Be Blessed

 

2 Timothy 4:2 (NLT)
Preach the word of God. Be prepared, whether the time is favorable or not. Patiently correct, rebuke, and encourage your people with good teaching.

What would make it good timing to preach the word? I can think of 1,000 reasons why it’s not a good time—and probably never will be.

• • Sorry, I’m in a hurry, let’s talk later.
  • Sorry, I’ve got these reports to go over.
  • Oh hey, yeah, not now, I’ve got a meeting coming up.
  • Oh man, can it wait? I just walked into a meeting.

Jesus didn’t do it that way, he preached – always –  even when his good friend, Lazarus, was dying. Instead of dropping everything as we expect, he stayed where he was for the next two days (John 11:6, NLT). Talk about bad timing.

Do you know what he was doing for those two days? I have to assume that he was teaching, preaching, and healing, just like he always was. Truth is, it’s always a good time to preach Jesus. Always.

Hold up. Maybe you are ready to exclaim that you are not a preacher. That may be true in the sense that you do not deliver sermons. Fine. But what about your neighbor? What about that coffee group or book club that you see all the time?

Timothy Keller calls that “Level 1 preaching.” Every Christian has the responsibility to understand the message of the Bible well enough to explain and apply it to other Christians and to his neighbors in informal and personal settings.  If we are to do that, we must “be prepared,” as Paul exhorts.

If you were prepared to preach today, what would you say?

That means that yes, we must have some idea of what we will say, but it also means that we must be willing. Being willing is kind of like budgeting: if I don’t decide beforehand where my money will go, it will decide for itself, and I usually regret it.

That’s why, once we are willing, we want to be prepared.  Here is a simple formula: start with the Gospel and finish with the Gospel.  Once again, Tim Keller gets it right. He says that “telling listeners only how they should live without putting that standard into the context of the gospel gives them the impression that they might be complete enough to pull themselves together if they really try hard.”  So this isn’t about having the perfect thing to say; it’s about sharing Jesus.

Today’s reading on Thanksgiving is 2 Timothy 3.

For me our reading today has perfect timing, like God’s Word commonly does out of no coincidence, as a bookend to a parenting conference and Sunday sermon by Brook and Elizabeth Moser and team with Intentional Parents this weekend at our church. This chapter reminds us that especially during end times and throughout our kids and our lives we will experience evil people with a love for self and pleasure above all things who can tempt us to head down that wrong path (2 Timothy 3:1-5). We often talk as Christians about the fact that we want others to see us and think, “What makes him/her different?” We discuss how we can impact them and their faith walk with Jesus by them to deciding they want the joy and peace we have through the Gospel as well. That’s what’s fun to talk about. What we don’t often talk about is that others will see us as “different” and not only judge us and laugh at us, but we are told here in 2 Timothy 3:12 that “all who desire to live a godly life in Christ will be persecuted.” There is no sugar coating from Paul here, there is pain in parenting differently than others by doing it the way God wants. There will be difficulty and stones thrown at us and our kids for putting sin away and putting Jesus first.

Many of us are likely familiar with 2 Timothy 3:16..

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,”

If you’re like me you may point to this verse for your conviction for all of Bible being the true Word of God and not only is it true, but we can’t pick and choose the parts we like and don’t like. I think then sometimes we can overlook the rest of the verse which tells us how that helps us…”for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” Again, if you’re like me you might easily stop there and not focus on finishing the sentence which is in 2 Timothy 3:17,”(so) that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” There will be fruit in following God’s Word despite the difficulty and persecution we will face. Who doesn’t want to be “complete” and “equipped for every good work” God has and wants for us?

Many of us can easily fall into the trap of saying we just want to raise good kids. But, good kids will not have an eternal life in Heaven if they don’t accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior when they die. The number 1 goal for us as parents should be to raise kids who have a heart and love for Jesus so strong that they will not stray from Him, their belief in Him, and His ways when they leave our house.

So parents, let us unite and win this battle together. We can have confidence we can do this as we are told here that God’s Word will help us be “complete” and “equipped for every good work.”

Let us pray..

Dear God, we love you. And today on Thanksgiving we are grateful for you and your Word which not only teaches us how to live and raise our kids, but also for the fact that you gave us your Son in the person of Jesus who was persecuted far worse than most all of us ever will experience for following you and your will, all the way to the point of death because He knew it was worth it. He followed your will for each one of us so that we could have eternal life. Although our children will make their own personal decision to follow Jesus, please help us know that following your will and leading them well to point them to You will also be worth it for our children despite the difficulty and persecution. Please help us do our part so that we can lead by example to help each one of our children accept and follow you in order to experience eternal life through your saving grace. Again, we love you and we are eternally grateful today on Thanksgiving and every day for doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. Amen.