Titus 3:8

The abiding practical holiness of Good Works

8. See summary at the beginning of the chapter, and note in Appendix E on The Faithful Sayings.

This is a faithful saying Render as 1 Timothy 1:15, where see note, Faithful is the saying. We begin a new paragraph embodying -another of the compendious fruitful utterances," thus uniting the wisdom of many, the wit of one, of God's prophets. As in the other cases, it is to be referred to the following clause, and here to that which comes after the parenthesis, see to it that they which have believed God may be careful to maintain good works. So Bp Wordsworth, -a formula introducinga solemn asseveration which declares the practicalcharacter of the doctrine of Regeneration by Baptism … the teaching of St Paul in the Pastoral Epistles on the necessity of good works," 1 Timothy 2:10; 1Ti 5:10; 1 Timothy 6:18; 2 Timothy 2:21; Titus 1:16; Titus 2:7; Titus 2:14; Titus 3:14 … -they who have been born anew in baptism have entered into a solemn covenant with God, by which they obliged themselves to a newand holy life." The particle -in order that" may be taken as part of the quotation, as Conybeare suggests, and as used with the subjunctive for an imperative; cf. Ephesians 5:33, -and (let) the wife (see) that she fear her husband;" Mark 5:23 -(I pray thee), that thou come and lay thy hands on her;" Cic. Fam. 14, 20, -ibi ut sint omnia parata." See Winer § 43, 5, a.

thesethings] should be rather, concerning these things.

affirm constantly Rather, the compound implies affirm confidently. The word is only (in N.T.) here and 1 Timothy 1:7; the middle as there and Titus 1:5.

they which have believed in God Lit. believed God, the least emphatic of the constructions with -believe," that is, the earliest and simplest form of faith, the personal going out of the soul to the personal God and Father, that -takes Him at His word." So how natural, at the end of a life's experience which built up the Christian Creed, is St Paul's return to the simplest elements of the personal trust which has underlain the life and doctrine all the time (perfect tense as here) -I know whom I have believed and do believe," -I know who is my trust," 2 Timothy 1:12; cf. Acts 16:34.

might be careful May make it their study; nowhere else in N.T. but frequent in LXX., e.g. 1 Samuel 9:5, -leave caring for the asses and take thoughtfor us," and in classical Greek.

to maintain good works Lit. to -stand forward," in N.T. only in St Paul, as in 1Ti 3:4; 1 Timothy 5:17, of -presiding over" -ruling"; so in LXX.; but in classical Greek in the sense here, -to be master of," -practised in," as a secondary sense, as well. Here the word carries further the thought in the Greek of -good;" the good works are not only to be good in themselves, but seen to be good; Christians are not only to do such good works, but to let their light shine, to be to the front, in doing them. The corresponding word for a wrong zeal is used by St John: 2 John 1:9, -Whosoever goeth onward and abideth not in the teaching." The use of these two verbs in their special sense, and the order of the words for evident special emphasis, confirm the view taken here, as by Bp Wordsworth and others (A.V. certainly, R.V. probably), that this clause is the -Faithful saying." We may perhaps render it as such, and try to mark the several points noted, in a proverbial couplet;

-Is God thy trust? Then make the study thine

In all good works to let thy candle shine."

Thesethings are good As is St Paul's way, the word -good" from the immediately preceding context, serves to make the transition to another point. -Good works" are necessary, all these practical counsels in fact are good and will bring their profit to men; for positive teaching of plain duties is the best safeguard against error.