With Age Comes Wisdom and Experience
The Apostle Paul had a good reason for using the word “aged” when he commanded the aged women to teach the young women in Titus 2:3-5. The aged women have wisdom and experience that the young women don’t have. They have raised their children and have time to teach the young women. A few month ago, I wrote about young women bloggers divorcing and received a few great comments from aged women that may be of interest to you!
Debby in Kansas, as she goes by when she comments on my blog, wrote this: “This reminds me of a Valentine’s day several years ago. My husband and I were watching the news and they had a celebrity couple on to talk about how they keep romance in their lives and their secrets to happiness. We both exploded into laughter because this couple hadn’t even been married six months! At the time, we’d been married 20 or so years…and they’re going to give US advice about marriage?! We both said the same thing. Bring on the couple celebrating 50 years!! The young pups they had were still on their honeymoon!”
Then Kelley responded: “EXACTLY! Ridiculous. Paul taught Timothy that aged women were to teach the younger. While I realize that, if you’re 16, a gal who’s 18 is older than you, Paul didn’t say the ‘older women.’ He said the aged women. There’s the difference.
“When I, too, reflect on the lofty advice and opinions I barked in my 20s and 30s, I blush in embarrassment. In my 40s, I earnestly began hungering and thirsting after a godly wifehood and motherhood. I began quizzing aged women whose husbands demonstratively adored and cherished the wives of their youth. In my 40s, I desired eyes to see and ears to hear.
“In my 20s and 30s, I was a brilliant know-everything. In my 40s, I was ignorant and unlearned. In my 20s and 30s, I called the shots and declared, ‘My way or the highway.’ In my 40s, true life began! I began seeing my husband for the man God made him and wanted him to be, and I began seeing myself as his helper to make that happen.
“Fortunately by the time I had come to myself, my husband had not chosen to leave his oft-foolish wife for some ‘bimbo’ whose words and actions put him first in an (adulterous) relationship. He had chosen to stay with the likes of a rotten wife. God bless that strong, valiant man.
“Younger women bloggers and motivational speakers who have lost their marriages (and their children) have also lost their witness, their voice, their testimony. The choices they made inspired the choices their husbands made: ‘I’m outta here, headed for greener pastures.’ Most of these women have no one to blame but themselves. When you cause the Word to be blasphemed, what do you expect?
“Stay off the computer, younger women, and your devices. Keep the main thing the main thing. GET INTO, climb into, crawl into, hide yourself in the Word of God. Listen to the reaches of godly, aged women. You’ll have no regrets for your own wiser choices then, and a very strong chance of ‘helping’ a grateful, fulfilled husband who sings your praises and children who rise to call you blessed.”
Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.
Proverbs 31:28
5 thoughts on “With Age Comes Wisdom and Experience”
I think we grow and mature as people throughout our entire lives. In our younger years it is natural for us to be more self centered, as we try to find our place in the world. As we mature, we start to realize what we owe to others, those who helped us get where we are now. What bugs me is why my generation can’t just grow up, they are “adulting” now, the world implying being an adult is merely a game, you’re just pretending and can take off the costume afterwards like a little girl pretending to be a princess! I mean, come on! Just grow up like every other generation did! The most respected people I know and grew up around were all middle aged adults. I think that’s why I learned to respect wisdom from age, because I wasn’t around peers who continually shunned old age and derided it. Sad how our society derides and belittles aging and the wisdom that comes with it! Infuriating how condescending people can be of the elderly, treating people decades their senior like little children again when they have twice your life experience and wisdom!
This is right on time for me, thank you! ❤
Beautiful Post Lori and so true! Every bit of it! I’m 55 and am not making an effort to be that Titus 2 older woman yet. I still have a ways to go and I know it. I help and teach my own kids, and help with the grandchildren at this point. Iron sharpens iron so I do help younger women with advice and know how when needed. I will wait however another 5 yrs or so to have more of a Titus 2 type ministry Lord willing. Very good advice about the computer and other devices. Spending too much time on-line can break your household and send the children to be left to themselves, bringing shame to their parents. God bless you Lori for speaking truth everyday. ~Diane
Thoughts from an aged woman: wisdom comes with age through life experiences – be open to the leading of the Lord. Being a Titus 2 woman isn’t something we set out to do it is who we are, it’s using opportunities as they come to encourage younger women, it is using our own experiences to guide and encourage others, to support them and offer guidance. It is being at least 10 years older that the other woman in a Bible study and sharing my own experiences raising teenagers (who at that point were adults with children of their own). It is using opportunities as God brings your way and being amazed how God used your experiences to encourage others.
From personal experience it was mentoring a younger woman with several children who needed some support. It meant admitting that I didn’t know all of the answers but being willing to learn and grow together. It meant being amazed once again at God faithfulness and being grateful for the opportunities He gives us to learn and grow as we walk with Him.
Being a Titus 2 woman is not a formula it is being available and heeding Gods leading as He bring others across our path.
This is a little off topic but relevant. My husband and I visited a dear friend who lives at a Christian retirement home. This place was first of all, amazing because they had such love and care for the elderly. It wasn’t a nursing home atmosphere. Their motto was: don’t think of this as your final resting place, but come here to live. They were definitely giving these aging people a new lease on life. They have a chapel on campus, and we were just blown away by these elderly individuals’ genuine love for the Lord. The old hymns were sung with gusto, and the men’s prayers were lifted up from hearts that were in close communion with the Saviour. The message was fillled with the meat of the Word. The ladies were all dressed with gentle dignity. There was not one woman without a headcovering. They were reverent and silently worshipping the Lord. You could just tell that these people had a life long, faithful, committed walk with Jesus. Respect for God’s holiness was very much evident. We came away energized in the Lord, but also somewhat saddened. These people are so very much needed in our local gatherings. The elements of faithfulness, holiness,commitment and decorum are missing from churches today. We treat the aging with such disregard and disrespect. Yes, I do very much agree that our aged need to teach, but the young need to be taught to respect the aged. How else will they be willing to learn from them if they are not first taught that the aged are worth listening to? ( With Christian love and Thanksgiving for all of our aging Christians who teach and for those who willingly listen)