The Pastoral Letters (i.e., 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus) were written by Paul to encourage church leaders (Timothy at Ephesus, Titus on Crete) in the good-hard-urgent work of shepherding God’s flock.  Earlier this fall we studied 1 Timothy.  Today we dive into Titus.  Paul’s “last will and testament,” 2 Timothy, is coming next month.

These letters reveal Paul’s intense concern over false teaching.  Alternative “gospels” are dead ends, so the Apostle says:  charge the people “not to teach any different doctrine” (1 Timothy 1:3).   Accordingly, elders/pastors had to be “able to teach” (3:2).  

As Paul puts it for Titus, an elder “must hold firm to the trust­worthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it” (1:9).   Notice both positive and negative:   able to set out, explain and apply “sound doctrine”; yet also able to detect and expose false teaching and “rebuke” those who promote it.  We may prefer the positive (speaking it and hearing it), but faithful­ness means also being clear about error—what it is, where it leads.

These letters warn against straying off course:   by professing false “knowledge,” people “swerved from the faith” (1 Timothy 6:21).  Those “who have swerved from the truth … are upsetting the faith of some (2 Timothy 2:18).  Don’t fall for “empty talkers and deceivers” (Titus 1:10).  Paul also exposes sinful motives:  through “the love of money,” people had “wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs” (1 Timothy 6:10).    

You see, “The time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for them­selves teach­ers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths” (2 Tim. 4:3-4). 

And so:  fix your eyes on Jesus, cling to God’s trustworthy word. And pray for our Elders and ministry staff—that they (we) would stand firm on the Gospel and speak the truth, the whole truth.