Series: Amazing!
“TRANSFORMING GRACE”
TITUS 2:11-14
Last week, we started this message series called “Amazing!” We’re looking at God’s grace and what it means to live in his grace.
One of the things we mentioned last week is that God’s grace is designed to be transformative. It’s intended to be life-changing. Grace is about God accepting us the way we are but loving us enough not to leave us that way.
An Amish man and his young son are in a huge mall. They are amazed at everything they see but they are especially fascinated by two shiny, silver walls that move apart and back together again.
The boy asks, “What is this, father?” And the father (never having seen an elevator before)
responds, “Son, I have never seen anything like this in my life.”
The boy and father stand watching as a very old woman moving with the aid of a walker goes to the elevator doors and pushes one of the buttons. The walls open and the old lady moves between them and into a small room. The walls close and the boy and his father watch as circles light up in the reverse direction. The walls open up and out walks a beautiful young lady. The father and son blink their eyes in amazement. The father leans down to his son and says, “Go get your mother.”
God’s grace changes us for the better. It’s been said that if your religion doesn’t change you then you’d better change your religion. We’re going to look at grace today as an agent of change – both on the inside and on the outside. When God’s offer of grace is accepted, the work of God’s grace begins in our lives and continues throughout our lives
Titus 2:11-14 – For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. 12 It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, 13 while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.
GRACE IS WELCOMING
Paul says in vs. 11 that “the grace of God has appeared.” The word translated as “appeared” is where we get out word “epiphany.” It’s a term that refers to Jesus coming to earth as God in the flesh.
This term translated as “appear” is used two ways in scripture. Paul’s use of the term incorporates both ways.
In the first sense, it conveys the idea of being made known. Jesus made God known. He told Philip in Jn. 14:9b – “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” Paul describes it this way in Col. 1:15 – The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
Jesus also made himself known. He traveled all over Judea, Samaria, and Galilee. He went to the region we know today as Lebanon and journeyed in the Gentile lands on the east side of the Sea of Galilee. He was one of the most well-known people in the whole area. People knew him or knew about his teaching and his miracles.
We can’t understand grace apart from the personal appearance of Jesus Christ. His first appearance was the grace of God demonstrated to its fullest.
The second sense of the term “appeared” carries with it the idea of a light coming into the darkness. It is sometimes used to refer to the sun breaking in at dawn dispelling the darkness of night.
The apostle John described Christ’s coming at the first Christmas in history by saying in Jn. 1:4 – In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. In Jn. 8:12, Jesus says, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” When God sent Jesus into the world – he literally “turned on the light.”
In Titus 2:11, Paul describes this grace as appearing to offer salvation to all people. God’s demonstration of grace through his son Jesus invites us into relationship with him.
God’s grace has been declared. It’s been announced. It is not a secret. It invites us to come to Him. God’s grace is welcoming.
Rev. 22:17 – “The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come!’ And let him who hears say, ‘Come!’ Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.”
Grace says, “You’re wanted.” Think of welcoming grace as the front porch to a house. It’s the front porch that attracts. The light is on and the porch holds the welcome mat that invites you in.
Remember that grace is a gift. It can’t be earned or purchased. It’s only available by accepting and receiving God’s gift. When we accept God’s gift, grace suddenly breaks into our moral and spiritual darkness.
This gift is expensive. It cost Jesus his physical life. He paid for our gift with his body and blood. Grace is free but it’s not cheap.
GRACE IS SAVING
While God welcomes us with his grace, he also saves us by his grace. Let’s go back to the front porch of the house. We’re attracted. The light is on. The welcome mat is out. But we can’t get in. We don’t have the key! Someone has to unlock the door for us.
We can’t use the key of our own righteousness or the key of good deeds. Those keys will not open this door. The only key that works is the key of God’s grace through the sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ. Eph. 2:8-9 – For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast.
We can’t earn God’s favor. We can’t do enough good deeds. We can never be righteous enough on our own. Is. 64:6 – All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.
Grace means that we can stop worrying about being good enough. God says, “I know that you’re not good enough. That’s why I sent someone who was good enough – my Son,
Jesus – so that He could do what you couldn’t do.” God’s grace forgives, pardons, and justifies.
Salvation is justification. That’s a big word we don’t use much anymore. Justification is a legal declaration that says, “Guilty, but no penalty.” We deserve the penalty for our sin. God demands justice but knows we are unjust. He provides justification through his son.
Justification gives us a right standing before God. It imputes or accredits the righteousness of Christ to us so as to declare us righteous because of our acceptance of grace through faith.
Rom. 3:23-26 – For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26 he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.
GRACE IS PURIFYING
Once we accept Jesus Christ into our lives, the Holy Spirit enters our life to start a transformation process. He works to purify us – to decontaminate and refine us.
Notice that I said that this work of grace is a process. The effects of living in a fallen world have harmed everybody differently. We all face different issues, struggle with certain sins, and deal with past hurts of varying degrees, hindering our ability to live the life God desires for us.
When I was a young preacher, I went to visit an elderly lady who was a “shut-in” member of the congregation I served. I pulled up into her driveway and started across the yard to the front door.
Bad mistake. I had ignored my parents’ advice of always using the sidewalk if one was available to get to someone’s front door. She had a little dog and that little dog had left a present for me in the front yard. Of course, I didn’t know about the present until later.
