Sunday Sermon: Older Men and Women in the Church (Titus 2:1-5)

You're listening to the Preaching Ministry of Gabriel Hughes, pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Casa Grande, Arizona.

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast, we feature teaching through a New Testament book, an

Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday. Each Sunday we are pleased to present our sermon series.

Here is Pastor Gabe. Titus chapter 2 is where we are, and we are taking what we have read over the last few weeks in chapter 1, which has been mostly doctrine related, talking about sound teachers contrasting them with false teachers, and now we're taking that doctrine that we've studied and we're putting legs on it.

Now, how do you live this out? What are we to do in light of the good doctrine that we have heard, and that's what we're going to see here at the start of Titus 2.

Before getting to our text, I came across this quote from J. Vernon McGee, somebody that I used to listen to quite regularly on the radio when

I was growing up. And McGee said, I'm afraid that we find a lot of sissy preaching in our pulpits today.

The popular thing is to have a little sermonette given by a preacherette to Christianettes.

There is so little urgency. Someone has defined the average church service in a liberal church as when a mild -mannered man gets up before a group of mild -mannered people and urges them to be more mild -mannered.

But what we're going to be reading about today in Titus 2, it is going to teach us how to be men and women of God in His church.

In honor of the word of the King, would you please stand as I am reading from Titus chapter 2, and I'm going to read verses 1 through 10 out of the

English Standard Version. Hear the word of the Lord. But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine.

Older men are to be sober -minded, dignified, self -controlled, sound in faith, love, and in steadfastness.

Older women, likewise, are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves too much wine.

They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self -controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

Likewise, urge the younger men to be self -controlled. Show yourself, in all respects, to be a model of good works, and in your teaching, show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us.

Bond servants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything. They are to be well -pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our

Savior. You may be seated as we pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for what we have read, and I pray that you give the application of this text to our hearts.

We see how it rightly applies to each person. We understand how it applies to us.

How we are instructed as men in the church to behave a certain way and to do a certain thing.

How women are instructed to go a certain way, even the young and the old.

And may we understand the responsibility that we have to one another in the body of Christ, looking out for each other and growing one another in love, as talked about in Ephesians 4, so that we may grow up in every way into the head who is

Christ Jesus. It is in his name that we pray, and all God's people said, Amen.

Well, this week, the Summer Olympics 2024 in Paris will come to a close.

And it has certainly been, as most Olympic seasons are, a season of drama.

Now, I've not watched a lot of the Olympics, but I've certainly kept up with a lot of the news that has been surrounding the

Olympics, and you are probably aware that just yesterday, it was said that a biological male won the women's boxing event, beat up all the women, and ended up with a gold medal.

Now, there's controversy surrounding this, of course, because nobody's admitting that he is a biological male.

They're saying, no, he is a female, and he competed in the women's event as he should.

In fact, the top two competitors in women's boxing were both male. Now, I don't think that women should be beating up each other for sport anyway, frankly, if I'm to be honest with you.

But we're seeing now on the world stage something that we know has been happening in our culture for the last several years, this blurring of the lines of distinctions between male and female.

Yet, even though we've seen that happening in our culture, or this idea that gender is even fluid, that somebody can change their sex or their identity, and they can be one tomorrow, and maybe the next day they decide they want to be something else.

Even though that's been going on in our culture, when you're looking at the Olympic events, you still can't escape the reality of biology.

Why is this such a controversy in this women's sport? Because we know that men are biologically stronger, and if you put a man in a woman's sport, he will dominate the women.

And so, even now in the 2024 Olympics, you still see distinctions between male and female.

This man won the gold medal in men's events. This woman won the gold medal in women's events.

Those distinctions still exist, and they are inescapable, because it is how

God created every one of us, as said in Genesis 127, in his image, male and female.

And not only are we biologically different, but God has assigned to men and to women specific roles.

There are roles that men are specifically supposed to do, even in the context of the church, and there are roles that women are specifically to fulfill.

And I want to say to you that in order to have a good functioning church, which is what

Paul is describing here in Titus 2, it is a functioning, godly, biblical church.

