How Should a Biblical Women Act

Ladies. I'm happy to see that you returned. Figured there let be a lot of bass in the room this morning. One young lady just said, you know, I'm kind of nervous, so I was really happy that you gave it to the guys last night. And I just realized, all right, turry, I'll be gentle. Let's pray, Father, thank you for your word. Thank you that you haven't left us to wander aimlessly in the dark, hoping that we've figured it out, but that you have provided and preserved and protected for us your self revelation in the Bible, so that we can know who you are and who we are, and what it means for us to be reconci to you. Pray that you would grant us wisdom and humility to hear and to heed your word. Pray this in Christ's name and for his sake, ah Man. Last time we were together, we looked at this picture of biblical manhood and this very basic picture of these minimum baseline requirements for biblical manhood. Today, we want to look at this picture of biblical womanhood. And the place I want to do that is in Titus chapter two. Titus chapter two is one of those places where's a very familiar passage of scripture, but the address is more familiar than the passage itself. And by that what I mean is we use the phrase Titus two all the time. Rarely, however, do we read the passage to which we're referring. Most people are very familiar with the phrase Tightus two, are familiar with it, not at all familiar with or at all committed to the principles therein taught. In fact, this is one of those you know, the old saying familiarity breeds contempt. I believe that's true also when it comes to scripture. When we become so familiar with passages of scripture versus a scripture, sometimes we show contempt in that we do not actually pay attention to what is said there. Paul talked on yesterday evening about this idea of the Sunday School ministry and this idea of youth group ministry, and some of these things that we do in our church that are actually absolutely not from scripture, but they are from the culture. And it's ironic. You know, we talked about the Sunday School ministry and early on in Chicago and how that happened here in Chicago. But before it was here in America, it was actually in England. And actually in England Sunday school ministry started not just to minister to and disciple you know, lost kids. But remember this is before child labor laws. So small children were working in factories because they had smaller hands and could do things with you know, these smaller pieces of material. They weren't going to school. They weren't being educated at all in any way, some of them, and again especially in the lower classes. So the Sunday School movement in its origins in England, even before it was here in America, was designed to make these kids literate. It was literally school on Sunday because they weren't working on Sunday, so they could go to school on Sunday and use the Bible to teach these kids and make them literate. Now, there have been two complaints about the Sunday school movement even from its inception, from its origin. Complaint number one is, if we do this eventually, we will make it available to Christian kids. That was argument number one against it. If we do this and commit to this, we will make it available to Christian kids. Argument number two is when we begin to make this available in the church, families will stop catechising their children. That was the argument, and people screamed from the rooftops. If we make this available in the church, families will stop catechising their children at home. Now, if you want to know how true that is, all you have to do is realize that ninety percent of the people in the room are now looking at me like a calf staring at a new gate, going should I be embarrassed? I don't know what catechising is. That's how true their fears came. We don't even know what it means for somebody to be catechized. Okay, we don't even get it. What is that? You know? And then those of you who've heard the word, you go, I thought that was like a Catholic thing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Is that something that's president Catholicism? Yes, But the Reformers really paved the way in the area of catechism. Catechism is learning doctrine or theology through a series of questions and answers. Okay, that's what catechism is. We'll talk some more about that here a little bit. But and so basically that was the idea that was a big problem. The youth ministry movement sort of followed along the same lines the Sunday School movement. It's actually even newer than the Sunday School movement. More recent. The youth ministry movement as we know it has its origins in the Jesus movement in the late sixties, early seventies. And so what we now know is youth ministry does not at all come from Scripture, does not at all come from the Life of Christ, does not at all come from the epistles, does not at all come from the teaching of the early Church. It is a modern American construct. And so having a conversation and come back to what we're talking about here, familiarity breeding contempt, and that's not understanding what passages of Scripture are about. I had a conversation with a guy who knew what my position was on this whole very concept of you know, age segregated ministry than the church. By the way, the idea of segregating people by age again not a biblical construct. The idea that you have a class for people in this age and a class for people in that age that we do now in our Sunday School movement not a biblical construct at all. Where does that come from? Well, that comes from the modern education movement. But where does a modern education movement get it from Darwinian evolution. Yes, the idea of age segregation has its roots in Darwinian evolution. So the fact that we have age graded ministries in our church is not only not biblical, it's actually Darwinian. Now you go run and tell that it's Darwinian, okay. And so I'm having this conversation with this guy about this, and he's go, well, you know, you guys are doing this with your children, and you're doing this with your family, and you're doing this in your home. Don't you feel like, you know, your kids need to be in the youth group so that they can be influencers and kind of you know, tightest two leaders in that group. I said, Bro, you scare me. What