Grab your Bibles, please, and open to John chapter 4. John chapter 4. If you got a Bible from an usher, that's page 985. 985, John chapter 4. And when you get there, if you are able, will you please stand for the reading of God's Word? We like to show in our posture that the words we are reading are actually the words of God, not the words of men. And that these words, the source of these words, is the God of the universe. So we're going to be in John chapter 4, and we're going to start in verse 31. So drop down to verse 31. God's word says, meanwhile, the disciples were urging him saying, Rabbi, eat. But he said to them, I have food to eat that you do not know about. So the disciples said to one another, has anyone brought him something to eat? Jesus said to them, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say there are yet four months, then comes the harvest? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, one sows and another reaps. I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored and you have entered into their labor. Many Samaritans from the town believed in him because of the woman's testimony. He told me all that I ever did. So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, it's no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we've heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world. After the two days, he departed for Galilee. Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honor in his own hometown. And when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast, for they too had gone to the feast. We'll stop right there. You may be seated. As you are, let's pray one more time together. Jesus, those words that you gave the disciples as they're sitting there going, wait, you got food from somebody? When you help them see that your food, your satisfaction, what mattered to you most was doing the will of your Father, that sets a paradigm for all of us who follow you, that that's the goal, not to do our will, not to live for ourselves, but to do your will, to live for you, to submit to you, and to do what you want us to do, that that should be our food. That should be our sustenance and our satisfaction is following you. And so I pray that our time together this morning would do that work in our lives. And I pray the same exact thing for Royal View Baptist Church. I pray that their time around your word as Pastor Mike preaches, I pray that you would use him and that you would bless them so that the same thing happens there. that their souls are nourished, that they're satisfied with your truth, and then they go out into the world proclaiming your good name. That's what we saw in the woman that you talked to at that well. She went into her city. She said, come and see the Messiah and hear these people believe. They said, we heard his word and we believe that he's the Savior. I pray that you would do that at Royal View, and I pray that you would do that here, that some today would hear your word and say the same exact thing. We know, indeed, that this is the Savior of the world. Please, do that here. Do that at Royal View, I pray for the glory of your name. Amen. So 24 years ago, God saved me. And when he did, I became kind of a little obsessive with the Bible. I was constantly reading the Bible when I was a new believer. If I wasn't reading it, I was listening to it. I was going to services sometimes three, four, five times a week. I just wanted to hear the Bible. I was listening to the radio. And at that time, I don't remember where I heard it, but I heard this line. that I believe, no doubt, but I thought it was a little kitschy. But the more I thought about it, the more I said, you know, it's really true. And the line was this. The Bible is more up to date than tomorrow's newspaper. And I thought, well, that's true. And I remember hearing that. I remember saying that. I think I've even said that a few times here. The Bible is more up to date than tomorrow's newspaper. You know, one of the ways that God uses the Bible to show that it's true is that it helps us see reality better when we look at reality through the lens of the Bible. In other words, we experience the world, our lives, we experience life in a certain way, and then the Bible comes along and it interprets life according to the words on the page, and that interpretation of life actually makes sense. The world that we know it fits with the words on the page. Well, the Bible, and why is that? Because the Bible is more up-to-date than tomorrow's newspaper. And specifically, the Bible interprets 21st century America for us, to a T, better than tomorrow's newspaper. And it does it in Romans chapter 1. Now, you don't have to turn there. You can if you want to. But I've told you before, if you've been here, I believe that we in America are under God's judgment. We're not waiting for God's judgment. We are currently experiencing it. And Romans 1 tells us why. It describes humanity at large in big picture terms. And it says, God has clearly revealed himself so clear that no one will be able to stand before God and say, not enough information, sorry. They are without excuse. What happened is that they knew the God of the Bible exists, but they rejected Him and replaced Him with idols. Substitute gods to worship, whether it was idols of gold or wood or today, idols of money, prestige, power, approval, whatever. They're idols that are worshipped in place of God. This is the height of foolish, it's the height of arrogance, but they do it and then God responds. And what we see in Romans 1, 24, 26, and 28 is that when people abandon God, God abandons them. Three times it says he gives them over to their sin, and each time he gives a culture over, it gets worse. The