Joining Titus for a study in GOOD #2

So here’s the first mention of the word GOOD, the word we are studying alongside Titus this month. Paul explains he’s left Titus in Crete to appoint elders to oversee God’s work, men who love what is GOOD.

The reason I left you in Crete was that you might put in order what was left unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you. An elder must be blameless, faithful to his wife, a man whose children believe and are not open to the charge of being wild and disobedient. Since an overseer manages God’s household, he must be blameless—not overbearing, not quick-tempered, not given to drunkenness, not violent, not pursuing dishonest gain. Rather, he must be hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined. 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 1:5-9

‘To love what is GOOD’ is one of those vague phrases that seem open to interpretation to me. But if we take a look at all the practical pointers that surround that phrase in the passage, then perhaps we can see what loving what is GOOD looks like in practice for a person of responsibility in the early church.

An elder must be:-

• blameless
• faithful to his wife
• a man whose children believe and are not open to the charge of being wild and disobedient
• not overbearing
• not quick-tempered
• not given to drunkenness
• not violent
• not pursuing dishonest gain
• hospitable
• self-controlled
• upright
• holy
• disciplined

What a list! If those were the criteria, I’m amazed Titus was able to find anyone to fill the role at all!

And on top of that, an elder ‘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’.

That’s the bar right there. Perfection. In the Genesis Creation Poem of when God created the world back at the beginning of time, at the end of each ‘day’, God looked at what He had done and ‘saw that it was good.’ In my understanding of the word GOOD, that feels like somewhat of an understatement! Amazing, more like – wonderful, awesome, breathtaking, mindblowing, perfect. Life on earth was perfect. Everything was as it should be. Everything was as God intended. Humans lived in perfect relationship with God.

Now that, that is GOOD.

And so these requirements of an elder are what a GOOD elder should be, a perfect elder, an elder living fully as God intended. A role model, mentor, example of how to live in God’s GOOD way. It’s an aspirational job description. Don’t see that as an excuse not to try to match up to it though. All I’m saying is that no humans out there in the world back then and in our world today could score 100% in these respects 24/7. I’m homeschooling my daughter at the moment as she works towards GCSEs. We’re working on exam papers and comparing her answers to the perfect example of an exam response. Her answers regularly do not match up, but that doesn’t mean she should stop trying. That is the bar she is aiming for – whatever she achieves in pursuit of that goal will be marked accordingly.

We will never achieve perfection this side of heaven, but having standards of what is expected in our leaders and role models is important. And we are all role models to someone out there. Someone is watching each of us (yes, us women included!) to see what it is to live as a Christian, to live God’s way. So take a look at the list above again – this time, not using it as a checklist to evaluate your spiritual leaders (which I imagine some of you did!) but as a challenge to see in what areas of life you need to step up and reign it in and get your act together. There are definitely a few in there that stand out to me!