do you mean? Because this guy was a state leader of youth ministries for a particular state in the South, And I say, you scare me that you say that I ought to, you know, put my children in specifically my older children who are of that age, into the youth ministry so that they can have a tightest two influence. He goes, why what's wrong with that? Said? Tightest two influencers are married women and men. Someone who's not married and doesn't have children doesn't fit the tightest two model. Amen, lights, Titus two is not about somebody who has more age than another person teaching them things that come with age. No, that's not what Titus two is about. And we'll see that as we look here in this text at a picture of biblical womanhood. And again familiarity has bred contempt here as it relates to this passage of scripture. Look with me beginning at verse three, specifically talking about women here, older women likewise are to be reverent in their 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, submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. That's what we're asking older girls in the youth group to do for younger girls. Give me a break. They can't do that. They can't do that. So again we use the phrase tightest to ministry, but we absolutely divorce it from the passage that it identifies. You can't get there from here. This is not about older college girls and younger college girls. That's not what this is about. This is not about older college men and younger college men. This is about individuals who have proven themselves as wives and mothers instructing those who have yet to prove themselves in those areas. That's what Titus too is about. Okay, that's what Titus two is about. And we see here a picture of Biblical womanhood, both in what is required of the older women and in what the older women are required to teach the younger women. All Right, so I want us to put all of these things together to give us a picture of Biblical womanhood. Look here, beginning verse three, older women likewise are to first of all, be reverent in their behavior. That's number one. Biblical womanhood is reverent in behavior, first and foremost. It is reverent in behavior. But what does that mean. To be reverent in behavior? It means to be appropriate in behavior. It means to be meek in behavior, a meek and quiet spirit, as Peter would say, that's what it means. It means that you are not boisterous. It means that you do not draw attention to yourself. It means that even in your manner of dress, you are doing everything you can to demonstrate propriety. That's reverence. That's reverence. Reverence means you conduct yourself in such a way that your goal is to bring honor to godd and not attention to yourself. Reverent in their behavior. And so yesterday the lady has got to be my daughter's. Today, men, you get to be my sons, and I'm gonna talk to you like I talked to my sons about what it is we're looking for. Okay, Amen, And the first thing I want to tell you is this, don't come to me with an irreverent woman. Don't do it. If she's loud and obnoxious, she doesn't qualify. If she draws attention to herself, she doesn't qualify. We're looking for a meek and quiet spirit. That's what we're looking for. If she is, again, does that mean that she can't have personality. Absolutely, that's not what we're talking about here. But that must be reverent, must be under control, it must be bridled. She must be reverent in her behavior. We're not talking forget bringing a loose woman home, that's way out of the question. We're going even beyond that here. Reverent in her behavior, godly in her behavior, as though she conducts herself with the understanding of God's holy and all seeing presence. That's what's required, first and foremost. That's what's required above all else. Reverent in her behavior. And this is incredibly important for us to hear. Why because we've skewed the lines. We are no longer raising women in our culture. We are raising men who happen to be biologically capable of having children. That's what we're raising, and then only if it doesn't interfere with career goals, that's what we're raising. We're raising women to conduct themselves like men, like one of the boys, to be loud and boisterous and inappropriate, and to draw undue attention to themselves, both in their conduct and in their dress. That is irreverent. And it's happening because we have an epidemic of unprotected women. Because just like the illustration we heard earlier, you know, if the young woman is out at midnight on the corner with a bunch of hoodlums, you know you want to bring them back to their fathers. I feel the exact same way when I see the way some young women dress and I want to bring them home to their dad, and I want to say, hey, I brought her to you because I'm sure that you didn't see her leave the house this way. And beyond that, I'm sure that somebody went and bought these clothes without you knowing it, snuck them in the back of her closet and you never saw them because had you been aware that these were even in her closet, you would have gotten rid of them. That's why I brought her here to you. But you and I both know dads who have daughters who dress inappropriately take one of two tacks. Tach number one, is this tact of well, you know, yeah, I understand, but that's the style you know these days. Or tack number two, he wants her to look like that, he likes the attention that she draws when she dresses like that. Both of those are completely and utterly inappropriate, utterly inappropriate. And I say this as the father of a seventeen year old daughter. I realize how difficult it is to buy and find modest clothes. I realized I realized it when my daughter was twelve. I did. I was like, maybe we gotta do something because we go you can go in the store and it's Hucci Mama Central, you know, and I'm just what, what, what's the deal? You know? I can't, we can't. We can't do it. We just we just can't. We can't do it. She can We can't have oos y'all have something with with you know more? What do you mean, sir? That just it's something missing right there. We just need some more. Can you put that with that so that they can, you know, both reverence in her behavior, reverent in her behavior again, does this mean you know, turtlenecks in the summer and all that sort of. That's not my point. That's