The Fulfillment
Titus 3:7
December 25, 2022
Almost a generation ago, Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman wrote an article entitled, “Being a Jew at Christmas Time,” in which he wrote, “There is nothing wrong with sleigh bells, Bing Crosby, and Christmas pudding, but I should hope Christians would want more than just that, and as Christmas becomes more and more secularized, I am not sure they get it.…In the end, the problem of Christmas is not mine any more than Christmas itself is. The real Christmas challenge belongs to Christians: how to take Christmas out of the secularized public domain and move it back into the religious sphere once again.” [CT, 12/13/93]
A letter from C.S. Lewis written a few years earlier reinforces that difficulty: “Just a hurried line…to tell a story which puts the contrast between OUR feast of the Nativity and all this ghastly ‘Xmas’ racket at its lowest. My brother heard a woman on a bus say, as the bus passed a church with a [Manger] outside it, ‘Oh [Good Grief]! They bring religion into everything. Look — they’re dragging it even into Christmas now!’” [Lewis, Letters to an American Lady, December 29, 1958.]
How do we keep from being distracted by the secular and how do we keep Christmas distinctively Christian? Paul’s letter to Titus has been helping us and will help us again today. In chapter one we saw the significance of the promise of Christ’s coming; last week in chapter three we were reminded of the importance of the appearance of Christ; and this morning we observe the fulfillment of Christ’s coming.
This morning, Titus 3:7 exposes one great culminating purpose for God’s salvation plan that came through Christ’s advent. Last week we saw the character of God that motivated Him to make the promise to Christ of a redeemed people — His saving nature, His kindness, and His pervasive love. This morning, we see His goal for saving sinners through the advent of Christ — this is the end (fulfillment) of His coming.
We have been saved by Christ so that we might be adopted as sons.
God made a promise to the Son, and God the Son appeared on earth and went to the cross as the infinite and eternal God-Man for the purpose of bringing His enemies into His home and Trinitarian “family.” Christ came to earth to make sinners into sons — His sons.
As we consider this verse, let’s see two aspects of our salvation —
- What Christ has done in our salvation
- What Christ will do in our salvation
Download the rest of this sermon on Titus 3:7.
The audio will be posted on the GBC website by Tuesday.
Words of Grace 