Introduction

1. In the early 19^th century in England the battle of the sexes was raging and the poem ‘What are little boys made of?' was written and popularised. I am sure that the ladies know it well. What are little boys made of? Snips and snails, and puppy dogs tails that's what little boys are made of!" What are little girls made of? "Sugar and spice and all things nice, that's what little girls are made of!" Women, particularly in English culture were portrayed as being the loving, caring, gentle, kind, helpful, pure, honest, sensible, and the nicer part of mankind. When it came to understanding human nature Paul did not draw his ideas about women from nursery rhymes but from sound doctrine. Christian women like Christian men struggle with the legacy left by the sinful nature. Listen to Paul's instructions to Titus concerning the changes he saw necessary in the Christian women in the congregations in Crete, ‘the older women likewise, that they be reverent in behaviour, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things - that they admonish the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed.(Titus 2:3-5)'.
   
   
2. The key to understanding a passage from Scripture is to look at it from the grammatical and historical perspective. What did Paul's words mean to those who first heard them? What was family life like in the first century? Family-life in the Roman Empire was radically different to family-life as we know it today. Families were dominated by older men. At the head of Roman family life was the oldest living male, called the "paterfamilias," or "father of the family." In a very authoritarian and autocratic way he looked after the family's business affairs, property and religious rites. By law the paterfamilias had absolute rule over his household and children. As a tyrant he had the legal right to disown his children, sell them into slavery or even kill them if they upset or disappointed him. According to the law only the paterfamilias could own property. Irrespective of age, sons could not own property while their father was alive. All income was vested in the paterfamilias and sons received an allowance to manage their own households. Sons enjoyed a higher status than daughters because they would continue the family name. Marriage in Roman times was rarely romantic; it was usually an agreement between families. The marrying age of men was usually in the mid-twenties, while women married when they were still in their early teens. When children reached the marrying age parents would meet with family and friends to find suitable partners that would improve the family's wealth, class and continue the family name. The wedding process was relatively simple, a formal ceremony was held between the families where the dowry was paid, gifts were exchanged, and a marriage contract signed and sealed with a kiss. Unlike today, marriage had no legal force of its own as it was a personal agreement between the bride and groom and their families. The status of what we call a ‘de-facto' marriage is more binding than marriage in the Roman Empire. In the Roman Empire divorce was simpler than marriage. Divorce was simply a declaration by the couple that they would no longer live together. All that the law required was a declaration before seven witnesses stating the divorce. These rather casual laws of marriage and divorce meant that divorce was extremely common. What about children born into Roman families? The paterfamilias had the right to decide whether to keep a newborn baby in the family. After birth, the midwife placed the baby on the floor: only if the paterfamilias picked it up was the baby formally accepted into the family. If the paterfamilias decided not to keep the child it was abandoned; usually in the market place to die or taken by someone else. Thousands of new born babies were abandoned every year in the Roman Empire. It is thought that family-life on the Island of Crete was worse than most other places in the Roman Empire. This is the historical context of the Pastoral Epistles. It ought to be obvious that the Gospel demanded radical reformation in family life and a clear departure from the culture and traditions found on Crete. Family life is crucial to the witness of the church therefore Paul calls on Titus to instruct men and women on how to live life that honour the Saviour.
   
   
3. Paul's instructions concerning women are not radically different to the instructions given to men. The focus is very much on exercising self control, this is obvious in the call for older women not to be slanderers and not to indulge in too much wine. Women need to learn to exercise greater control over their tongues and not partake in gossip about others. Gossip is usually malicious gossip designed to cause pain, embarrassment, and shame. Many women like men use alcohol to soften the pain, pressure and the loneliness of life. Evangeline Cory Booth the daughter of William Booth the founder of the Salvation army said, ‘Drink has drained more blood, hung more crepe, sold more homes, armed more villains, slain more children, snapped more wedding rings, defiled more innocents, blinded more eyes, twisted more limbs, dethroned more reasons, wrecked more manhood, dishonoured more womanhood, broken more hearts, driven more to suicide than any other scourge that ever swept across the world.' What she said is true about the world we live in, and would have been true of the Cretans to whom Titus was ministering. Christians need to be very careful and diligent not to be caught in the trap of alcohol abuse. This warning was appropriate in Paul's day and is equally appropriate for us today.
   
