Hey everybody. We're gonna be in Titus tonight. So, it's in your worship guide. If you've got a worship guide, if you don't have one, look on with the person next to you or grab a Bible. We'll be in Titus chapter 2.
Collin Hansen:If you find Titus, then you've found chapter 2. So that's that's an easy win there. We're also gonna be in Luke chapter 2 if you wanna, take some time to flip there, and, we will read that later on. So Titus, chapter 2. What's happening here, is that Paul is writing a letter to Titus, to encourage him in the ministry that's going on.
Collin Hansen:To encourage him in the gospel. To remind him of the truth of what God has done. Some, kind of housekeeping issues are also going to be addressed when it comes to leadership and and those kinds of things within the church, but, but what we're going to 0 in on tonight is, is chapter 2 verses 11 through 14. I think it's a timely word for us, here, the 4th week, the 4th Sunday of Advent. So let us turn our attention to God's word and listen carefully.
Collin Hansen:For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people. Training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age. Waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness, and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. The word of the Lord. It is to God.
Collin Hansen:Let's pray. God, we are thankful for your word, and we ask that by your spirit you would meet with us in this time, that you would challenge us, you would comfort us, You would open our eyes to see who you are, that you would reveal yourself, and that we would find hope and rest. Father, help us by your spirit to to know the salvation that is in Christ, to also receive the the training in how to live. That we might declare who you are and enjoy who you are all the days of our lives. And we pray in this special season of Advent that you would help us to prepare our hearts, that we would be readied this week to celebrate the birth of our king.
Collin Hansen:And we pray these things in and for his name here and around the world. Amen. So if it hasn't already happened to you this season, it's likely going to happen this week, and that is when that that sting of nostalgia occurs. Maybe it's watching some particular Christmas movie, a certain scene. I remember years ago, being like, oh, what's the big deal?
Collin Hansen:It's a Wonderful Life. You're just you're just an old campy black and white film, and then you're crying by yourself at 2 o'clock in the morning when it's finally over on NBC. Just ugly crying next to a Christmas tree. That's okay. That's okay.
Collin Hansen:There's freedom for that too. But, but maybe it's that, maybe it's a movie where a song my mom would not let us play, I'll be home for Christmas in our home growing up. Her brother, lived and still lives in California, and so, that was that was banned. Couldn't listen to that one. Maybe it's with an ornament or, or some some, particular aspect of a tradition, and that nostalgia sets in.
Collin Hansen:And I don't think that nostalgia is necessarily a bad thing, like being nostalgic. I don't think it's necessarily bad. Now, when when it was first, termed, nostalgia, was in the 1600 by a Swiss doctor. And what he was just trying to describe was what would happen to soldiers when they would long for home. They would ache, and that's really what it means, these two Greek words for for, aching for home, or what we translate into homesickness.
Collin Hansen:And I don't think that that's altogether a bad thing. Now, when it would happen on the battlefield and they would just start wandering home, that's problematic. But for us, being nostalgic, not altogether a bad thing. In fact, that's part of the invitation of advent. It's to look back.
Collin Hansen:It's to stand in in this season and to look back at the story, to actually enter into it, really, to stand in the place of Mary and Joseph. To stand with the shepherds. To stand with the Magi. To go to Bethlehem. To behold the child in the manger.
Collin Hansen:It's an invitation to remember, it's an invitation actually to long to be there, to ache in the stable. It's an invitation, and it's an important one, I think, to accept. To accept that invitation to go back, to look back longingly, to ache, I think that's a good thing. And one of the main reasons that I think it's a good thing is that it fortifies our faith. It strengthens us in the gospel.
Collin Hansen:When we look backward, when we look back at the manger, when we see what we find out in 1st John 4, that this is how we know God loves us, that he sent his son. The sending is how we know he loves us, and that love is displayed. It's manifest at the cross, but it begins at the manger. So for 1, it strengthens us there in knowing that that's how he loves us, and he shows us. He proves it in the incarnation.
Collin Hansen:God taking on flesh. Not only that, it tells us that he did this at the right time, Which can be hard to believe if you take your time through the gospel narrative of the birth of Jesus. It's hard to believe that that is the right time. No room at the end. This long journey.
