 2 Corinthians chapter 7. I'm going to begin reading at verse 11. I'm going to read the verse 16 and we'll get into our study. 2 Corinthians chapter 7, beginning at verse 11. Paul writes for observe this very thing that you sorrowed in a godly manner, what diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication. In all things you proved yourselves to be clear in this matter. Therefore, although I wrote to you, I did not do it for the sake of him who had done the wrong, nor for the sake of him who suffered wrong, but that our care for you in the sight of God might appear to you. Therefore, we have been comforted in your comfort, and we rejoice exceedingly more for the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all. For if in anything I have boasted to him about you, I'm not ashamed. But as we spoke all things to you in truth, even so our boasting to Titus was found true, and his affections are greater for you as he remembers the obedience of you all, how with fear and trembling you received him. Therefore, I rejoice that I have confidence in you in everything. Now I'm going to need to give to you a bit of a backdrop to develop the context in order for us all to understand what Paul is referring to as we go through these verses in front of us. Now Paul has just responded to and commented on their response to his earlier letter that he had written to the church concerning something called church discipline. To give you context, let me remind you that there was a serious situation in the church there in Corinth that needed his intervention. In 1 Corinthians, in chapter 5, verse 11, rather verse 1, it says, it is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you and of a kind that even pagans do not tolerate. A man is sleeping with his father's wife. So there was a man, a member of the church of Corinth, a man who was a professing Christian, a professing believer in Jesus Christ who was committing a terrible sin, and the church had not responded to the sin. They actually had allowed it to continue. So Paul was making it very clear that this sin was so bad that it was considered evil even by the Jews as well as the Gentiles. You see, under Jewish law, such a thing was recognized as the sin of incest. This man was having relations with his father's wife, not his mother, but his father's wife. But that was still considered to be incest in the Old Testament book of Leviticus in chapter 18, verse 8. We are commanded, do not have sexual relations with your father's wife. That would dishonor your father. So the Jews recognized that as a grave sin. Now, when you consider Corinth, Corinth was renowned, it was famous for its sexual immorality. As a matter of fact, if somebody wanted to insult somebody else during that day, they would say, you are a Corinthian, because the Corinthians were known as immoral people. They were the worst of the worst. Keep that in mind, because as sinful as the Corinthian culture was, they saw this sin of incest. They saw this as totally wrong. Now, there was a Greek dramatist. His name was Sophocles. And he had a play that he authored in 429 BC. It's called Oedipus Rex. And it was a tragedy that condemned incestuous relationships. And that shows you how deeply within the Greek culture incest was regarded in this capacity. You see, what makes this especially interesting and revealing is that the Greek culture was more than permissive. They considered sexual appetite as normal. And your sexual appetite should be satisfied whenever you wanted. They believed in a very casual approach to sexual intimacy. As a matter of fact, in the first letter that Paul wrote to Corinth in 1 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 13, he mentioned a saying that was well known amongst the Greeks, where they would say, well, food for the stomach and stomach for food. If you're hungry, you eat. If you have a sexual desire, you satisfy it. That's the way they thought. So they were very, very permissive. They were sexually permissive people. Greek culture actually permitted homosexuality. They actually had, as their highest form of love, what is called man-boy love. That might be interesting to you, but it's the truth. There's one author who wrote the most common form of same-sex relationships in Greek culture was boy love. Sex was a part of their worship. Ancient Corinth had a temple dedicated to Aphrodite. They practiced something called temple prostitution, as progressive as they were considered to be. And this is what is interesting and so revealing. They still considered a man having relations with his father's wife to be wrong. And that's why Paul is saying that even pagans do not tolerate this kind of immorality. You see, what had happened is this had taken place. It's commonly known, and the church had responded to the sin in a totally wrong manner. Instead of seeing it for the evil that it was and how it was infecting the body of Christ, they actually gloried. And the response to this sin was a great concern to Paul. He said in 1st Corinthians 5, verse 2, he said, you are so proud of yourselves, but you should be mourning in sorrow and shame. You should remove this man from your fellowship. See, Paul had to correct them because they didn't