   
4. Titus is instructed to teach the older woman to be teachers of good things to the younger women in the congregations. Older women were to teach younger women things that were good - noble, excellent, honourable, pure and praiseworthy. This teaching was not done in a formal way, but by disciplining or mentoring younger women. Older women had a ministry to younger woman. The focus was very much on improving the home-life of families. Younger women according to Paul needed to be taught to be homemakers. Self-control, self-disciple or self-restraint by the power of the Spirit according to the Word was the key. Older women are to teach the younger women self-discipline and submission to the Word that trains them to be able to do their God given duties, which are to love their husbands and love their children. Older women are given this ministry and are to engage in this vital training process of raising a generation of sensible disciplined prudent wise discreet restrained Christian women committed to living according to the Word and doing God's will. This is a high calling and a massive challenge. It's not an easy task. A training process implies an ongoing relationship with responsibility, confrontation, encouragement and affirmation. Older Christian women who no longer have the responsibility of training their own children now have the responsibility of training the next generation of women. This is a ministry that has almost disappeared in the modern church. The absence of this ministry has had three profound results. (a) It has allowed the word of God to be blasphemed (Titus 2:5).  (b) It has compromised the witness of the church therefore opponents are not put to shame, and have bad things to say about us (Titus 2:8). (c) Church doctrine has suffered in that we fail to adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in every respect (Titus 2:10). The instructions Paul gave to Titus were specifically designed to introduce this ministry into the church in order to counter the Cretan culture and honour God and his Word. Our culture is a lot closer to the Cretan culture than to the Biblical norm. We need to reflect on the historical application of this passage and then apply the principles to ourselves.

The pressure on women not to conform to God's standard.

1. As we do not have much narrative in the New Testament about the role women played in the early church it is assumed by many that they played second fiddle to the men. As indicated earlier, life today is radically different to what it was in the first century. It is obvious from Acts 6:1-7 that the early church had a large number of widows in the Jerusalem congregation. Some widows were destitute and sickly and were to be fully cared for by the church. Able widows like most women in the congregation considered themselves as servants of Christ and sought to serve among the Lord's people and society. Women had a number of responsible tasks. Besides the tasks mentioned in Titus 2:3-5, older women often visited younger women not simply to train them, but to help them with the daily chores of being a wife, mother and homemaker. They also counselled women who had problems and needed help. They were the chief visitors of the sick and imprisoned believers. Older women in particular exercised hospitality and cared for travelling believers, itinerant preachers and missionaries. That they helped with the care of their grandchildren and extended family goes without saying. Most of us are familiar with these duties and still see older women picking up most of these duties.
   
   
2. Listen to John MacArthur explaining an aspect of the role of able widows long forgotten by the church. ‘One of the ministries that they had that was quite unique was they would go through the city streets and the marketplace on a daily basis to pick up the babies that had been left there. Ancient times also experienced a woman's liberation movement, especially in the time of Paul. Women didn't have the means of abortion that people have today because they didn't have the medical advancement, so they gave birth to their baby and just left it in the marketplace. Male children would be picked up and trained to be gladiators. Female children would be picked up and trained to be prostitutes. In order to save these little lives, Christian widows, those who were on the church list would comb the marketplace and the public places of the city daily and they would scoop up the little lives and put them in Christian families so that they could be raised to be Christian young people. This was one of their responsibilities with abandoned babies.' (John MacArthur is not a supporter of abortion and rightly sees it as the murder of unborn children.) Dumping unwanted babies was part of the culture and it is in this light that you must hear Paul's words to Titus, teach older women to train younger women to love their children, children were not automatically loved. Every baby has a mother and a father, that the babies were abandoned also reveals that the fathers did not care about the children. This callousness of the women was more than matched by the attitude of the men  Over the past few months abandoned babies have featured in the news - The case of baby Catherine, left outside Dandenong hospital in Victoria in May and more recently, baby Joan, left on the doorstep of a Sydney church, have captured public interest and concern. The media and public commentary has focused on the question of "why would a mother abandon a newborn?" and for some, the question of "how could she?" (ABC news) Surely we can see the hypocrisy of our society that condemns the action of these desperate mothers, but condones the death of 80,000 babies by abortion. Our society is not a society that loves its children. If 80,000 babies had not been murdered in Australia last year the number of abandoned babies would have been huge, it would be a massive problem - the early church met this need, would today's church do the same?  Would the women in the church have the time and compassion to seek out unwanted children? In the early church older Christian women were full of love and compassion for children, not for the sake of the children, but for Christ's sake. The phrase ‘teach these young women to love their children' is one word in the Greek. It literally means to be children lovers. You protect, treasure, nurture, care, and train those you love. The high calling of motherhood according to Paul is to raise godly children. The greatest contribution women make to the church and society is raising godly children for God's glory.
   
