The three-year Lectionary that many Catholics and Protestants hear in public worship gives us a great variety of Holy Scripture.

Yet, it doesn’t tell the whole story.

My series Forbidden Bible Verses — ones the Lectionary editors and their clergy omit — examines the passages we do not hear in Church. These missing verses are also Essential Bible Verses, ones we should study with care and attention. Often, we find that they carry difficult messages and warnings.

Today’s reading is from the English Standard Version Anglicised (ESVUK) with commentary by Matthew Henry and John MacArthur.

Titus 1:5-9

Qualifications for Elders

⁵ This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order, and appoint elders in every town as I directed you— ⁶ if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife,^[a] and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination. ⁷ For an overseer,^[b] as God’s steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, ⁸ but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined. ⁹ He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound^[c] doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it.

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Yesterday’s post, the first of this two-part instalment, discussed verses 5 and 6.

As I mentioned there, Paul had already discussed much of this with Timothy, as you can read in the following posts:

1 Timothy 3:1-7 – qualifications for overseer, bishop

Paul gives Timothy the qualifications for an overseer, or bishop — lead pastor, as we would know it:

• • • Forbidden Bible Verses — 1 Timothy 3:1-7 — part 1
    • Forbidden Bible Verses — 1 Timothy 3:1-7 — part 2
    • Forbidden Bible Verses — 1 Timothy 3:1-7 — part 3

No doubt Titus knows these principles well, but they are also intended for the people of Crete to whom Titus is ministering. This letter from Paul gives him authority to administer the many churches on the island properly. Error had slipped in, along with Judaizing, and the people’s personal behaviour was not always at its best, either.

I will try not to repeat too much of what Paul wrote to Timothy, however, various principles of church leadership still need to be emphasised.

In verse 5, Paul instructs Timothy to appoint elders in every town where there is a church. Then, Paul uses a different word for this type of church leader.

Paul refers to an elder as an overseer, saying that such a man — God’s steward — must be of above reproach, a term he used in verse 6, adding that he must not be arrogant, quick-tempered, a drunkard, violent or greedy for gain (verse 7).

The King James Version puts it in a more literary style (emphases mine):

7 For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre;

We have three terms for a church leader in that era: an elder, an overseer and a bishop. All meant the same thing: a pastor.

John MacArthur tells us about the Greek used here:

“For the overseer“; there’s that word again. It’s used five times in the New Testament, four times of pastors, once of Christ, and when it’s used of Christ in 1 Peter it’s translated “Guardian.”  That’s a great word.  We are guardians. Pastors are the teachers and the feeders but also the guardians.  It comes from the word episkopos. The middle of that word, skop, is the word from which we get skeptic in English. Where you look and search and you examine everything very closely, we say someone is skeptical, and we mean by that that they’re very analytical and they want to look everything over very carefully, and you add the epi at the beginning, the preposition, and you get this kind of man who is over and looking into everything.  That’s an “overseer,” that’s a guardian, “paying close attention.”  It was used to describe the gods who kept watch over the people and over their nations.  And then it was used to describe those religious leaders who represented those gods and watched over religious communities.  And then it moved into the Christian church, and it was used of those who ruled the church.

… And these men who have this responsibility, says verse 7, “must be above reproach.” Verse 6 says “if any man be above reproach.” Verse 7 adds the word “must”; it is a necessity. It is not an option; it is a necessity. Why? Because he is responsible to lead the flock of God as God’s steward, and to lead that flock to the kind of life that God wants, which must be the kind of life that he exemplifies.

That little phrase “as God’s steward” is very important, very important.  A “steward” was oikonomos in the Greek. He managed the “house”; oikos is the word “house.”  He set the law for the house – nomos, “law”; oikos, “house.”  He was the law of the house.  He didn’t own it; he was a steward of it.  He managed it; he managed the people; he managed the resources.  He made sure the work got done. He made sure the crops were in. He made sure the food was stored.  He made sure the people were fed.  He made sure the servants did all the right tasks, that the right allotment of work was sorted out among the people who could serve.  He took care of those who needed to be corrected.  He took care of those who needed to be trained.  He took care of those who were wounded or ill.  He managed the house.  That was what a steward did.

