“7 For an overseer, as God’s administrator, must be blameless, not arrogant, not hot-tempered, not addicted to wine, not a bully, not greedy for money, 8 but hospitable, loving what is good, sensible, righteous, holy, self-controlled, 9 holding to the faithful message as taught, so that he will be able both to encourage with sound teaching and to refute those who contradict it.

10 For there are also many rebellious people, full of empty talk and deception, especially those from Judaism. 11 It is necessary to silence them; they overthrow whole households by teaching what they shouldn’t in order to get money dishonestly. 12 One of their very own prophets said,

13 This testimony is true. So, rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith 14 and may not pay attention to Jewish myths and the commands of men who reject the truth.

15 To the pure, everything is pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; in fact, both their mind and conscience are defiled. 16 They profess to know God, but they deny Him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, and disqualified for any good work.”

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Several years ago, Francis Chan did an excellent video/teaching on the idea of a third road. Jesus have us the instruction on the wide and narrow gates in Mathew 7. And Francis said that so many people who profess to be Christian spend a lot of time trying to walk on a third path, a middle road, somewhere between perdition and salvation. They know the wide road is wrong, but that narrow road demands too much, so they try their best to just live somewhere in the middle. They create their own standards, their own truth and their own calling. It looks something like what Jesus said, and it seems far enough away, to them, from that wide road leading to destruction that they figure they must be okay. You can be on a pretty nice looking ‘middle road’ and still be dead wrong.

As Paul talks to Titus, he is instructing him in the selection of elders for the town on the island of Crete. Verses 7-9 hold a good description of what that man should look like. Their life is distinctive, lived for Christ. Their priorities are straight and they are invested in their walk with Him. To contrast, Paul holds up the example of the locals that that they are trying to bring to salvation in Christ. Their lifestyle is distinctly different, clinging to pride, laziness and greed. These are not good qualities in a leader in Christ’s Church, you know?

And then Paul proceeds to this last collection of verses:

“15 To the pure, everything is pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; in fact, both their mind and conscience are defiled. 16 They profess to know God, but they deny Him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, and disqualified for any good work.”

Either you are pure, or you are unbelieving and defiled. There is no middle road here. Either you profess God, and your works match up, or you simply don’t. There’s no room for a grey area here. There’s no compromise for some middle road. Either you have been defined by Christ and you live in Him, or you do not, pursuing your own appetites and desires. There is no middle road, and we need to quit trying to convince ourselves that there is some alternative to what Jesus told us, that we can manufacture our own truth from bits and pieces of what He said.

Later on ion Matthew 7, Jesus says this, “21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to Me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in Your name, drive out demons in Your name, and do many miracles in Your name?’ 23 Then I will announce to them, ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you lawbreakers!’”

and this:

“24 “Therefore, everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts on them will be like a sensible man who built his house on the rock. 25 The rain fell, the rivers rose, and the winds blew and pounded that house. Yet it didn’t collapse, because its foundation was on the rock. 26 But everyone who hears these words of Mine and doesn’t act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.27 The rain fell, the rivers rose, the winds blew and pounded that house, and it collapsed. And its collapse was great!”

There is no other way to cry out to Him, but in sincerity, devotion and in a humble dying to self. Everything else is just lip service. There is no other foundation to build on, it’s either stone or sand, Christ or death. Our culture doesn’t like black and white options, they strive for the grey middle ground of ambiguity, but in reality, a concocted truth is still a lie, and a partial disciple is still a liar. We cannot have it both ways. We cannot have two masters. Matthew 6, “24 “No one can be a slave of two masters, since either he will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot be slaves of God and of money.” Whether it’s money or self or anything else, we will either serve Christ, or we will serve anything else. And it’s only too hard, to difficult, to much if we are relying on our own strength to accomplish it all.

Trust in Christ as you follow Him on that narrow road. Trust in Christ as you GoLove others in His Name. Trust in Christ, live according to His teachings and walk as Jesus walked (1 John 2:6) because that is how people will know that our claim on Him is true. Aim high. Aim true.