Hold Tightly to the Truth
We're continuing with the rest of Titus 1. We've seen Paul's wonderful greeting in the first verses. Last week we saw what he expected of the elders in the early church and all Christians. This week we'll see how he spends the rest of chapter one dealing with the false teachers of his time.
There's this little bridge verse between the two sections where Paul is still talking about the characteristics of the blameless elder, which we spoke about last week. And he says this: “He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.” (Titus 1:9)
Hold Firmly
Let's talk about that little phrase, hold firmly. Paul says “hold firmly to the original message of the gospel”. Or as one commentary said, we must hold tenaciously to the spiritually healthy doctrines taught by Jesus and the apostles. Keep that image of holding it firmly or tenaciously in your mind today.
Now, I'm a bit of a klutz. I'm clumsy at the best of times. Just ask my wife! Not so long ago, I remember taking the butter out of the fridge and dropping the butter glass dish and it just hit the floor, shattered into a million pieces. The cats bolted under the bed. I jumped away to avoid stepping on little shards of glass. There was butter and glass everywhere. It was chaos!
Then a couple of weeks back, I did the same thing at my parents' kitchen. I had a cup of tea, and when I was bringing the cup back into the kitchen, I'd lost my grip on it somehow, and it crashed down. The dogs bolted into the next room. I jumped out of the way to avoid stepping on the glass shards. You get the picture. I need to learn to get a grip, I guess!
Protect the Gospel
Picture the truth of the gospel as a precious ornament. There are all sorts of things trying to knock it out of your hands. The world tries to do it every day. Hold tight! Hold tight to the truth! Hold tenaciously to the true gospel that was first given to the apostles by Jesus.
How do you do this? You read your Bible. You go deeper in prayer. You connect with good spiritual teachers and leaders and mentors. You attend worship and Holy Communion.
If you have a loose grip on your faith—oh man, how quickly some winds of change might come and knock it out.
I pray, friends, that whatever comes your way today, you'll be holding tight to the truth that you've learned—that Jesus is Lord, that He loves us, that He saves us from sin’s punishment and power, and that life is all about honoring Him.
What a precious gift to hold on to. Don't drop it, please, friends. Hold tightly onto it, because your very life depends on it.
