Sound Thinking

From Revive Our Hearts radio, October 31, 2008:

Titus 2, verse 2: First of all, “Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled.” There’s our word—sophron—self-controlled. It’s of a sound mind. They’re to be “sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.”

Verse 3: “Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women…”

Now, you don’t see the word “self-control” there, but that word “train” is in the same family in the original Greek language as the word sophron. It actually means to train them to have sound minds, to train them to think soundly, to train them to be sober-minded.

You don’t see all of that in the English translation, but that’s what’s behind it in the original. “Train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled” (verse 4). There’s our word again, sophron—sober-minded, of a sound mind. In the New American Standard Bible, you have the word sensible there. Sensible, discreet in the King James, sound-minded, of sound thinking.

That word sophron is something that, as we saw in the last session, is rooted in sound doctrine. First of all, we have to think correctly about God’s Word: Who He is, and what the gospel is, and what it looks like, and how it works. If we have sound doctrine, then that will result in sound thinking about all of life—wise, discreet, sensible, self-controlled, sound thinking about all of life. That will result in sound living.

One Bible dictionary talks about this word sophron—sensible, self-controlled. It says "this is a person that has developed the ability to govern or discipline himself, his mind, his passions, his affections, and his behavior." So it’s putting the reign on your life—your affections, your behavior, your tongue, your thoughts. Everything is being reigned in by the Holy Spirit as a result of having thinking that is sound.

Addicted to Much Wine?

It is not for kings, O Lemuel,
It is not for kings to drink wine,
Or for rulers to desire strong drink,
For they will drink and forget what is decreed,
And pervert the rights of all the afflicted.
- Proverb 31:4-5

Didn't think I meant all of Proverbs 31, didja?

"Older men are to be sober-minded [or temperate], dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Likewise, older women, to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, and not slaves to much wine" (Titus 2: 2-3).

The NIV says "not addicted to much wine."

I don't drink alcoholic drinks. I can't even stand the smell of fermented beverages. Here's the thing: All Scripture is inspired. We know that every word of it is necessary and is "profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness" (2 Timothy 3:16, KJV).

How does this apply to me, a Christian woman studying Proverb 31?

I think that "slaves to much wine" applies to more than drinking habits. I "interpret" this as a physical thing with a spiritual meaning, concerning indulgence and temptations of the flesh. I can't make any new laws that are not found anywhere in Scripture regarding this. I'm only trying to look at this lesson from the inspired writer whose written words were passed on and saved for my learning. I don't think this is only a checklist that I can check off, saying "oh, I'm not a drunkard. I must be wonderful." I think there's always more to learn.

First of all, the direct, physical lesson. Doesn't it hurt your physical body, which God gave you to care for and honour Him with? Whether it's wine or something else (food, sugar, caffiene, over the counter stuff) - overindulgence hurts physically. But we know that. Best not to "look at wine when it sparkles in the cup". (Proverbs 23:31-32)

But also: don't be controlled against your will by something external. "Such were some of you; but you were washed...". "Don’t get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery [wild living, excess, riot, luxury]. But instead be filled with the Holy Spirit" (Ephesians 5:18) "All things are lawful for me, but I will not be mastered by anything. " (1 Corinthians 6:12).

And consider this:

"But beware lest somehow this liberty of yours become a stumbling block to those who are weak. For if anyone sees you who have knowledge eating in an idol’s temple, will not the conscience of him who is weak be emboldened to eat those things offered to idols? And because of your knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? But when you thus sin against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never again eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble." (1 Corinthians 8:9-13)

I think that we are intelligently blessed by God enough to be able to apply "eating things devoted to idols" to our lives today.

Finally, a quote:

"And as I get older, am I living a life that’s more indulgent, more carefree, more thoughtless? Or am I living a life that is more focused, more intentional, more temperate, more wise about what I’m doing with my time and with my life?

"So I think Paul is saying, first of all here, whether you drink wine or not is not the first issue. The issue is do you have a lifestyle that is temperate, that is disciplined, that is bounded by godly ways of thinking, that is fruitful and productive?"

- ROH Radio, Nancy Leigh DeMoss

I personally have a problem with "needing" to check the computer too often, and to have coffee. There are other things, but these are the biggies, for now, in this area. Now, I don't know if the Proverbs 31 lady may have had to use a little caffeine to help her get started before the sun rose, but if she did, I'm sure she did it responsibly, not relying on it to help her through, because she put her reliance in the Lord. May my husband and children see that in my life!