And if you look back to 1 Timothy, it’s very important to note this. In 1 Timothy chapter 3 and verse 15, Paul says to Timothy, “I’m writing so that you may know how one ought to conduct himself in the household of God” … And Paul is saying the church is a household – it’s God’s household; He owns it.  The children are His children.  They belong to Him, “but your responsibility is to manage it for Him, all the resources, all the people blending their giftedness, feeding them proper diet of spiritual truth, correcting them, disciplining them, caring for them, loving them, restoring them.  You need to manage the household of God.”  That is also why back in verse 5 of chapter 3 Paul says to Timothy, “(if a man doesn’t know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of the church of God?).”  Because it is a household; it is God’s household. That’s why I said last time that the family is the proving ground for the ability to manage God’s household.  We are stewards; we don’t own it; it doesn’t belong to us.  We are directly answerable to God, and “it is required of stewards,” 1 Corinthians 4:2 says, “that a man be found” – What? – “faithful, trustworthy” …

Now, God then is looking for people sexually pure, who have demonstrated the ability to lead a household to salvation, to sanctification, and to service, and have demonstrated they can handle all of the resources and they can feed and nurture and care for that household. I think that’s why the Lord said “if you can’t handle money, why would I give you souls? If you can’t prove that you can handle the mammon, then why would I give you the true riches?” That’s why I think Jesus said, “If you’re faithful over little, I’ll give you much.” Spiritual leadership belongs to those who have proven that they can manage their own household, and thus are given the task of managing the household of God. They must then be men who take the oversight and who exercise it with impeccable character.

Henry’s commentary discusses the must-nots in that verse:

First, Negatively, showing what an elder or bishop must not be: Not self-willed. The prohibition is of large extent, excluding self-opinion, or overweening conceit of parts and abilities, and abounding in one’s own sense,—self-love, and self-seeking, making self the centre of all,—also self-confidence and trust, and self-pleasing, little regarding or setting by others,—being proud, stubborn, froward, inflexible, set on one’s own will and way, or churlish as Nabal: such is the sense expositors have affixed to the term. A great honour it is to a minister not to be thus affected, to be ready to ask and to take advice, to be ready to defer as much as reasonably may be to the mind and will of others, becoming all things to all men, that they may gain some. Not soon angry, me orgilon, not one of a hasty angry temper, soon and easily provoked and inflamed. How unfit are those to govern a church who cannot govern themselves, or their own turbulent and unruly passions! The minister must be meek and gentle, and patient towards all men. Not given to wine; there is no greater reproach on a minister than to be a wine-bibber, one who loves it, and gives himself undue liberty this way who continues at the wine or strong drink till it inflames him. Seasonable and moderate use of this, as of the other good creatures of God, is not unlawful. Use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake, and thine often infirmities, said Paul to Timothy, 1 Tim 5 23. But excess therein is shameful in all, especially in a minister. Wine takes away the heart, turns the man into a brute: here most proper is that exhortation of the apostle (Eph 5 18), Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit. Here is no exceeding, but in the former too easily there may: take heed therefore of going too near the brink. No striker, in any quarrelsome or contentious manner, not injuriously nor out of revenge, with cruelty or unnecessary roughness. Not given to filthy lucre; not greedy of it (as 1 Tim 3 3), whereby is not meant refusing a just return for their labours, in order to their necessary support and comfort; but not making gain their first or chief end, not entering into the ministry nor managing it with base worldly views. Nothing is more unbecoming a minister, who is to direct his own and others’ eyes to another world, than to be too intent upon this. It is called filthy lucre, from its defiling the soul that inordinately affects or greedily looks after it, as if it were any otherwise desirable than for the good and lawful uses of it. Thus of the negative part of the bishop’s character.

MacArthur points out that the negative characteristics Paul lists in verse 7 are those of false teachers:

False teachers, by the way, are described in the same terms in 2 Peter 2:10 as being “daring and self-willed and they don’t even tremble when they revile angelic majesties.”  They’re so arrogant and so daring and bold in their arrogance and so self-willed that they will tread where angels fear to tread. They don’t have the sense to even realize the powers they’re dealing with in the kingdom of darkness.  There’s a certain egotism that makes them so arrogant that nothing stands in their way. They have no regard for the authority or the power of any other.