Collin Hansen:The senses. All these things happening. And then Jesus is born into this stable, and then further than that, that, he has to flee to Egypt. All of these things. And so when there's a hit out on all of these first born males, that's the right time?
Collin Hansen:And in Galatians, Paul tells us, yes. At the right time, God sent his son. So it fortifies the gospel in me knowing that that this is how God is showing that he loves me, and he's showing how he loves you, but also how he controls, and he is sovereign over history and timing, So that even when things don't look right, it can be right according to God's purposes. So it strengthens those things. That's why I think it's really helpful for us to look back, but the invitation of Advent is not just looking backward.
Collin Hansen:It's also an invitation to look forward. You see, Advent, Adventus, a Latin word that means coming or arrival, we stand between 2 of those. We have a unique place and point in history. Now we often like to think that everything that's ever happened before has been just like us, but we stand at a unique point in all of history. Not not everyone, as we see from the biblical story, not everyone has stood in this place where we are between advents.
Collin Hansen:We are between the first coming of Christ, the first advent of the Messiah, and the second advent, the second coming and arrival of the Messiah. We stand and live between those two places. And since it's unique, and there are unique things in that, it's worth our time considering, what does it mean to live here? What does it mean to live between advents? What does life between the advents look like?
Collin Hansen:And I find that Paul's words to Titus are quite helpful here. They're quite helpful in in us, kind of, gaining a North Star to realize where we are and what that means. And so let us follow Paul's instructions on how to live in between advents. We begin by looking back. Verse 11.
Collin Hansen:For the grace of God has appeared. The grace of God has appeared. Now now what Paul is saying in this in a short We're going to go piece by piece here, so buckle in. And we're going to go quickly too. But he's saying, for the grace of God has appeared.
Collin Hansen:And the grace of God, what's being talked about there, is that the sin, and the death, and the estrangement that came from the fall. What is a result of our unrighteousness is that the grace of God has appeared to address that. We've talked about that a number of times this fall, and we we have, really seen that in the Exodus story, what it means to be redeemed and called out of captivity. And so the grace of God has appeared. Now sometimes we like to think of the grace of God as just some commodity, some thing, or theology, but ultimately the grace of God is Jesus himself.
Collin Hansen:Not just what he has, done, not just what we, gain from him, his riches and rewards of his righteousness, and his death and resurrection and ascension. Not just that, it is himself. He is the grace of God, and that grace has appeared. And that grace came, that grace of God came in the coming, the advent of Jesus. And that has come to us, and Paul is saying that has occurred in space and time.
Collin Hansen:Our grace today is because Jesus came, because Jesus appeared. His arrival brought us this grace. And then that grace has accomplished 2 things, is what he's gonna lay out here in 11 through 14. His grace has accomplished 2 things. 1, he has brought us something, and 2, he is teaching us, he's training us in something.
Collin Hansen:Okay? So those are the the 2 categories we're going to work through. 1, that the grace of God, Christ himself has appeared, and in that appearing, he is doing these 2 specific things. He's bringing something, and he's training us in something. So what has he brought?
Collin Hansen:Verse 11. He's brought salvation to all people. Now what Titus is needing to hear from Paul, what Paul is encouraging him in, is that all there means people from all walks of life. From every walk of life. From every culture, from every age.
Collin Hansen:It's not restricted to Israel. It's not restricted to a gender. It's not restricted to any particular identity that someone could claim. This is a for all salvation. He is calling people from every tongue and every tribe.
Collin Hansen:And so what he has done in his appearing, when the grace of God, Christ himself has appeared, he has brought with him, he has accomplished salvation. And this is what has been promised long ago. Joel talked about this a few weeks ago when we were looking in Isaiah, that this salvation was promised. Hear these words from Isaiah 25. 25 verse 9.
Collin Hansen:Hear this. It will be said on that day, behold, this is our God. We have waited for him that he might save us. This is the lord. We have waited for him.
