Remembering Voddie Baucham, Jr.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Just this past week we received word that a dear pastor, missionary, and brother in Christ went home to be with the Lord. It was a huge shock to all of us who knew Voddie Baucham, Jr. and were grateful for his life and ministry. The first announcement I read reported that Voddie had “left the land of the dying and entered the land of the living.” Today we’ll honor the memory of this faithful servant of God by revisiting a message he gave at a past Revive Our Hearts True Woman conference.

Pastor Voddie Baucham: My mother didn’t even know the Lord when she was raising me. When I was old enough to find a little trouble in South Central, or for a little trouble to find me, my mother decided, “Time’s up. He’s a young man. There’s some things he needs that I can’t give him.” So I got on a bus for three days and went from Los Angeles, California, to Beauford, South Carolina, to spend a year and a half with her oldest brother who was a retired drill instructor in the Marine Corps . . . and I got out of trouble. (laughter)

Dannah Gresh: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of A Place of Quiet Rest, for October 1, 2025.  I'm Dannah Gresh.

Nancy: An American pastor, author, and educator, he served for nine years as Dean of Theology at African Christian University in Zambia and was the Founding President of Founders Seminary in Cape Coral, Florida.

I remember Voddie as a tenderhearted warrior. Now he’s at rest, home with the Lord. When I heard the news, I immediately felt heavyhearted for Voddie’s wife, Bridget, their nine children—seven of whom still live at home—their grandchildren, and the churches and ministries he has served over the years. 

Voddie was just fifty-six. I can still recall the shock and sadness that our family experienced when my own father was suddenly taken to be with the Lord at the age of fifty-three. Now, Voddie’s family and many others are experiencing that enormous sense of loss right now. 

In 2010, Voddie spoke at our True Woman conference in Chattanooga. I still remember it as a deeply moving message, and we wanted to share a portion of it with you today as a way to remember and honor a man greatly used by God.

Something we do at every True Woman conference is read through the True Woman Manifesto. Voddie commented briefly on that document.

Voddie: In the Manifesto, if you have that with you, pick that up. If you open it, I want you to see a couple of things that I think are extremely poignant as it relates to the message tonight.

It says, “God’s Plan.” 

God’s plan for gender is wider than marriage. All women, whether married or single, are to model femininity in their various relationships by exhibiting a distinctive modesty, responsiveness, and gentleness of spirit.

Then look down at the third one there, “Mature Christian Women.”

Mature Christian women have a responsibility to leave a legacy of faith by discipling younger women in the Word and ways of God and modeling for the next generation lives of fruitful femininity.

Amen. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. That’s just good!

Nancy: Well, as you’ll hear in this message, Voddie Baucham unapologetically stood for the biblical perspective on men, women, marriage, and family. And he did it with a wonderful sense of warmth and grace.

By the way, tomorrow evening True Woman '25 starts in Indianapolis. You can register to watch it online. It’s not too late. Find all the information at TrueWoman25.com. 

Now, let’s listen to a portion of the message Pastor Voddie Baucham gave at True Woman in 2010. And as we do, let’s also be praying for the entire Baucham family. Here’s Voddie, helping us see that even when circumstances are less than ideal (which they are for everyone), it’s always best to follow God’s design.

Voddie: Titus 2:1: 

But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Older men are to be sober minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

There’s the picture of the older men. “Older men are to be . . .” Now, since this is a woman’s conference, we won’t spend a lot of time here for a number of reasons because, number one, if we spend a lot of time here, then you’ll go to your husbands, telling them what I said they’re supposed to be, and you’re not going to use me like that. (laughter) 

Look at the second one, verse 3: 

Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior.

Notice that with older men and with older women, we’re talking about what they are to be. We’re talking about character. In other words, I said “godly mature men and women in the church,” not just mature men and women in the church. This is character that’s formed over time as a result of our justification, and the fruit of that, our sanctification. That’s what we’re talking about.

In light of that, look at this: First, with older men, they are to be sober-minded, dignified. There’s nothing like an undignified older man, amen? The difference between an older man and a younger man, basically, is self-control.

Look at the next part of the text: “Sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.” That’s the picture of character forged over time.

Now, look at older women: “Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior.” Perhaps the only thing worse than an undignified older man is an irreverent older woman. Amen? Just an irreverent older woman. Now, we could spend a long time here tonight talking about what it looks like to be an irreverent older woman, but let me just give you one example, and we can be done with it right here.

Here is the mark of an irreverent older woman: You hear her long before you see her. (laughter) 

Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. (v. 3)

Not slanderers. Women, you need to know you have a unique power in your tongue. You have a unique power to build up and to tear down. You use more words than we do, and you use them more effectively than we do. Just like the older man is exemplified by self-control, the older woman is exemplified by the way she uses her speech.

