God’s truth guards us against deceit and is the compass by which we navigate this life.

Someone recently told me, “The sky really is falling.” This individual pondered the assassinations of three public figures. He listened to calls for retribution and cries of celebration. He felt the dial on the political and cultural climate get turned up even more. He thought that our social fabric was coming undone.

Whether that is true is a different discussion. Suffice it to say, people feel like our shared society is on a razor’s edge. This feeling has deeply affected individuals’ outlooks, and outlooks affect attitudes and actions. Though public life can be overwhelming right now, the world needs Christian men and women with their sanctified outlooks, attitudes, and actions more than ever. The world needs Christian men and women who live truthfully in public life. Turn with me to Titus chapter 3.

Doing good to all people

Christians bring something different to bear in public life. Just consider Paul’s encouragement to Pastor Titus in verses 1 and 2. Titus was to encourage Christians to submit to and obey governmental leaders and to be peaceable, considerate, and gentle to those who are non-Christians.

The political and public arenas can be filled with vitriol and malice. Individuals openly disrespecting politicians is commonplace. Social media posts assailing an individual’s character are ubiquitous.

Don’t get me wrong: Speaking the truth is necessary, but where I speak it, when I speak it, and how I speak it all matter. Speaking the truth and living the truth are not mutually exclusive of each other, rather they are two sides of a coin called godliness. I do not get to trash someone’s reputation and then shrug it off by saying, “But it’s true!” Just as Christians are to be ready to speak the truth (1 Peter 3:15), we are also to be ready to live truthfully by doing good to all people.

Remembering our own sinful depravity

Imagine for a moment non-Christians whose opinions, political ideologies, and life practices deeply offend and anger you. How will it be possible for you to do good to them? How will it be possible to have a considerate and gentle attitude when they frustrate you so much? It has everything to do with your outlook. Rather than viewing them through their political ideology or their self-defined identity, view them through what you once were.

In verse 3, Paul reminds us that at one time we too were just like them. When speaking to the Cretans, he was presumably addressing a group of adult converts to Christianity. They could reflect on their lives and recall times when they too were deceived and lived as “liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons” (1:12).

But what if you have been a Christian most of your entire life? Even then, before you were baptized, you were a lost and condemned creature. I was too. We lived in malice. We were comfortable with the temperature set to “hate” regarding both God and our neighbor. We did not know the truth that leads to godliness.

Seeing others through the lens of what you once were helps you to live truthfully, particularly in your public life, because this outlook prevents you from becoming conceited. The thing that really differentiates them from you is that, by the grace of God, you have been reborn and renewed. By the grace of God, your life is different now.

Your salvation required the work of the eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present triune God. The God whom you still struggle to wrap your mind around put his saving plan into action to save you. God the Father willed it out of his love. God the Son accomplished it out of his grace. Through the washing of Baptism, God the Holy Spirit performed an act of re-creation through which he gave you a completely new way of life.

Transformed by the truth

“This,” Paul says, “is a trustworthy saying” (verse 8). What is the saying? Everything that Paul said God did for you and for your salvation. Yes, the kindness of God appeared in his Son and in his Spirit and finally in you, as it was applied to you by the same Spirit. As hard as it might be to believe, it is trustworthy because it is true. The veracity of this statement is proven by God’s promise put into action.

This saying is trustworthy not only because it declares you forgiven but also because it daily creates in you a new heart. This is why Titus was to “stress these things” (verse 8). He was to stress the truth because the truth leads to godliness. The truth would be at work forming God’s people for a life that is always ready to do good.

God’s truth transforms us from the inside out so that as walking and talking re-created beings, we live good and profitable public lives that are reflective of God’s truth. Christians live truthful public lives as their attitudes, actions, and outlook reflect God’s own outlook, attitudes, and actions when he caused his love and mercy to appear among us. Christians live truthful public lives when they live by the outlook, attitudes, and actions God has created in them and when they carry out the good the Spirit empowers them to do.

If public life today is marked by strife and quarrels, then we Christians, armed with God’s truth, speak truth in the face of controversy. If public life today is marked by self-actualization, then we Christians have the outlook of seeing people for what we once were. If public life today is marked by culture wars, then we Christians are ready to do what is good because this is what we have been re-created to do. If public life today is marked by malice, then we Christians bring with us peace-loving and considerate attitudes because this is what the Spirit has renewed in us.

Whether in private or public life, Christians are born of God’s truth and renewed by his grace to bring God’s own outlook, attitude, and actions to bear on public life. That kind of public life is different. That is truthful living.

This is the third article in a three-part series on the book of Titus. Read the first article and second article.

Author: Aaron Goetzinger
Volume 112, Number 12
Issue: December 2025

Avoiding deceptions

In Titus 3:9, Paul wanted Titus and the Cretan Christians to avoid three deceptions:

• Foolish controversies. These controversies were foolish, likely, because the people were arguing over things that God’s truth did not reveal.
• Genealogies. Such genealogies were likely attempts at creating a religious lineage to justify oneself, as opposed to living by faith. For example, if you could show you were directly related to Abraham, then you could present yourself as holier than someone who wasn’t.
• Arguments and quarrels about the law. These were battles over interpretations of the law and their application to daily life.

Paul wanted the Cretan Christians to avoid these deceptions because they were antithetical to what he encouraged in verses 1 to 8. Rather than debating foolish controversies, they were to hold to the trustworthy saying (verse 8). Rather than engaging in arguments and quarrels, they were to be peaceable and gentle (verse 2). Rather than being preoccupied with deceptions that were unprofitable, they were to be ready to do good (verse 1) and live productive public lives (verse 8).