"The Christian faith is meant to be lived moment by moment. It isn't some broad, general outline--it's a long walk with a real Person. Details count: passing thoughts, small sacrifices, a few encouraging words, little acts of kindness, brief victories over nagging sins." Joni Eaeckson Tada
I started this blog as an outlet. I was, and am, going through a transition time in my life and I needed to express my feelings about it and so many other things that I prayed the Lord would use in other women's lives. I have had the feeling for a long time now that we, as Christian women, do not fully follow the teachings of Titus 2:3-5.
"Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God."
I prayed that the Lord would give me the words in this blog for that purpose.
As I began writing this blog it became apparent to me that He had a different purpose for calling me to write again. Hopefully you will be able to find somewhere in my ramblings encouragement to adhere to Titus 2:3-5, but I think, more importantly, we can discover together that it is a journey to Titus 2:3-5. Yours' will be different then mine but we can travel together towards it. We don't have to chart new territory constantly, we can pick each other up when we stumble and fall, we can encourage during those dark times of discouragement, we can pray for each other when there is doubt or fear or anger or remorse. We are called to be sisters--we need to start acting like sisters.
I'm probably the last person in the world who should be writing about being a sister. I'm an only child, I had only one daughter--I could write a book on what it's like to be an only child, but how do I know anything about sisters? What I have learned through the years has come mostly from observing. My mother had five sisters, three are still living. Not one of them had the same personality. They shared few of the same attributes, some had brown eyes, some blue, one green. They were brunette, blond and red headed. They were short and tall, small and medium framed. They lived different lives. One married to one man until his death, the others married and divorced. Some lived in near-affluence, others in near-poverty. Yet from these women I learned what it meant to be strong, to be generous, to be loving, to close ranks and defend your sister against anything or anyone. I learned to trade recipes and cleaning solutions. I learned how to manage money and mis-manage money. I learned how to dress, how to put on make-up, how to attract a man. I learned that people respond to honey more then vinegar and that everyone loves to be really listened too (although that was not a strong attribute in our family), that gossip was fun and that family sticks together no matter how mad you get with them. Without ever saying a word they taught me what a woman should do and be--in our family.
Then I got saved and a whole new group of sisters came into my life. Not born of the same mother, but born again of the same Heavenly Father. I was very timid about joining in with these women. They seemed so sweet and so good. I thought they couldn't be true. I feared that when I left the room they would begin to talk about me. They prayed so earnestly and knew so much scripture. Maybe I wasn't good enough for this sisterhood. I stayed to myself most of the time. I was a divorced single mother of three. It appeared these women had been married and loving their husbands forever. I felt more like a step-sister (in the fairy tale meaning) then a real sister. Little by little the Lord began to draw me into this group of sisters. First by listening to Christian women speakers on the radio, then going to a women's group to hear a study I was interested in. Then He did the most amazing thing. He put a ministry on my heart for abuse victims--women abuse victims! I tried to just hand it off to the women's ministry at my church. I told the leader there that I would help organize it and get the material for it but she said only if God was calling me to teach it. I couldn't say no.
As Corrie ten Boom said, "Peter said, "No, Lord!" But he had to learn that one cannot say "No" while saying "Lord" and that one cannot say "Lord" while saying "No".
When I said yes to Jesus, to the ministry for abuse victims that He gave me, I began to finally be in a sisterhood of God. Week after week as I sat in a classroom with injured survivors and watched the Lord walk among us and heal us, I began to understand. He used all of the things that I had learned growing up with my amazing Aunts and He fine tuned it with His truths of what a Godly woman looks like. She is not a robotic super woman with a bow on her head. She is one of many beautiful Princesses of God. She might have brown or blue or green or grey or speckled eyes. She might be tiny or fluffy; tall or short; a beauty queen on the outside or gorgeous on the inside. She could be rich or poor or anywhere in-between. She might be the one who prayed amazing prayers or she might be the one who could only manage to say "please help me Lord". She could have memorized every scripture and read her Bible through and through every year since she was 17 or she just might be the one who jumped for joy because some caring woman just donated a brand new Bible to her or she might even be the one who after thirty years of shame finally admitted that she never learned to read and had never been able to read one word of scripture but still knew that she loved His word. A Christian sister may not start off dressing a certain way, talking a certain way or acting a certain way. A Christian sister starts with the act of giving up her life to Jesus. She doesn't have to understand it all, she just has to understand that she's been one way--a sinner--and when she surrenders to Jesus--He will forgive those sins and start to teach her another way, His way; and while He's lovingly teaching her, He brings these amazing women into her life that He has already taught some of those same lessons to. He doesn't want us to be observers the way I observed my Aunts and Christian sisters right after my salvation. He wants us to be participators in each other's lives.
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God." 2 Corinthians 1:3-4
He wants to use us to instruct each other, encourage each other, love each other. He cannot use Christian men for this particular part of our growth so we as Christian women must make ourselves available to Him for this work. Chronological age has nothing really to do with our Titus journey. A fifty year old new Christian woman can be taught much from a loving twenty-three year old sister who has walked with Jesus for years. Because Jesus valued women and thought of them as equal in the kingdom of Heaven, He has given us roles and the means to accomplish those roles. He needs us to be sisters involved in each other's lives. He needs us to say yes when He calls us to speak a word of encouragement or challenge or just to relate to another sister's suffering. I encourage you to use this blog for that purpose. You don't have to know all there is to know about being a Christian, you don't have to be considered a prayer warrior or an authority on scripture. Come as you are, just as you came to the cross. The Lord will make sure that you are coming with a gift and a purpose that someone else needs to share.
