Well, good evening. If you have a Bible, turn with me to the book of Titus. The book of Titus, we are in chapter two. And again, somewhat like last time, and read this section in its entirety. Chapter two, verse one through nine. Hear now this, the word of the living God. But as for you, speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine. That the older men be sober, reverent, temperate, sound in faith and love and patience. the older women likewise, that they be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things, that they may admonish the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed. Likewise, exhort the young men to be sober-minded, In all things, showing yourself to be a pattern of good works. In doctrine, showing integrity, reverence, incorruptibility, sound speech that cannot be condemned, that one who is an opponent may be ashamed, having nothing evil to say of you. Exhort bondservants to be obedient to their own masters, to be well-pleasing in all things, not answering back, not pilfering, but showing all good fidelity, that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior, in all things. Well, this is the word of the living God, and we say, thanks be to God, amen. Please be seated. Let's go to the Lord in prayer together. Our Father in heaven, we are grateful for all of your words. We are thankful for those great doctrines in scripture. that you lay out so carefully for us to examine. We thank you also for practical teachings. You do not leave us guessing, but you give us clear instruction that we may know not only what to believe, but how to live in light of it. Pray for grace this evening. Pray for help. from the Holy Spirit. I pray that you will speak through me, despite my own weaknesses, sinful tendencies, and I pray for those who hear, that they would hear from you, that even from this text, they'll see the glories of Christ, and that they would be comforted convicted, warned, encouraged, that they may all attain to the likeness of Christ on the last day. It's in his name we pray, amen. Well, my focus this evening is on verse two. Let me reread this. It's about older men. Paul's instruction to Titus is this, speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine. Verse two, that the older men be sober, reverent, temperate, sound in faith and love and patience. We were in this text a few weeks ago, and as I mentioned there, this text, verses one through nine, breaks down various instructions, encouragements, warnings, into different classes of people. And as I said a few weeks ago, well, it makes a distinction between male and female. It makes a distinction between the old and the young. And it makes a distinction between classes. You see bond servants there in verse nine. And the world may not like this. They may say, look, this is sexist, this is ageist, this is classist. But this is the word of God given to us. And the gospel is laid out earlier in Titus. And Titus is instructed by Paul to establish healthy churches on the island of Crete. And now he's instructing the people in the churches to behave in line with the gospel. He says, speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine. And then there's this instruction to these various groups of people. And our focus tonight is just on this first group of people, older men. Now, the text does not say what makes an older man an older man. It doesn't say age 30, 40, 50. We just are left here with this phrase, older men. Now, perhaps in different cultures and different time periods based on lifespan, you could say that an older man in this culture, in this time period, was 40 or 50, perhaps younger. But here, we are going to simply address older men as older men. And if you feel like you're an older man, Well, this is for you if you do not feel like you are an older man. You are not a man at all. Well, this text is still for you. There is something here for all of us. But I want to begin, before we even get into this, why address older men, especially in the ways that they are addressed here? Be sober, reverent, temperate, sound in faith, love, patience, Why are older men given these particular instructions? Should we not all aspire to possess these qualities? Well, the answer is yes, we should all aspire to possess these qualities. Nonetheless, why are older men singled out here? What is in Paul's mind? Why the need to address older men in such ways? Well, think for a moment about the temptations that older men are prone to face. Older men, as they grow, as they age, their bodies begin to break down. They are disappointed, perhaps, with their physical abilities, but then their mind also is not as sharp as it used to be. And in various aspects of life, they begin to be surpassed by younger men in various ways. But more than that, older men are as accustomed as anyone to the disappointments of life. Older men know their sinful tendencies. If anyone has regrets in life, it's probably the older folks, the older men, the older women who have more regrets than the younger. When you combine all of these factors, older men are going to be tempted by Satan in ways that younger men are not. And so Paul addresses the older men to warn them. But at the same time, I think there's an exhortation here towards older men. There is a command given towards older men. Older men are particularly useful in the church of God. And these instructions are meant for them. Now, in my own experience, when I think of older men, just based on my own life, I've been blessed in this way, I do not think of men who are prone to sin. I do not have in mind many men who've just fallen off the wagon, who have left the faith, who have done something terrible in older age. But that does happen. I know from experience, to some degree, that does happen. But consider even the scriptures. Think about Abraham for a moment. We think of Abraham, this man justified by