4 But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared,
5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewal by the Holy Spirit;
6 Whom he poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour;
7 So that, being justified by his grace, we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Our past is summarized in Titus 3:3. It's a terrible reality. Life may have seemed good, but it was full of evil and pain, with no future except more of the same. How would you like to have no hope that things could ever be different? This is what the writer's telling us--that until the Son of God, Jesus Christ, nothing could be different, because we were our own worst enemies. Happiness is never part of the equation that includes malice and envy, being hateful and hating each other. It's like acid burning in your heart--you hate. You are hated. And that lasts as long as life.
But then, God poured out His love on us, and His love has the power to wash away all the evil we formerly endured and committed. Think of it! No more rage against each other. No more walls between people. Nobody wishing you were dead, or using words to destroy you, or wrecking your life with evil they do to you. And you--no more hatred. No more venom. A complete change, yours if you want it, and it's not something you do--it's something that God does for you, through His Son and His Spirit. Transformation. Regeneration (although, instead of growing a lost arm or leg, you grow a new heart and spirit). Renewal, so that your life is made over. And it's abundant, not miserly, offered through Jesus Christ, all for the mere price of allegiance to Him. Can you imagine a greater gift? It's a gift with the power to change the one thing you can never alter--you. It's the gift that makes enemies into friends, the gift that transforms life into a thing of beauty, the gift that gives for all eternity.
And that's the final point: This is not a gift that God gives, and then removes. It is a gift that's eternal, an everlasting offering, a new inheritance, in which you are an heir of the most precious thing ever offered mankind, a solution to the unsolvable problem--an answer to death itself. Once you believe in Christ, you are "an heir according to the hope of eternal life." Want your life changed? Want that changed life to last forever?
God offers that to you, without price or payment--just for the simple act of faith. Yours today, if you want it. And it's free.