You see, it’s important to say this because in the world’s system the first thing people look for in looking for a leader is somebody who is a strong, aggressive, natural leader.  And very often the SNL, as he is called – the “strong natural leader” – is just the opposite of the kind of person that should lead effectively in the church.  It doesn’t mean he’s not strong. It doesn’t mean that this man should be without convictions – we’ll get to that.  But very often the man who leads in the church is selected because of his strong natural leadership ability, and what drives it is not concern for God and truth, but what drives it is a sense of ego fulfillment – a need to be in charge.  And when things don’t go the way the guy wants them to go, it’s very frustrating for him and everybody else.  No one who is dominated by self is fit for this kind of task.  You have to examine your heart all the time on this one … We all fight the battle of the flesh and self-will and self-desire. But a man who is to be a leader in the church is a man who is not self-willed. He has to continually suppress his own desires – the desires of his flesh, desires for his own self-glory and self-gratification. He must not despise others because they get in his way, the way of fulfilling his own desires …

Secondly – and this goes along with it – he says in verse 7 he’s not to be “quick-tempered.”  Recently I was talking to some people from a church, and they were telling me the problems of this church and didn’t know how to resolve them.  And I said, “Well look, obviously you’re very upset with your pastor. What is it about your pastor that causes you such concern?”  And they said, “he gets angry all the time.”  I said, “He gets angry?  Well, what do you mean?”  “Well, in a meeting he’ll just blow up, and then he’ll stomp out of the meeting.  What should we do?”

And the right answer, of course, was “you should get another pastor because he’s not qualified” – “not quick-tempered.” That word, “quick-tempered,” is used only here, orgilos, though its cognates are frequent – the word orgē, from which the word wrath, anger comes, a smoldering kind of anger that resides under the surface.  Everybody is going to lose it now and then a little bit and get upset about something.  I mean, that can happen in your lifetime.  We all have to face the reality of that.  But this is talking about a person with what we would call a temper – that’s always under the surface and at given points it just erupts.  It’s this, it’s this sort of constant, lasting, nurtured hostility maintained in the heart, and periodically it bursts out.  It’s probably behind what Paul said to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:24 when he said, “The Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind and patient when wronged,” and putting up with evil graciously.  And when things don’t go the way he wants them to go, that’s all right, that’s fine, that’s okay.

And James really sums it up. Anger produces nothing of value, absolutely nothing of value in spiritual leadership.  James 1:20, “The anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God,” “the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.”  The man of God will not be angry, he will not be hostile, he will not be quarrelsome, he will not be fuming on the inside because he’s not getting his way – that is not an appropriate man for spiritual leadership.  He is a man who can take a no, he is a man who can be set aside and another man’s decision can preempt his.  He is a man who can turn things over to other people who do it in ways that he might not think are best, and he is a man who can deal with that with joy in his heart and gratitude and kindness and patience.  He is a man who can allow people around him to fail until they learn to succeed, because he doesn’t tie his ego up in everything they do.

Well, let me just mention a third one … He says this man is to be “not addicted to wine,” “not addicted to wine.”  That’s a tremendous word.  That word is paroinos, and it literally is the word oinos, “wine,” and para, “alongside.”  Not someone who is “alongside wine.” 

I do not need to go into detail there. MacArthur’s views on strong drink are set against Henry’s. MacArthur advocates a total prohibition for himself, his other clergy at Grace Community Church and — probably — the students at The Master’s Seminary, which he founded.

MacArthur points out the trouble with being ‘alongside wine’ or other alcoholic beverages:

The implication being you’re hanging around it, you’re not just drinking it for the sake of quenching your thirst or the sake of the refreshment of it. You’re hanging around it, you’re alongside of it, it’s a major part of your life, and it has some impact on your thinking.  The idea could be one who is a drinker, one who goes to the feast and hangs around the wine, one who goes to the tavern or the inn or the bar – places associated with drinking where there is potential for drunkenness, where there’s potential for indiscretion, where there is a potential for losing control of yourself to the degree that you say things or do things that are inappropriate, where there is obviously the association with those who are drunkards and those who are sinners. Everybody knows that taverns and inns and bars, things like that in ancient times, were places of debauchery and iniquity.  No man who has any of that kind of stuff in his life is fit to be a pastor or an elder.

And when you bring that down into today’s world, it’s still true.  People who frequent bars, who drink as a normal course intoxicating beverages, who hang around – you know, the idea would be drink your wine and leave, don’t hang around and hang around and keep drinking and keep drinking until you finally have inebriated yourself. Anybody who is at all involved in that kind of thing is unfit for ministry …

So as elders here at Grace Church and pastors through all the years that I’ve been here, we have all affirmed a total abstinence position and said none of us will ever drink any alcoholic beverage, any time, under any circumstance.  It’s not necessary. And because the kinds of alcoholic beverages that we have today are not reconstituted, non-alcoholic, nor are they mixed with water sufficiently to dilute their force, we abstain from all of that.  That’s been our position.  It’s not necessary to drink that today, so why would we do it? …

And then there is the interesting mention of Timothy, in 1 Timothy 5:23, where Paul says, “take a little wine for your stomach’s sake.”  And it certainly seems to me that the fact that Paul had to tell Timothy to do that meant that it was against the grain of what Timothy’s normal behavior was like.  He had to say take a little wine for medicinal purposes most likely because Timothy normally wouldn’t take any. 