In order to have a functioning church, we need men filling the roles that men are supposed to fill, and we need women filling the roles that women are supposed to fill.

Men cannot do the women's job, and women cannot do the men's job. Now, there are some that will try to say that the way that these roles are laid out are unfair, and a woman can do everything that a man can do, or vice versa.

Usually, it doesn't go the other way. A man can do everything a woman can do. You rarely hear that. It's usually a woman can do everything that a man can do.

But I tell you that if we start blurring the lines, and we start thinking that any person of any sex can do any role, then we have a dysfunctional church.

And you could just have a church of all men, or a church of all women, and it would be every bit as biblical as if you had both sexes in the church.

But that would be a dysfunctional church. A church with all men in it would not be a properly functioning church, because God's kingdom is for men and women.

And furthermore, God's kingdom is not just for the older, but even for the younger. Remember that Jesus said to his own disciples,

Do not prohibit children from coming unto me, for to them belongs the kingdom of God.

We see it for the oldest generation, and even for the younger generation as well. And so as the

Apostle Paul comes here to giving instructions about how people are to function in the church, we have instructions that are specific to men, instructions that are specific to women.

And you also see something here that is multi -generational. There is an instruction that is given to older men.

There's an instruction given to older women on even how to teach younger women.

And there is instruction for younger men to receive the instructions from their elders as well.

So this is how this is going to break up for us over the next couple of weeks. I'm actually not going to be here next week.

I'm going to be preaching up in Gilbert. So this week, we're going to look at primarily the instructions that are given for older men and older women.

Next week, somebody else is going to be leading the teaching. And then the week after, we'll come back to this section, and we'll see specifically those instructions for the younger women and the younger men.

But notice that we begin first with instructions to older men, because they are going to be the ones that are first expected to step up and lead in the congregation of the church.

Now, the way that this passage breaks down for us today is we're going to be looking at it. We have it broken down into three parts.

Number one, notice this first verse. But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine.

This is a bridging verse that takes all the instructions that we've heard in Chapter 1 and then gives them application that we see here in Chapter 2.

And we're going to have another bridging verse at the end of Chapter 2. So Chapter 2 is bookmarked with two bridging verses.

As for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Look down at verse 15, and you'll see, Declare these things, exhort and rebuke with all authority, let no one disregard you.

It is a call back to the doctrine that Titus has been taught, and then that'll take us into the practical instructions that we'll see in Chapter 3.

So for our first point today, we're looking at this bridging verse of teaching what accords with sound doctrine.

Secondly, we're going to see instructions that are given to older men. That's in verse 2. And then thirdly, we'll see instructions that are given to older women in verse 3.

And then after that, when we come back to this section, you see the instructions to younger women, instructions to younger men, and even instructions to bond servants that are given here also in Chapter 2.

So let's come back up to the top, and we'll look at this first verse at the start of Chapter 2.

But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine.

Now, remember, our theme as we have been reading through Titus has been that doctrine and life go together.

What you believe will affect the way that you behave. And that is true for everybody.

It doesn't matter whether they are a believer, a professing Christian, or not. What a person believes absolutely has everything to do with the way that they conduct themselves in this world.

Paul is instructing Titus, who is going to be instructing these churches that have been planted on the island of Crete.

They have been taught the gospel. They have come to faith in Jesus Christ because of the declaration of the gospel.

But then there are other things in these churches that remain incomplete. For example, back in verse 5,

Paul says, 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 had directed you.

So these churches don't yet have sound men of God that have been placed over the congregation to help shepherd them.

And that is one of the assignments that Titus has for going back into these churches and setting these things in order.

Then what we had in verses 5 -9 were the qualifications of a sound teacher.

These are the kinds of men that Titus should have been appointing. And they were set in contrast with false teachers that needed to be silent.

That's what we looked at last week in verses 10 -16. Silence the false teachers, but give a platform to those sound men that will guide

God's people into all truth with sound doctrine. Good doctrine, or good teaching.

Doctrine is just a word synonymous with teaching. So good teaching leads to godliness.

If we have sound teaching that flows from the gospel of Jesus Christ, the person who hears it and does what is exhorted of them to do will be more godly in their living and in their behavior.