   
3. Titus was instructed to teach sound doctrine that promoted and helped wives to love their husbands. The Greek word used here literally means husband lover. Christians who were married women were to love their husbands and not despise them as the majority did. It is very important to take note that this statement has no exceptions. Married Christian women were not only to love their husbands, but also obey them. The meaning of Titus 2:4 is so strong that for a Christian woman not to love her husband is sinning and disobeying God. The love Paul is talking about is not the chemical reaction that Hollywood exalts, but the love of a friendship that runs deep and satisfying. We must never forget that God created Eve primarily to be a companion to Adam. This kind of love is learned and rests securely on the greatness of God's grace, mercy and love. It's the kind of love Paul talks about in Philippians 2:3-4 when he says, ‘Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.' This is love that is sacrificial, humble, condescending, and self-effacing in its concern for in others. In Crete life was primarily a matter of survival; everyone looked out for their own good without concern for others.
   
   
4. When life is a matter of survival qualities like being discreet, chaste and good are early casualties as they seem to invite exploitation and make a person vulnerable. To get the security they needed women in Crete exploited and manipulated every situation to gain an advantage. Remember that Paul in Titus 1:12-13 affirmed that the Cretans were all liars; they needed to be to survive in their perverse culture. Wives used all means, good and wicked to provide for their short-term and long-term needs. Wives were conniving schemers doing their best to survive in a dog-eat-dog world. Life on Crete was ruled by the sinful nature therefore the fruits of the sinful nature were rife. Paul in Galatians 5:19-21 spells out the fruits of the sinful nature saying, ‘Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.' It is from the world dominated by the sinful nature that believers are called to glorify Christ. Listen to Paul talking about this fact in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, ‘Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.  And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.' Christians are not like those of the world ruled by the sinful nature, they are different and they show it in their lives by being servants of Christ Jesus given to doing the will of God.
   
   
5. Christian women who have chosen to be homemakers, husband lovers and children lovers are vehemently attacked by feminists for accepting in their opinion a degrading and demeaning role in life. Professor of Feminism, Vivian Gornek of the University of Illinois teaches that - ‘Being a housewife is an illegitimate profession.' We must not think for one moment that our society is a loving and caring society. In our culture what is being said to younger women is the very opposite of what the Apostle Paul teaches. Today young women are taught to believe it's their right to love whoever they want, farm their children out to somebody else, don't allow being sensible or responsible to restrict you, do whatever pleases you. Don't worry about being pure; fulfil your all your physical and lustful desires. Don't be a slave and work at home, work outside the home. Do not worry about being kind, you do whatever you want, too bad if people get hurt. Focus on your happiness and use other people to secure whatever makes you happy.  Take care of number one; meet your own needs and desires, before you think of others. Don't waste you life by being subject to your own husband, do your own thing. Scripture applauds women who choose to give themselves to the task of raising godly children and developing a loving home. The home is the primary place where a woman provides the expressions of love for her Lord, husband and children. The home is where she leads and guides and teaches and raises the godly generation. The home is where she lodges strangers, washes saints' feet, shows hospitality and devotes herself to every good work. Christian women who focus on the home and using it for the glory of the Lord are obedient to the Word.

Conclusion