“For the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation for all people training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in the present age.” – Titus 2:11–12
When I read these verses (Titus 2:11–12) I couldn’t help but kind of work from the end back to the beginning. So verse 12 ends with talking about living self-controlled, upright, godly lives in the present age. So I’m just thinking, “Yes, God that’s exactly how I want to live. I want to be self-controlled, and upright. I want to be Godly.” And you kind of … The beginning of verse 12 renounces ungodliness and worldly passions. I’m just thinking, “All the temptations that are in my life.” I’m guessing in your life toward ungodliness, toward worldly passions, so yes.
Titus 2:11–12 Reminds Us That God Trains Us to Renounce Ungodliness
So how do we live lives like that? And this is what I love about the beginning. So verse 11 says the grace of God has appeared to us it has brought salvation to us, so praise God he’s saved us from our sins. He saved us from the effect of sin, the penalty of sin, the power of sin in our lives. But then I love this word. It’s the first word in verse 12, “The grace of God has appeared bringing salvation for all people.” And then Titus 2:11–12 says, “Training us.” Training. So God’s grace has appeared to train us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, to live self-controlled, upright, godly lives. So it’s the grace of God that enables us to live like this.
It’s the grace of God working in us that empowers us to live godly lives.
It’s the grace of God working in us that empowers us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, to be self-controlled, upright and godly in this present age. So what that means is if we want to renounce ungodliness, worldly passions, live self-controlled, upright, godly lives, then we need grace. We need grace all day long to train us, to teach us, to mold us, to direct us, to empower us, to enable us.
Prayer for God to Help Us Live Godly Lives
And so we pray oh, God, well we praise you for saving us by your grace. We know it’s by grace we’ve been saved through faith. Not because of ourselves. That’s a gift from you. We know we’ve done nothing to earn our salvation. And yet we confess that we’re prone to then almost kind of leave grace behind and say, “Okay, well then how can I, now that I’ve been saved work for you? Work to be godly, self-controlled, upright, to renounce worldly passions.”
Titus 2:11–12: Prayer for Grace
But God we can’t do any of that apart from your grace. We need your grace today to train us so God may it be so. Train us by your grace today to renounce ungodliness and worldly passion. Train us to be holy by your grace, by your love toward us. And train us to be self-controlled and upright and godly. God help us, help us, help us. We need your grace, we need your mercy today. We praise you and your grace has appeared to save us and that your grace is with us right now to sanctify us. So we say we need it. Help us, help us, help us. We pray in our lives to walk in godliness by your grace. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