But if you have bad doctrine, if the teaching is bad, then it leads to more and more ungodliness.

So now after talking about those things, talking about the importance of right teaching, silencing those who teach wrongly,

Paul then comes into chapter 2 saying, as for you, Titus, contrasting him with the false teachers.

Don't be as those men, but for you, teach what accords or what flows from sound doctrine.

Now I teased this at the end of the sermon last week and I said this is going to be like a teaser for what we're going to be talking about today.

What accords with sound doctrine is what results from the sound teaching of the word.

And so now what we have in chapter 2 with regard to men and women in the church, how they are to behave, how they are to conduct themselves, this is what flows from sound doctrine.

This is what is in keeping with sound doctrine. If a person is listening to the gospel, if they're listening to the teaching of our

Lord Christ, then what should we expect their lives to look like? And we begin with the environment of the church.

Now Paul doesn't limit these instructions to just how they will conduct themselves in the church. That's chapter 3.

Chapter 3 will even talk about how we conduct ourselves in the world. But for now, since we're talking about the context of the church, this is how men and women are to be in the assembly.

The called -out assembly of people who worship and serve the Lord. So that's verse 1.

And it's very rare for me for my first point to be my shortest point, but in this particular sermon, that's going to be the case.

I was on a message board with some other pastors not long ago, and I asked them, how many of you, like me, spend like 30 minutes on your first point and then 10 minutes on every subsequent point after that?

And the pastors were responding, oh my goodness, I thought I was the only one. I'm glad to hear that there are others that do the same. Point 1 for me is going to be the shortest today.

We're going to spend more time looking at these instructions, first for older men and then for older women.

So look here at verse 2. Older men are to be sober -minded, dignified, self -controlled.

Sound, we see that word sound again. That was in verse 1. Sound doctrine. So now we also see that he is to be sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

Now Paul starts with older men, then older women, then younger women, and then younger men.

In the text, we have on either side of the women instructions for men.

You notice that? So the older men are first. Then older women, younger women, and then the younger men.

Now I don't know if this was Paul's intention or not, but coming right off the warning against false teachers, we have this picture of godly men, old and young, standing strong.

And then the women, and even you might consider the children, because it's also talked about there about a younger woman who is raising up children in her household.

So you have the women and the children that are in the middle. What I do know is that Paul starts with older men because no one in the church is more influential than the older men in the church.

It's not that men are more important, but the older men hold the most influence.

It is from the more mature men that the elders will be chosen. These men that Paul had told

Titus that he is to raise up and appoint as shepherds in the church that we read back in chapter 1.

Remember from Titus 1 .5 that this was one of Titus' objectives and that elder was from the word presbyter, so he is one who is a leader, or as we also considered, a shepherd in the church.

We know from the context, because Paul contrasts older men with older women in verse 3, that we're not talking about the elders of the church here in verse 2.

We're talking about the older men in the church, those who are more mature and more experienced, especially in the context of faith.

There's no value in being old if you're not also godly.

You've heard, and perhaps you've even used the expression, grumpy old man. Ever used that expression before?

I had a friend of mine who used to say, I'm aspiring to be a grumpy old man, and now I'm just working on the old part.

It's such a common euphemism in our culture that there were two popular movies under that title,

Grumpy Old Men and Grumpier Old Men. It's easy to become a grumpy old man.

That's an easy thing to do. How about a godly older man? Psalm 71 says,

O Lord, you are my trust from my youth. Even when

I am old and gray, O God, do not forsake me until I declare your strength to the next generation, your might to all who are to come.

So look with me at these instructions for older men. Verse 2, older men are to be temperate.

That's another word for sober -minded. They are to be dignified, and they are to be self -controlled.

Another word that's used there for self -controlled is sensible. And they are to be sound in faith and in love.

In the English Standard Version it says, and in steadfastness, if you're reading from the New American Standard or the

Legacy Standard, it probably uses the word perseverance. That's another word for steadfastness.

So you'll notice here we have two sets of three. We have, first of all, sober -minded, dignified, and self -controlled, and then following that with a second set of three, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

Now, it may not look like this at first glance, but the first set of three is actually the result of the second set of three.