respond with sorrow and repentance. He instructed them to enact what is called church discipline on this young man. He told them, remove the young man from the church. Well today, some might ask, why did they not just leave him in the fellowship instead of removing him? Someone would say, well, how can he be reached and cared for if he's not there in church? Well, if they allow him to remain in church, it gives the impression that God is less and holy and compromise is acceptable. Paul said by allowing him to remain, well, that caused sin to be acceptable. The result would be moral indifference. And the moral indifference will infect the entire church. In 1st Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 6, he said it like this. He said, your glorying is not good. Then he asked the question, do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? It's going to infect the whole church. If you don't act properly and deal with this, you need to remove this young man from your midst, it's going to infect the entire church. It's going to appear that God is okay with incest, with sexual sin. And it's like a little leaven. It only takes a small amount to infect an entire lump of dough. Now somebody says, well, what does that really matter? Why is that so important? Well, because the Bible makes it very clear that sexual intimacy is reserved for marriage. And Jesus intends his bride, the church, to be pure as well as spotless. In the book of Titus, in chapter 2, verse 14, Paul said, Jesus gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself his own special people's Alice for good work. They needed to be reminded that God doesn't condone evil. The body of Christ is to be pure. And sin that is allowed to fester in a church produces an impure church. And we need to remember that God did not design the church to live in an impure manner. When you read the writings of the Apostle Peter, he said in 1 Peter chapter 1, verses 15 and 16, but as he which has called you as holy, so be holy in all manner of conversation or lifestyle, because it is written, be holy, for I am holy. Sexual sin is not to be ignored in church, nor is it ever approved of. The body of Christ is to love one another, not sexually violate one another. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verses 3 through 5, Paul said it is God's will that you should be sanctified, that you should avoid sexual immorality, that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen who do not know God. And so he gave a word of authority on this. He said, disfellowship him. 1 Corinthians 513, put away from yourselves that wicked person is how he put it. And so what happens? Well, the church responded and enacted church discipline. They disfellowship the sinning member. They obeyed Paul's command on the subject. They brought discipline on the young man. The blessed result was that this young man actually had repented. But in their zeal, they had forgotten one essential thing, the purpose of church discipline. They had failed to restore him. They failed to reinstate him in fellowship. You see, when somebody is dealt with in this fashion and the evidence, and you're going to see this in a moment, and the evidence of the fruit of repentance, then you restore them because they're to be reconciled and restored. And that's what they had forgotten to do at first. They had failed to restore him. They failed to bring him back into church fellowship. The Bible in Matthew, Jesus said this in Matthew 18, verse 15, reads, if your brother shall trespass against you and you go and tell him his fault between you and him alone, he says, if he shall hear you, you gained your brother. So he should be restored. Because he's reconciled, he should be restored. And so Paul had to, in the first portion of this letter in chapter 2 of 2 Corinthians, Paul had needed to write and instruct them to restore this young man to fellowship because the guy had repented and was to be restored. The sorrow was necessary for healing. And that's what we were looking at in verses 8 through 10 in 2 Corinthians chapter 7, which is leading to the verses we'll be looking at in just a moment. You see, Paul had given this command, had given this order, and it had caused some of them a bit of grief. And Paul had said, I'm not sorry that you have grief. It hurts me to produce that in you, but I love you enough to tell you the truth. I don't enjoy causing you pain, but correction is necessary. Because in bringing this correction in a church, it produces purity. And that's how the Lord brings his children into spiritual maturity. In Hebrews 12 verse 11, it reads, Now, no chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous. Nevertheless, afterward, it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness and to them, which are exercised thereby. And so Paul was speaking about this, what had taken place, and we had looked at this together in verses 8, 9, and 10. Last time we were with one another, and now we move into verse 11, where Paul continues, and he begins by saying in verse 11, observe this very thing, that you sorrowed in a godly manner, what diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication. In all things, you proved yourselves to be clear