first time he gives a culture over in chapter 124, it says that it leads to a sexual revolution. The second time he gives them over in 126, it says that he gives the culture over to a homosexual revolution. And then the third time he gives a culture over, it says in Romans 128, that he gives them over to a debased mind, a mind that's become unusable, a mind that is useless, that's lost its sense of common sense, a mind that makes evil good and good evil, a mind that cannot even come to the most basic logical deductions, a mind that is actually insane. And this is the final stage of a dying culture. And these words in Romans chapter 1, written almost 2,000 years ago, are more up-to-date than tomorrow's newspaper. These 2,000-year-old words describe where our country is right now as a culture. As a debased mind has hit our culture like a tidal wave, its effects are even being seen in the church. So the question becomes, what are we to do? What are Christians to do? Are we just supposed to hide in the corner and wait for the rapture? Or, you know, are we just supposed to, like, say, you know, to hell with the world and all of that? Like, we're just gonna have our holy huddles and all of that? What are we supposed to do with all of that? Well, Titus helps us. So turn to Titus chapter 2. Titus chapter 2. If you got a Bible from an usher, that's page 1100. Titus chapter 2. The letter to Titus will help you, it will help me, it will help our church to understand how to thrive in a dying culture. Titus was on the island of Crete and the culture on that island was dying. It was full of sin, full of error, full of false teaching, and full of false teachers infiltrating churches and spreading that dying culture amongst the churches there. And so Paul leaves Titus on that island, according to chapter 1, verse 5, to straighten things out, to bring order to the island, to bring order to all of the chaos. And this letter was how he was supposed to do that. He is to focus on Christian leadership. That was the first thing, that's chapter 1. You bring order to the churches by focusing on the right leaders. And then second, chapters 2 and 3, you bring order to the chaos going on on that island by focusing on the Christian life. And I don't want you to miss this. Titus wasn't supposed to focus on the Christian life just so that we thrive, just so that we kind of survive here and we just kind of make it until the very end and then we die and we're in heaven and all that. No, Paul's problem with the Christians on the island of Crete is that they forgot that the dying culture is made up of lost people that need Jesus. They were, for whatever reason, they were either bringing in the culture or some of them were looking at the culture going, look at all those bad people over there and thank God I'm not like them. God, destroy them. No, no, no, no, no. The dying culture is actually our mission field. So God, through Paul, did not want them to live lives, chapter 2, verse 5, that caused the Word of God to be slandered. They didn't want to live in such a way that non-Christians looked at the Christians' lives and go, that Jesus must be an idiot because look at those people. No, lost people are watching, chapter 2, verse 10. So, quote, in everything, the Christians must adorn the doctrine of God our Savior. In other words, as Christians in a dying culture, our lives can make God, can make Jesus, can make the truth look believable, look attractive. Because if we're living lives that match the scriptures, the culture could look at our lives and go, Everything else is crazy out there, but there's a counter-cultural non-craziness going on with you guys. What's happening there? Now, you would think, so he tells them, chapter 2, verse 1, teach what accords with sound doctrine. That's what he tells Titus. He says, what I want you to do, big picture, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Teach what's in agreement with the truth. Teach what he heard from Paul. And you'd think you'd hear those words, sound doctrine, and you might think, uh-oh. We're now going to talk about cosmological argument for the existence of God. It's now going to be the most non-understandable religious musings that you could even think about because that's what most people hear when they hear sound doctrine. But notice, when he says in chapter two, verse one, teach what accords with sound doctrine, what we're gonna find in the rest of chapter two is Paul's focus was on the life that sound doctrine should produce. In other words, the Christians with the best theology should be the Christians with the best lives. But sadly, can we just all admit that that's not always the case? Those with the best theology can be some of the most petty, stingy, critical, self-centered people in the church. They are hearers of the word all the time, right? Hear it, read about it, sermons, conferences, all kinds of things, Bible, Bible, Bible, Bible. And then they excuse themselves from being doers of the word. Notice chapter two, verse two. Notice where Paul starts to talk about the Christian life. He breaks the church up into specific groups. And where does he start? He starts with those who are the older among us. Right? And after doing some cultural background research, it seems clear to me, at least, that that's about 50 and above. That's what older in that culture meant, 50 and above, which was helpful to hear because I'm not there yet. You know, got some time still, Lord willing. But I think when it comes to 50 and above, I mean, I've been in church for most of my life. I've seen church members who, the older they got, the more committed, the more loving, the more generous, the more passionate about serving God they got as they got older. And I've seen others, the longer that they were in church, the more worldly, the more self-centered, the more angry they got. The longer we walk with the Lord, the more we should look like the Lord. That Him actually living inside of us, shaving off all of the stuff that's us and replacing it with the character of Jesus, that happening over years and decades and decades should create in us a likeness to Jesus that we don't have at this point. So just as there are criteria for church leaders, that was chapter 1, so there is criteria for being an older Christian. So let's start by looking at God's criteria, God's will for older men. That's where the text starts. So that's where we're going to start. Verse 2. Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in the faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Clearly what we just read about older men applies to all Christians. But these virtues are singled out because they are particularly applicable to the lives of older Christian men. Think about it. As the last half of a man's life begins, as he realizes that he's probably lived more in the past than he's going to live in the future, as his body hurts, as his mind is not as sharp, as he and his friends and others close to him start to have health problems, what happens is care starts to shift. What he cares about starts to shift. It starts to shift towards health and retirement and ease and leisure. As he gets closer to the end, he starts to waste his life on crossword puzzles and TV shows and casinos. Listen, do not forget this. Older Christian men. Moses was 80 when he led the people out of Egypt. 80. What that means is this. God is not done with you yet. He's not done with you until you walk into glory. And between now and that day, You got job to do, you got a life to live. And by the way, if, I mean, if you look at it, average lifespan is what, about 78? So if you're 50, you got 28 more years and you can do a lot of damage against the kingdom of darkness in 28 years, right? And if it's, and if you're 60 and you got 18 years and you're 70, you got eight years, you're 75, you got three years, you're 80 and you're like, I'm already past that. You still have work to do. And that's what this text wants you to embrace. This text shows older Christian men that they can thrive in a dying culture. That God is not finished with them. Even though the world might be finished with you, God is not finished with you. That he can use you. That he can use you to bless your family. He can use you to bless your friends in your church. It's point number one. Older men care about character. Care about your character. Care about being like Jesus the closer and closer you get to meeting Jesus. Care about being a man that God will use to reach the dying culture that you interact with. It's not retirement. It's not ease. It's not travel or Sudoku or sports or entertainment that your life is for. What should a godly older Christian man look like? What does chapter 2 verse 12, what does grace train an older Christian man to do? Let's look at these four criteria. And let me just pause and say, did you know that the Bible was this specific? If you are an older Christian man, 50 and above, this is criteria for your life. You should be looking at your life right now as we walk through this and go, God, Is this who I am? Am I seeing this happen in my life? And by the way, if you are younger than 50 right now, it is no accident that you're here. This is not a waste of time for you. Because Lord willing, you're going to be over 50, right? And you need to see that this is the trajectory of the character of my life that I need to be headed. Number one. And number two, You should be saying, God, bring me an older man. Bring me an older woman who matches the criteria here, who's walked with you for decades, because I want to be like them. So let's jump into the text here. Look at the first one. There, older men are to be sober-minded. The way I've summarized that is we are not to be careless, not careless. Grace makes older men sober-minded, watchful, alert, wise, careful. The word literally means cautious in the use of wine. But it's probably being used more generally here as in cautious, sensible, clear-headed when it comes to life, not given to extravagance or overindulgence. Time with the Lord has brought them clarity. It's brought them focus. It's brought them greater strength and temptation. It's made them much more careful when it comes to their time and their money and their energy. Their priorities are more clear now. They're not lost in all the nonsense that everyone says that they should listen to because they've seen it all. They've done it all. No, I'm good. God has worked in my life to give me a clarity about life, so I'm good. So that's first, should be sober-minded. Second, older Christian men should not be childlike. Not childlike. Grace makes older men dignified. That's our word. That word means noble, honorable, worthy of respect. Listen, it is not good for you to be 50 and act like you're 15. It's not good. It's shameful. 