not my point. Men. What we're looking for is a woman who, whenever she prepares herself to go out, asks this question, to what aspect of my person am I drawing attention? Today? And is that honoring to Christ? You want a woman who presents herself in totality everything about her like that, as though she is looking in the mirror and saying, to what aspect of my person am I drawing attention? By the way that I act, by the way that I dress to what aspect of my person? Am I drawing attention? That tells you a great deal about a woman. Men, if you are around a woman and you find yourself okay doing you know, the male neck exercise. I call it the male neck exercise because I find myself having to do that. A lot of times women are dressed so inappropriately and there's so much cleavage there, or the shirt is so tight revealing the shape of their breasts that I find myself doing this in order to exaggerate so that I don't find myself going. If she's a woman who makes you constantly have to do the male neck exercise, either there's some more discipleship that needs to happen, or she has just told you what she thinks is the most important thing about her. I can't say, men, yo, say she is just communicated to you what she thinks is the most important thing about her. Why, because that's the thing to which she is trying to immediately draw your attention. Reverent in her behavior, Reverent in her behavior. And again, these are things that many young ladies haven't heard. Many young ladies haven't had a father to sit them down and say, listen, your value and your worth is not contingent upon men lusting after you. And ladies, if you haven't heard that, let me say that to you right here and right now, because that's the lie that the culture has sold to you. Your value and your worth is contingent upon how men lust after you. And from the minute you began to develop curves, this is the idea that the culture has thrust upon you. You see it everywhere. And so in order to feel valuable, you have to dress yourself and present yourself in such a way that you make people look at you. And so you walk around all the time like this, and like this, look at me, look at me. It's because you don't know where your worth is. It's because you don't know where your value is, and so you've developed behavior that is irreverent because you don't know where your worth is. And because you don't know where your value is, look at me. You deserve to be honored and respected and protected, not demeaned. You are not a piece of meat. To satisfy the sinful, fleshly desires of a man is above rubies. The scriptures say this outward beauty, it's fleeting, it will fade, It is useless. It is meaningless. But that mean and that quiet spirit, it's imperishable, and that's what's valuable about you. And it burdens me that you don't know that. It burdens me that your father never said that to you. I can tell by the way you present yourselves to some of you that your father never said that to you. And you're yearning from male approval. And the only way you've learned how to get it is go to the most base part of the male nature. That's not it, that's not it. You must be reverent in your behavior. And if a man is not decent enough to be attracted to reverent behavior, you don't want him anyway. Because if now it's the youthfulness of your body and the curvature of you. Look for a woman who teaches what is good. Why because she is going to be the primary instructor of your children. You talk to my sons right now. I tell you, a woman who is not committed to the education of our children in our home I can't even consider as a wife. People ask me all the time your kids resent being homeschool? Do they resent it? You know? One of the ways we used to threaten them you don't get your act right, sign you up and send you to school. Teddy's petty, hetty, Please. They're committed. They're absolutely committed to this hands on education and discipleship of their children. My sons are not interested in a woman who is not absolutely committed to that hands on education and discipleship of their children. Not absolutely committed to that. Now we'll get to that more in a minute. But because of this, she has to teach what is good. She has to be able to give instruction in what is good. Otherwise the time that he is off toiling in the land as he's commanded by God will be timed that she is there undermining what it is that he's trying to build into the next generation, or they will be passed off for somebody else to undermine what it is that he's trying to build into the next generation. So she must be committed to teaching what is good. Look at the next part of this, and so train the young women too. Now we've seen this in the character of the older women, and again we have to put both of these together to get this Titus to a picture of biblical womanhood. Because the older women are to be something and they're also to teach something. So we get a picture when you put those two things together, of a more full orbed understanding of biblical woman. It is so, what are they to instruct the young women in? And by the way, this guidance that they are to give the young women. The word here is not for the kind of instruction that we have for indoctrination. The word here is for gently bringing people along and guarding them from other tendencies. That's the goal here, that's the word that's used here. Gently bring these women along, direct them, disciple them, because their tendency is going to be to move in a direction other than what I'm about to say. Look at this. Teach the young women to love their husband and children. And here's what's interesting. We hear that and we go, okay, time out, teach them to love their husbands and children. Now, women are these intuitive emotional creatures. Why should we need to teach women to love their husbands and teach women to love their children. If they are these intuitive emotional creatures, they're the loving ones, are they not? Depends on how you define love. The idea that we say they're the loving ones because they're intuitive and emotional creatures basically gives away the fact that we don't understand what biblical love is. We've bought into the Greco Roman myth. Now here's the Greco Roman myth. The Greco Roman myth says that love is an you know, overwhelming, uncontrollable sensual force. A