in this matter. And so he begins to speak concerning this, and he said, you sorrowed in a godly manner. So this is what we're going to be looking at, the fruit of obedience. Because it's very encouraging, notice again, they sorrowed after a godly manner. Now, what does that mean? Well, that was evidenced by their prompt reaction to Paul's letter. They righted the wrong. But as he's speaking now, he's going to give us insight into the fruit of repentance. What is the fruit of true godly sorrow? Remember with me, as we're looking at repentance, this is something very important, because every person in this room, and those of you who are listening to this need to remember this, we all need to remember, as we were sharing just last week, repentance is not regret, and it's not remorse. Repentance is a change of mind. Somebody can do something that's wrong and feel badly about it, and maybe change for a moment, but they come right back to it, because they weren't repentant. They were regretting. They felt sorry. They hurt somebody. They did something wrong. They got caught, whatever the case may be. Repentance is not regret, and repentance is not simple remorse. It is something deeper than that, and you can see the fruit of repentance, and that's what Paul is speaking about here when he begins to describe how that appears. You see, they have sorrowed, he says, after a godly manner. You reacted quickly to my letter. You dealt with the situation, but there are other things that he wants to point out right now, and he begins to describe it, so he's giving us insight into the fruit of repentance. This is the fruit of true godly sorrow, and he says, what diligence? He begins by saying, what diligence? The word diligence is immediate and earnest response to his command. Instead of indifference, in other words, you moved quickly to deal with sin. You see, there are people today who will say, well, let's give them a little time. Let's give them a little time. You know, we don't want to be too quick, but no, they moved immediately. They moved with a diligence. They weren't indifferent to it. They obeyed the order and did the right thing, and that's why he says they were diligent. He says, what clearing of yourselves? It's interesting, the word clearing, when he says, what clearing of yourselves, the word clearing is a Greek word, the word that we get the word apology from, or apologia is a Greek word, it's a root word for the word apologetics. Clearing is speaking of clearing yourselves of any blame. You're clearing yourselves of any more guilt by acting promptly. So there was a diligence that led to a clearing of yourself, and then he speaks of indignation. What indignation? There's an indignation you had over sin and how it impunes the gospel and Paul himself. One of the airmarks of repentance is, and this is something to note, one of the airmarks of repentance, and you can know that you really have repented when you hate the sin, when you hate it. There are people who have sins that they keep like pets. Like it's one of their favorite things. Well, I've given God everything else except for this. I feel bad because sometimes I allow it to control me, but they never really hate it. You have to hate it. And one of the airmarks of repentance is hatred for sin and what it has resulted in. Repentance helps you to see sin for what it is. Repentance helps you to see that sin is evil. It helps you to see that. How many times have people said, Oh, I feel so bad about it. And then they go back to doing it. How many men have beat up on their wives and tell her, honey, I'm so sorry. And then a month later, they do it again. How many times have these things happened? I'm so sorry. No, you're not. You're not sorry. You may regret it may have caused pain, but you didn't repent. You actually have to hate it. You have to say within yourself and to the Lord, God, I hate this. I don't want this in my life. That's how I got saved. That's how you get saved is when you hate sin, when you hate what it does, and you hate what you are. You hate this. I hate this so much, Lord. I don't want to be unkind. I don't want to be unloving. I don't want to be unforgiving. I don't want to be the person I am. I don't want to be addicted to these things. I don't want this. God, help me. I hate it. And that's what he's speaking about. There's this sense of needing to move quickly because I hate what I am and I see it for what it is. It's evil. He goes on and he says, what fear? When he says what fear, that would be what fear of God, which prompted their quick response. This reverence for God prompted them to move quickly to deal with the sin, to correct the harm. He says, what vehement desire? What vehement desire speaking of your longing to be pure? It speaks of their anxious desire to deal with the sin because they had tolerated it and allowed it to continue. But he says, you moved on this quickly. You had a longing to be cleared. You had a longing to be pure. And then he says, what zeal? What zeal to remove the sin? What is zeal for holiness? And some commentators even say that he may have been referring to not only their zeal to do that, to remove sin, to be holy, but also what a zeal they had in listening to Paul as an