Remember we've been considering how belief and behavior go together. So if a man is sound in faith and in love, and he is steadfast in this, he perseveres in this, then he will demonstrate soundness of thought or being sober -minded, he will demonstrate this love that he has in being dignified, and he will also be self -controlled.

Sound in faith describes your relationship with God. Sound in love describes your relationship with other people.

Steadfastness is your perseverance in these relationships with God and with his people.

So one of the signs of fruitfulness in a Christian's life is that you are growing in your love for God and for his word and in your love for his people, for fellow

Christians. A man who loves God and loves the people of God will also show himself to be sober -minded, dignified, and self -controlled.

So to be temperate or to be sober -minded, some of you might have in a different word in a different translation, this means to be clear -headed in your thinking.

You are not easily given over to wild and fanciful ideas, particularly when it comes to doctrine.

You have such a sound grasp on the truth that your mind is guarded from being persuaded by things that aren't true.

Philippians 2 .5 says to have the mind of Christ, and that's not merely for your sake. That's also for the sake of others.

Ephesians 4 .14 -15, I quoted a portion of in my prayer this morning, it says that we are no longer to be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every shifting wind of doctrine, by the craftiness of men, by their deceitful scheming, but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into him who is the head, into Christ Jesus.

Men, if you are the kind of guy that tends to believe all the kinds of craziness that you hear in the world today, and it seems like whenever an election season rolls around, the theories and the ideas just get crazier.

If you are tossed around by every different wind of doctrine, you hear a new teaching that comes about and you think to yourself, well, that sounds unique.

I've not ever given it that thought before, and you start to take that teaching and wedge it into the

Bible as though you found it there, but that's not where you found it. You found it out here, and you're trying to wedge it into the pages of Scripture.

If this is the kind of person that you are, then you are not just a danger to yourself.

You're a danger also to your church. If you are the kind of person who loves drama, and when

I say drama, I mean you tend to make things a bigger deal than they really are, or you think that whatever you're passionate about, whatever you get excited over, whatever you obsess in, well, that needs to be everybody else's obsession too.

And if that's the kind of person that you are, you lack temperance.

If you like what we often label conspiracy theories, like I do, I love a good conspiracy theory, but there's a balanced and proper way to handle such information.

Don't fear the government or Big Pharma or whatever else is going on more than you fear

God. That was a bird that hit the window back there. That's what that was. That's a conspiracy.

They're after us now. They heard what I was saying. So without the distraction, let me repeat that again.

Don't fear the government or Big Pharma or some uncover agency or something that somebody is whispering about online.

Don't fear those things more than you fear God. Isaiah 8 -12, let him be your fear and your dread.

And that is having temperance. That's what it means to be sober -minded. Now how about that next one, to be dignified.

Men, this means to behave in such a way that is worthy of respect. The interesting thing about the definition of this word is that it implies that you are involved with other people.

So you actually have relationships with other people that they may know and see and test your conduct and recognize you as being someone worthy of emulation or someone worthy of respect.

What do they think about your character or your behavior? Do you act in a way that would make anyone admire you?

Do you want to act in a way that when people look at you they think, now there's a man who wants to be like Jesus.

However far away that you might think you are from that, we should all desire that.

Ephesians 5 -1 says, be imitators of God.

Now that third word, to be sensible or to be self -controlled is exactly what that means.

Being able to control yourself. In fact, some translations use the word self -control instead of sensible because that's the more plain definition of the word.

This is a man who knows how to curb his desires and impulses. And again, you do this not for yourself, although you should.

For your sake, be self -control. A person who lacks self -control we've recognized how destructive that kind of behavior can be, right?

You've known people who just seems like everything they decide to do seems to be something that is more and more self -destructive.

So having self -control is certainly for your benefit, but more specifically in this context it is for the benefit of other people.

The man of God is self -controlled for the sake of others. My friends, no one sins on an island.

Your sin does affect other people. And the way that you act and the way that you behave can bring a reproach against the church that you're a part of.