random, overwhelming, uncontrollable sensual force. That's what we believe love is, all right. First of all, love is random. By the way, what is the basic illustration in our culture of love, Cupid? Cupid's arrow. That's love. Okay, by the way, we have this idea of the heart drawn, but that's an incomplete picture. It's the heart with the arrow through it. That's the way we define love in our culture. What's the heart with the arrow through it? That's Cupid. It's Cupid's arrow. That's the way we've defined love in our culture. And so it's a random force. We don't know when we'll be struck with this force. It's random. We don't choose who we fall in love with. That's one of the phrases that we use in our culture. Why, because we believe that love is a random force. We don't choose who we fall in love with love is a random force. It's also an overwhelming and uncontrollable force. How do we stay that this thing is bigger than both of us? Don't act like you never heard nobody say that. We do say stuff like that. We don't choose who we fall in love with. This thing is bigger than both of us, and my favorite, the heart wants what it wants. I have more degrees than a thermometer. I don't know what that means. So love is a random, overwhelming, uncontrollable and it's a sensual force. Okay, it's a sensual force. So that's what we believe love is. Small problem, that's not the way the Bible defines love. It's not random, it's not uncontrollable and overwhelming. It's not just sensual. And by the way, because we believe that about love, let me give you a couple of examples. All right, let me give you two examples of why that's faulty thinking. And it's two examples that we've all experienced and we've all heard before. Because this definition of love doesn't work. Here's example number one. A woman's pregnant with child number two. While she's pregnant with child number two, she's worried. Why is she worried? I love that my first baby so much? And how am I going to be able to love this baby and love that baby? And well, I love one of them more than I love the one. Why is mom worried about her ability to love child number two? Because she thinks love is a random, overwhelming, uncontrollable sensual force. And what if Cupid is busy when baby number two is born. That's why we have such a hard time with this idea of the sovereignty of God and salvation and God loving us, because we think that love is this random, uncontrollable, overwhelming sensual force. So how is it that a sovereign God shows us this random, overwhelming, uncontrollable sensual love when the fact of the matter is he worked this thing out according to the counsel of his own will. Because will and love don't go together, right if you have a faulty, godless definition of love. Example number two. We have four children. Two of our children were adopted, Our three year old and our eight month old were adopted, and we're in the process of our next adoption. Even as we speak, we're working on our next adoption and so we get this question. All we get. You know, all the time people want to ask us this about adopted children, and they go, you know, that's do you do? You do you find that you love your adopted children as much as you love your own children. And I love when people try to ask us these questions because I just mess them up. I'm just not nice and sometimes, you know, I need to be rebuked for the way that I deal with this. But I do you know you love them as much as you love your own children? Well, they are our own children. Well, you know as much as your natural children. Well are you saying our adopted children are unnatural? I mean, you know what I'm saying, as much as like your real children. Oh so now they're not even real. Eventually I let them off the hook. But you know what I tell them, and I mean this with every fiber of my being. Oftentimes it's not until somebody asks a question like that that I think about the fact that ore to youngest children are adopted. We don't think like that. It never enters into our mind. These are our children, period, end of discussion. Yes, we most assuredly and absolutely and unconditionally love them. We don't even think about divisions like that. We laugh sometimes because we'll you know, look at you know, one of our adopted children, and you know what, my wife will be saying something like, you know what, he got your eyes, and he's got your this and that and the other, and he's got and then she looks at me and goes, huh, adopted, wasn't he? Yeah? But that's okay. Still, you know, looks that's wonderful. That that's great. We don't think like that. Why do we ask questions like that because we don't know what love is. We think it's a random, overwhelming, uncontrollable, sensual force. I mean, you're a third third example, I said, I give you two, okay, give you one more. And this is with fathers and daughters. A lot of daughters dressed the way that they do because they yearn from male affection, because a lot of fathers, as soon as their daughters develop into women, become uncomfortable being affectionate toward them because of a wrong definition of what love is. We define love as sensual. Therefore, love is inherently inappropriate between a man and his daughter of a certain age. Do we mean that, No, we don't mean that. But if you buy the definition, you also have to buy the limitations. And there's a lot of you girls in this room. And your first boyfriend coincided with dad and not letting you sitting on his lap anymore. You yearn for some male to show you the kind of physical attention and affection that you used to get from your and you went and found it because God created you to yearn for it. But then the world lied to your daddy and told him that he couldn't give you that which you needed anymore, and instead let you run off into the arms of some irresponsible, sinful, lustful boy. My daughter's seventeen years old, five ten whatever. She still climbs up in my lap. I have to balance a little more than I used to. You know. See, party's a way over there and part's way up here, and she absolutely loves it, so do I. A lot of men are leaving their wives for younger women because they yearned for attention from younger women, and God gave him a daughter who could give him that, and instead they go find a substitute daughter. You've seen it, We've all seen it. He's oh, guys, go