MacArthur addresses violence, whether physical or verbal:

Then fourthly, in verse 7, “not pugnacious.”  That is used only here and in 1 Timothy 3:3 and has the idea of simply of someone who hits you.  It’s someone who punches you, basically.  The old lexicon says “a giver of blows” – somebody who uses his hand, fist, a stick, a rock to hit you.  Now apparently that was one way conflict was resolved in ancient times.  It’s still a way, and most of us are a little more dignified than that.  We resolve conflict by more subtle means than vengeance … 

Second Timothy 2:24 and 25 says that “the servant of the Lord must not fight” – must not strive.  Here is the idea of this self-willed quick-tempered or even alcohol-affected individual who resorts to physical violence. And it may well even include other forms of verbal violence, but primarily the idea of just lashing out … A spiritual leader is to resolve conflict peacefully, biblically, in a godly, gentle, meek, and humble manner.

MacArthur finishes with words on the love of money, an obsession with material gain:

Number five then, and the last one in verse 7, which is the negative aspect or what a pastor must not be – “not fond of sordid gain,” “not fond of sordid gain.”  Here again you have one word, a very interesting word, coming from two Greek words: aischros, which means “shameful”; and kerdos, which means “gain.”  Somebody who is “after personal gain shamefully.”  That is to say, he doesn’t care how he makes money; he doesn’t care how he aggrandizes himself; he doesn’t care how he amasses material things.  He lacks integrity; he lacks honesty.  There is nothing wrong with paying the preacher, 1 Corinthians chapter 9, verses 11 and 14 say, “if you preach the gospel you should live of the gospel.”  What that means is not “you should live what you preach”; that’s not the idea. What it means is, “if you preach, you ought to get your living from your preaching.”  That’s what Paul is saying.  First Timothy 5:17 says “the elders that rule well are worthy of double honor, especially if they work hard in the word and doctrine.”  That’s to be an understood fact.  We are to be paid for ministry if God so chooses; and not all pastors and elders have to be, but it’s an option; it’s available.  Paul says it’s right.

But we don’t do it for money.  Peter says, 1 Peter 5:2, we do not do this “for sordid gain” – same concept. We’re not in it for money. We don’t do it for money. We can be remunerated, but it isn’t because we want the money.  False teachers do it for money. They want money.  They seek the “sordid gain.” Paul wrote to Timothy about that in chapter 6 of 1 Timothy: “godliness actually is a means of great gain when accompanied with contentment. We brought nothing into the world, we can’t take anything out of it either.  So if we have food and covering, with these we shall be content.  But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and darkness, ruin and destruction, for the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many a pang.” Then this, “but flee from these things, you man of God.”  “Man of God” is a technical term for a pastor, an elder in a church, a preacher of the Word; it’s a term used to describe the prophets of the Old Testament.  If you’re one of those, flee the love of money.  Any man who is enamored by money will compromise himself and somehow will gain in a sordid way.  The man who is in spiritual leadership is not to be greedy. He is not to be indulgent, because he can be so easily corrupted.  He handles God’s money.  If you have a man who is selfish and greedy and you put him in charge of the money in the church, you have a very volatile situation.

MacArthur returns to false teachers:

Now the typical false teacher was just the opposite of the kind of person the pastor is to be.  The typical false teacher could be well described by the very terms that you have just gone over in Titus.  The typical false teacher was “self-willed, quick-tempered, addicted to wine, pugnacious, and loved money.”  That’s why they were into it.  If you run into a false teacher, you find that: they are self-willed, self-motivated, self-directed, arrogant, and they get angry when anybody stands in their way.  They are those typical megalomaniacs who become furious when anyone thwarts their dream.  They very often are addicted to wine. They are into the good life.  They strike out and lash because they’re basically not under the control of the Holy Spirit, and they do what they do for money.

But that’s not the kind of person you want leading in the church.  They had that in Crete with the false teachers. 

Paul then goes into the positives of a man of God — an elder, a bishop, an overseer — saying that he is hospitable, a lover of goodness, self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined (verse 8).

