Толкование К Титу послание ап. Павла 1 глава 16 стих - Экзегет

Некоторые считают, что от Бога отрекаются только тогда, когда кто-либо, схваченный язычниками в гонении, откажется от имени христианина. Но вот апостол утверждает, что от Бога отрекаются во всех случаях, когда совершаются нечестивые дела.

Those whose “mind and conscience” are polluted “confess to know God, but they deny him by their deeds” according to what is said in Isaiah, “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.”Therefore, just as someone with the lips honors and in the heart withdraws far away, so someone confessing God in words denies him in deeds. But the one denying God by his works, since his confession is feigned, is rightly “detestable” and profane; and being in no way convinced of the truth, he is called “disobedient and unbelieving.” This is how it comes to pass that he is “rejected for every good work,” namely, because even the things that he did, perhaps good things, when his natural goodness had the upper hand, are not good things when they are rejected by the perversity of mind.
Some think that God is denied only in the case of someone who is arrested by the Gentiles during a persecution and denies that he is a Christian. But behold the apostle asserts that God is denied by all deeds that are perverse. Christ is wisdom, justice, truth, sanctity, fortitude.Wisdom will be denied by foolishness, justice by injustice, truth by falsehood, sanctity by baseness, fortitude by weakness of heart. And as often as we are overcome by vices and sins, just that often do we deny God. And on the other hand, as often as we do anything good, we confess God.
Let it not be thought that on the day of judgment only those will be denied by the Son of God who have denied Christ in respect to martyrdom. On the contrary, by all works, words, and thoughts, Christ denies when he is denied. He confesses when he is confessed. I think that it was concerning this “confession” that he instructed the disciples, saying, “You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Thus in all good works and words, the mind devoted to itself “confesses” Christ. There is even a certain praiseworthy form of denying of which the apostle himself speaks: “Thus denying impiety and worldly desires, let us live chastely, justly, and piously in the present world, awaiting the blessed hope and coming of our Savior and God.” He who denies this denial and wants to follow the Savior, who says, “Whoever wants to come after me, let him deny himself,” having stripped off the old man with his works, and having put on the new, will follow his God.
But we need to contemplate how someone denies himself. A chaste man denies the fornicator that he once was; a wise man denies the imprudent man, the just man the unjust, the strong the weak. And that I may speak with universal application concerning everything, however often we deny ourselves, just so often do we tread upon former vices, cease to be what we were, and begin to be what we were not formerly.