faith. He believed God. It was credited to him as righteousness. He had met God. God had been so kind to him. and to his family and set him apart that he may be a blessing to all the world. And yet, even after all of that, Abraham sinned. He lacked faith in God. He lied about his wife, saying that she's my sister. Or consider David for another example. David was not a young man. at least not as young as he was when he sinned with Bathsheba and against Uriah, her husband. When he set up the murder of Uriah, he was an older man with adult children. Consider Gideon. If you have your Bible, you can turn with me to Judges chapter eight. Gideon, this great deliverer of Israel, this great judge of Israel, had done mighty things for the Lord, had exhibited great faith, had brought Israel away from her enemies. But it was an older age that Gideon sinned against God. We recently went through this book, but let me remind you from Judges chapter eight, After Israel's enemies had been subdued, the men of Israel came to Gideon, and they began to tempt him to be king. But there was no king in Israel, nor should there have been. God had not called anyone to be king. And the men of Israel said to Gideon, rule over us, both you and your son and your grandson also, for you have delivered us from the hand of Midian. Now Gideon, He had seen the hand of God as closely as anyone, especially in his day. Would this really work on Gideon? Gideon said to them, well, I will not rule over you. But then he kind of leaves the door open. Nor shall my son rule over you. The Lord shall rule over you. Now that's a good answer. But then Gideon says to them, I would like to make a request of you though. That each of you would give me the earrings from his plunder. So the people of Israel give them the earrings. And they answered, we will gladly give them. They spread out a garment and each man threw into it the earrings from his plunder. And the weight of the gold earrings that he requested was 1,700 shekels of gold. Gideon made it into an ephod, that is, something to worship. And he set it up in his city, Orphra. And what did Israel do? They played the harlot with this golden idol. Gideon was not a young man. He was an older man when he sinned in this way. Shortly after, we also learned that Gideon had taken on some foreign lives. Just a little while later, we realized also that he has concubines. And after that, the house of Gideon begins to fall further and further into sin. This great man of God, used of God, now falling into sin. When? Not when he was a young man. When he was a young man, he was faithful. He was a warrior. Now, as an older man, perhaps he got comfortable. What is it about the aging of a man that produces this sort of action? It may be surprising to some of the younger folks in here that you would think that as you grow, that as you go along in the Christian life, perhaps you think that, oh, young men, those are the wild ones. Those are the ones that commit crimes. Those are the ones that get into trouble. Well, it's true. But the scriptures offer pictures of older men falling into great sin. Consider also Moses. Moses, who saw the burning bush, who took off his sandals, for he was standing on holy ground. Moses, who met with God on the mountain, whose face shone with glory. Moses, as an older man, lacked faith. God told him, speak to the rock. But Moses cowered in his faith, and he struck it instead, disobeying the Lord. He failed to trust God, and from that point forward, God told him, you will not enter the promised land. When did Moses sin? When he was an older man. So older men, if you're listening, you will be tempted. Perhaps in ways that you are not expecting. Older men, you need Christ. For every picture we have in the scripture is of men and women who fail. If they do not fail when they are young, they fail when they are old. One person lived a righteous life, and that is Jesus Christ, our Savior. Jesus went to the cross after living that perfect life, and he died paying the penalty that you and I deserve, and now by faith in him, you and I can have his righteousness. It's credited to our account by faith in him. So in our sermon tonight, I want you to see three things, three observations from our text, particularly verse one and verse two. Here's the first heading. First heading is this, adorn the gospel in your station in life. Adorn the gospel in your station in life. Now the first, verse here, it says, speak those things which are proper for sound doctrine. So Paul's words to Titus, speak those things, that is, teach those things. And what he means here is, show the people how to behave in light of the gospel. If you look back just a few verses, remember in chapter one, we read about the Cretans, and they were twisting the gospel. They were adding law to the gospel. They were not preaching a pure gospel. And Paul could call them out based on the content of their message alone. But that's not all that Paul does. Paul also calls them out for their lives. Paul says that they deny the gospel by their works. Look back in chapter one. Those false teachers, they live nasty lives. Those false teachers, they deny the truth of God by the way they live. And now, we're turning the page, and Paul says, you don't be like that. In light of all that God has done for you, live in light of it. For I have given you the greatest gift. I've given you my son. And in my loving kindness, I have offered you salvation. And now the Christian ethic is not that we achieve our own salvation, but we live in light of the salvation that's already been accomplished for us. We, Christians, live in gratitude. God has paid it all. And now the Christian life is one of gratitude. So Paul says live in light of the gospel. Speak, Titus, those things which are proper for sound doctrine." Now that word, sound doctrine, at least as it's used here in the book of Titus, it's