apostle, a man of God, who was sharing with them the necessity of turning away from this. And then what vindication? The word vindication speaks of meeting out justice. It speaks of doing justice. He's saying, you corrected the offender. You reestablished the proper witness of the church. You moved. There is fruit of repentance. Again, it's not just saying I feel sorry for what I've done. It's not saying, oh, I regret what I've done or I've hurt so many people. All of that could be part of the fruit of it. But true and genuine repentance is a change of mind in regards to what I've done and who I am. And it's a turning away so that I might turn to God. And when the gospel has been preached to me and I see myself in the mirror of the word of God, I awaken to the fact that I have sinned against God and others. And that's when I repent. And that's when I say, God, be merciful to me. I'm a sinner. I hate what I am. And I want to live a different life. And there are some people right now who are listening to this study that the Lord is speaking to that you need to do just that. You need to turn from your sin. And you need to turn to him. And you need to hate what you have been in order that he can make you brand new. And Paul is speaking about that here. And he's saying this is the fruit of repentance. This is what took place. You had allowed a man in your church to pollute it with his sin. You gloried as if you guys were so grace-filled that even simple men like this, men who were practicing a sin that wasn't even mentioned in Greece. In Greek, the Greeks were so sexually permissive. And even they, these pagans, thought that was wrong. But you're trying to glory in it as if you are the most gracious people in the world when in fact you're polluted by it and you're allowing the leaven to leaven the whole lump. And so therefore you need to turn away from it. Deal with this now that the guy has repented. Bring him back. But you demonstrated to us your sincerity by your behavior. You moved on this the way you should have moved on it. And you have been vindicated. You made it out justice. And you've now reestablished the proper witness of the church before the world and helped this man to once again be reconciled with God. And so in verse 12, therefore, although I wrote you, I did not do it for the sake of him who had done the wrong, nor for the sake of him who suffered wrong, which would have been his father, but that our care for you in the sight of God might appear to you. I did not do it for the one who did the wrong, the son, nor did I do it for the sake of the one who was wronged, his father. I did it to demonstrate my love for you. Now, what was his motive? Why was Paul doing that? What was he saying? He's saying my motive is for your spiritual purity and my motive is for the protection of the body of Christ. You see, if he hadn't reacted quickly, sin would have become acceptable in the church. If you take notes, Ecclesiastes chapter 8 verse 11 says, because the sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, and therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. You have to act quickly. You don't allow things to just be unapproach. It becomes stagnant and it festers. And so you have to move quickly. And that's what my motive is. If you don't react quickly, it will become acceptable. A little leaven will leaven the entire lump of dough and the church will be hurt by that. Not only that, but you will have been chastened by God over this. The church actually will be chastened. Revelation 3 19 says, as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten, therefore be zealous and repent. So his love for them is desire for their peace and blessing provoked Paul to act. And in this, they saw his real love for them, because it's been revealed in an open way. He was making it very clear. He said it, but that our care for you in the sight of God might appear to you so that you would see that even in the correction is care is being demonstrated. If you love your child, you correct them quickly. You don't allow them to get into the habit of doing that particular thing over and over again, because the habit becomes a character trait eventually, if not corrected. And he's simply saying to the church, I dealt with this because I loved you. And I wanted you to see an open demonstration of it. You know, sometimes we go to church and we want to hear how everything is so good, how everything is always fine and fun and that God wants to bless you. And that's true. God wants to bless us, but he also desires his bride to be pure. And if you don't give the whole counsel of God, the blessings that God provides as well as the corrections, you end up with a church that's out of balance. And then the church can become so tilted towards accepting everything that before you know it, they cease having a holiness and a purity about them. And that church that at one time might have been on fire for Christ, becomes like a social club of some sort, a fraternity of some sort. Some group of people just gathering together to enjoy themselves together for a while, getting a pep talk from a pastor and walking out unchained. Unchanged. You need to be in an area where the Word of God is being rightly