1 Timothy 2.2, this should mark all Christians. So it's not just older men. 1 Timothy 2.2, this marks all Christians, a life that's not childlike, that's not superficial, vulgar, not given to the trivial. In other words, age isn't an excuse for like, OK, midlife crisis time. Hey, it's just I'm here now, so might as well have one. No, he's not a kid anymore. He doesn't look up. He doesn't look back at the days when he was a kid and go, those are the best days. You're like, those are foolish days. Those are stupid days. Why? Because God has been working in your life so much, conforming you to the image of Christ. You're going like, no, that's not good stuff. You know, this isn't, he has a dignity that garners respect, but he's not like arrogant in that. That's dignity. Third, older Christian men should not be impulsive. Not impulsive. In other words, grace makes older Christian men self-controlled. It's a word that means disciplined. It's a word that means restrained. I just thought of this too. Didn't say this in the last service, but if you're a single Christian woman here today and you are on those websites looking for a man to marry, you should like tattoo these on your hand somewhere. You should keep this in mind because you need to find a man like this. Maybe I shouldn't say that at 11 o'clock, but I just said it now, so whatever. Now, Titus 2.12, grace teaches all of us to be self-controlled. But this is particularly applicable to older men. So it's highlighted in this verse. The older he gets. He's not justifying intoxication with his passions and desires. He's not flying off the handle emotionally. He's not full of fear. He's got control of his tongue. It may have taken decades, but God has worked in his life and there's control over his tongue and his body and his mind. He's not justifying bad behavior with, hey, I've been dealing with this sin for 25 years and it's never going to change. No, he's still fighting his sin. He's not saying, oh, this is who I am, or you can't teach an old dog new tricks, or, you know, I was a goody two-shoes for most of my life, and I'm going to live it up before I die. No, you're not. Not if you're a godly Christian man. You reject that idea because you're like, I want to be self-controlled. And then finally, number four, older Christian men should not be immature. not be immature. Titus was to teach older men that the expectation for them was that they should be noticed, sound in the faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Those three words summarize the whole Christian life. Age was not an excuse to let spiritual diseases into their lives. And again, it wasn't an excuse to say, okay, I've kind of just let this sin into my life and I've never been able to get rid of it, and so that's just the way it is. No, a weakened commitment to Jesus, a selfish preoccupation with me, myself, and I, losing interest, giving in to hardships and old age must not mark the older Christian man. They are to be, notice the text, sound in faith. Their commitment to Christ, their zeal, their passion, their devotion to Him should grow stronger as their life gets longer. They should trust Him more, live for Him more, serve for Him more because many years with Him produces that in their lives. They look at their life and they're like, God, you've worked so strongly in my life. I'm growing and I'm changing and I trust you more because I've seen how you've worked and I'm amazed by it and I want to live for you more. Second there, to be sound in love. their love for others, their wives, their family, their friends, their coworkers, that this desire to serve them, to sacrifice for their wellbeing, or thinking about 1 Corinthians 13, their patience, their kindness, their contentment, their humility, them preferring others above themselves, all of that should be growing stronger in their lives as their lives are getting longer. They should be less arrogant, less rude, less irritable, less resentful, more forgiving, more trusting, because they're more loving. And then third, notice the text. They're to be sound in steadfastness. As a man gets older, Life gets harder as things are less and less like they used to be, as disappointment and failures are compounded over the years, as the culture decays, as the body decays, as friends and family die, as it gets more and more difficult to be a Christian because there's more and more opposition to you living for Jesus. Older Christian men are not to give up. They are not to fold. They are not to turn away at the very end. They should continue trusting in Jesus, firm and stable, not shifting from Him until they enter glory. An early Christian leader named Polycarp, he was arrested for being a Christian. Have you heard this story? And he was brought to the stadium, and there's all these people in the crowd, and they're all just screaming for his blood. They hate the Christians and want them dead. And here's the leader. Here's the major Christian leader of that era. And so the Roman procouncil promises him, just reject Jesus and I'll let you go free. And he says, no. And so then the procouncil starts to threaten him with, see those animals over there? They're going to tear you apart. And that doesn't stop him. So he says, I'm going to put a post right in the middle. I'm going to burn you on that. And that doesn't faze him. And he says to him, 86 years I've served Jesus and he has done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my king and my savior? That's what it looks like to be sound in the faith, in love, and steadfastness to the very end. So men over 50 here today, have you been seeing these things grow in your life? Have you been seeing these traits growing so that there's more self-control? Or as you get older, are you becoming more immature and childish? As you think about your life, is it more and more marked by being sober-minded, clear, careful, dignified or is it more sophomoric and out of control? You're driving down the street, I'm driving down the street, you know often you can't fit everything into your car so you got to put stuff on top of your car and some of that stuff it's like you know I don't even think about it it looks just like okay fine you know that stuff's safe but when I see someone's luggage on the top of their car and there's just a tent over like a net over it never really all that sure that that's gonna hold on