Consider what Paul says here in 1 Thessalonians 4, 3 -6. For this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality, that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and in honor, not in lustful passion like the

Gentiles who do not know God, and that no man transgress and defraud his brother in this matter, because the

Lord is an avenger in these things. So recognize there that Paul is talking about how you can sin and that sin will be against you, but you can also sin in such a way that will transgress a brother or a sister in the

Lord. When I first took over as the pastor of my church in Kansas, it was a very busy season, of course, when you have a transition of pastors like that, and there were some things that were going on that the other pastor that I took over after just left undone.

He was not a disciplinarian. He would not confront people in their sin, and so some people were allowed to run in various positions while they were also living sinful lifestyles on the side.

To give you an example of that, we discovered that one of the women that was leading part of our AWANA program was actually living with a man out of wedlock, and so we had to confront that and remove her from that position, and in so doing, it creates work for everybody else because now we have to find somebody to fill that position or we have to move some people around in order to make sure that these kids are being cared for and they're being led according to the verses that they were learning and the different lessons that we had with them in our

Wednesday night program. So just kind of give you an example of that. Now, in this transition, there were not elders.

I think we talked about this a little bit when we went through different church polity and having a plurality of elders.

When I first took over as pastor, I was the only guy. I was the only one kind of at the top leading things.

I was taking the church in the direction of understanding why it was important for us to have a plurality eldership, but we weren't there yet, and so a lot of the decisions that had to be made,

I just had to do it myself, and there were things that I couldn't delegate to anybody else. It was just stuff that had to be done, and it had to be up to the pastor to do it.

But there were a lot of well -meaning people that came to me and said, is there anything that we can do for you beyond praying?

We love praying for you, but is there something that you can give us to do? And sometimes I would have something that I could delegate out, but again, other times it were just things that the pastor had to do or some other men, friends of mine could help me do in some of those respective roles.

But finally, at one point when I was teaching through, I don't even remember which book it was at the time, but when we were doing application toward the end of the sermon,

I just took a moment to say, a lot of you have asked me what you can do to help me, and I appreciate your request.

Some of those things I can't delegate out, but as I was thinking about this, going through the passage that we're reading about today and what we can be doing together as a church, here's just a very simple application, a very simple command that I would give for you to do and apply to your lives.

And this would help me, and it would help you and the rest of the church. Stop sinning.

And a lot of the people, when I said that, reacted just like that. But I did have a few people that came to me afterward.

One man in particular I remember coming to me and saying, Pastor, you can't just tell people to stop sinning. You can't say, stop doing that.

We've heard you preach that there's no one good, there's no one righteous, so we can't just stop sinning like you instructed us to do.

So how can you say that? And I said, well, if you need chapter and verse, fine. 1 Corinthians 1534, stop sinning.

It is actually there in Scripture. Now, of course, under our own fleshly power, we don't have the ability to just stop sinning.

But I'm talking to a people who are not living in the flesh, at least I hope they're not, but having the

Holy Spirit of God. They do have the power that has been given to them to abstain from sin and walk in holiness.

And my friends, especially talking to you men, since that's the section of Titus 2 that we're in, that's a standard that you need to be modeling for the rest of the church.

Pursuing holiness and righteousness in Christ that the rest of us can look up to you and we see someone who models godliness and Christ -likeness in their behavior.

I don't know about the rest of you, but when I'm in need of counsel, I don't often turn to men who are younger and less experienced than I am.

I need the wisdom and the experience of an older, godly man. And we need men who can say as Paul did, be imitators of me as I am of Christ, 1

Corinthians 11. We need men who have borne the burdens of life and are still able to say, my

Redeemer is faithful and true. We need older men whose body is wasting away from the years and we can tell.

And yet you have a wonder and an enthusiasm for the gospel that mirrors the energy of a small child.

I remember a brother named Ray, who was a Sunday school teacher in my church in Texas.

He's in his 90s now. And the man walks with the gait of a 90 -year -old.

But when you talk to him about Jesus and you look in his eyes, you see such a youthfulness and a vigor there that I wish

I had. I loved talking with him about the Lord. And there were some members of the church that probably thought of Ray as a grumpy old man in some respects.

But you get to talking with him about Christ and what he knew the Lord had redeemed him from.

