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Holy Women – Pt. 2
Sunday, September 28th, 2025
Christ Covenant Church – Centralia, WA
Titus 2:4-5

Prayer

O God of grace, to whom all majesty belongs, bestow upon us now the warmth and radiance of thy heavenly light. Send forth the brightness of thy Spirit into our dark and frigid souls, revive in us again the roaring fires of charity, for we ask this in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Introduction

When a girl is young and unmarried, she has all kinds of hopes, dreams, and expectations for what her future “real life” shall one day be. Depending on the kinds of novels she reads or does not read, depending on the kinds of movies and shows she watches or is not allowed to watch, depending on the kinds of stories that capture her imagination in youth, she will inevitably develop some very (either) reasonable or unreasonable expectations for what falling in love will one day be like.

• Perhaps she imagines her future husband will be handsome, tall, and wealthy. Oh, and a Christian, of course. Perhaps she imagines meeting him when she is just about to graduate college (or high school, depending on the girl). Whenever it happens it is at a time most convenient for her. By then, she is 22 (or 18, or 28, whichever she prefers), she knows who she is (or at least thinks she knows), she’s an educated young woman who has made her parents proud. He has a job and can afford to take care of her, her parents like him. So, they get married. Awhile later they have a child. And then another child. A few more years go by a few more children arrive, and suddenly this formerly young unmarried girl is living that “real adult life” she was always looking forward to.
  • And it is then that the question becomes: How does real life match up with those youthful expectations? Does it meet them? Does it fall short of them (or exceed them)? Is life easier or more difficult than you thought it would be?
  • Whenever reality falls short of our expectations, we are tempted to become disenchanted, discouraged, disappointed. And while that can actually be good for many people who have unbiblical or unrealistic expectations for their life, for the Christian, God intends for us to live a life that is constantly enchanted by the Holy Spirit.
    • This word enchantment comes to us from the Latin incantare, which literally means to sing into. And the idea is that a person can be filled, either by evil spirits, the music of the world, demons, and sorcerers, OR, it can be filled by the Holy Spirit, as Paul says in Ephesians 5:19-20, but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
    • That is what Christian enchantment is supposed to look like. Moreover, this is what God expects to be normative amongst His holy saints (you and me), not the exception. According to Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3, basic Christianity is more like a musical than anything else. And the fact that God gave 150 inspired songs to sing, is proof that this is the case.
    • So what is the soundtrack of your life? What is the music and melody and lyrics animating your soul each day? Is your life enchanted by the beauty of God and His infinite wisdom, or is it bewitched by the things of this world that are passing away?
• Now I begin with this idea of enchantment, because in our text this morning, Titus 2:4-5, God has 8 specific exhortations for young wives and young mothers. For this class of younger women who are often tempted to become disenchanted, and discontent with their husbands, their children, and their very busy and sleep deprived lives.
  • Marriage and motherhood can be a most romantic and rewarding vocation, if you are virtuous. It can also be a hell of your own making if God is far from your thoughts.
  • And so God, knowing exactly what you need to hear, assigns 8 virtues for younger women to pursue, and which if pursued, shall re-enchant them to a life of joy and thanksgiving in the Holy Spirit. That is the true enchantment God wants for all His people.
  • And so this morning we are going to look at just the first four of these virtues, and then in a future sermon we’ll look at the last four. So let me read again verses 4-5, and recall that these are all things the older women are to teach the younger women. This is the core curriculum for biblical women’s ministry.

Verses 4-5

4That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, 5To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.

Outline of the Sermon

The first four qualities the older women must embody and then teach to the younger women are:

• 1. Sobriety
• 2. Love for her husband.
• 3. Love for her children.
• 4. Discretion
  • So let us consider these together.

#1 – Younger women are to be sober (ἵνα σωφρονίζωσι τὰς νέας)

