Older Women Training Younger Women — Titus 2:3-5 Part 2

CHomeS Round Up
Older Women Training Younger Women — Titus 2:3-5 Part 2
by Barbara Smith
[In Part 1 Barbara introduced the idea that these older
women just don’t seem to be around….well, they’re
around, but not available or willing or qualified to teach
the younger ones….and there is so much a young
Christian home educating mum needs and wants to
know! It is at first surprising to see that Titus 2:4 bids
the older women to train the younger ones how to love
their husbands (maybe not so surprising) and their
children!! Apparently God knows that mums need to
be taught how to Biblically love their husbands and
children. Much instruction is found in Proverbs 31, and
Part 2 picks up as Barbara continues to review ideas
from this passage.]
V13 She works with willing hands.
V14 She is like merchant ships which were fetchers and
carriers.
As an example, we see in Genesis 24:18-21 that
Rebekah worked hard for the servant of Abraham. She
worked “quickly”. She said, “I will draw for your
camels also, until they have done drinking”. “So she
quickly emptied her jar into the trough and ran again to
the well to draw, and she drew for all his camels. The
man gazed at her in silence to learn whether the Lord
had prospered his journey or not”. Do you know how
long that servant (and the men who were with him V54)
gazed at her in silence? Verse 10 says that there were
10 camels. They had just come on a long journey. One
camel drinks 20 gallons, so 10 camels would drink 200
gallons. In those days they used water jars that held 5
gallons of water. So that would have taken 40 trips
from well to trough. If it took Rebekah 3 minutes to fill
the water jar, run to the trough, empty the water jar and
run back, it would have taken her 2 hours to have
watered the camels until they had “done drinking”.
Rebekah must have been strong. She worked hard, and
she was willing and she worked quickly.
Children Are Our Holy Things
V15 She is quick to get out of bed in the morning, and
knows that she is the heart of the home, the one in
charge. She personally makes the meals, and oversees
everything regarding her family. Ezra 44:6 says God
gave the charge to the Priests not to the uncircumcised.
Are we keeping the charge of the holy things God has
given into our care, or have we handed them over to the
uncircumcised? What holy things has God given to us?
Our children! Our seed! Children are a blessing from
God. When we interfere in this process our objective is
to render the seed within our bodies ineffective, to
purposefully make them non-productive, rather than
letting God’s perfect will take place. The Bible is not
saying we must have lots of children, 15 or so at least.
The Bible is about being available to God, being in the
center of God’s will. It is about being obedient to God.
God is about Life, promoting, protecting, defending
life; He is not about killing life or our seed. It is about
letting God decide the size of our family, about letting
God bless us with His blessings. God will supply all
our needs – so we can have more babies. Are we
willing for God to choose the size of our families? Are
we willing to face work and do work like a Rebekah?
Our Babies and Toddlers. I let my children move
away from me; I don’t move away from them. I
believe that the beginning of peer pressure is when the
children are still very young and we leave them in
creches, daycare or with babysitters that they are not
intimate with. Let your children tell you when they are
ready to move away from you. When Jedediah was
just little, we were invited to a 50th birthday party (yes,
we are nearly that age). I said that I couldn’t come
unless my baby came with me. (There are not many
people that age with babies). When babies and
toddlers are left to be with lots of other children, they
learn to depend on other children rather than depend on
the parents God assigned to them to be dependent
upon.
School Age Children. The peer pressure increases
into school age whether at a Christian school or a State
school, for with whom do they spend the bulk of each
day?
Youth. This is where peer pressure really takes over.
More and more I keep hearing from people who say
that their children were great until they went to
secondary school: then they went astray. But be sure of
this: it didn’t begin in secondary school. Teenagers
don’t just suddenly become peer dependent when they
become teenagers. In many cases it is that we have
been training them since babies to be peer dependent.
It only manifests itself in the teenage years. The
foundations for parents losing their children begins in
day care and primary school.
So How Do We Keep From Losing Our Children?
How do we look after the Holy things God has given
us? How do we keep our children pure? Proverbs 22:6
may say, “Train up a child in the way he should go,
and when he is old he will not depart from it,” but what
does it mean to “train up a child” and what is “the way
he should go”?
