Book Study · Week 1 of 4

Leadership Qualifications

Titus 1:1-16

What healthy church leadership looks like

Main Point

Healthy churches need qualified leaders — not perfect people, but people of integrity, sound doctrine, and character. False teachers create division; qualified leaders maintain doctrinal purity and live exemplary lives.

Application Ideas

What qualities do you value in leaders? Titus lists character, not charisma or eloquence. This week, pray for your church leaders by name, praying for their integrity, family life, financial honesty, and sound doctrine. How are you modeling these qualities to those you influence?

Discussion Questions

What does it mean for a leader to be 'above reproach'? Why does Paul emphasize both doctrinal soundness and moral character? What dangers does Paul warn about from false teachers?

Detailed Sermon Outline

Primary Text: Titus 1:1-16

Supporting Texts: 1 Timothy 3:1-7; Acts 20:28-31; 1 Peter 5:1-4

Big Idea: Healthy churches need leaders marked by character and sound teaching, because false teachers divide what faithful leaders hold together.

Target Length: 35-40 minutes

Introduction

Titus was left on Crete with an unglamorous assignment: 'put in order what was left unfinished, and appoint elders in every town.' Not plant something new. Finish something started, and find the right people to carry it.

Crete had a bad reputation even among its neighbors, and the young churches there were already under pressure from teachers who were doing real damage. Into that, Paul sends a list.

The main point: what a church needs most in its leaders is not brilliance but proven character joined to sound teaching.

I. Truth That Leads to Godliness (Titus 1:1-4)

Paul's greeting is longer than usual, and it contains the sentence the whole letter turns on.

He serves 'the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness.' Truth here has a direction. It is going somewhere, and the destination is a changed life.
'In the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time.' The confidence is in God's character, not ours.
'To Titus, my true son in our common faith.' Paul is writing to someone he has invested in, which is itself part of how leaders are made.

Keep that phrase in view — truth that leads to godliness. It is the standard Paul will apply to leaders, to congregations, and finally to the false teachers whose doctrine went nowhere.

II. The List, and What It Measures (Titus 1:5-9; 1 Timothy 3:1-7)

The qualifications are strikingly ordinary. Almost nothing on the list is a skill. Almost all of it is observable over time by people who live near you.

'Blameless, faithful to his wife, a man whose children believe.' It starts at home, where reputation cannot be managed.
Not 'overbearing, not quick-tempered, not given to drunkenness, not violent, not pursuing dishonest gain.' Five ways power goes wrong, named plainly.
'Hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined.' The positive list is about what a person is like to be around.

Then the one competence: 'He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.' Both hands — build up, and hold the line.

III. What False Teaching Does (Titus 1:10-16; Acts 20:28-31)

Paul then names the problem he is guarding against, and his language is direct because the damage was real.

They are 'disrupting whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach — and that for the sake of dishonest gain.' Follow the money and you often find the motive.
Paul quotes a Cretan poet against Crete itself and says 'this saying is true' — he is not sentimental about culture, including the culture of the people he loves.
'They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him.' Here is the test again: truth that does not lead to godliness is not the truth being kept.

'Rebuke them sharply, so that they will be sound in the faith.' Even the correction has a restorative goal. Paul is not trying to win; he is trying to make people well.

Conclusion & Appeal

It is worth asking what we actually look for in leaders. We tend to be drawn to confidence, communication, and a certain energy. Paul's list barely mentions any of it.

That is not because gifts do not matter. It is because gifts can be borrowed for a season and character cannot. A church survives a dull leader. It does not easily survive a dishonest one.

So pray for your leaders by name this week — for their marriages, their money, their tempers, their teaching. And then look at the list again and ask which line is the weakest in you, because every one of us leads someone.