Collin Hansen:Let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. This salvation was long promised and long waited for, and we'll talk about that more in a moment. So this salvation has come, redeemed us from death, redeemed us from sin, redeemed us from this estrangement, and has given us life and acceptance. That is what that grace is. That grace is an acceptance with God the father himself.
Collin Hansen:So now if that's what he has brought us, he has brought salvation, then what has he training us in? What is he teaching us? Look at verse 12. He's he's teaching us here how to live. He's teaching us what it means to follow after this grace of God.
Collin Hansen:So let let me read to you from, from verses 12 through 14. Training us. Training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age. Waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and savior, Jesus Christ. So what's happening here is that he's training us up in there are kind of 3 different categories that he's breaking down.
Collin Hansen:He's training us. He's teaching us. What does it mean to live between these 2 advents? Because if we have come from sin and death and estrangement, there's a pretty good shock to the system of what it means now to live as the children of God. Right?
Collin Hansen:If we were sons and daughters of disobedience, we were children of wrath, it's a pretty big shift to now be children of light. Right? And so now he's training us. Think about this. Think about the image that that Paul is offering here, that the grace of God who is Jesus Christ is training us, which I like better than teaching or instruction.
Collin Hansen:He's training because it has this this action to it. It's not just agreeing with our minds. It's not just saying yes to a bunch of questions, But he is training us to live between advents. And he does it in 3 different ways. He's training us, number 1, to live a repentant life.
Collin Hansen:Training us to live a repentant life. The second thing, training us to live a righteous life. A righteous life. And the third thing, training us to live a waiting life. So let's walk through those.
Collin Hansen:First off, training us to live a repentant life. He says this in verse 12, to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions. This is us learning. Jesus is teaching us how to trust him. He's teaching us how to trust him and to learn to repent.
Collin Hansen:As we turn from ungodliness and we turn from worldly passions, we are turning to Jesus. We are turning away from these things, and we are turning to him. And some of this takes rewriting maybe what we define repentance or even think about repentance to be like, Because repentance can get this bad rap. It's just like this gloomy thing that we do. But really this is a call to life.
Collin Hansen:In the world of philosophy, Socrates used to talk about how he delighted in being proven wrong. He eagerly sought that out. To to get a notion of what that would be like, take the opposite of everyone today. Right? So just just all of us.
Collin Hansen:No one likes to be proven wrong, especially in some kind of public context. That's where you're ashamed, you cut bait, you find some other profession, some other social group, something like that. Like you just you just hide at that point. But he would seek it out, and here's why. He would seek out being proven wrong because he valued rightness so much.
Collin Hansen:Think about that. If he was wrong, he wanted to know it, because then he actually had the chance to be right. If he went on in his ignorance, then he would just be wrong, not know it, and go on. That that that's not helpful, that's not fruitful, that doesn't go anywhere. Be delighted in being proven wrong.
Collin Hansen:Do you delight in the spirit showing you your sin? That you might love the grace of God in such a way, and love the righteousness that Christ is calling us into, that you would boldly state the things that he is illuminating in your life. Confess them and live in the fullness of his grace. Where's where's that? Where's that among us?
Collin Hansen:So we have to realize that this call to repentance, him training us up to leave ungodliness, to to to renounce these things is actually a call to live in the fullness of his grace. And we also have to rewrite maybe some of our definitions, some of our glossary terms for repentance, and realize that we are not saved by the purity of our repentance, but the purity of the cross. Let me say that again, because I need to hear that again. We are not saved by the purity of our repentance, but the purity of the cross. That it's not how successfully I'm sorry, but how completely Jesus is righteous.
Collin Hansen:That's what matters. And so we can live into this. We can live in this training more wholeheartedly. Let's keep moving. Verse 12, the next thing, a righteous life.
Collin Hansen:A righteous life. To live, he's training us. We'll carry that training down another line here. Training to live self controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age. We have to learn to obey.
Collin Hansen:We have to learn what it means to trust him, to to turn from our sin, and to follow him in obedience, and he's training us up in that. That's the good news. We're This isn't just a self directed course. Like how many of you all like took You don't have to raise your hand. I don't want you to feel awkward, and we all look at you, but how many of you took a self directed class in college?