The who, what, why, when, where and how of it are all
found in Deuteronomy 6:1-9 (and many other places as
well….look some up yourself!): “Now this is the
commandment, and these are the statutes and
judgments which the Lord your God has commanded
me to teach you (the WHAT), that you may observe
them in the land which you are crossing over to possess
(the WHY); that you may fear the Lord your God
(another WHY) to keep all His statutes and His
commandments which I command you (another
WHY), you and your son and your grandson (the
Keystone Vol. VI No. 6 P a g e 2 4 N o v e m b e r 2 0 0 0
WHO; and note, we don’t stop with our children), all
the days of your life (the HOW LONG), and that your
days may be prolonged (another WHY). Therefore
hear, O Israel, and be careful to observe it (the HOW),
that it may be well with you (yet another WHY), and
that you may multiply greatly (note most of these
WHYs are for our blessing, including this one about
multiplying greatly) as the Lord God of your fathers
has promised you — ‘a land flowing with milk and
honey’. Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is
one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your
heart, with all your soul and with all your strength. (the
WHAT — love God — and the HOW — with
everything we’ve got. This should be our number one
goal for home educating our children). And these words
which I command you today shall be in your heart. You
shall teach them (the WHAT) diligently (the HOW) to
your children (the WHO), and shall talk of them (the
WHAT) when you sit in you house, when you walk by
the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up (the
WHEN & WHERE — everywhere, all the time).
The Fear of the Lord
Proverbs 1:7-9 says, “The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and
instruction. Hear, my son, your father’s instruction,
and reject not your mother’s teaching; for they are a fair
garland for you head, and pendants for your
neck.” (RSV)
Psalm 111:10 – 112:2 says, “The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom; a good understanding have all
those who practice it. His praise endures for ever!
Praise the Lord. Blessed is the man who fears the Lord,
who greatly delights in his commandments! His
descendants will be mighty in the land; the generation
of the upright will be blessed.” (RSV)
From these two passages we are told that the fear of the
Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge. How
can our children learn anything when they are in the
State schools where the fear of the Lord is forbidden by
Section 77 of the Education Act (the “secular” clause)?
If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and
knowledge, and the State primary schools are forbidden
to teach this, exactly what does that leave the schools to
pass on to the children? How can our children be
taught “diligently” the commandments, statutes and
judgements of God, unless we do it ourselves?
Proverbs 6:20-22 says, “My son, keep your father’s
commandment, and forsake not your mother’s teaching.
Bind them upon your heart always; tie them about your
neck. When you walk they will lead you; when you lie
down, they will watch over you; and when you awake,
they will talk with you.” (RSV) Combining this with
Deuteronomy 6 and Proverbs 1 above, we find the
parents are commanded to diligently teach their
children, and that the children are to look back on his
fathers instructions and commandments and to reject
not their mother’s teaching. If we teach our chldren
“diligently” for half an hour a day, then that will be
reflected in how long our children will remember it
when they are old. However, if we diligently teach our
children the commandments, statutes and judgemnts of
God and to love the Lord their God with all their heart,
with all their soul and with all their strength as they sit
in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie
down, and when you rise up…..then when they are old
they will know that God’s Word is for all of life and for
all of time. It is under this scenario that the Scripture is
fulfilled: our “descendants will be mighty in the land;
the generation of the upright will be blessed.”
Then too we will have children who are Holy and Pure.
Genevieve our 20 year old is like other children who
have been home educated, she is holy and pure. She
has not been on a date, she has not been kissed. Her
desire is that her first kiss be on her wedding day. What
a contrast to children who have been to school and been
influenced by wordly standards, and unfortunately this
includes Christian schools.
(Now back to Proverbs 31):
V16 She is not impulsive or compulsive.
V17 She is strong and eager to get started. In Genesis
24:51-61 we see that Rebekah’s mother had trained her
daughter for life. Both Rebekah and her parents were
willing for her to leave the next day, even though they
at first asked for 10 days. Her mother was confident
that she had trained her daughter in all that she needed
to know, and Rebekah was sure in the training.
V26 “She opens her mouth with wisdom, and the
teaching of kindness is on her tongue.” This ties us
back to just what Titus 2 says we older women need to
be doing in regard to our younger Sisters. Younger
women, seek out older Godly women who are
Biblically qualified and encourage them to share their
Godly wisdom with you…..you will both benefit.
V28 She has invested her time into her children. She
has looked well to the needs of her husband and
glorified God in all her doings. Well, this isn’t most of
us older ones today….we messed up. As pioneers in HE
and as stay-at-home mums, we had to learn things the
hard way. Our older children absorbed our mistakes,
our younger ones are benefitting, and we now want to
pass on what we’ve learned to our younger Sisters. We
trust that the Lord will impress His life-long calling on
you younger women and on our daughters, as in:
V30-31 It is the work of her hands that will bring her
praise. Investing in others rather than in self will bring
praise from others. I want to be willing to be willing.
How about you?
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