somewhat of a narrow phrase. Sound doctrine is that singular message of God for salvation. Sound doctrine is that once for all, passed down through the ages, apostolic faith. Sound doctrine is true Christianity, in other words. Now, when you and I may speak about sound doctrine, we may contrast our doctrine with the Presbyterian church down the road, and that's right. But in this case, the word is meant more narrowly. Doctrine here is the true gospel. Sound doctrine is the gospel that's not twisted or added to by false claims and extra-biblical laws. So Paul says, speak what goes with the gospel. If you look down at verse nine, so we have verse one, and then we have a bunch of instructions to various people, and then you'll see verse nine. In his instruction there to bond servants, you'll notice this phrase, that they are to adorn the gospel. Bond servants are to adorn the gospel. I think this is really the same sort of phrase as we see in verse one. Speak that which accords with proper doctrine and then adorn proper doctrine. So I think this is really one and the same phrase. So I take this verse one and then verse nine to be brackets. and everything in between is a fleshing out of what it means to adorn the gospel. So every instruction here is showing various peoples within the church, what does it look like for you to adorn the gospel? Now adorn means to add to, particularly add something beautiful to. decorate, beautify, bejewel, that's a word. If you're gonna enhance the appearance of something, you are adorning it. And so much of the scriptures actually is a description of God adorning us. So once we are clothed in the robes of righteousness, You can read all of these various phrases in the scriptures. Revelation, for instance. The new Jerusalem is called a bride adorned for her husband. So the church is adorned, getting ready for the appearing of Christ. In Jeremiah, God says that he will adorn Jerusalem with the sound of tambourines. So when God blesses Jerusalem, he gives her salvation, but also he adds to the salvation with joy and music and tambourines and dancing. In Isaiah, it says this, God has covered me with the robe of righteousness as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments and as a bride adorns herself with jewels. That's adornment. Yes, we're given salvation, but then we're given these little symbols in Scripture that show us how wonderful it really is. Adornment just means adding beauty to something. So how do we add beauty to that beautiful message? Well, we do it with our good works, as we'll see later in Titus, but here, most immediately, Paul says, adorn the gospel with your way of life. Adorn the gospel with your behavior. Adorn the gospel with the fruit of the Spirit. Recall Galatians. The works of the flesh. What are those things? Those are nasty things. Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, sorcery, hatred, jealousies, outbursts of wrath. That's adornment of a different kind. Those people of Satan, what are they doing? They're making life with Satan look awful, aren't they? They're making it look nasty by the way they live. what Paul says in Galatians, not so you, believer. For you have the Spirit, and if you have the Spirit, walk by the Spirit. And if you walk by the Spirit, it will be evident that you're walking by the Spirit, because there will be fruit, love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. If you have these things, you are adorning the gospel. You're making the gospel. look beautiful, for the gospel is beautiful. Paul says, should we sin that grace may abound? By no means. Instead, when we experience grace, we're to put away the old man and to live in light of all that God has done for us. So no matter your station in life, whether you're an older man, older woman, Younger man, younger woman. Adorn the gospel. Whatever your career might be. What does it look like to be a faithful Christian in your particular circumstances? For it's gonna look different for all of us. But here we have some general instructions to older men. So let's pay particular attention to this. Second heading is this, older men, take special care to be temperate. How do older men adorn the gospel? Well, they are temperate. There's a list here of two sets of three, I believe. There's older men are to be sober, reverent, temperate. and then they are to be sound in faith and love and patience. I'm gonna take these as two sets of three. So the first is this, take special care, older men, to be temperate. I think there's overlap here between these first three words, sober, reverent, and temperate. First, sober. Sober is actually, this is not sober-minded, that's, That's stated later in the chapter. Sober here really does mean like not drunk. You're not giving over to vice. You're sober, you're not drunk. Sober-minded, when that's used, that's a bit of a different thing. That means sort of in your right mind, you're thinking sanely. But this specifically means not drunk. Older men, be sober. That is, do not get drunk. Now, at least in our culture, you may be thinking, do older men really need to be told, do not get drunk? Do older men really get drunk? Is that a problem? If you're asking that, you have never been to a NASCAR race. But seriously though, at least John Calvin and some other commentators actually do think this is. a problem for older men. I was surprised. John Calvin says this, excessive drinking is a vice too common among the old. Excessive drinking is a vice too common among the old. Again, though, let's think of the scriptures. Can you think of older men who sinned in an egregious way by getting drunk? What righteous man lived for over 500 years, was a preacher of righteousness, and after being used of God to do mighty things, got drunk and fell asleep? It's Noah. Noah gets drunk. He's later hailed in the scriptures as a hero of faith. But Noah gets drunk. Or