Collin Hansen:You got an A. Okay. Let me guess. Because you directed yourself so well, you did your independent study, you picked out all the books you wanted to read, maybe, and you read them, maybe, and you did a great job. This isn't an independent study.
Collin Hansen:No. God is training us up by his grace in these things. The things that we so desperately need and long for, he is training us by his Spirit and his word. So when we see that the righteous life is also a life of joy and love, that's what Jesus talks about when he's teaching in John 15, and he's he's giving that metaphor of the vine and the branches. And he says, when you obey my commandments, that's when you are in the center of this joy and love.
Collin Hansen:It's not cold obedience. It's not becoming some kind of robot. It's about living in the middle of God's joy and love. That is obedience. And then the third thing, we see it in verse 13.
Collin Hansen:So just to recap, God's grace, Christ Jesus, accomplishing 2 things, bringing us salvation and training us, training us in living a repentant life, a righteous life, and awaiting life. Verse 13, waiting for our blessed hope, The appearing of the glory of our great God and savior, Jesus Christ. We have to learn. He has to teach us. He has to train us in how to wait because we are not good at waiting.
Collin Hansen:We are very, very bad at waiting. We're not just neutral on waiting, we're bad at it. I got a phone upgrade the other day. I was inside the Apple store. To do that, they have to put your phone in a little plastic bag, which just feels weird, and then they take it away from you.
Collin Hansen:Alright? And they take it to the back, and during that time at first, I'm kind of looking around, people watching. Apple's full of interesting people. And so I'm looking at all these people and then I become disinterested. And then I reach for my phone.
Collin Hansen:And I kind of panic. I don't know where my phone is because they have it in the back, as I'm panicking looking for it, and then I think, well, what am I going to do? I don't have my phone. If I can't check my email, or, like photos, which is a critical part of every person's day. Living into the Imago day of what we were created to do, liking photos, social media.
Collin Hansen:But if I'm not doing it, what am I here for? Was kind of my question. We're terrible at waiting. This The device that had taught me not to wait was making me wait. Like, that's that's messed up.
Collin Hansen:Right? Think about it. Alright. But he has to teach us because we really, really need to learn how to wait. He's faithful to do it, but it's not going to be easy.
Collin Hansen:It's going to be uncomfortable at times. We're not really gonna know what we're doing. We actually might even feel like we're wasting time, but there's not any wasting time when we are waiting on the Lord. Not when he's training us, not when he's shaping us, and speaking to us, and furthermore, just being with us. Now sometimes we we start to think about these 2 advents, and and we forget that he's present with us now by his spirit.
Collin Hansen:I'm with you always, he tells us. And so he's with us in the waiting, and he's teaching us, he's training us what it means to wait. And here Paul casts Titus and our attention from the first advent to the second, that we wait, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and savior, Jesus Christ. It changes things when we know what we're waiting for. So what are you waiting for?
Collin Hansen:We wait for lots of things. We wait for some change in our job. We we wait for a spouse, or we wait for a child to be born. We wait for money. We wait for clarity, we wait for answers, we wait for lots of things.
Collin Hansen:So what are you waiting for? What is the supreme longing of your heart? What do you ache for? It's this second advent that we have to be trained up because just like the in being full, the signs around us aren't that great that there is a blessed hope. I mean, when we read the news, I mean, some of you might even, like, just be trying to take a break from news because it's just been so overwhelming.
Collin Hansen:We have to learn to wait for this blessed hope, and to know that the spirit of God and the word of God is there to train us up to wait. There there's a great example, for us, and and we we don't have time to read it, but, but I would encourage you as you are doing your Advent readings to to read about Simeon and Anna, because Luke gives us a picture of 2 people who wait. Simeon was waiting for the consolation, the comfort of Israel. He was an old man, a humble man waiting. And then there's Anna, she was a prophetess and she was old, she was an old widow and she was longing for the redemption of Jerusalem.