And he loved to tell the story of Jesus and his love. When Moses died, he was 120 years old.

Nobody in here I expect to live to be 120 years old. Nobody probably wants to live here that long for that matter.

Lord, take me home. Deuteronomy 34 .7 says, Now Moses was 120 years old when he died.

His eye was not dim, nor his vigor abated. Moses was old in body, but not in heart.

His eye was fixed on God, and his enthusiasm was for God's promises.

And older men, we need you to be sober -minded, dignified, self -controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

Older women, it's your turn. Look at verse 3. Older women, likewise.

So some of those things that have been said to the older men, women, you need to take that to heart and imitate that as well.

Older women, likewise, are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers nor slaves to much wine, but they are to teach what is good.

So older women, likewise, are to be reverent in their behavior. It was just to the older men that they're to be temperate or sober -minded, dignified, and self -controlled.

That's reverent behavior. So the older women, in like manner, are to be reverent, a word that is synonymous with sacred, just like a pastor might be called a reverend.

So it's interesting to see that word applied to the older women. This is to behave in such a way that is suitable for sacred or holy character.

If you have the Holy Spirit dwelling within you, you are a sacred place. 1

Corinthians 6 .19 says, Do you not know that your body is a temple, which is also translated sanctuary, a sacred place of the

Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? So it is being said here of older women that they should demonstrate a sense of sacredness.

The elders of the church, the pastors and the overseers, certainly they should behave in reverence.

And here Paul is saying that responsibility and that duty is also for older women.

They may not hold an office of pastor or overseer or elder, but nonetheless they demonstrate the character of one who may hold that office, that they may in their reverent behavior guide and instruct others, especially the younger women.

And it's interesting to consider how much of this instruction given to older women is like the qualifications for a pastor that we saw previously.

In Titus 1 .7 we read, The overseer must be above reproach as God's steward, not self -willed, not quick -tempered, not addicted to wine.

Remember that was said of the elder. And he must also teach what is good.

So what do we see here for older women? She is to be reverent. She's not to be a slanderer or a malicious gossip.

She's not to be enslaved to much wine. And she also is to teach what is good, specifically in the context of teaching those that are younger than her and younger women.

Now that doesn't mean that she is qualified to be a pastor. The contrast here clearly states whom she is to teach regarding the younger women.

But in her character, in her behavior, she should be held to the same standard that we would hold a pastor to, that a pastor must hold himself to.

I remember years ago one of the pastors at the Shepherds Conference was preaching from 1

Timothy 3, 1 through 7, and he said the following, Can we all just admit that the qualifications for pastors really are not all that remarkable?

And he's saying this to a room full of pastors. The point he was making was to say that any

Christian should aspire to those characteristics that we see should be emulated by the elder or the overseer.

Not everyone is going to be called to preach, but we are all called to holiness.

The sun came out above me here. I feel like saying that statement was like, whoo!

We're all called to holiness. So here the older women are being given a huge responsibility in the church.

Be reverent in behavior. Or as it says in the King James, for you

King Jamesers, Be in behavior as becometh holiness.

Now the next part says they must not be slanderers, or in some translations, they are not to be malicious gossips.

About this, the great London preacher John Gill said, quote, they are not to be false accusers of the brethren and sisters, which is to act the part of the devil.

And indeed, the same word is here used, which is commonly given to him, the accuser.

She is not to raise false reports of, bringing false charges against, members of churches, and sowing divisions among them, unquote.

So women, control your tongues. Just like the older men were told not to be given over to wild ideas, don't let your mind wander in the way of assuming the worst of your brothers and sisters in the

Lord. Or if your mind does begin to think such things, have at least enough self -control that it doesn't come out of your mouth.

Now men can struggle with gossip just as much as women. Back in 2 Timothy 3 .3, it says that godless men will also be malicious gossips and slanderers.

But in the pastoral epistles, 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, there does seem to be more of an emphasis on cautioning women against becoming slanderers.

In 1 Timothy 3 .11, deacons' wives must be dignified and not malicious gossips.

In 1 Timothy 5 .13, instruct younger widows in such a way so that they do not become gossips and busybodies talking about things that are not proper to mention.

