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training in consistent living

Titus 2:1-10 (JDV)

Titus 2:1 But you should say what fits in with healthy teaching.
Titus 2:2 Teach older men to be balanced, dignified, self-controlled, healthy in the faith, in the care, and in the perseverance.
Titus 2:3 In the same way, teach older women to be reverent in how they act, not slanderers or slaves to a lot of wine. They should be good teachers,
Titus 2:4 so that they can train the young women to show love to their husbands and show love to their children,
Titus 2:5 to be self-controlled, devout, hard workers for their families, good, and submissive to their own husbands, so that the word of God may not be accused of being useless.
Titus 2:6 In the same way, encourage the younger men to be self-controlled.
Titus 2:7 Offer yourself to be a model of these good achievements in every way, demonstrating in your teaching integrity, dignity,
Titus 2:8 and a healthy message which is beyond criticism, so that anyone wanting to oppose you may be put to shame, finding nothing worthless to say about us.
Titus 2:9 Teach bond-servants to be submissive to their own employers in all matters; they should be satisfactory, not argumentative,
Titus 2:10 not embezzling, but demonstrating that they can be trusted to do all kinds of good so that in everything they make the teaching about God our Savior attractive.

training in consistent living

Barnes paraphrases the text in 2:5 as “That the gospel may not be injuriously spoken of on account of the inconsistent lives of those who profess to be influenced by it” (343). Believers of all types need to be trained to live consistently with the gospel message we profess. For each of us, there might be a different temptation to overcome. But we all have the responsibility to demonstrate that the word we live by has made us trustworthy.

Barnes, Albert, and Ingram Cobbin. Notes on the Epistles to the Thessalonians, to Timothy, Titus, and Philemon: Explanatory and Practical. Edinburgh: Gall & Inglis, 1840.