Henry’s commentary explains:

Secondly, Positively: he must be (v. 8) a lover of hospitality, as an evidence that he is not given to filthy lucre, but is willing to use what he has to the best purposes, not laying up for himself, so as to hinder charitable laying out for the good of others; receiving and entertaining strangers (as the word imports), a great and necessary office of love, especially in those times of affliction and distress, when Christians were made to fly and wander for safety from persecution and enemies, or in travelling to and fro where there were not such public houses for reception as in our days, nor, it may be, had many poor saints sufficiency of their own for such uses—then to receive and entertain them was good and pleasing to God. And such a spirit and practice, according to ability and occasion, are very becoming such as should be examples of good works. A lover of good men, or of good things; ministers should be exemplary in both; this will evince their open piety, and likeness to God and their Master Jesus Christ: Do good to all, but especially to those of the household of faith, those who are the excellent of the earth, in whom should be all our delight. Sober, or prudent, as the word signifies; a needful grace in a minister both for his ministerial and personal carriage and management. He should be a wise steward, and one who is not rash, or foolish, or heady; but who can govern well his passions and affections. Just in things belonging to civil life, and moral righteousness, and equity in dealings, giving to all their due. Holy, in what concerns religion; one who reverences and worships God, and is of a spiritual and heavenly conversation. Temperate; it comes from a word that signifies strength, and denotes one who has power over his appetite and affections, or, in things lawful, can, for good ends, restrain and hold them in. Nothing is more becoming a minister than such things as these, sobriety, temperance, justice, and holiness—sober in respect of himself, just and righteous towards all men, and holy towards God. And thus of the qualifications respecting the minister’s life and manners, relative and absolute, negative and positive, what he must not, and what he must, be and do.

MacArthur discusses the Greek words in that verse:

The positive side is in verse 8.  On the other hand, here are six positives: “hospitable, loving what is good, sensible, just, devout and self-controlled.” This is what a pastor must be.  “Hospitable,” a Greek word philoxenos from two words: phileo, “to love”; xenos, “strangers” – “to love strangers” is what it means.  It’s used also in 1 Timothy 3:2. It is an oft-repeated attribute of Christian character ... You find it in Romans 12:13, Hebrews 13:2; you find it over in 1 Peter 4:9 and in 1 Timothy 5:10. And what we mean by hospitality primarily, simply, in a general and somewhat leading sense – although it may have other implications – is that it is the idea of opening your life and your resources to people you don’t know.  That’s basically it.  And primarily, in the context of the early church, it had to do with other Christians.

… bars and taverns and inns and places like that in the ancient world were despicable dens of sin and debauchery – very dangerous.  Robbers were there, and prostitutes were there.  And many believers, of course, traveled; they were on the road traveling, maybe for business.  Some of them were traveling because perhaps they were moving from church to church in ministry.  Some of them were traveling because they had been kicked out of their city under persecution, driven from their own homes and dispossessed of all that they had.  And so there was plenty of opportunity in the early church to open up your home and your food and your life and your clothing and your resources to meet the needs of people you didn’t know.

Hospitality is not having your friends over for dinner.  That’s not hospitality in a biblical sense.  It’s nice to do that, but in Luke … chapter 14 … our Lord said “when you have a dinner, don’t invite your friends; invite the people you don’t know.  Go out and find strangers and poor people and all of that.” And, He said, “people who can never pay you back, who have no resource to pay you back.”  That’s the essence of loving strangers.  Opening your life, opening all your resources to anyone and everyone who is in need.  That’s hospitality …

Secondly, he is to be characterized as “loving what is good.” That’s a very simple thing.  Again a combination of two words: phileo and agathon, “to love what is good.”  Agathon or agathos, from which we get that old name Agatha, which means “good.” It means he’s a lover of good men and a lover of good things.  You know, they say – and it’s true – you can tell a lot by looking at a man’s friends, can’t you?  And you can tell a lot by looking at a man’s life and seeing what he surrounds himself with … 

Thirdly, in verse 8, “sensible.”  This is another one of those compound words that takes two words in the Greek: the word  phronm, meaning “mind”; and the word sz, “to save.” And the Greeks used to say “he is a man who has saving thoughts,” or “he’s right minded.”  In other words, he’s in control of his mind, and his thoughts are redeemed thoughts; they’re saved thoughts.  They’re delivered from the mundane and the earthy and the base.  He rescues his mind out of the gutter, you might say.  And also he lifts his mind above the trivial, the passing, the frivolous – not a clown, not a jokester, not a jester, not frivolous, but a man with a sure and a steady wisdom, a man with a cool mind, unimpassioned, careful in judgment, thoughtful, wise, profound, deep with a disciplined mind.  First Timothy 3:2 translates the same word “prudent.”  It’s a form of wisdom, of disciplined wisdom.  This is the kind of man to be a pastor.

