Titus 2:11

For the grace of God that bringeth salvation,.... By which is meant, not the free love and favour of God, which lies in his own heart; for though that is productive of salvation, and is the source

For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, The grace of God - God's gratuitous favour in redemption.

The gospel of our Lord Jesus, which containeth the glad tidings of salvation, is not now hidden, and obscurely delivered, as in the times of the Old Testament; but is risen up as the sun, or some bright star, directing all men their duties in their several stations, that is, all sorts of men amongst whom it cometh.

11 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Ver. 11. For the grace of God, &c.] This is rendered as a reason why servants should be faithful, because to them also belongeth the promise of salvation, yea, the reward of inheritance, as if they were sons, and to them the gospel is preached as well as to others. Hath appeared] επεφανη. As the sun in heaven, or as a beacon on a hill.

(11) For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men.—More accurately translated, For the grace of God hath appeared, bringing salvation to all men. “For” gives the ground, the base upon which the practical exhortations to freemen as well as to bond-servants, contained in Titus 2:1-10, rest. These words might be paraphrased thus: “Yes, exhort all classes and orders, every age of life, each sex, bond as well as free, to struggle after pure, good, righteous lives, for I tell you, in very truth, like a sun on a darkened world has the grace of God arisen with salvation in its beams.” Compare the grand Isaiah passage, “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee” (Isaiah 60:1); and also the words of Malachi (4:2), “Unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings.” (See, too, Isaiah 9:2.) The thought of these passages was not improbably in St. Paul’s view while he wrote the words to Titus telling him to exhort his flock, for God’s grace had appeared to all men. The Greek word translated “appeared” occurs in Luke 1:79 and Acts 27:20—both writings closely connected with St. Paul, if not in great part written by him—and in each of these passages it is used to express the shining of the sun. The “grace of God” here spoken of is that divine favour to and love for men upon which the whole work of redemption was based, the object of which redemption was the ultimate restoration of man. The epiphany, or manifestation of this grace to the world, commenced with the incarnation of our Lord; but the reference here must not be limited to that or to any one event in the blessed Life. The expression “bringing salvation to all men” is another of those hard sayings which have been pressed into the service of that kindly but erring school of expositors which shuts its eyes to the contemplation of the many unmistakable sayings which warn the impenitent and hardened sinner of the sad doom of eternal death. The “grace” alone brings salvation to all men—in other words, it is that grace of God whereby alone it is possible for mankind to be saved. The expression by no means asserts that all men will be saved by it, but that it is the only means by which salvation is possible.

Verse 11. The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men] ΕπεφανηγαρἡχαριςτουΘεουἡσωτηριοςπασινανθρωποις· Literally translated, the words stand thus: For the grace of God, that which saves, hath shone forth upon all men. Or, as it is expressed in the margin of our authorized version: The grace of God, that bringeth salvation to all men, hath appeared. As God's grace signifies God's favour, any benefit received from him may be termed God's grace. In this place, and in Colossians 1:6, the Gospel, which points out God's infinite mercy to the world, is termed the grace of God; for it is not only a favour of infinite worth in itself, but it announces that greatest gift of God to man, the incarnation and atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Now it cannot be said, except in a very refined and spiritual sense, that this Gospel had then appeared to all men; but it may be well said that it bringeth salvation to all men; this is its design; and it was to taste death for every man that its author came into the world. There is a beauty and energy in the word επεφανη, hath shined out, that is rarely noted; it seems to be a metaphor taken from the sun. As by his rising in the east and shining out, he enlightens, successively, the whole world; so the Lord Jesus, who is called the Sun of righteousness, Malachi 4:2, arises on the whole human race with healing in his wings. And as the light and heat of the sun are denied to no nation nor individual, so the grace of the Lord Jesus, this also shines out upon all; and God designs that all mankind shall be as equally benefited by it in reference to their souls, as they are in respect to their bodies by the sun that shines in the firmament of heaven. But as all the parts of the earth are not immediately illuminated, but come into the solar light successively, not only in consequence of the earth's diurnal revolution round its own axis, but in consequence of its annual revolution round its whole orbit; so this Sun of righteousness, who has shined out, is bringing every part of the habitable globe into his Divine light; that light is shining more and more to the perfect day; so that gradually and successively he is enlightening every nation, and every man; and, when his great year is filled up, every nation of the earth shall be brought into the light and heat of this unspotted, uneclipsed, and eternal Sun of righteousness and truth. Wherever the Gospel comes, it brings salvation - it offers deliverance from all sin to every soul that hears or reads it. As freely as the sun dispenses his genial influences to every inhabitant of the earth, so freely does Jesus Christ dispense the merits and blessings of his passion and death to every soul of man.

11–15. The sphere of the Apostolate—to claim all Life for God, through His Grace, and for His Glory11–14. The first of the two Evangelical outbursts of that ‘spring of living water’ in St Paul’s own heart which kepd his life and teaching always green and fresh. It corresponds with the passage in 1 Timothy 1:2; 1 Timothy 1:12, where see note, but is (as we should expect from St Paul’s less close and tender relation to Titus) more general. Coming to the end of the plain practical counsels for men and women, old and young, whether free or slaves, he ‘goes off at a phrase,’ one which he has used several times, but the full significance of which he now allows himself to dwell on—‘our Saviour God.’Upon this he enlarges fervently, bringing out of it at the same time the true springs of holy living for all alike; these are, as the General Thanksgiving of the Prayer Book puts it, (1) the grateful appropriation of the ‘inestimable Love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ,’ (2) the thankful realisation ‘of the means of grace,’ and (3) the joyful anticipation ‘of the hope of glory’; all three being really but one—Christ Jesus, for us, and in us.Thus (1) Titus 2:11. The grace of God appeared in Christ, ‘who for us men came down from heaven’ bringing salvation to all. (2) Titus 2:12. It guides us daily—to ‘true repentance and His Holy Spirit’—that we may ‘live a godly, righteous and sober life.’ (3) Titus 2:13. So living we look for the appearing again with power and great glory, ‘when we shall be made like unto Him.’ In other words, Titus 2:14—He gave Himself for us, ‘that we may dwell in Him and He in us,’ a people for His own possession now and evermore.‘Live your creed,’ says St Paul, ‘adorn your doctrine, as indeed you well can. Work from Life; let doctrine inspire duty. This is the doctrine of our Saviour God; God the Father Almighty, who made all men and hateth nothing that He made, really did, as a past fact of history, manifest His love by sending His only Son to redeem all men; that love really does as a present fact of experience give us the life of His Son through His Spirit; that love really will as an equally certain fact in the future manifest the glory of His Son as God, and give us the fulness of Divine Life, the fruition of His glorious Godhead. And the Father’s love is the Son’s; He gave Himself to redeem us, He gives Himself to purify us, to possess us, that we may be zealots for the ideal, the Divine, life, whose glory is “my Father worketh hitherto and I work.” Claim, then, all life for Him.’

For the grace of God - The favor of God, shown to the undeserving; see the notes at Romans 1:7. That bringeth salvation - Margin, to all men, hath appeared.

11. For—Over these precepts of severe Christian morality for the various classes mentioned, St.