• If this sounds like a virtue we have already studied, that is because we have. More than any another virtue, Paul has made this a requirement for bishops/pastors (Titus 1:8), for the aged men (Titus 2:2), for older women and younger women (here in Titus 2:4), and this same virtue is the one thing Paul will charge to the younger men. He says later in Titus 2:6, Young men likewise exhort to be sober minded.
• So God thinks we need this virtue and we need it badly, therefore he repeats it again and again, and in fact he assigns this virtue to the young women twice. Our fourth virtue which in English is translated as discretion shares the same root as what is translated here as sober. So what exactly is this virtue?
  • At the most general level, this Greek word for sober urges us to be self-controlled. Meaning we have self-possession and self-mastery over our desires, our emotions, our thoughts and our appetites.
  • So young women, how much do you possess yourself? How much control do you exercise over what you say and don’t say? How much responsibility are you taking for your own thoughts, words, actions and the things you allow to influence you (friends, media, entertainment)?
  • When you sin, do you own your sins all the way to the ground? Or do you imitate the first woman who blamed the serpent, who chose deception, and refused to take ownership for disobeying the one thing God told them not to do?
    • It says in 1 John 1:8-10, If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.
• Self-control/sobriety means you do not deny or diminish your free agency as an image bearer of God (as a moral creature). The Bible says it is in your sinful nature to blame others, to blame your circumstances, and our culture loves to cater to that blame shifting mentality (men blame women, women blame men and everything in between).
  • In our land today (in large part because of feminism), there is a false gospel out there that says,“All women are victims. And because of your sacred status as victim, you are thereby absolved from any responsibility for anything bad you may have ever done. Any sins or actions you do after your baptism into the cult of victimhood are justified because of the greater evil that was done to you. You are just a product of your environment, society is to blame.”
  • But think about what the does to women? It shuts the kingdom of God in their faces. It robs women of their dignity, of their moral agency, and of the freedom they could have if they confessed their sins completely and honestly to God. Yes, people have and will sin against you. Yes, there are real victims. But without confession of what you have personally actually done, you cannot ever be free! The wages of sin is still death, and death cannot be escaped except by the precious blood of Jesus. You have to plead the blood, and that means pleading guilty! Have you done that?
• The way this false gospel usually plays out is that some woman is genuinely sinned against (sometimes very grievously), but then she is told and counseled to use that real sin against her as the forever excuse and justification to cover for all her sins. But what is that? That is a fake and false justification. It is fig leaves, and fig leaves cannot clothe you, at least not permanently, you need the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ imputed to you.
  • Jesus never said, “Truly truly I say to you, If someone sins against you, you may sin back without guilt.” Or, “So long as your sins are not as bad as their sins, you don’t have to confess them.” No, Jesus is constantly telling us, look in the mirror. Look at the plank in your eye. Look at yourself, your sin, and nobody else. And then come and look at me, look at my cross, look what I have done for you!
    • We see in John 8, with the woman caught in adultery, what happens when a woman truly knows her sins, she knows she is justly condemned,Jesus says to her, “Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee?” She said, “No man, Lord.” And Jesus said unto her, “Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.”
    • There is no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit (Rom 8:1).
• Against Christ, against Romans 8, there are many false gospels out there, fig leaf gospels, that tell you to hide from the light, to cover and blame everyone else. Of such people who teach these false gospels it says in 2 Peter 2:19, While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage.
  • Paul says likewise in 2 Timothy 3:6,For of this sort are those who creep into households and make captives of gullible women loaded down with sins…
    • The devil wants to keep you women loaded down with sins. He hates forgiveness. He abhors absolution. He detests that part of the liturgy where I say, because you have confessed your sins, holding nothing back, it is my joy to announce to you that your sins are forgiven through Christ!
    • The devil wants to make you entitled, embittered, and full of resentment, not just because it makes you miserable, but also because it makes you more easily manipulated by his demonic hordes. But Christ has come to set you free. And that freedom comes by sober confession, by not holding anything back, and casting yourself upon the mercy of Christ.
    • It says in 1 John 3:8, He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.
• And so against all those false fig leaf gospels our there God says, teach the young women to be sober. To be self-controlled in submission to the Word of God.
  • This brings us to the second and third virtues which I will combine together because they overlap.

#2 – To love their husbands (φιλάνδρους εἶναι)

#3 – To love their children (φιλοτέκνους)

