The Place to Be #33

Having addressed the need to appoint elders in every town as the first and foremost issue Titus needed to attend to, Paul goes on to tell why this issue was so pressing: 

 Titus 1:10 For there are many who are insubordinate, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision party. 11 They must be silenced, since they are upsetting whole families by teaching for shameful gain what they ought not to teach. 12 One of the Cretans, a prophet of their own, said, “Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.” 13 This testimony is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith, 14 not devoting themselves to Jewish myths and the commands of people who turn away from the truth. 15 To the pure, all things are pure, but to the defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their minds and their consciences are defiled. 16 They profess to know God, but they deny him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work.

Paul did not tread softly. The false teaching was disturbing the peace within the body of Christ and leading people away from the work of Christ. They were preaching "good works," instead of His work, and the "works" they were doing were nothing but good.  Paul addressed not only their methods, but their motives. They had evil, selfish, empty motives which came from impure minds and an evil conscience, if you could call it a conscience at all; it had been immobilized by their lusts and their lies.  They needed to be rebuked and silenced and called to repentance.  They obviously did not "know God."