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Amachos the word translated `no brawler' is a compound of a the negative and
mache `to fight' which in its turn derives from machaira `a sword'. It will
be remembered that earlier we observed that the civil power is depicted as
bearing `a sword' and the exhortation to the believer to be amachos
`swordless' indicates the extreme contrast instituted by God between the
civil authorities and the officers in the church, a difference ignored at our
peril.
Now a `sword' is provided in the panoply of God (Eph. 6:17), but it is
not employed in a fight with `flesh and blood'. While the apostle said that
he had `fought a good fight' and urged Timothy to `fight the good fight of
faith' he used the word agonizomai, there is no instance in the New Testament
where mache or machomai are used of the fight of faith, rather we have
`fightings' or `strivings' (2 Cor. 7:5; Jas. 4:1,2; 2 Tim. 2:23,24; Titus
3:9; John 6:52 and Acts 7:26), all of which are the strivings and contentions
of the flesh. We must ever discriminate between contending earnestly for the
faith, and striving, for `The servant of the Lord Must Not Strive'. Upon
examination it will be seen that the first half of Titus 3 is bounded by this
word `strive'.
Titus 3:1 9
A
Ready to every good work.
B
Not brawl
amachos.
C
The kindness and love of God.
A
Maintain good works.
B
Avoid strivings
mache.
We not only do not `fight' with our fellows because it is forbidden, we
do not fight because it is unseemly, for we too were once found `living in
malice and envy, hateful and hating one another'. Such a condition should
move us to pity; who are we that we should fight with such as these, who have
ourselves received such mercy.
`But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man
appeared' (Titus 3:4).
This `kindness' is expounded by the apostle in Ephesians 2:7 -10, where
the phrase `not of works' is echoed by Titus 3:5 `Not by works ... we have
done'. Kindness, which translates the Greek chrestotes, implies in all its
occurrences and variants an attitude that has the well being of the recipient
in mind: `Charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words to
no profit (chresimos) (2 Tim. 2:14)'. Again, when Ephesians 4:32 says `be ye
kind one to another' the same word chrestos is used that we find in Matthew
11:30, `My yoke is easy'. The zealous advocate of dispensational truth, the
earnest preacher of salvation by grace, the stalwart defender of the faith
needs much grace, for this word chrestos suggests that he will never `rub up
the wrong way' the one he seeks to lead into the truth and to forsake
erroneous ways.
How wonderful to remember that when we were `hateful and hating one
another', God against Whom we had so violently offended, did not `rub us up
the wrong way'; He giveth liberally, and `upbraideth not' (James 1:5), a
reticence seldom exhibited by any of us who have a beggar under our control
for a fleeting moment. The `love' that is conjoined to this `kindness' the
margin reads as `pity' for it is the Greek philanthropia, in English