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praying, Bible reading, dressing nicely, turning off the computer

Singing at Midnight

Author: Joanne Beckley
Price: $8.00
Description:
Aging is a fact of life. But growing old doesn’t mean it’s time to shirk our responsibilities to God and stop the work in His kingdom. In LEARNING TO SING AT MIDNIGHT, author Joanne Beckley talks of this little written about, but important time in a woman’s life. In her study she discusses spiritual strength and wisdom that is gained through life’s experiences. Also discussed are the topics of society and aging, changes and adjustments we face after retirement, plus instruction on how to grow spiritually and the hindrances we will most likely encounter. LEARNING TO SING AT MIDNIGHT shows us that although we must grow older, we should be maturing in Christ. 12 chapters, 76 pages.

The High Calling for Noble Ladies

From the latest radio series conversation from (click here:) Revive Our Hearts:

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Bob Lepine: I’ll never forget a conversation I was having once with two college professors. These professors taught what is a dying discipline on the college campus. They were teaching Home Economics. They were meeting with a group of young college women. They said to these women, “How many of you hope that some day you will be married and that you will be parents, that you’ll be a mom?”

And virtually all of the women raised their hands. That was their hope and their longing. And these college professors said, “How come you’re not taking Home Economics classes?” And one of them said, “Because my dad said, ‘I’m not spending all that money sending you to college just so you can learn how to cook and clean the house.’”

We do seem to live in a culture today that is somewhat confused about what God’s intention for a woman is when it comes to career, when it comes to her role in the home, and it’s one of the issues that young women are having to address, having to confront.

In fact, I remember speaking to a group of teenage girls once, talking to them about their plans for going to college, what they were planning to major in, and what they hoped to be doing five or ten years from now. Virtually all of them gave me career answers to that question, and when I stopped and said, “What about marriage and family? Is that something that you’re interested in?” They said, “Oh yeah.” But their thinking was career not how do I prepare to be a wife and a mom.

This is one of those challenging issues for us in today’s culture.

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And, Dannah, as you talk with teenage girls, as you talk with them today, how is this shaping their thinking, and how is it subtly influencing them in a directional way from what God would have for them?

Dannah: Well, I don’t think it’s very subtle. I think it’s pretty direct. What’s frightening to me is we’ve had the issue of young women saying, “I don’t know if I want to submit to my husband when I have a husband; I don’t know if I really want to have a husband.” Within the last five years or so, they are increasingly saying, “I don’t know if I want to have kids, at all, ever. I haven’t seen that be a good thing. I don’t want to be tied to that. I don’t want to be slowed down.”

It’s frightening to me that this isn’t just a cultural pressure anymore, but it’s something within the church.

Bob: So the lie that teenage girls are believing today is that being a mom, being a wife, is not something that has any real value. Is that it?

Nancy: It’s not just what a woman’s role is, but it goes back to this whole thing of our calling and our design as women, and the fact that God made women and men for distinctive, unique purposes to bring Him glory in this world, that’s what it’s all about. It’s not about our fulfillment or our happiness. I think we had stripped from us, in the last two or three generations, the sense of what it even means to be a woman.

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Honestly, it wasn’t until I was probably in my early twenties that I started grappling with:

• What did it mean?
• What does it mean for me to be a woman?
• Why did God make me a woman?
• Why is that a good thing?
• How can I glorify God as a woman?

I think I was probably in my early thirties before I was really comfortable with that, and not just comfortable. What God did was so sweet. It’s not just something I said, “Okay, I surrender to this.” There was that, but more than that there was embracing a vision for how my life could distinctively glorify God as a woman and finding joy and freedom and fullness in that.

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Please read or listen to the series: (click here:) Revive Our Hearts.

Definition of Modesty, & etc.

From Elizabeth Elliot's "Gateway to Joy"(please read the full article at this link for the context):

What does modesty mean? Well, it means placing a low estimate on one's own merits, not being forward or showing off. It means unpretentious. Modesty means to be free from undue familiarity, from indecency, from lewdness, pure in thought and conduct. Speaking of modest apparel, it means decent, seemly. The opposite of modesty is conceit, boldness, immodesty, brazenness, lewdness.

Let's think first what immodesty says about us women before we talk about what its effects may be upon others. What are your Christian standards? Do you seek to be noticed, to make a splash when you come into a room? Or do you seek to be simple, humble, gentle and quiet in spirit and not wearing the very latest fashions nor looking frumpy by wearing something that's way out of date. We do have to conform to a certain degree, but there're always classic clothes. Those are the ones that I try to stick with because they last for many years. I have a suit now that I think is 17 years old and I just wore it about a week ago. I wear things, which are tailored and simple and classic.