• In Greek these are just one-word virtues, φιλάνδρους, signifies affection for one’s husband, or better yet, affection for your man.
• And φιλοτέκνους signifies affections for one’s children.
• Now we might wonder, is it really necessary for God to say this? Aren’t affections for your husband and children natural affections that every woman has?
  • Yes and no. (Yes in potency, not always in act.) Love is supposed to be a natural affection, but there are many people who have declared war on their own nature. This is what LGBTQ+ is, this is what elevating your career over your own children is, it is a war against nature that cannot be won, because God is the author of our nature.
  • And so love for husband and children needs to be explicitly stated as the standard God has for wives and mothers, so that you can actively cultivate this within yourselves.
    • Affections are like a vine on a trellis, they can be directed, formed, and taught where to grow. It says in Psalm 128:3, Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine in the very heart of your house, Your children like olive plants all around your table. That is the romance of a Christian home. It has an affectionate and fruitful wife like a vine the center.
    • So ladies, your husband is the head of the house, but you are the heart, so what kind of heart do you have? Is it respectful towards your head, tender towards your children (those little olive shoots), is affectionate, forgiving, joyful? Or has your heart grown cold towards your husband, and irritable towards your children? What is the adornment of your heart? Is it hot with anger, cold with bitterness, or warm and welcoming like the arms of God?
• While love is meant to be a natural affection common to all, the Christian life is no merely natural life, it is a super-natural life, what the Bible calls a “living in the Spirit.” And what distinguishes natural love from supernatural love, is that supernatural love (charity) loves someone simply because God loves them, full stop.
  • While natural love is based on what we may find appealing in someone (they’re handsome or cute or pretty), supernatural love is a participation in God’s love, and God’s love causes loveliness in other people. God’s love is gracious and bestows goodness where it is lacking. And there is a world of difference between those two kinds of love. To love someone for their own inherent loveliness, and to love someone in spite of their lack of loveliness. In what way has God loved you?
  • Supernatural affections come to us, when we first recognize our own wretchedness, the ugliness of our own heart, the perversity and pride of our own thoughts, and then we see just how much God has loved us in spite of ourselves. And when we truly know just how affectioned God has been towards us, then we can see other fellow sinners in that same light.
  • Charity sees people (even our husband and children) the way God sees them, as broken image bearers in need of healing, and as people who God loved so much He sent His own Son to die for them.
  • The gospel should change the whole reason for why we love people.Grace should elevate our natural loves to become supernatural loves.
    • Jesus describes this in Luke 6:32, 35, But if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them [mere natural affection]… But love your enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High. For He is kind to the unthankful and evil.
  • And so ladies, if your husband or children are ungrateful and evil does it excuse you from loving them? No. It just means you need to remind yourself that God loved you, and was kind to you, when you were/are ungrateful and evil. If God has loved you undeservedly, then you can show affection for your husband and children even when they do not deserve it.
  • That’s a life of grace, and that is the kind of love that makes usexperience union with Jesus, because our hearts become one with his.
    • It says in 1 John 4:16, 20-21, And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him…If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother [or spouse or children], he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.
• So do you love your husband simply because God loves him? Do you love your children simply because God loves them? Because that kind of supernatural gracious love has the power to transform your entire household, your family’s future, not to mention your own personal destiny. So ladies, if you are the heart of the home, how healthy and affectionate is it?
  • Finally, we come to our fourth virtue which is discretion. And as I said earlier this is basically a species of sobriety/self-control, and so we’ll touch on this very briefly.

#4 – To be discreet (σώφρονας)

• It says in Proverbs 19:11, The discretion of a woman makes her slow to anger, And her glory is to overlook a transgression.
  • So wives and mothers. Are you slow to get angry? Because that is a fruit of discretion. Are you thoughtful and deliberate with your decisions, or are you impulsive? Discretion is that virtue that keeps you from doing and saying things you will later regret.
• It says in Proverbs 11:22, As a ring of gold in a swine’s snout, So is a lovely woman who lacks discretion.
• And of how to acquire this virtue it says in Proverbs 2:11, When wisdom enters your heart, And knowledge is pleasant to your soul, Discretion will preserve you; Understanding will keep you.
  • So is God’s wisdom in your heart? Is the knowledge of Christ, his cross and his glorious resurrection pleasant unto your soul? Because that is where discretion comes from. Keeping the gospel of God upon your heart all the day.

Conclusion

• It is easy to become disenchanted in this world of sin and evil and death. But what makes the Christian life an enchanted life is our blessed hope in the Savior: that Christ Jesus has conquered death, He rose the third day, he ascended to heaven, he is seated at the right hand of the Father, and He shall come in glory to judge both the living and the dead.
• It says in 1 Corinthians 2:9,Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man [or woman] The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.
  • So what do you expect from God in the future? Whatever it is, the Bible says that your future “real life,” eternal life, will far exceed your greatest expectations. As it says in Romans 5:5, our hope shall not put us to shame. You will not be disenchanted in heaven.
• C.S. Lewis once pointed out that for the true believer, this present life is as close to hell as we shall ever get. And so while our pains and sorrows are great, they are as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:17, light and momentary compared with the exceeding and eternal weight of glory that is to come.
  • However, for the unbeliever, for those who deny God and reject Him, this life is as close to paradise as they will ever get. For the unbeliever, this is heaven, and that should break your heart.
• So what kind of perspective do you have on your present difficulties? And do you see them the way God wants to you see them? As tests to make you more virtuous, as purging to make your soul radiant. God is inviting all of us back to a life of hope in Him, which when we have such hope, makes our life enchanting again through the power of His resurrected Son. May God grant you such gracious enchantment, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.