to everything. A good gust of wind, you know, can knock that thing right off. Suitcases and sports equipment, but there's that net that's just kind of engulfed everything and then for some reason it's firmness, it's sturdy, I don't know what it is, but it keeps it in place so that stuff doesn't come loose and make a mess all over the highway. Listen, older men, your life is to be like that net. Your character is to be like that net. When your life, when your words, when your desires, when your actions are trying to get out and make a mess all over the highway of your life, your character is meant to seal you in so that none of that happens to you or the effects in the lives of the people that you know and love. Character should engulf your life so that your thoughts, your body, your tongue, your desires, your hands, everything about your life is held in place to obedience to Christ. You're not out of control, dishonoring God, making a mess in other people's lives. Now, coming to the other side of that list, if you're hearing those things and you're like, Oh God, I'm not perfect, I'm not sinless, obviously, but I'm seeing those things in my life. Then right now should be a moment where you just pause and say, thank you, Lord. That's evidence that you exist, that's evidence that you're here. It's evidence that you're on the way to finishing your race well, whether your race ends five days from now, five years from now, or five decades from now. Now, if you've claimed to be a Christian for many years, but you don't see this character in your life, if the longer you've lived, the more careless and childish and impulsive and immature you're becoming, make sure that you read this text as a warning, because that's what it is. It's a warning. God doesn't make us less holy the more we walk with him, right? He makes us more like Jesus, not less. So this text, you should take this text if you're an older man and examine your life and say, Jesus, have you been making me into this or have I been resisting this? And maybe I'm not even one of yours, even though I think I am. And if you're like, I'm not really sure now, please come talk to me before you leave today. I'll be right in the back, talk to me before you leave. For all the men here also, I want to personally encourage you to come to the men's conference. I've invited two of my heroes as a young seminarian. These are the guys I looked up to and said, I want to be like them. I want to preach like them. I want to pastor like them. And so I was amazed two years ago when they were both like, yeah, sure. We'll do that. We'll come to your conference. Oh, I got to make one. And so. And so we talked to Kosti two years ago, and these guys were just like, let's do this. We want to see godly men in our church. And so I would encourage you to come Friday, six o'clock. It starts with dinner. We'll continue until three o'clock on Saturday. So if you're a man, you should be there. You can sign up online or you can just come and register then. Now, God also has criteria for older women. So now the men can be like, all the women can get tense now. All right. So let's take a look at those. Chapter two, verse three. Older women, likewise, are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good. As Titus went around the churches on the island of Crete, like the older Christian men, he was to encourage the older Christian women who were around the age of 50, whose lives have shifted for the most part because their kids most likely have left home and the daily demands of parenting are now less or not even there. And when that happens in a person's life, particularly in women's lives, what can be replaced by all of those activities is, those can be replaced by depression, a sense of uselessness, loneliness, self-pity, thinking the best days are behind me, not ahead of me. And this passage is clear. Listen, that God is not finished with you yet either. at all. He has a role for you to play, and listen, it is a vital role in a church. It's the 84-year-old widow named Anna in Luke 2.37, who did not depart from the temple, but worshiped with fasting and prayer both day and night. And God, in Luke 2.37, God sets her up as an example for all time. for older Christian women and he rewarded her devotion by letting her actually see the Messiah with her own eyes. So our text in Titus chapter two shows older women that they too can thrive in a dying culture. That you can bless your family and your friends and your church is point number two. Older women mature to mentor. Mature to mentor. The older Christian men can mature and become elders in the church. The older Christian women grow and mature and become more like Jesus. And as they do, a whole world of ministry opportunity opens up to them. God will use their knowledge and their experience and their walk with him over the years to be a blessing and help others. Like chapter two, verse three, should mark every Christian, no doubt. But these specifically mark older Christian women because they are particularly applicable to them. So let's look at these four criteria, these four graces that God produces in Christian women over 50. The first grace produces what I've called the dignified devotion. Titus was to teach them to be reverent in their behavior. The idea there is that their inward holiness, their inward commitment to God actually comes out in an outward devotion to God. There's a dignity, not a frivolity. They're not acting like 15 when they're 50. It's not a sense of superiority either. It's a sense of submission to God, that there's this inner submission. He says, I want to live for Him. I want to follow Him. It's the practicing the presence of God in what they say, and how they dress, and their desires, and how they live, and how they talk, all of those things. It's a practicing the presence of God that there's a reverence. over their lives. Second, grace produces what I've called supportive speech. Supportive speech. Titus was to insist that older Christian women not be slanderous. The word in Greek for slanderous is the word diabolos. Does that sound familiar? 