on and find these substitute daughters. Why why we don't understand what love is? Folks? So what is love? So the second time, let me just give you this, okay, biblical definition of love, and this is derived and those of you got your family driven faith. You probably already looked at this, but it's derived from Deuteronomy chapter six. You know, love the Lord your God with all your heart or your soul, are your mind? You know it's interesting you exegete those words. And by the way Jesus repeats this and the New Testament Matthew twenty two, love is and you extget these words. Here's the definition that I use. Love is an act of the will accompanied by emotion that leads to action on behalf of its object. Let me say that again. Love is an act of the will accompanied by emotion that leads to action on behalf of its object. The problem with the Greco Roman myth of love that we operate from in our culture is that it is too fickle for family life. It won't work. Why a woman's not going to be overwhelmed toward her husband and her children all the time. And that's why what do women talk about all the time. I just I feel like we've fallen out of love with each other. Why because the Greco Roman myth is wearing off. This is why young women have to be taught how to love biblically, not just culturally and emotionally, but biblically. Teach young women how to love biblically, not just culturally and emotionally. Teach them how to do this because, contrary to popular belief, they don't know how to do do it intuitively. This is a work of sanctification. And one of the problems that we have is women think that whatever this intuitive emotional thing is that women have going on is actually enough to sustain what God intends to be sustained. On the part of biblical womanhood in the context of meriage relationship, it's not enough. It's not enough. Biblical womanhood does not rely on this intuitive emotional version of love. Biblical womanhood pushes past that to biblical love, an act of the will accompanied by emotion that leads to action on behalf of its object. It is first and foremost and act of the will. It is a choice. We choose to love you better believe we do. We don't choose who we fall in love with. First of all, you fall in love you already got a problem, because anything you can fall into, you can climb out of. Amen. It is a choice. It is an act of the will. We choose to love. Sometimes it's more will than anything else. We have to push past because we don't always feel like loving each other. My wife doesn't always feel like loving me. I know that shocks you. It's only happened like once or twice early in the marriage. But she didn't always feel like loving me. What do you do? You push past that you love in spite of beautiful answer Paul gave us last night talking about these areas where we are not going to be fulfilled through our mate, because that's what God uses in order to teach us, this unconditional love. It is an act of the will. It is a choice we do choose. I tell my wife all the time, girl, you leave me, I'm going with you. It is a choice we choose to love. It is an actor of the will. It is accompanied by emotion, led by emotion, but it's also not void of emotion. It is accompanied by emotion. Women tend to air on the lead by emotion. Part love that's led by emotion is a roller coaster. You just you can't do that. You know, that's the sixteen year old dating relationship right there. Love that's led by emotion. You go from oh my God, I love him to I just wish you'd never been born in ten minutes. It's not led by emotion. It's also not void of emotion. This is where men tend to err by the way. And I know we dealt with you guys yesterday, but let me just put this in here, all right, because men, you know I do you get that from men? You know? Well, you know, I'm more of a stoic person, and I'm more of a you know, sort of just kind of a matter of fact kind of person, and I'm not really an emotional person. You know what? Sell that somewhere else? You know why, because here's what I know. If you're on the golf course and you shank one, you don't say, oh, I seem to have hit that one poorly. You're watching a ball game or your team getting beat like a tied up goat. You don't just say they seem to have far more points than we do at this time. You go sell that somewhere else about not being an emotional man. Okay, God created you to be emotional. We don't all show emotion in the same way, but we're all emotional, and so it's an act of the world, a company by emotion that leads to action on behalf of its object. In the words of that theologian Janet Jackson, what have you done for me lately? Okay? Love leads to action on behalf of its object. By the way, if you're wondering where an example of this kind of love exists, it's the garden of gath Simony. Jesus is praying intently, sweating drops of blood, saying that there's any other way let this bitter cup pass from me. But he comes to a point where he says, nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. What did he do in the gardener, guest Simone an act of the will? It was a choice, It was accompanied by emotion, and it led to action on behalf of its object. Was not selfish. Jesus didn't need the cross, not for his own benefit. That was for his bride, okay. And because women have this natural inclination toward the intuitive, emotional version of love, they have to be taught how to exhibit biblical womanhood, which pushes beyond that to the appropriate kind of love. Okay, get the next part of this, love their children, love their husbands and children to be self controlled, to be self controlled. That goes back to what we talked about with the older women being reverent. We have to teach the younger women to be self controlled, not volatile, self controlled. Amen, Hallelujah, Praise the Lord. Self controlled. Okay, it's self explanatory. For the second time, I want to get something, get to something. Let's move here. Pure pure again, back to what we talked about with reverence. This is why reverence is so important in the older women. You can't teach a younger woman to be self controlled and pure unless you are self controlled and pure. Amen. Teach younger women to be self controlled and teach younger women to be pure. Here's what's interesting. We talk about purity and when we use that in modern American culture, what