And here the older women are told not to be malicious gossips. Women, do you think that gossip is an easy trap for you to fall into if you're not careful?

The Japanese writing system called kanji is made up of thousands of characters like little pictures representing words.

It's adapted from Chinese, and you're probably used to seeing some of these pictorial symbols. Maybe you had a moment in college too where you thought,

I want a tattoo of one of those things on myself, even though you had no idea what that symbol meant. There's a character for women.

So it's a single character for women. And then there's a character for noisy. And the character for noisy is three of the characters for women put together.

Now I don't mention that to doggone anybody. I showed that to my wife, and she thought it was funny.

She was able to recognize, and even in most cultures able to recognize, that there does seem to be a tendency among women to be more that way than among men.

And again, I say, doesn't mean that men won't be that way. But there does seem to be kind of a natural sense for a woman to fall into a noisy crowd and become a gossip or a slanderer.

Thank you for having a good sense of humor about that as we look at that. Psalm 141 .3 says,

Set a guard, O Yahweh, over my mouth. Keep a watch over the door of my lips.

Do not incline my heart to any evil thing. And that is a good prayer for all of us.

So older women are to be reverent in behavior and not malicious gossips. Now what is the next part?

Nor to be enslaved to much wine. A malicious gossip is about what comes out of your mouth.

Enslaved to much wine is about what goes into the mouth. Notice that we're not just talking about a glass of wine with dinner here.

I'm not prohibiting all alcohol consumption in reading this particular passage.

It says she must not be enslaved to much wine. So being enslaved to alcohol demonstrates a lack of self -control over your appetites and being drunk, you tend to lose control of yourself altogether.

How many of you are familiar with the wine mom phenomenon in our culture? According to a 2021 article in Good Housekeeping, this is not a magazine that I frequent, by the way, wine mom culture says that the best and only way to mom is with a glass of wine in hand.

That sounds to me like being enslaved to much wine. There's a whole subculture for this.

You can buy wine glasses on Amazon that say mommy's sippy cup. I saw a baby onesie that said mommy loves me more than wine.

You can buy throw pillows that say mama needs some wine. There are memes going around on Facebook that say things like the most expensive part of having kids is all the wine you have to drink.

Wine is to moms what duct tape is to dads. It fixes everything.

Motherhood, powered by love, fueled by coffee, sustained by wine.

When you go to Google Trends and you look up the term wine mom, over the last 10 years, the

Google searches for that term have spiked as much as 400 % in the months of May and December.

Why those months? That's when school gets out. The biggest spike was in 2020.

What happened then? Everybody had to go home during the pandemic. In fact, during the days of the pandemic, it was estimated that drinking just among mothers went up 41%.

In an article for The Atlantic, Lisa Jacobson, history professor at the University of California, suggested the following solution.

Quote, maybe what wine moms need isn't a supersized glass of alcohol, but social support in the form of affordable child care, paid family leave, wages, equitable wages, and of course, an equitable division of labor at home.

Unquote. According to this liberal professor, wine moms just need socialism. That will solve the problem.

Woke me up. It woke you up? Good one there, Jeff. What do the scriptures say?

Ephesians 5 .18 says, Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery.

But be filled with the Spirit. You don't need booze to help you be a mom.

You need God. Galatians 5 .16 says, Walk by the

Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of the flesh. The chapter goes on to say that those who carry out the desires of the flesh will not inherit the kingdom of God, and among those works of the flesh is drunkenness.

So this is a big deal. And let's not limit this to merely wine.

There are many ways to get intoxicated. In 1966, the Rolling Stones had a song called

Mommy's Little Helper. It was a song about a woman who took Valium. According to a recent study, the drugs most commonly abused by women after alcohol were stimulants such as Adderall, depressants such as Xanax and Valium, and opiates such as Oxycontin, Vicodin, and Percocet.

Ladies, if that's you, and I'm not saying that all prescription drugs are bad.

Don't hear me saying that, standing up there issuing that kind of exhortation. But it's your addiction to it.

It's your dependency upon it that could turn into something very destructive. And if that's you, then

I hope that you will talk to somebody, lest you let yourself be given over to judgment because of substance abuse.