divided so that you can see the blessings as well as the corrections. And Paul is simply saying, in the correction that I gave to you, I was demonstrating my love for you. In verse 13, therefore, we have been comforted in your comfort. We rejoice exceedingly more for the joy of Titus because his spirit had been refreshed by you all. So on a personal level, he was blessed to receive such a good report from his man Titus. In verses six and seven of the chapter, Paul had said that Titus brought a good report about the Corinthian church. Now here, Paul says that his spirit had been refreshed by them. So that reveals that the church is moving towards healing. It's no longer divided in the way that it had been. He says in verse 14, for if in anything I have boasted by him about you, I'm not ashamed. But as we spoke all things to you in truth, even so our boasting to Titus was found true. So your loyalty and love as well as your obedience have given me a good reason to boast of you. And I boasted of you to him. And it's been demonstrated that my boasting was correct. You know, I'll be honest with you. For those who are members of our fellowship, there are times that I've had opportunities to go places and to share in other states and sometimes other countries. And I share about the Lord and what God is doing. And I can honestly tell you this. I have boasted about our fellowship because we have some great people here, some very loving people and very, very, just very dear people to us, you know. And so I understand what Paul is saying. And Paul is basically saying that he had told Titus, when you go to the Corinthian church, you're going to find a group of people that you're going to love. And so Titus came back with a good report and shared with Paul the things that had happened in all of that. And Paul is simply saying, I told you, I told you that they're great people. I told you how dear they are to me. And that's what's happening. So Paul sent Titus to Corinth. He had told him this is a great church. When Titus arrived and met them, they had not proven Paul to be wrong. But it also may be in there. And you can see this sometimes in the underlying tone of Paul's writing, that can also be a bit of a gentle rebuke, if you will, of this loving church because he had said, I trusted you and I knew that you would not be a disappointment. So I trusted you and I have trust in you. So why have you doubted me? Because of Paul's teachers have crept in and are actually undermining Paul's relationship with the church. I trusted you. I boasted about you. I told Titus when he went there, but a loving group of people you are. And you proved me right. But here's my question for you underlying tone. Why have you doubted me? I haven't doubted you. And that's a good question to ask. If I have such love for you, would it be wrong for you to return that kind of love to me? In verse 15 and 16, his affections are greater for you as he remembers the obedience of you all, how with fear and trembling you received him. And therefore I rejoice that I have confidence in you and everything. In other words, Titus fell in love with you. He witnessed your great zeal. He saw how you wanted to be obedient to the command that you had received from me. You were following my instructions. And that caused him to have even a greater affection for the church. Again, notice verse 15, his affections are greater for you as he remembers the obedience of you all. So Paul saw this, rather Titus saw this. They had a great zeal. They were obedient. They moved quickly. There's a fear that many people have today that if they do what they're told by their pastor or leadership, as they're instructed out of scripture, that they somehow are going to be less of a Christian, perhaps even take an advantage of it. And let's face it, in many churches, and you can see them on television sometimes, well known, there is an advantage that can be taken of people. And I don't believe that you should ever take your will and slavishly hand it to somebody else. You were saved and you remain having an independent relationship with God. But there's still a structure and a fellowship that occurs where when that pastor, like Paul the apostle, is giving directives that people respond because in faith they recognize that this is consistent with scripture. It's a proper thing to do. And that demonstrates an obedience and an understanding of spiritual authority. And Paul is making mention of that because he said it again, his affections are greater for you as he remembers the obedience of you all. How with fear and trembling, you received him. Therefore I rejoice that I have confidence in you in everything. So Titus fell in love with them. He saw their zeal to obey the Lord and their love and appreciation for Paul and their willingness to follow his instructions knowing that they were proper. In the book of Hebrews in chapter 13, verse 17, the writer writes, obey your leaders, submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account, obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you. Those are strong words. They're strong words. And the words really that remind me that I give an account for the church and the way the church operates. I