consider lot. You remember righteous lot. Drinking too much and the problems that produced. So older men, be sober. Do not give over to vice. Secondly, older men be reverent. that is honorable, noble, respectable. But I like this, the King James Version says, grave, older men be grave. And by grave, I don't think the King James means like you got sullen, sort of sunken eyes, and you're always frowning. I don't think that's what is meant here. Rather, older men, have some gravity about you. Older men, When you walk into a room, let your presence be weighty. Let it be felt. Calvin says this, gravity comes about by well-regulated morals. If you have gravitas, it's a word that some have been using more in recent years. It means that you're sensible, you're respectable, you're strong, you're steady. just means heaviness, weightiness. And if you think about it, if you are serious, if you are grave, if you're weighty, you're difficult to push over. And the church needs that. The church needs men who are difficult to push over. They're steady. They know what they think. They're not overly impressed. They're not overly disappointed. They're steady. They have a broad stance, and they're ready. They've seen it before. They're not surprised by the fiery trials of the evil one. Those flaming darts have been coming at them for years. They're grave, and we need this. In a frivolous culture like ours, just this silly culture that we live in, what a gift older men are. What a gift they are. And a diagnostic question, I think, for men in here, younger men as well as older men, we want to strive for that gravity, and you have to ask yourself, do I regularly do something that undermines my own respectability? Or another question, how might I cultivate respectability? How might I cultivate reverence? How might I cultivate gravitas? In the next few days, that would be good to ask of yourself. Is there some habit that you possess that keeps you from being as respectable as you otherwise could be? The next quality is temperate. And again, there's overlap between sober and reverent and now temperate. Temperate is a little broader, I think, self-controlled. If you are temperate, you're well-regulated, you're sensible. One pastor says that temperance is a spirit-wrought fruit in a believer's life that manifests itself in the godly abstinence of sinful passions and moderation of even good desires in conformity to Christ. That's a long quote. Let me read it one more time. Temperance is a spirit-wrought fruit in a believer's life that manifests itself in godly abstinence of sinful passions and moderation of even good desires and conformity to Christ. If you're temperate, you abstain from those passions. You don't have real high highs or low lows. You're moderate. So I think these three things go together, sober, reverent, temperate. And now the next three, third heading is this. Older men, be sound in faith, hope, and love. Be sound in faith, hope, and love. Now I recognize that these, it does not say faith, hope, and love, but I wanna explain why. First, it says older men be sound in the faith. That is, in terms of the things that you actively believe, do not waver. You don't need to be shifting your opinions all the time, but get to a place where you know what you believe and stick to it. What a gift that is to the church. For many young men coming to the church, and they're especially going to be the ones with questions, as they work out their own salvation, as they work out what they believe. Am I a paedo-baptist, am I not? Am I reformed, am I not? What a gift it is to have many in the church who really know what they believe so that they can be a guide to others. Older men, be sound in the faith for the sake of the church. For you are a pillar, older men. Even if you're not an elder, you are a pillar of sorts. Not just in the church, but in your families. Your family needs someone who's steady, Research the scriptures, know what you believe, that you may be a guide to your friends, to your family, to your church. While others may waver, you should not. Next it says, sound in love. Sound in love, healthy. When you think of that word sound, think healthy. There's not a defect. You're strong in love. Do not have, men, do not have these little hidden sort of pet peeves in your heart where you love most things but you got this secret place and you just really can't stand this particular thing or person. No, sound, without defect. Let your whole being be one of love. Let your faith Produce love and let all of your heart guide your behavior in love. In love for Christ, but in love for your church. Next it says, sound in patience. Have much patience. Have a track record of being patient. Do not be surprised at the slow growth of your family members. or of some in the church. You've been around a while. You of all people should be patient. One commentator says that these three, faith, love, and endurance, they form a triad that reflects on the whole of human life, and I think that's right. I think this writes, this faith, Love and patience. It sounds a little bit like 1 Corinthians 13, doesn't it? Remember there, faith, hope, and love? What is patience anyway? Patience is the ability, it's the ability to wait on Christ. Patience is very much related to hope. We should be people of hope. Hope fuels our patience as we wait. Hope fuels us. It gives us endurance. That would be another good translation. Have much endurance, older men. Do not be like those older men that I read about earlier, Moses and Gideon, who made it such a long way before sinning such egregious sins. Well, there are many warnings in Scripture. Charles Spurgeon says this about old age, and this is good for me. I know it's good for many of you to read a quote like this, because we don't know, many of us don't know what it's like to get to get older, I say that being the grayest of the elders. But a