And then the fourth one is “just,” dikaios, the New Testament word for “righteous.”  It describes conduct that meets God’s standard.  He’s a man whose life is approved by God.  It’s a legal term indicating that the divine verdict on his life is positive.  God looks at him and says “this man is right; this man is good; this man is righteous; this man meets My standard.”  He’s a man whose life is approved by God.  That qualification alone would be enough to describe the man, wouldn’t it?  Because that would cover everything else.  If God approves of him, that’s enough.  He’s right with God.  He is known as a man whom God approves of because he lives according to divine standards.

And then it adds – and these two words are very often partners in the New Testament, such as 1 Thessalonians 2:10 – it adds, “righteous,” “devout.”  That’s the word for “holy,” not the word hagios, but hosios, which also means “holy.” It means “pure, unpolluted, free from any stain of sin.”  Here we are back to that stainless life again, “above reproach.”  In every area of his life – everywhere you look – every area of his life is exemplary; there’s no stain of sin there …

One lexicon translated this word “devout,” hosios, as “supremely holy.”  Now it’s a wonderful word.  It has to do with a life that is utterly set apart from sin, a life that is pure in its very character.  In fact, in Acts 2:27 it calls the Messiah “Thy holy one,” and it uses the word hosios.  So this level, and I only point that illustration out to let you know it’s a high level of holiness, not lower than say hagios, in case some of you who know that word we’re asking.  It’s used in Acts 13:35, Hebrews 7:26, and even Revelation 16:5 when referring to the Lord Jesus Christ.  It has to do with being holy.  The man is right before God – that’s God’s judgment. He is holy in the way he lives, and that’s man’s judgment.  We look at his life and we say “yes, there is no stain there.”

And then lastly, the sixth qualification, “self-controlled,” literally “restrained.”  He’s a man who has control of his life … if a man cannot control his life in righteousness and holiness when he’s absolutely all alone and by himself, he doesn’t belong in a pastorate.  If he is the kind of person that has to have a committee walking around hanging on to his clothes, he doesn’t belong in the pastorate.  If the man is controlled from the outside, he is unqualified if he’s not controlled on the inside …

The character of a pastor comes from the inside.  He is “self-controlled,” egkrats, he has control of his life.  He does not need to be policed.  You can send him all by himself to the farthest corner of the world and he’ll walk with God in the integrity of his heart, if nobody knows who he is, because that’s the kind of man he is.  He has the grace of God in his life to the degree that he is mature and he can apply it in dealing with the temptations of life.  The general character for one who is a pastor, as you can see, is very, very demanding – very, very demanding.

And when men in the pastorate and the ministry do sin, serious consequences fall.  First Timothy 5:20, “Those who continue in sin rebuke in the presence of all so that the rest also may be fearful of sinning.”  Public rebuke to an elder who sins, a pastor who sins, is fitting.

Finally in this section, Paul tells Titus that the elder — or overseer — must hold firm to the trustworthy word (Scripture) as taught, so that he may (can) also give instruction in sound doctrine as well as rebuke those who contradict it (verse 9).

In other words, the church leader must uphold Scripture to believers and those who contradict it, either through error or through unbelief.

Henry’s commentary says:

As to doctrine,

(1.) Here is his duty: Holding fast the faithful word, as he has been taught, keeping close to the doctrine of Christ, the word of his grace, adhering thereto according to the instructions he has received—holding it fast in his own belief and profession, and in teaching others. Observe, [1.] The word of God, revealed in the scripture, is a true and infallible word; the word of him that is the amen, the true and faithful witness, and whose Spirit guided the penmen of it. Holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. [2.] Ministers must hold fast, and hold forth, the faithful word in their teaching and life. I have kept the faith, was Paul’s comfort (2 Tim 4 7), and not shunned to declare the whole counsel of God; there was his faithfulness, Acts 20 27.

(2.) Here is the end: That he may be able, by sound doctrine, both to exhort, and to convince the gainsayers, to persuade and draw others to the true faith, and to convince the contrary-minded.