will give an account for you members of this fellowship. How did I teach you? How did I treat you? What were our expectations? Were we obedient to the things of God together? I have to give an account. And that's why he said, obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden. That would be of no advantage to you. Well, they had received him with fear. The scripture says in trembling, they had great respect for the gospel as well as the messengers of the gospel. And then Paul's blessed. He's blessed how they showed respect to Titus as a man of God, an emissary of the kingdom of God. And I want you to see that they were filled with respect for the man who represented the kingdom. They greatly valued their salvation and they respected God's ambassadors and they showed him proper honor and respect. They received him with fear and trembling. They didn't engage in foolish or disrespectful jesting with him. You know, and I was in the army many years ago now. I was stationed in the south in North Carolina. A friend of mine invited me to a church event that they were having on a weekend. I still remember going. And as I went to this church event, and I must say this quickly, I was a Christian at that time of probably less than a year, for sure less than a year, probably six months to eight months old in Christ. I was a new believer, a new believer. I was 20 years old, not yet 21. And I was invited to go to this particular church and I went to the church and they were having some kind of carnival. And as we were walking through this small church grounds, they had what is called a dunk tank. You guys know what a dunk tank is, right? They had a dunk tank where they had a tank of water. They had like a little cage around it. They had an opening just in front of an arm with a target on it, with a bullseye. And if you threw a softball and you hit the target in the bullseye, it would cause the person who was sitting on this platform that would cause the platform to collapse. And then the person who was seated on that platform would fall into the water. It's called the dunk tank. And as I was walking by, I saw that now me, I've never been one of these guys who likes that kind of thing period as a Christian or non Christian. I've never thought that was funny or I just that's not my humor at all. And I didn't like it, but made it what made it worse was when he told me the one who is sitting on that little seat there who's about to be dunked is the pastor. And I looked at him and I said, that's the pastor of the church? He said, yeah. I said, they're going to throw a softball and hit that target and knock him into the water? He goes, yeah, it's a lot of fun. I'm a brand new Christian. My pastor was Chuck Smith. I couldn't picture dunking pastor Chuck. I just couldn't picture that. And I looked at that and I thought, and I'm a new Christian. I've only been a Christian six months. And I said, there's something wrong with this. No, it's just all in fun. Even I, six, seven, eight months old in the Lord, young man fresh out of the street, even I knew that's wrong. How could I listen to this guy preach to me about the kingdom of God when they mocked him in, I just couldn't see that guys to this day. I've seen pastors act like children when I was first saved again and first in ministry. I've seen pastors wrestling around with their congregants. I've seen them goofing around like their, their, their children. I've, I've seen the immaturity. And I've thought not with this harsh judgmentalism, because I know that it can sound like that even as I'm opening my heart to tell you these things. But I thought, no, the office of pastor is a dignified office. We represent the kingdom of God. You would never see an American ambassador to England or France or whatever. You would never see them sitting in a dunk tank getting dunked. Why? Because they're representing the United States. They're representing the, the president who put him in that position and they're bringing honor to the country that they represent. It's very basic, very simple. Pastors and leaders are to be respected. They're to act in a way that enables people to respect them. You act in that way a dignified sober way so that people know that this person represents something greater than what's on earth. It's a very sober thing to represent the kingdom of God. And we need to remember that. Believers need to remember that. But pastors need to remember that. And Titus was blessed because they had a reverence for God. And these Corinthians had a reverence for the apostle Paul who represented the kingdom of God. And they showed great respect for him in all of this. They valued their salvation. They respected God's ambassador. And they showed him proper honor and proper respect. The elders are to live in such a way that they're honored by people. And the people are to honor the elder as a representative of God. In 1st Timothy 5.17 let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the Word and doctrine. 