Use these for group work, or to assist your personal reflection.
- Discuss the importance of administration to the life of the church, and the qualities necessary for a good church administrator.
- Does the church of God give a good example to the rest of the world of people who care for each other? How can we improve this image?
- What does this passage mean by the expression ‘fruitless lives’ in verse 14, and how can the church help God’s people to be fruitful?
Use the programme which can be found on the link ‘discipleship challenges’. The ‘worksheet’ will help you follow through anything you feel is right to take up. The following notes are for your interest and consideration.
Personal comment:
The ending of Paul’s letter to Titus is straightforward, but it does throw up a number of interesting issues. I have always felt that there must surely be a need for balance in the church between administration and mission. Tensions between those who feel that the church’s resources should be used in mission and those who seek to maintain its structures are profoundly unhelpful. The mission of God’s church depends on the security and effectiveness of the local church, and the church itself has no purpose except to do the work of God. The two are and always have been entirely interdependent.
Ideas for discipleship programme
- Where do you see yourself within this passage of scripture? As an administrator, a missioner, or as one who does ‘good deeds’ within the life of the church? Pray about this because the Lord may wish you to be something other than you perceive yourself to be!
- Fast and pray for the administrators and missioners within your church, and ask the Lord to bless the witness of your church within the community in which it is set and the wider world.
Give me, Lord God, a heart that is open to Your guidance and Your will. May I be prepared to go wherever you may call, and have the courage to stand against all evil, according to Your grace; and help me to serve others under all circumstances, so that You may be glorified in everything I do. Thank You, Lord God. AMEN