we use it for is don't have section until you get married. That's that's synonymous with purity. No, purity is not something that you do until you get married. Purity is something that we're I'm called the purity now, my wife is called the purity now. Purity is not just and The other thing is a lot of people think purity is you just don't go all the way. There are little ones in the room, so we'll just leave it at that. Okay, purity means you don't go all the way. You do everything else up to that point, not leice. I didn't say everything, airthing beyond everything you do airthing else up to that point. But as long as you haven't committed the final act, you say that you've still been pure. No, that's not pure. That's what we talked about yesterday with courtship, and a lot of you looked at me cross eye when I talked about the young man going to the girl's father first, even before going to her. Why purity, Because when you go to that young woman first, here's what you've done. You have actually said to her, I've chosen you, and I'm going to go to your You have opened up all sorts of things for that young woman and you haven't even earned the right to pursue her. That is impure. That is impure. And so again here we see this picture. She must be pure again. This is not just this idea of not having experienced physical consummation. We're talking about people here who are married and still walking in purity, still walking in purity. That is why when you base your relationship on impurity before you get married, you compromise the very foundations upon what your marriage is built because you're trying to seek purity. But you built what you hope to be pure on a foundation that was not. You see that. What's interesting is if you want to know how tall a building is going to be, you don't have to wait till it goes up. Do you know that? New engineering Guys in here, you know what I'm talking about. If you want to know how tall a building is going to be, all you have to do is see how deep they dig the foundation. If you're building a skyscraper, you dig deep into the ground because you gotta have enough foundation to support that much of a structure. You're just building a single story house for somebody to live in. You don't have to dig fifty feet into the ground. If that's all you want to build. What kind of marriage you want to build? You want to build a little bungalow or you want a skyscraper. I want my marriage to be a skyscraper, which means we have to dig deep, deep, deep in the foundation. That's what purity is about, and that purity remains even long after the structure has come up out of the ground. It has to remain. Biblical womanhood is about purity again, even in the way that we present ourselves. Purity, purity, purity. Look at the next part of this, and I still haven't got to what I want to camp out on a little bit here. We'll get there, all right, working at home, working at home. And let me be clear here, does this mean that Biblical womanhood says a woman can never do any kind of work outside of her home. No, I don't think so. I don't think Proverbs thirty one agrees with that. Okay, I'm not going to make that argument. I know women. I mean, they have all kinds of stuff that they do outside of their and they volunteer work and this and that and whatever. Again, that's not what's being said here. But here is what's being said here. There is no priority in biblical womanhood that supersedes the priority of a woman's role in her home. There is no priority that supersedes the priority of the woman's role in her home. That's what this means. That's what this means. Her home is her place of work, her home. Hey, if she can find something to do within the context of her home, praise the Lord. But that's what she's committed to. I know. We don't like this, We really don't. We don't like this. Matter of fact, we hate this because we've had an entire movement, an entire feminist movement, that has communicated this. To us. Marriage is bondage and women have to be equal to men in every regard. By the way, they're not talking about equal as far as value and worth. They're talking about egalitarian, as far as roles and everything else, with no distinctions whatsoever. There are tremendous distinctions between men and women. By the way, those of us who are married can say, praise God, because it's those distinctions that make it glorious. Hallelujah. All right, we are not the same. If we were the same, one of us would be unnecessary. Okay, But sons, we're looking for women who are committed to the home. Committed to the home, not just as a place where they drop their stuff off, where they go and try to do whatever in the world. No, they're committed to the home. It is their priority. They're committed to raising their children, not to paying somebody else to do it. They're absolutely committed to their roles as wives and mothers. And I know that doesn't sit well with us. Why because most of you, young ladies have not been raised to be women. You've been raised to be men who happen to be biologically capable of having children, and so you've been taught not to prioritize the home above all else. I do not apologize for the fact that the scripture clearly teaches this that a woman is to prioritize her home above all else and whatever else she does. And that's between Hey, I got my hands full running my own house. I'm not trying to run yours, okay, But whatever else she does, from a biblical perspective, the principle is that she prioritizes her home. Now, if there is a husband and a wife over here, and the way that they prioritize their home is, you know, he has this business and she's a vital part of this business, and she says, helped me because of her vital part in this business. And that's something that they do together. You know, they have a mom and pop store and they live on top and everybody works down and the kids are all hands on deck, you know, or they have a farm or whatever. And when it's time for harvest, everybody, mama, daddy, sons, daughters, dogs, everybody. You know, it's time for harvest. We all go out and we harvest. Amen, Hallelujah, Praise the Lord. That's not the point that I'm making. And the reason I'm camping out of here is because whenever I talk about this, it's so foreign and offensive to our modern feminist culture that I want to be clear. And it