Titus 2:13

Titus 2:13

¹³looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,  

Into the Future

These verses focus us back on our Savior and his coming for us, which could happen at any moment.  Many churches today have been bashful to teach on the return of Christ because of the negative connotation put on it by date setters.  In an even worse turn many churches and teachers have fallen into Amillenialism and Preterism, which commonly teach that Jesus will not be coming back to Earth in any physical form.  This is a tragic loss as we find in Scripture the fact that Christ’s eminent return is to encourage us, give us hope, and influence why we should be living Godly lives.

Verse 13

looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,

looking for

In Greek this is a present participle.  This means that it is something that we are to be doing every day, moment by moment.  The Greek word translated looking for  here has the idea of an anticipation, a hopefulness, and a great desire to see the thing that is being looked for.  Much like when we are anticipating an important phone call we won’t let the phone out of earshot, nor will we let anyone else talk on the phone, but we wait and watch and hope that the call comes soon.  This is the idea here.  It is also important to remember the verse before: “teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age…”  There is no break between those characteristics of godly living and our anxious anticipation of the coming of the Lord.

the blessed hope

Couch tells us in his commentary that this word translated “hope” can be translated “expectation, anticipation, prospect.” He tells us that it would be better translated “joyous anticipation.”  It is an extreme joyful longing that looks to the horizon anxiously awaiting the coming of the Lord.  This is a matter of character for us, so many Christians allow Christ’s return to be a sort of fairy tale in their lives, or let it slip to the background of their thoughts until they feel that they want to cast their thoughts on it.  However this is something that should be on the forefront of our thoughts constantly.  This is the great promise that we have, the promise that the Lord will come back to take us out of struggling, trial, and our sinful flesh. 

appearing of the glory

Other translations have this as “glorious appearing” however, “appearing of the glory” is closer to the Greek original.  It is important to notice that this is the glory which Christ has already been given in heaven that will be displayed before all the world.  It may come as a terrible shock to some, but to the believer it will be the time that we look forward to above all times.  We see the doctrine of the Rapture most clearly in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18: “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive  and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord.  Therefore comfort one another with these words.”

great God and Savior, Christ Jesus,

This is a tricky phrase in the Greek.  Those who don't believe in the Trinity try to make it seem as if both God the Father and Jesus Christ are in view here.  They are trying to teach that God, and our Savior Jesus Christ will be appearing and that is what we look forward to.  The traditional interpretation, from the Church Father's forward, is that this passage is ascribing deity to Christ. 

   In Roman times Caesar was considered both a god, and the savior of Rome and civilization.  When the Caesar went parading down the streets of a city the people were forced to cry out “Savior!  Savior!” to him.  However, Paul tells the believers of His time that they have only one Savior who is Jesus Christ, and only Jesus Christ is God, not any other man.  It is also important to notice that this is talking about the appearance of the object.  In this case we have to take other scripture into account.  God is never said to be appearing or coming.  Only Jesus.  That is something that is unique to the Person of Jesus Christ.  This being the case firmly establishes that Paul is trying to establish that Jesus Christ is fully God, and our only hope of salvation.