But we're talking about these low-cut dresses, sleeveless blouses, see-through blouses and the slit skirts. Does a man's thought life have a problem? Well, of course. As both of these men recognized, it is their job to stop looking. Don't look the women up and down. Don't fall for the types who are dressing like prostitutes. But is it right for us women to be thoughtless in these areas? Is there an earnestness about pleasing the Lord? Have we taken His yoke? Are we learning from Him? Are we gentle and humble in heart? Are we walking worthy of the Lord, looking and acting and speaking differently from the Lord?

The Bible says that we're supposed to shine as lights in the world. Christ lives in me. Does that make any visible differences? Will it correct my thinking? Do I pray that God will purify my desires? Prostitutes dress obviously, so as to draw attention. It's their business, isn't it? The last thing that a Christian woman is thinking of is being like a prostitute. But here is some very frank talk from two different men in two different places, and it's not by any means the only letters that I've had from them. It is a very difficult and a very delicate question.

What would the Lord have you do? Look like a frump or look like the vanguard of the fashion magazines? Flashy or sober? Are you pregnant? Are you overweight? Do you try to dress in such a way as to minimize those things? Are you too old for short skirts? I see a lot of women as I travel around who I would certainly say are too old to be wearing those short skirts. And if you're 16 years old, how short a skirt can you wear if you want to be responsible before God in the presence of young men?

Neat or messy? Wildly and deliberately messy? I see some hair-dos, which I think of as wildly and deliberately messy. Feminine? There are many ways of drawing attention to yourself without your once thinking about it. Think. Ask the Lord's guidance. We older women must be willing to take the risk of making someone angry and speaking to her about the way she is dressing. We have to take responsibility. It is our fault that we have not been teaching younger women modesty.

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In other news: "On Sunday, April 20, 2008, the Pure Fashion Show, an annual faith-based event, will hit the runways again in style, as it has in Atlanta for the past nine years. This year, guests will enjoy a fabulous show at the Georgia World Congress Center sure to cause a positive stir in the fashion industry. With an emphasis on modesty – mirroring the ‘Modesty Movement’ that says girls can wear cute clothes and still maintain their dignity – Pure Fashion includes more than 60 teen models and stresses that real models are role models who know who they are and know that they can ‘change the culture one outfit at a time!’"

Pure Fashion is an international faith based program designed for girls 14-18 to help young women re-discover and re-affirm their innate value and authentic femininity. Pure Fashion is a character formation program that enhances not only a young woman's external appearance, but more importantly, her interior beauty and balanced self confidence. The organization’s goal is to emphasize a young woman's inherent dignity and therefore create in her a desire to dress and act in accordance with that dignity. Understanding that many young women today are losing their sense of innocence at a very young age, Pure Fashion aims to reverse this trend by offering a fun, exciting and effective virtue formation program that can impress the hearts and minds of young girls at a very critical stage in their lives. www.PureFashion.com

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And in other places: Harding University's Marriage and Family Therapy program and Counseling Center will sponsor the 14th annual Women in God's Service (WINGS) conference Feb. 22-23 at College Church of Christ in Searcy.

The WINGS conference encourages women of all ages from all over the region to come together and study topics both timely and helpful to Christians. This year's conference, “What's Real? Finding Truth in a Reality Show World,” plays off of various television shows, making creative spiritual applications.

. . .

The last track, “The Ultimate Makeover,” will feature spiritual perspectives on modesty and beauty. Classes titled “What Not to Wear” and “How to Look Good Naked” will feature panel discussions, report on men's thoughts on modesty, and share women's struggles with appearance.

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And yet there is trouble in some places: "Students Reject “V-Monologues” on Catholic Campuses"

The V-Monologues play by feminist author Eve Ensler seems to be meeting more opposition on Catholic colleges and universities lately. The production, scheduled to perform on 20 Catholic college campuses in the next few weeks, is sparking renewed protest from groups upset over the play’s vulgar content.

According to Tradition Family Property Student Action, a Catholic group with members on 719 college campuses nationwide, the play is objectionable because of its “lewd and graphic descriptions of sexual encounters, lust, and lesbian behavior.”

“The play tramples purity, modesty and degrades women. It openly flaunts sins against nature, and thus subverts the order established by God,” said TFP Student Action director John Ritchie. “This scandalous play offends every good Catholic and has absolutely no place on Catholic campuses. Students, alumni, and parents should call for the play’s immediate cancellation.”