doesn't matter if I say it ten times. There are some of you who already shut me off because you're mad that this is even in the Bible. Somebody told you that you can have it all. The fact of the matter is you can't. You can't have it all, but that's okay because you don't need it all. I can't have it all, but I don't need it all. I want Christ and I want His blessings in generations of my family. And here's the deal. The more my wife and I have come to understand what it takes to raise children biblically, the more we realized it wouldn't even be possible for us if she was out doing wife swap. We couldn't do it. It takes so much, we couldn't do it. That's where her commitment is, that's where her joy is, that's where her passion is. He talked to my wife, and she says, you know, people always ask me, do you work outside of the home? Do you this? Do you that? And now when I tell them, you know, my homeschool mom, they kind of get this. You know, Oh, bless you. You know, You're just you know, for a second, and she's just going, I have the most incredible calling in the world. There is no higher calling than that of being a wife and a mother. God has blessed me with this body to bring life into the world, and through adoption, to bring other children into our home, and through the investment of my life. She would say, I have the opportunity to shape world changers. That's what my wife does. She shapes world changers. The Lord says that he gives us quivers filled with arrows. I don't think it's too much of a stretch of the text, but I tell my children, we are in the business of building intercontinental ballistic missiles in our home. And that's what each one of you is. Each one of you. You're an ICBM baby. One day the silo is going to open up and it's going to be on you know. That's what we do. And I could not do this without my wife being committed, absolutely committed to our home. My wife's an educated woman, a well educated woman. She's absolutely committed to our home, absolutely committed to our children, absolutely committed to making our home the most beautiful and productive environment. It can be. Number one, so that she can be all that I need, so that God can launch me and use me in whatever ways he sees fit. And secondly, so that as she and I partner together, we can raise, train, and disciple as many children as is humanly possible to the glory of God. That's why my wife and I exist to be poured out for the cause of Christ, to be thoroughly used when it's all said and done, and to raise, train, and disciple and launch from our home as many as many warheads as humanly possible, not as few as we can not A boy for me and a girl for you, And praise the Lord, we'll finally through. No no, no, no no no. If this is a war, last time I checked, no warrior goes into battle, saying, hey, man, just give me as little ammunition as you can. You go to war, you go. Wait a minute, I think I got a sock down here, I can put some bullets in. Give me those two. I'll find somewhere to put them. And because my wife is committed to our home, that's the attitude that we can have. Look at the last part of this, and then we'll come back and finish this up. Working at home, kind and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. Teach young women to be submissive to their own husbands. Why Two reasons this is very important. Number one, because women war against submission by nature as a result of the fall. Women war against submission by nature as a result of the fall. Look at me here, if you will. Let's go back to Genesis chapter three. Okay, and we'll do this quickly, because I know we've got to do our Q and A in just a couple of minutes. But I want you to see this Genesis chapter three and look at verse sixteen. Lookive verse sixteen. To the woman, he said, I will surely multiply your pain and child bearing and pain you shall bring forth children and look at this next one. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you. Your desire shall be for your husband. Now, if we're not careful, we look at that word, and we think you know you shall, you shall have this passionate desire for your husband. You shall, you shall want him, and he shall rule over you. If you want to understand what that phrase means, it's only used three times that that Hebrew phrase. Another time that it's used chapter four and verse seven. And look at what the lord says. Here the Lord said to king, why are you angry? And why has your face fallen? Verse seven? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it. Same phrase, Sin's desire is for you wife, Your desire shall be for your husband. That phrase means, as a result of the fall, women, you will desire his headship, you will desire his role, and yet he will rule over you. So, as a result of the fall, number one, you are naturally disinclined to submit to a husband. Secondly, in addition to this result of the fall, we also have now decades of feminist teaching, not just outside the church, but even inside the church, feminist teaching on egalitarianism, that somehow this submission is a couple of things. Number one, it's either mutual, or number two, it's conditional. It's mutual or it's conditional. And let's take these two in turn as we talk about submission here, because we don't again, we don't like it. We really don't. Ladies, I know you don't like submission. You don't have to tell me that you don't like it. It's a result of the fall. You don't. However, here a new creature in Christ, you gotta have a different attitude toward submission. And so the idea of mutual submission, when we go back to Ephesians and Ephesians chapter five, verse twenty one, a lot of people look at that and they say, in verse twenty two it says wives, be subject to your own husbands. But before that you have verse twenty one be subject to one another. Okay, fear in reverence for Christ. And so when we look at verse twenty one and Ephesians chapter five, we say, see here you're supposed to be subject or submissive to one another. So husbands and wives are supposed to submit to one another, and so they make the argument for mutual submission. There small problem. Verse twenty two is the beginning of a paragraph. Verse twenty one is the end of a paragraph. You can't put the beginning of a paragraph in context by using the end of another paragraph. You got to use the whole