I started this blog as an outlet. I was, and am, going through a transition time in my life and I needed to express my feelings about it and so many other things that I prayed the Lord would use in other women's lives. I have had the feeling for a long time now that we, as Christian women, do not fully follow the teachings of Titus 2:3-5.
"Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God."
I prayed that the Lord would give me the words in this blog for that purpose.
As I began writing this blog it became apparent to me that He had a different purpose for calling me to write again. Hopefully you will be able to find somewhere in my ramblings encouragement to adhere to Titus 2:3-5, but I think, more importantly, we can discover together that it is a journey to Titus 2:3-5. Yours' will be different then mine but we can travel together towards it. We don't have to chart new territory constantly, we can pick each other up when we stumble and fall, we can encourage during those dark times of discouragement, we can pray for each other when there is doubt or fear or anger or remorse. We are called to be sisters--we need to start acting like sisters.
I'm probably the last person in the world who should be writing about being a sister. I'm an only child, I had only one daughter--I could write a book on what it's like to be an only child, but how do I know anything about sisters? What I have learned through the years has come mostly from observing. My mother had five sisters, three are still living. Not one of them had the same personality. They shared few of the same attributes, some had brown eyes, some blue, one green. They were brunette, blond and red headed. They were short and tall, small and medium framed. They lived different lives. One married to one man until his death, the others married and divorced. Some lived in near-affluence, others in near-poverty. Yet from these women I learned what it meant to be strong, to be generous, to be loving, to close ranks and defend your sister against anything or anyone. I learned to trade recipes and cleaning solutions. I learned how to manage money and mis-manage money. I learned how to dress, how to put on make-up, how to attract a man. I learned that people respond to honey more then vinegar and that everyone loves to be really listened too (although that was not a strong attribute in our family), that gossip was fun and that family sticks together no matter how mad you get with them. Without ever saying a word they taught me what a woman should do and be--in our family.
Then I got saved and a whole new group of sisters came into my life. Not born of the same mother, but born again of the same Heavenly Father. I was very timid about joining in with these women. They seemed so sweet and so good. I thought they couldn't be true. I feared that when I left the room they would begin to talk about me. They prayed so earnestly and knew so much scripture. Maybe I wasn't good enough for this sisterhood. I stayed to myself most of the time. I was a divorced single mother of three. It appeared these women had been married and loving their husbands forever. I felt more like a step-sister (in the fairy tale meaning) then a real sister. Little by little the Lord began to draw me into this group of sisters. First by listening to Christian women speakers on the radio, then going to a women's group to hear a study I was interested in. Then He did the most amazing thing. He put a ministry on my heart for abuse victims--women abuse victims! I tried to just hand it off to the women's ministry at my church. I told the leader there that I would help organize it and get the material for it but she said only if God was calling me to teach it. I couldn't say no.
As Corrie ten Boom said, "Peter said, "No, Lord!" But he had to learn that one cannot say "No" while saying "Lord" and that one cannot say "Lord" while saying "No".
When I said yes to Jesus, to the ministry for abuse victims that He gave me, I began to finally be in a sisterhood of God. Week after week as I sat in a classroom with injured survivors and watched the Lord walk among us and heal us, I began to understand. He used all of the things that I had learned growing up with my amazing Aunts and He fine tuned it with His truths of what a Godly woman looks like. She is not a robotic super woman with a bow on her head. She is one of many beautiful Princesses of God. She might have brown or blue or green or grey or speckled eyes. She might be tiny or fluffy; tall or short; a beauty queen on the outside or gorgeous on the inside. She could be rich or poor or anywhere in-between. She might be the one who prayed amazing prayers or she might be the one who could only manage to say "please help me Lord". She could have memorized every scripture and read her Bible through and through every year since she was 17 or she just might be the one who jumped for joy because some caring woman just donated a brand new Bible to her or she might even be the one who after thirty years of shame finally admitted that she never learned to read and had never been able to read one word of scripture but still knew that she loved His word. A Christian sister may not start off dressing a certain way, talking a certain way or acting a certain way. A Christian sister starts with the act of giving up her life to Jesus. She doesn't have to understand it all, she just has to understand that she's been one way--a sinner--and when she surrenders to Jesus--He will forgive those sins and start to teach her another way, His way; and while He's lovingly teaching her, He brings these amazing women into her life that He has already taught some of those same lessons to. He doesn't want us to be observers the way I observed my Aunts and Christian sisters right after my salvation. He wants us to be participators in each other's lives.
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God." 2 Corinthians 1:3-4
He wants to use us to instruct each other, encourage each other, love each other. He cannot use Christian men for this particular part of our growth so we as Christian women must make ourselves available to Him for this work. Chronological age has nothing really to do with our Titus journey. A fifty year old new Christian woman can be taught much from a loving twenty-three year old sister who has walked with Jesus for years. Because Jesus valued women and thought of them as equal in the kingdom of Heaven, He has given us roles and the means to accomplish those roles. He needs us to be sisters involved in each other's lives. He needs us to say yes when He calls us to speak a word of encouragement or challenge or just to relate to another sister's suffering. I encourage you to use this blog for that purpose. You don't have to know all there is to know about being a Christian, you don't have to be considered a prayer warrior or an authority on scripture. Come as you are, just as you came to the cross. The Lord will make sure that you are coming with a gift and a purpose that someone else needs to share.
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