The group is encouraging Catholics to sign an online petition featured on its web site at www.tfp.org/sa. When visitors sign the petition, simultaneous letters are instantly e-mailed to every Catholic university president where the play is planned.

Together with the Cardinal Newman Society, TFP Student Action has protested “The V-Monologues” in the past. As a result, several Catholic institutions have canceled showings of the play including the College of Saint Scholastica, Assumption College and Carlow University.

“I can’t understand why any Catholic institution of higher learning would stoop so low as to allow this play on campus. It explicitly condones sin, promotes the abortion mentality and fuels sexual anarchy,” continued Mr. Ritchie. “This immoral play is the antithesis of Catholic morality. What the world needs today is purity, modesty and respect. So we invite all concerned Catholics to protest, to call the universities and urge them to end the scandal.”

Teaching Old Fashioned Values

School Administrators Under Fire for Protecting Female Modesty

Read here part of the article, written by Ralph W. Conner, in: School Reform News; Publication Date: January 1, 2008; The Heartland Institute. Then click on the title above to read the entire article. My, how "the dance" has changed since the days of the "old fashioned ladies".

School administrators nationwide are in a quandary about how to deal with the new freak dancing--or “juking”--craze going on at high school dances and proms.

The Wall Street Journal devoted an article in mid-November to the way the issue is tearing apart the Dallas suburb of Argyle, Texas. And last September, Evanston Township High School in Illinois issued fliers before its homecoming dance admonishing students that “salacious and inappropriate dancing” was outlawed. At Naperville North High, also in the Chicago suburbs, the dance tickets outlawed “sexually explicit and front to back dancing.”

. . .

Part of the problem here is the decline of academic standards. Student achievement and parental involvement are less important to some government school systems than socialization, and that means accepting highly dubious behavior in order to give students a chance to define a set of social mores in which they can feel comfortable.

As a result, rappers such as 50 Cent hold more sway with students than the civil rights icons of the 1960s, who extolled academic excellence as a way to elevate all Americans in a free-market economy.

This tag-team effort causes many parents to stand on the sidelines as another generation of girls is led to believe their self-esteem can be augmented by accepting their own degradation as normal. Those who disagree have to pull their children out of the public schools--while still paying taxes to support the institutions that are contributing to social decay.

Ultimately, of course, it’s up to parents to teach their children the lasting values of self-esteem and self-respect, while accentuating academic excellence as the path to the wonderful opportunities available to everyone not named Beyoncé or Britney.

But the schools certainly shouldn’t work against the process, especially while taking people’s tax money.

Underline this - parents are responsible for the children they have been given. Not everyone understands this, and many children are growing up with no better guidance than peer socialization and weak academic leaders who are not allowed to teach good moral behavior. If we live in a country where we are proud of our rights and freedoms, then we must realize that we live in a country where those civil liberties trump all other rights - such as the rights of all people to grow up safe, contented, and at peace. It is our responsibility, as parents and as concerned people, to train up our children, to correct one another when we harm someone else, to live as we understand to be the wisest, without fear that our government - or our government run school systems - will stop us from doing so. Make it a point, this day and all days ahead, to give the gift of responsibility to children - that is a gift that keeps on blessing in years to come. Putting a leash on a puppy is not as cruel as letting it run free and into a busy highway. How much more valuable is the life of a young human being?

Of course, the whole issue of public dancing has changed drastically from the days of folk and barn dances, and the lovely and complicated rules of Jane Austen era dances. Truly, the "dirty dancing" that our parents and grandparents were concerned about in the 50's and 60's has nothing on what dances are all about today. Some concerned administrators can see the difference. Some parents surely can see the difference in going to the prom in the high class preppy 80's (which still had its problems to be sure) and the "dances" of today. The dance has certainly changed in our culture - don't be fooled.

Links to listen to and to read today

"Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, or slaves to 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, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled."

The Wonders of Womanhood Titus 2:1-5 from Love Worth Finding, with Dr. Adrian Rogers

Common sense in 'mommy wars', by Penna Dexter in the Baptist Press

Submission , a list in "A Wise Woman Builds Her Home"'s blog

A Model of Ladyship

I never knew Elisabeth Elliot, nor have I read much of her writings, or listened to her old radio broadcasts: "Gateway to Joy." But I was directed to something that she wrote recently, and found a webpage full of her wise words and gentle council. She wrote and edited a newsletter, called "The Elisabeth Elliot Newsletter", in which are many thoughtful essays and poems, and I encourage you to seek out some of the articles from this older woman of experience.