Collin Hansen:And here in Luke, we have this picture of 2 people waiting that first advent. And they waited. And when when Christ was carried into the temple by Mary and Joseph, as they came in with just 2 turtle doves, that that's where it is, by the way, 2 turtle doves. They come in. They're going to be sacrificed, by the way, just so you know.
Collin Hansen:Those turtle doves are not going to get out of this story very well. Not just a gift. They're going to be killed. So these, these 2 turtledoves, they come in, which are actually they testify to how Mary and Joseph are poor. They were supposed to bring a lamb, but they come in with the default option, the the the b list option of bringing 2 turtle doves as their sacrifice to pigeon.
Collin Hansen:That's what you could they could substitute if they didn't have enough money. And here they are, knowing that they have Jesus the Christ child, the Messiah, you think you're going to put your Sunday best on for that, they can't afford it. And they come in, and they are met by 2 humble servants of the Lord. 2 humble waiters who are longing in the temple. And some characteristics, 4 characteristics.
Collin Hansen:Let me walk through them really quickly. Lessons in waiting from Simeon and Anna. Number 1, they were zealous for good works. Simeon is described as righteous and devout. Anna is worshiping and fasting day and night in the temple.
Collin Hansen:The second thing, they long for God and his kingdom. Simeon is said to be waiting for the consolation, the comfort of Israel. Anna is waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. The third thing is they listen for the spirit. It's the spirit who tells Simeon that he will not die until he sees the Messiah.
Collin Hansen:And he listens, and the spirit revealed it to him. And the fourth thing is this, they celebrate God's graciousness. When he when Simeon walks in, and he sees the baby, he says, for my eyes have seen the salvation of the Lord. When everyone else in the temple saw a baby, Simeon saw salvation. That is the work of the spirit.
Collin Hansen:That is life in the spirit, listening for the spirit. And then as he takes him into his arms, Simeon blesses God. Anna gives thanks, and declares the Messiah to all who will listen. See these things, zealous for good works, longing for God and his kingdom, listening to the spirit, and celebrating God's graciousness, all of these things is what Paul is calling Titus to, saying, live between these 2 advents like this. Stand firm.
Collin Hansen:Be trained up by God himself to repentance, to righteousness, and learn how to wait. Because waiting is hard. But when we know what our blessed hope is, the appearing, the second appearing, where his grace has appeared, and now his glory appears in the second coming. That is what we wait for. That is how we long and how we yearn.
Collin Hansen:You see, the gospel gives us a new kind of nostalgia. It teaches us how to to have a heartache, to ache, to long for a home that we haven't had yet. See, it's not a looking backwards nostalgia and aching. It's a looking forwards nostalgia. It's it's aching for what is to come.
Collin Hansen:It's an aching for the kingdom of God in its fullness coming to earth and making all the wrong things right. And I kind of I wanna see this moment as a commissioning. We are gonna go to different places this week. Some of you will be surrounded by lots of people, some of you by a few. Some of you will travel a great distance, some of you will will go, little distances.
Collin Hansen:Perhaps some of you that go, to your hometown, and you sleep in your old bedroom, or you drive the old streets of your hometown, or maybe you sit at that dinner table, and there's an empty chair that was full last year. And that nostalgia for Christmases long long ago comes in, and that pain comes, I encourage you to let it in. Let in that pain. Let in that heartache. Let in that yearning for the past, and remember what you are waiting for.
Collin Hansen:Remember what your aching is turned towards. That the gospel gives us a new heartache, a new home sickness, And that our hope is certain and true, and our God is kind and present. Let us pray. Oh, god. This season of advent, will you be our teacher?
Collin Hansen:Will you instruct us in waiting? As we celebrate this week, will you help us to long for your return? For some of us, that might be an altogether new concept, and I pray that you would work it deep in our hearts. But as we experience joy and as we experience sorrow, the supreme longing of our hearts would be for you and your kingdom. Help us to be zealous for good works.
Collin Hansen:Help us to long for your kingdom. Help us to listen to your spirit. Help us to celebrate all that you have done, and all that you have promised to do. God, we are in a world of deep darkness, and we need your light this Christmas season. Teach our hearts that Christ has died.
Collin Hansen:Christ is risen and Christ will come again. Amen.