30 times in the New Testament this word is translated devil. It's a word that means to be an accuser. Slanders in family, among friends, in church, in other words, are she-devils. They do the work of Satan amongst a group of people with half-truths, false accusations, criticism, innuendos, and malicious gossip. It's couched in objectivity, it's couched in religious language, like, I'm just concerned, or I've been praying about something, and then all manner of evil comes out of their mouths. Proverbs says that it sinks deep into the hearts of those who hear it, which means that they believe it, all while the other person who's being slandered has no idea, is blissfully ignorant, and cannot give their side of the story, and are probably not going to be believed, because the slander has done its work. This kind of thing was probably damaging the churches on Crete, just like it can damage families and friendships and churches like ours. Our speech to one another, in other words, should be supportive. It should not be slanderous. Supportive means that if the person I'm talking about had a secret microphone and they were listening to my conversation, not only would they not care what I'm saying, but they would be encouraged by it. That's what that means. If there's an issue, what should we do? Talk only to the person we have an issue with, and that's all. Right? That's loving. That's kind to the person who we're in a disagreement with. Listen, you shouldn't even talk to your spouse about them. There's not this safety zone where it's not slander if I'm just talking about this person to my spouse. No, it's still slander. And Christian parents often wonder, why do my kids hate church? It might be because you spend your time after church slandering the people at church while they're listening in the backseat. James 3.6 calls the tongue a fire that burns down lives, it burns down relationships, it burns down people's view of one another, and it burns down churches and ministries. Ephesians 431, let all slander be put away from you. Proverbs 2019, do not associate with, do not be in the presence of a slanderer. Third, grace produces what I've called the ended enslavement in a person's life. Ended enslavement. Titus was to insist that older women not be, quote, slaves to much wine. That is a powerful way to put addiction to some kind of substance, enslavement to it. Nobody, it is very rare, I would say almost never do you hear somebody say, talk about the positive effects of enslavement, right? We don't hear slavery and go, oh, that's great, that's positive. It's always with a negative tone, and that's what Paul wants to convey here. This is not good. But you need to understand the culture on the island of Crete. Archeologists have found inscriptions on the island of Crete that viewed heavy drinking as a virtue. I might have just described your high school experience by saying that. Right? Propping people up, like, they can drink so much, and they're incredible. And Paul's like, you keep that stuff out of the church. That doesn't belong here. Like slander, being slaved to substances dishonors God, brings shame on the truth, and can lead others into the same sin. Older Christian women are to control their tongues, and they're to control their appetites. 1 Corinthians 6.12, the Christian is not to be dominated by anything, because we're to be dominated by who? Jesus, right? He's in charge. He's the one that dominates us, our thoughts, our desires, our actions. He dominates all of it. We are his servants. We are his slaves so that all other slaveries have ended. And finally, grace produces a major ministry in the lives of older women. Titus was to encourage them to teach what is good. What is good is what's true. It's what's good is defined by the Bible. Here's what the Bible says for us to do and how to live, and that's good. Which means that our learning is for living first, and then it's for lipping to other people who God brings into our lives and allows us to influence. So I want you to notice something. What are they to teach younger women? So older women teach younger women. What is it that they're to teach? Well, that's next time. When all the people over 50 can breathe a sigh of release, then all the people under 50 can be tense. I want you to notice something just at the observation level of this text. Titus was to teach older men. He was to teach older women. And in this text, he was to teach younger men. But who was supposed to teach younger women? Titus? Doesn't say that, does it? Who is supposed to teach the younger women in a congregation? The older women. That's right. The older women are to teach younger women what Paul tells Titus to teach them. Listen, this is an incredibly crucial role in the life of any church because nobody enters adulthood going, I got this whole thing figured out, right? And what we typically do is we just pool the ignorance of all the people on our own level. So all of the older Christians look at all the younger Christians and go, man, they're just so dumb. Like, why do they do this? And why don't they do that? And all the younger Christians are like, I don't know what to do and I'm freaking out. when older women are to come alongside the younger women and say, this is how God has worked in my life. This is how he's worked through my life. That's what we see here. Instead of