One of them I will reproduce here, on this occasion of Mother's Day, for all women, be they mothers, adoptive mothers, foster mothers, room mothers, house mothers, den mothers, or those who mother anyone who needs mothering. May all of us be blessed, and be such a blessing to others.

A Call to Older Women

by Elizabeth Elliot

In 1948 when I had been at Prairie Bible Institute (a very stark set of wooden buildings on a very bleak prairie in Alberta) for only a few weeks, I was feeling a bit displaced and lonesome one afternoon when there came a knock on my door. I opened it to find a beautiful rosy-cheeked face framed by white hair. She spoke with a charming Scottish burr.
"You don't know me, but I know you. I've been prraying for you, Betty dearr. I'm Mrs. Cunningham. If everr you'd like a cup of tea and a Scottish scone, just pop down to my little aparrtment."
She told me where she lived and went on to say that my name had been mentioned in a staff meeting (she never said how--was I thought of as a misfit at PBI? I wonder) and the Lord had given her a burden for me. Many were the wintry afternoons when I availed myself of her gracious offer and we sat together in her tiny but very cozy basement apartment while she poured tea for me and I poured my soul out to her. Her radiant face was full of sympathy, love, and understanding as she listened. She would be quiet for a little, then she would pray and, looking up, cheer and strengthen me with words from God. During and after my missionary years she wrote to me until she died. Only God knows what I owe to "the four Katharines"- -Katharine Cunningham, Katharine Gillingham Howard (my own mother), Katherine Cumming (my house mother when I was in college), and Katherine Morgan. These and several others have not only shown me what godliness looks like (many have done that), but have significantly graced my life by obeying God's special call to older women.
The apostle Paul tells Titus that older women ought to "school the younger women to be loving wives and mothers, temperate, chaste, and kind, busy at home, respecting the authority of their own husbands" (Titus 2:4-5, NEB). My dear "Mom Cunningham" schooled me--not in a class or seminar, or even primarily by her words. It was what she was that taught me. It was her availability to God when He sent her to my door. It was the surrender of her time, an offering to Him for my sake. It was her readiness to "get involved," to lay down her life for one anxious Bible school girl. Above all, she herself, a simple Scottish woman, was the message.
I think of the vast number of older women today. The Statistical Abstract of the United States for 1980 says that 19.5 percent of the population was between ages 45-65, but by 2000 it will be 22.9 percent. Assuming that half of those people are women, what a pool of energy and power for God they might be. We live longer now than we did forty years ago (the same volume says that the over-sixty-fives will increase from 11.3 percent to 13 percent). There is more mobility, more money around, more leisure, more health and strength--resources which, if put at God's disposal, might bless younger women. But there are also many more ways to spend those resources, so we find it very easy to occupy ourselves selfishly. Where are the women, single or married, willing to hear God's call to spiritual motherhood, taking spiritual daughters under their wings to school them as Mom Cunningham did me? She had no training the world would recognize. She had no thought of such. She simply
loved God and was willing to be broken bread and poured-out wine for His sake. Retirement never crossed her mind.

If some of my readers are willing to hear this call but hardly know how to begin, may I suggest to you:
1. Pray about it. Ask God to show you whom, what, how.
2. Consider writing notes to or telephoning some younger woman who needs encouragement in the areas Paul mentioned.
3. Ask a young mother if you may do her ironing, take the children out, babysit so she can go out, make a cake or a casserole for her.
4. Do what Mom C. did for me--invite somebody to tea, find out what she'd like you to pray for (I asked her to pray that God would bring Jim Elliot and me together!)-- and pray with her.
5. Start a little prayer group of two or three whom you can cheer and help. You'll be cheered and helped too!
6. Organize a volunteer housecleaning pool to go out every other week or once a month to somebody who needs you.
7. Have a lending library of books of real spiritual food.
8. Be the first of a group in your church to be known as the WOTT's (Women of Titus Two), and see what happens (something will).

"Say not you cannot gladden, elevate, and set free; that you have nothing of the grace of influence; that all you have to give is at the most only common bread and water. Give yourself to your Lord for the service of men with what you have. Cannot He change water into wine? Cannot He make stammering words to be instinct [imbued, filled, charged] with saving power? Cannot He change trembling efforts to help into deeds of strength? Cannot He still, as of old, enable you in all your personal poverty 'to make many rich?' God has need of thee for the service of thy fellow men. He has a work for thee to do. To find out what it is, and then to do it, is at once thy supremist duty and thy highest wisdom. 'Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it.'" (Canon George Body, b. 1840).

(Sept. 1989)