I rang the doorbell and the elderly lady’s housekeeper let me in. She led me to the living room where the lady was sitting. She invited me to sit down on the couch across from her chair.
As we talked, I began to get a whiff of something. It wasn’t until I shifted positions and crossed my legs that I saw where the smell was coming from. I had to apologize for being a bad visitor and asked the housekeeper for a rag and some cleaning fluid. I then got on my hands and knees to clean up the mess I had made on her carpet.
Let’s go back to the house analogy I used earlier. We’ve been on the porch and now we’re through the door. A lot of Christians get through the front door, and they are a little surprised to see what they track in with them. I think they assume that once you’re through that front door, once you’re saved, the things that used to really tempt you, things you used to really struggle with, would just be gone and somehow disappear.
So you get through the front door and it seems like the scent stays and you’ve tracked some stuff in. Just because you are through the front door doesn’t mean you are not going to struggle with things.
Maybe you have found that your temper still gets the best of you, that sexual temptation and lust just keep coming up. Maybe you find that you are always putting yourself ahead of other people. You can’t seem to put your selfish ways behind you. Or maybe it is struggling with bitterness, hatred, or maybe it’s jealousy or gossip in your life. And you thought that when you became a Christian you were free from all of those things, and when you went through the front door, you left those things behind.
While God forgave you of those things and while He continues to do so, you are just surprised to see what you have tracked in. God knows about the problem so he provides a process of purification.
This process of purification is called sanctification. That’s another big word that we don’t use much anymore. It simply means to be “set apart.” The Bible refers to places, things, days, and people as being “set apart” for His purposes. Sanctification can be described as an inward spiritual process whereby God brings about holiness and change into our lives.
Justification is a declaration that we are no longer under the penalty of sin. Sanctification is a process that works on removing the power of sin – its cause and effects – in our lives.
In Titus 2:12, Paul says that grace “teaches us.” When we’re saved, we’re immediately enrolled into an institution of higher learning called Grace University. There is one professor – the Holy Spirit. There is one textbook – the Word of God: the Bible. There is both classroom teaching when we gather together to study from God’s Word but there is also “on the job training” where we’re expected to put into practice the things we learn.
Some people have said that there is a danger in preaching salvation by grace. They’re afraid that people will use salvation by grace to live any way they to – just put your faith in Jesus, just be baptized. But Paul wants us to understand that grace changes us. It transforms us from what we used to be into what God wants us to be.
Paul uses a word here that gets translated as “teach.” This word has a special sense of teaching a child. How do you teach a child? You teach by instruction but you also teach by hands-on experience (called training), encouragement, and discipline. God’s is an accomplished teacher who utilizes all of those methods.
What does grace teach us? First of all, Paul says in vs. 12 that grace teaches us to say, “No,” to things that are wrong – to ungodliness and worldly passions.
It seems to have been just as much of a problem in the early church as it is today. Jude 1:4 – For certain individuals whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord.
James Merritt: “Grace doesn’t give you the license to live the way you want to. It gives you the liberty to live the way you ought to.” Grace changes your heart. It changes your desires and affections. It changes your head. It changes your thoughts and attitudes. And it changes your habits. It changes the way you behave towards God and others.
Grace also teaches you to say, “Yes,” to what is right – to be self-controlled, upright, and godly. God not only gives you grace to live with him in heaven. He gives you grace to live for him on earth.
We are taught to look inward – to evaluate where our desires come from and how we can best develop godly desires so that we’re self-controlled. We are taught to look outward – to allow others to see the work of grace in our own lives so that our walk is upright. And we’re taught to look upward – to keep our eyes focused on God so that might learn what it means to be godly.
Paul says in Titus 2:14 that Jesus “gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.” God’s grace teaches us to be zealous and passionate about doing what is good. God’s grace moves us from being reluctant about doing good to being enthusiastic about doing good.
From the point of salvation, we grow in grace. Peter encourages us in 2 Pet. 3:10 – But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory
both now and forever! Amen.
Sanctification means that we’re in the process of becoming more and more like Jesus. Eph. 4:22-24 – You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.
That doesn’t become complete at the point of salvation. We are not immediately like Christ the moment we are baptized, the moment we accept Christ as our Savior. It’s a process.
CLOSE
While God gives us grace and his grace works a transforming process in our lives, we will not become completely like Jesus until he comes again. Paul frames his reasoning in Titus 2:11-14 between two events: Christ’s first coming and his second coming.
Paul says that the grace of God has appeared – referring to the time when God took on flesh and came to earth. But he also says that the grace of God will appear. Titus 2:13 says that while we are saved by grace and live in grace, we “we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.”
While we live here, we still live in the company of sin. But when Christ comes again, we are permanently transferred to where sin can never be. At Christ’s first coming, he came to take my sin away from me. At his second coming, he comes to take me away from all sin. Paul calls that glorious appearing is our blessed hope.
Without God’s grace, we have no hope. Our life here means nothing in comparison to eternity. Our destiny is eternal separation from the grace of God. But when we receive God’s salvation by grace through faith, we anxiously await and anticipate the return of Jesus who came to give us God’s grace. We wait and cry out with the early Christians, “Marantha – even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus.