complaining about the younger generation, older Christian women are to see themselves as coaches for the next generation. You're learning your life. We're meant to help younger Christians. Instead of moaning to each other about the younger Christians, older Christian women are to mentor younger Christian women. but only if you are an older Christian woman whose life is mature or maturing in reverent behavior. So you're to share your knowledge of the Bible and the wisdom that God has worked in your life and the way that he's comforted you, or it's to say, no, don't do these things that I did. Use me as a negative example of these things to avoid the pain that I've caused. In either way, This is what I meant by the crucial role. You have a responsibility from the Lord for the younger women in this church. This is a necessary ministry, listen, that's not given to men. Now, by saying that, I don't think that means that I'm not supposed to do what I'm doing here and then all the younger women are supposed to be somewhere else. I don't think that's what he's saying. What he's saying here is the kind of one on one personal discipleship interaction that's not supposed to happen with a younger man and a younger woman who's not his wife. Where is it supposed to happen? In your homes. And coffee shops and things of that nature. Women over 50 here today, have you been seeing these four traits growing in your life? Have you grown in reverent behavior the older you've gotten? Or has slander and enslavement to substances kind of pushed out that behavior? As you think about your life, is it filled with pride and bitterness and unforgiveness that leads to slander and gossip? Or is it filled with young women clamoring for your wisdom, clamoring for your time and your advice and your insight, because it's wise and biblical and helpful and good? Now, though you're all adults, and for the most part here, you're all adults, some aren't, but I'm glad you're here. And I say that to say, though you're all adults and you can create mentoring relationships on your own without us, we do want to help to facilitate that. So I want you to know about two ministries that are coming up next year. Starting next year, we're going to have a marriage ministry. That's for people who want to know what the Bible says about marriage. You want to sit there with their wife and their spouse, their husband, and learn. Here's what the Bible says in preaching and fellowship and all of that. But that is an opportunity for you, older Christians, to come alongside them. and be a mentor to them that creates that environment. And also, we're starting a women's breakfast in January, where once a month on a Saturday, you'll be able to gather and bring your daughters and granddaughters and get good food and even better Bible teaching. And again, where you can have relationships, where you can have an environment where these relationships can be formed and older Christian women can get to know and pray and look, say, God, bring me just one, one younger woman that I can be a blessing to. And you younger women, that you can pray, God, bring me one older Christian woman who's far ahead of me, who did it well, and let me learn from them. And really, if you're a younger Christian woman here, again, don't get your advice from mommy blogs and talking to each other and going like, I don't know what to do. I don't know either. Talk to these older women in our midst. That's why they're here. That's why God has placed them here and made this church multigenerational. As you look around, we are multigenerational for that reason, so that you who are older can pour into the lives of those who are younger, and so that we who are younger can learn from and be blessed by the wisdom and the knowledge that God has placed in your life. In the end, no one admires a runner who comes around the last turn and just before the finish line stops and walks off the track and goes home, right? The closer you get to the finish line, do you slow down or do you speed up? It's hard to, you speed up, right? You speed up through the end. So for you older Christians in the room, Finish well. Finish well. There is no connection between your age and your usefulness in ministry to others. You play a crucial role here, and I hope that you've sensed that. That was the goal, that the older Christians in these churches on Crete were the front line that pushing back the darkness of that culture. We need you here at Redeemer. We need to see what 60, 70, 86 years of walking with Jesus looks like. The younger Christians here need to see this is the encouragement that comes from seeing someone who's been a Christian longer than I've been alive. We need your experience, your wisdom. We need your passion. We need to see your steadfastness, your commitment to stay strong to the very end, despite the pain that you go through. We need the good that God has done in your life. We need it. I remember reading a pastor and he said, as he was thinking about his church, he says, there's nothing more beautiful, that was his word, there's nothing more beautiful than older Christians whose words and lives and passions show that Jesus is still alive and well. And that's how you don't just make it through these dark times. This is how you thrive in dark times, by giving your life away and seeing God take what he's done in your life and copy it into the life of someone else. And then that work that he did in your life continues on into the next generation. Now, I'm not going to ask all of you over 50 to stand. I was told that there are some ladies in the room that might not like that very much. That was my original thought. So to close, I'm just going to pray for you, and then we'll be done.