1st Thessalonians 5.12 and 13. We urge you brethren to recognize those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their worksate. Be at peace among yourselves. And so I believe that very deeply. I believe that a bishop, an elder, a minister, a pastor is to live with a respectability and people will honor them. Even if they disagree with them, they should at least respect them. And I as a pastor, that's been my heart. And I thank God for this. I'll be honest with you. If I were not a pastor, if I weren't even a Christian, I learned from my father how a man should be. I learned it from my dad. And my dad, my mama used to tell me this before he was saved. My mom would say to me, your father is very respected. And he used to say, don't dishonor his name, which I dishonored my father's name I must confess. But she said, your daddy is very respected. Don't dishonor him. And that's true, isn't it? And it should be. We should honor our fathers. We should. Fairfully, they're respectable. My father was. So my dad was not a man. From the earliest of my recollection was not a man that goofed around, played around, and was not respected. He wasn't a big man. He was a small man. But you don't have to be big and strong to be respected. You just need character, sobriety. My father had that. Thank God he influenced me in that direction. I've had people think I'm too sober minded. I don't know how you can be too sober minded. The kingdom of God is of that import. People's souls really matter. And people don't come to the church for entertainment. I would hope they don't. And they don't come to our church so that I can tell them stories of my victories or how important I am in this world. They come to hear about Jesus Christ and how they can live for him. And they look to people like me and staff members, even if it's an unwelcome way that they view you. Some don't want to be regarded that way on staff or whatever. They don't want to be. But I have to tell you today, especially today, there needs to be people who are models of sobriety and love for Christ. And wherever you guys go, wherever you go, including you who are listening right now, once you say I go to this fellowship, you become a representative of Calvary Chapel Chino Valley. Regardless of whether you like that or not, you are the evidence of the work of the ministry here. Everywhere you go, everywhere you go. People notice our music minister Jared has mentioned how he's gone places before in the early days. And people who are in the store will actually walk up and say, I go to the church. I see you up there leading worship. Sometimes they'll even look in your your cart as you're going through the island groceries. We've had that happen where they want to see what kind of wine my wife gets drunk on. I'm teasing. If you were here, you'd be laughing with them watching her. She's squirming here right now. I gave you away, didn't I? You little drunk you. They watch the way we act. I've had them and we have had them in all truth, haven't we? Where people have come to our basket and they look in my basket to see what I'm what's in it. They want to know I've had them open up my refrigerator to look in to see what I have in my refrigerator. I'm aware of who I am and you need to be aware of who you are too, because we are evidences of the work of God. And Paul was simply saying Eucharist. Eucharist showed respect to a man of God because he is a man of God and it blessed his heart because not in showing the respect you did Titus, you showed just sobriety. You also showed your respect for the things of God and you also showed your respect for Paul the Apostle and for that he was very blessed. So yes, we need to live lives worthy of respect. And if a person expects to be respected, that person must live in such a way that establishes the ability to be respected. And that's what Paul told Timothy in 1 Timothy chapter three versus two and three. He said, the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. You see that produces a dignified godly man and it results in a dignified godly congregation. It's been said like pastor, like sheep because the sheep become like the shepherd. And very often I can tell you where people go to church if I know they're pastor. They don't even have to tell me what church they go to. I can tell you because I know they're pastor. I have friends of mine who are very strong in their faith in the way that they minister. And I can tell you one of my friends, Roy Reese, a very, very dear man to me. When I encounter the people of his church, I can tell you that they are like their pastor. They're like him. They're good people and serious about God, hungry to see people saved. And I see that that's a fruit of their ministry. And I've seen others who are like their pastor and I can pick it up. Maybe arrogant a bit, maybe aggressive a bit, but I will see them and I'll say I know where this person goes to church. Because like sheep, like shepherd. And so it's really important for us to understand that. So if you want to be respectable, respected, you need to be respected, respectable. You need to live a life of sobriety, not to say you don't laugh because you just saw me messing around with my wife. Now we have fun, but we're sober-minded too. And people need to know that. And again, when Paul was speaking here, he's saying that these Corinthians had shown the proper attitude towards Titus. And it caused Titus to respond well to them. And then finally, he