quote like this, a quote like this is really helpful for me. Here's Spurgeon. The infirmities of old age often create petulance. So the grace of God is to make the venerable Christian to be full of faith, love, and endurance. When commenting on this, Spurgeon just straight up says, it's difficult to be an older man. And if you would have told that to me when I was a younger man, I would have had maybe a harder time believing that. Well, I get it, yeah, I can't play soccer as well as I used to. Well, and everything else, I'll probably be smarter, right? But when you read someone like Spurgeon say that, that old age creates petulance. Think about that, crankiness, whininess, irritability, grumbling. Unfortunately, those qualities are things that we often associate with older men, older women. And so there's a warning here for all of us as we age. Do not give over to crankiness. Older men often complain. They complain about how something doesn't work as well as it should. I think the encouragement here, the warning here, is that men, you will be tempted to sin as you age. You will not stop being tempted. And I speak this to men who already know this lesson, I am sure of it, but the warning is good for all of us to hear. Just because someone is older in the faith does not mean that they're immune from sinning great sins. So heed the warnings, brothers, but now hear also this encouragement. Older men are very useful for the church. You cannot replace older men in the church. how thankful I am to have older men in my life. In fact, when I got to college, I first moved on to this dorm, people said, hey, have you met so-and-so? I was like, yeah, he's my roommate. I moved in with this guy, and his name was Mike, and people said, oh, he's like the most spiritually mature guy on the whole hall. You've got a great room, man. That's just so great for you. I was like, hey, that's great. Well, I got to know Mike, and The thing that Mike would joke about is that at his church, he had no friends. That is, his church in his home state. His only friends, he said, were older men. I guess that's all his church had. And so Mike would go to these prayer meetings with older men, and he did this regularly for years. And it had a wonderful effect on this brother. Because Mike, a college-aged man, did not pray like any other young man on campus. When Mike would pray to the Lord, he would be praying about things that none of the rest of us were even thinking about. Why? He'd been around older men. He had been accustomed to praying with older men. And in God's providence, as I got out of college, I experienced the same thing. I moved to a church in Charlotte, North Carolina, and on Tuesday mornings at 7 o'clock, I would meet with three older men, and we would pray. Just usually, I was the only young person there, early 20s. And what an effect that had on me. when older men gathered together and they began praying. And so often, they would begin by just quoting the scriptures. They would tell God who he is and how great he was. And they would kinda go on and on, said, God, you're in heaven, the earth is your footstool. And they would go on and on. And I was like, well, when are these guys gonna get to the requests? But I learned that they were praying in line with the Lord's prayer. And I learned that by acknowledging God for who He is, these older men were comforted. These older men who had much more difficult lives than I did, who had much more responsibility than I did at the time. They wanted to just speak to the Lord as to a friend. And they would go on thanking the Lord. and then they would make their request. And after time, after years of being around these men, it had an effect on me. And now I hope that that bears fruit even in this church. Older men, you cannot be replaced. We saw no better example of that than this morning as Pastor Ryan talked about Jethro. Jethro, a new believer, gives Moses advice. Who's gonna give Moses advice? Moses, as I said earlier, met with God, saw the burning bush, went up on the mountain, at least a few chapters after this one. Moses, used by God to deliver the people of Israel over Pharaoh. Moses, who raises his hands up and Israel wins. A younger man is not gonna approach Moses and say, hey, I got some advice for you. That's not really a younger man's place. See, older men, you cannot be replaced in the church. For even if you are a new believer, there are certain things that your time and experience in life provide the church with. So consider Jethro. Spurgeon also tells a story in which an older man once corrected him very gently by putting a pin in his Bible. I think he meant like a bobby pin and just kind of pinned it right there upon a verse. That was an older man's way of giving advice to a very famous young preacher. And Spurgeon later talked about how it did not irritate him in the slightest, but how he was abundantly grateful for that older man. You see, older men, younger men need an example. There's so much to learn in life. There's so much that we don't know, that we have not been through. So we need you. We want your wisdom, older men. We want your patience. We want your masculine, direct, honest form of loving encouragement. We want the safety of your presence and guidance. We want your seriousness. We want your gravity. And most of all, I think, we want to see you make it to the end. We want to see you persevere in the faith and not give up. What a grace that is to the church. We want to see you hold on to Christ, depending on him, all the way to the end. So older men, take seriously your role within the church. It is great indeed. Let's pray together. Our Father, we thank you for the examples provided to us in the scripture. We thank you for Christ, the only one who lived a righteous life. May we adorn the gospel by the way we live. Conform us more and more into his image. It's in his name we pray, amen.