paragraph itself. So when you go back to the beginning of the paragraph that ends with verse twenty one, you go back to Ephesians chapter five, beginning of verse fifteen. Now, when you get there, you see a pattern in the pattern. You see three threes. First of all, you see three contrasts. Then you see on the third contrast three commands, and on the third command three context. All right, and so we have these three contrasts. Look at them, beginning in verse fifteen of Ephesians chapter five. Look carefully, then, how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the most of your days, because the days are evil. So don't be unwise, but be wise. Look at the next one, verse seventeen. Therefore, don't be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. Second contrast, don't be foolish, understand what the Lord's willis contrast Number three comes in verse eighteen. Don't be drunk with wine, but be filled with the spirit. Now on the third contrast, not drunk with wine, but fill with the spirit, we get three commands. What are those three commands? Command number one Verse nineteen, addressing one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, making melody to the Lord in your heart be filled with the spirit. Well, how do I do that? Number one? You do that by addressing one another with psalms, hymns, the spiritual songs, and making melody in your heart. It'd be interesting if somebody said, I'm a spirit filled believer and you go, great, let's worship and make melody to the Lord together. No, I'm not much for a worshiping and making melody to the Lord, but your spirit field. Look at the second one, verse twenty giving thanks always for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. I'm a spiritfuled believer. Great, join me, let's pray and just give thanks to God for a while. I'm not much for a prayer and thanksgiving, but your spirit filled Verse twenty one, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ Christ. So submission to proper God given authority is evidence of a spirit filled life. Now you get verse twenty two. But remember I said three contrasts, three commands and then three context What are the three contexts of submission? Wives to husbands, children to parents, servants to masters. And neither one of those is it mutual? And none of those is it mutual. There you have it. It's not there. And when we see it in First Peter chapter three, there is no statement of mutual submission in First Peter chapter three. When you see it in Colossians chapter three, again no statement of mutual submission. The husband has never called to submit to his wife. The wife is called to submit to her husband. There is headship First Corinthians, chapter eleven. What do we find there? What does Paul say head of every man is Christ and for every woman is a man. There's a headship there, and God doesn't apologize for that headship. Well, okay, if it's not mutual, then it has to be conditional. Well Fesians chapter four and verse twenty two, why submit to your own husbands? That's the lord. For the husband is the head of the wife. Even as Christ as the head of the church, his body, and himself. It's Savior. So now as a church submits to Christ, so why submit to their husbands? And what? Everything and everything? Again, we talked earlier about the law of God's when he says, you go out and you're an ex murder and you kill all this, you're not obligated to do that, but you're even submissive in the way that you don't go out and build an atomic bomb and commit ex murders. Okay, well, okay, that's fine, but it has to be you know, only if he is doing what he's supposed to do. Right, If he's not doing what he's support apposed to do, then I don't have to be submission to him. If he's not doing what he's supposed to do, turn with me to the right first Peter Chapter three. Likewise, wives be subject to your own husband, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be one without a word by the conduct of their wives. Well, if he's not doing what he's supposed to do, then I don't. It doesn't get clearer than that. It doesn't get clearer than that. In fact, I can even make it clearer than that. Immediate context. The first word he uses there is likewise. What do you mean likewise? Glad you asked? Go to the beginning of that paragraph just before and look at verse eighteen of chapter two. Servants be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to good and gentle, but also to the unjust. That's what he's referring to when he says likewise in chapter three, verse one for the submission of wives, and marinate on that for a while. We don't like that. Fall in with this. My wife is a highly educated woman who has laid down all of her pursuits in order to submit herself to my vision for our family. My wife does not contradict me in front of us. She shows me that respect and that honor. My wife communicates to our family and to others, the vision that I have established for our family. My wife has forsaken other opportunities for independent fulfillment and use of her gifts in order to put those gifts in subjection to me and my vision for our family. Now, I say those things, and feminism cringes. But what if I tweak those things just a little bit? And what if I change the two players? And it's no longer me and my wife. It's doctor Conder Lee's the Rice and President Bush and I say the same phrases. Rice is a highly educated woman who is employing her education for the benefit of President Bush. Secondly, doctor Rice does not contradict President Bush in public. Thirdly, doctor Rice has committed herself and submitted herself to President Bush's vision for his administration and not her own. And Doctor Rice has forsaken all other opportunities for independent self fulfillment for the sake of partnering with President Bush to fulfill his agenda. How come she does it and she's a hero. My bridget does it and there's something wrong with it? Same phrases, ladies, But because you've been lied to, you believe that working for some man you don't know in the White House has more value than laying down your life beside a man who would lay his down for you. This is biblical womanhood. It is not what we're accustomed to, it's not even what we're comfortable with, but it is what is required if we are to see the kind of reformation and revolution that we've been talking about.