closes in verse 16 by saying, Therefore I rejoice that I have confidence in you in everything. Your response to my command and the way that you have treated Titus blesses my heart. This has caused a great confidence in me towards you. He would be saying, Why? Because you're serious about the Lord Jesus Christ. Any pastor, and I'll close with this, any pastor who loves the Lord wants the sheep to also love the Lord. And any pastor who loves the Lord is going to live in such a way that his sheep can use him as a model of one who loves the Lord. That's the key. You need to remember who you are. And you need to remember who you represent because you represent the kingdom of God. You represent Jesus himself. And that should sober up anybody. Again, we still laugh. We enjoy ourselves, tease amongst ourselves. Life is filled with blessings and joy, but we're sober-minded because we know what our purpose is. We have been created to worship God, to honor him, and to encourage others to do the same. And we do that through the way that we live. The things that are most important to me are the things you're going to hear coming out of my mouth because out of the abundance of my heart, I will speak. And you will get to know what matters to me by just listening to me for a while. You will see that the same is true for you. All I need to do is converse with you for a while and I will know what matters to you. I will know because it'll come out of your mouth and eventually I'll see where your heart really is as you will see where mine really is. And in the case with Titus, Paul was blessed because he said, I boasted about you to Titus and he came back in love with you because you showed the love for God that you have and your love for me. He responded quickly to the things I told you you needed to do and that establishes you in the sight of Titus and it refreshes my heart in you because you're serious about those things that bring honor to God. And again, that's what every pastor would like to be able to say. Let's pray. Father, we would ask in Jesus' name that you would help us, Lord, as we go through these passages to see some of the things that you say, to see how they would apply to our lives as we daily live for you in a world that has fallen. And I ask, Lord, in Jesus' name that you would just use this study to refresh us. May we have a sober mind, a sober heart, and may we live for Christ. And Lord, may we truly, those of us who have come to know Jesus, may we truly, may we truly have a heart of repentance and may that repentance be demonstrated by the things that we do and the way that we speak. May it be evidence, Lord, may we have this zeal, may we have a desire to respond quickly to the things that your word teaches us so that we could live in a way that brings pleasure and honor to you. And, Lord, I lift up to you right now those who need to repent, those who are going through tough times right now rejecting you perhaps or have never received you. And I ask, Lord, that even now that you might speak to their hearts. And as our eyes are closed, our heads are bowed, you may need to get right with God right now. And if you do, you can say, God, be merciful to me. I'm a sinner. Forgive me, Lord, I need you. I'm drifting away from you or, Lord, I've never even come to you. And you may be right now trusting in a religion or trusting in the fact that you watch programs like this. Now that's making you a Christian and it's not. Because if you were to stand before the Lord right now and he were to ask you, why should I allow you into my kingdom? You might say because I watched TV or because I tried hard or I wanted to be good and none of that's enough. What you need to do is say, because I, as a sinner, asked you to forgive me of my sins. I asked you to cleanse me, to wash me, and to come into my life, to forgive and come into my life. And I wanted to live for you. And if that's where your heart is now, I want to encourage you. If you're a backslider, I want to encourage you to come back to the Lord. And if you're a person who's never opened your heart to Christ, I invite you to do that even right now. And if you desire to get right with him, why don't you pray this prayer with me? Father, I'm a sinner. Forgive me of my sins. Cleanse me. Wash me with the blood of Jesus and come into my life. Lord, I desire to follow you every day. And I will in Jesus' name. So Lord, come into my life, wash me, cleanse me, forgive me, dwell in me. And I will follow you. Thank you, Jesus. And if you, with sincerity and faith, can pray a simple prayer like that, asking Christ to enter in, well, Jesus did. Because by faith, you're asking Him. You're turning from your sin and you're turning to Him. And so if you did that, just now, please let us know so we can connect with you and share with you some more things about this. It's very important that you do. Please let us know. And now let's close by saying, Father, in Jesus' name, I ask that you'd work in us. And once again, I ask, Lord, that you would open the doors of the churches so that we can congregate once again. Be with those who have lost loved ones. Lord, be with us so that we might live with hope and peace and give you thanks in Jesus' name. Amen.