Galatians 5, 22 -23 says, The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, self -control.

And that last one is the most often neglected fruit of the Spirit, if you ask me, self -control.

Older women, we need this kind of spiritual example from you. But if your mouth is given over to gossip or to whine, then how can you fulfill the last part of this instruction?

Teaching what is good. That's what you should devote your mouth to, speaking words that honor

God and build up His church. And who is it that the older women must be teaching?

Verses 4 -5, So that they may instruct the young women in sensibility to love their husbands and their children, being sensible, pure workers at home, kind, subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be reviled.

It's interesting to note here that Paul does not tell Titus to teach the younger women. Titus is not given the instruction to teach the younger women.

He says the older women are to teach the younger women. Now that doesn't mean a pastor cannot teach the women.

Us pastors teach men and women as I'm doing right now, young and old every week. But there is a certain one -on -one aspect that older women are able to speak into a younger woman's life better and more effectively than I am able to do.

And that is an important function for older women in the church to fulfill.

And again, this is all in consistency with living out sound doctrine.

Behavior and belief go hand in hand. What you believe affects your behavior and your behavior even affects your belief.

What we need in our churches are good, godly examples of older men and older women that all of us can look up to.

And as we read the good doctrine of the faith in the word that we have been given, what does it mean now to live out that faith as a follower of Jesus Christ who died on the cross for my sins, who rose again from the dead, who is seated in the heavens at the right hand of God, who is interceding on our behalf, who is coming back again to judge the living and the dead.

I know that. I believe it. Now, how do I live it in my life? And praise

God that he's given us real -life examples that we may look at and see and follow so that we may know how that is supposed to look at, how that's supposed to look in the life in which we live.

And so let us look to those examples. Older men, be those examples for us.

Older women, be good, godly teachers, especially in the lives of the younger women who need you so that we may know how we are to walk in the way of Christ.

I shared with you a couple of weeks ago that there have been times in my life that I've gone my own way, seeking after the way of my flesh, and that's who

I followed, myself. And the Bible tells us in Proverbs, the man who follows himself or who trusts in his own heart is a fool, despite the fact that the world will tell you, believe in yourself, follow your heart.

Jeremiah says that the heart is wicked above all things, and who can understand it? And so I went after my own way, doing the things that please my own flesh, and I am so very thankful for older men of God who

I wasn't even looking for, but they were watching me, and they got a hold of me and strangled me in a spiritual way and rebuked me and said, stop going that way or it will destroy you and set me in the way of righteousness, the righteousness of Christ.

And sometimes we need that kind of rebuke. Some people are more stubborn than others, as I was.

Others may be more receptive to it, but either way, we need those good, loving, godly examples to help lead the church in righteousness so that we may all aspire together to hold fast to the head who is

Christ in whom we should all desire to imitate, be imitators of Christ.

So what we're reading about here in these instructions for men and women, this is eventually getting us to the end of the chapter, which says that the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, and that all people there, the people that we're reading about in chapter 2, older men, younger men, older women, younger women, multi -generational, both sexes, all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live, all of us live, self -controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great

God and Savior, dear Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

And I want to encourage you to be a part of a small group this week because we'll take the passage that we just read today and we'll talk about it even more so that you may get to know one another and encouraging each other in your strengths and weaknesses that we may grow up as men and women of God together.

Amen? Amen. ♪ What a fellowship, what a joy divine,

Leaning on the everlasting arms.

What a blessedness, what a peace divine,

Leaning on the everlasting arms.

Leaning, leaning, safe and secure of all of us,

Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.

O how this pilgrim way, leaning on dear

Jesus, Leaning, leaning, safe and secure of all of us,

What have I to dread, what have I to fear,

Leaning on the everlasting arms.

I have blessed peace with my

Lord so near, Leaning on the everlasting arms.

Leaning, leaning, safe and secure of all of us,

Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.

You've been listening to the preaching of Pastor Gabriel Hughes, a presentation of Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Casa Grande, Arizona.

For more information about our church, visit our website at providencecasagrande .com. On behalf of our church family, my name is

Becky, thanking you for listening. Join us again Monday for more Bible study, when we understand the text.