“Not slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good.” Here’s what you need to understand: The picture that’s painted here is of an older woman who, as a result of having walked with God, being conformed to the image of Christ, opens her mouth, and pearls of biblical wisdom come out. She speaks God language, the opposite of being a slanderer. She is the picture of Ephesians chapter 4, speaking those things that are fitting and suited for the occasion, speaking those things that build up but, more importantly, speaking those things that are found in God’s Word. She is a woman who speaks forth God’s truth.

Now, by the way, Titus 2 is not a picture of a woman who happens to be a Bible teacher. That’s not the picture that Paul is painting here in Titus 2. He is not painting the picture of a woman who teaches multiple women, but older women who, in a relational perspective, speak words of wisdom, speak God’s truth into the lives of younger women as they have occasion and opportunity.

And look at the end thereof: “And so,” verse 4:

And so, train the young women to love their husbands and children. 

Isn’t that amazing? Train the young women to love their husbands and children.

Now, we usually think about love from this perspective: “Why would a younger woman need to be trained to love her husband?” Because she doesn’t know how.

“Yes, but that’s why she married her husband, because she loved him.”

Well, maybe, but if she was brought up in this culture, she probably doesn’t know what love is. She thinks love is an overwhelming, uncontrollable, sensual force, and she speaks phrases like: “This thing is bigger than both of us.” And she says things like: “We don’t choose who we fall in love with.” You have to say it like that, too, or it doesn’t work. (laughter) Or she says things like, and this is my favorite: “The heart wants what it wants.” (laughter) What does that mean? She has no idea how to love her husband. She has no idea that her husband.

She doesn’t know how to love her children. Younger women don’t know how to love their children. They say crazy things like: “I love my child. I could never spank my child because I love my child.” They need an older woman to come alongside and say, “If you love that baby, you better wear him out.” (laughter)

To be self-controlled, pure, working at home, teaching them to be keepers of their homes, that the Word of God may not be reviled. (v. 5) 

What a statement . . . “in order that the Word of God may not be reviled.” In other words, when older women are not in the practice of training and teaching younger women how to exemplify true womanhood, there is a sense in which we are defiling the Word of God. Why is that so?

Well, we see, for example, in Romans 1, in the degradation of culture, that picture there from Romans 1:18. We see that the beginning of the degradation of culture and man running toward sin is a rejection of what we see through general revelation, and that is that there is a God and that He is the Creator of all things. As a result of that, we have our own sense of order; our own understanding of what manhood is; our own understanding of what womanhood is. If we are walking in the midst of a culture that denies true manhood and denies true womanhood, several things will inevitably follow.

One of those things that will follow is this: According to Ephesians 5, marriage is designed to be a picture of the relationship between Jesus Christ and His Church. So if the Bible tells us what a man is and what a woman is, and the Bible tells us what marriage is, and marriage is a glorious earthly representation of a heavenly relationship between Christ and His Church, and I decide not to listen to that but instead, based on my culture that rejects God:

• I redefine manhood so that it’s sissified.
• I redefine womanhood so that it’s no longer about being a woman but a man who happens to be biologically capable of having children.
• I redefine marriage so that we sort of negotiate for ourselves a better understanding than the Creator of the Universe.

Now what I’m doing is marring the picture of the relationship between Christ and His Church and the Word of God is being dishonored. It’s being defamed, and we can’t have that. (applause) So these things need to be taught.

God has given us this incredible gift of godly mature men and women in the church, and these relationships between godly mature men and women in the church and younger men and women in the church. So as mature women in the church, you have an incredibly important role. You have the role of striving for maturity, of walking in maturity, of exemplifying biblical womanhood and not holding it to yourself but passing it on to younger women as you have occasion and opportunity to do so. So God gives that to you when you’re a less than mature woman, and you turn around and give it away to another when you are a more mature woman. This is what He gives.

Well, I know what you’re saying. "Yeah, I get that, and I understand that, but you just don’t understand my situation. I would like to be a godly mature woman, but I didn’t have an example of that when I was growing up.”

Altogether . . . “Awwww.” (laughter)

Here’s what you need to know: I didn’t grow up with godly manhood in my life. I did not grow up with godly examples in my life.

I just came back from Los Angeles, and, in God’s providence, last weekend I had a conference in the LA area. I grew up in Los Angeles. I grew up in drug-infested, gang-infested, south central Los Angeles, California. I was raised by a single, teenage, Buddhist mother. I never heard the gospel until my freshman year in college. I grew up with my mother, so I didn’t have much connection with my father’s side of the family. 

God’s bigger than the failures in your families. My wife Bridget and I, of the last two generations of both sides of our families there are twenty-five marriages, twenty-two divorces. That’s our legacy. 

 

Here’s what I want you to know: God is able, and He is sufficient. You’re here tonight, and you say, “I’ve never seen that. I don’t understand that.” Yes, you have. It’s here. There are godly, mature women in the Scriptures. Read of them, learn from them, and trust the Spirit of the Living God who abides in you. He is sufficient. So when I say that, here’s what I’m saying to God: “Yes, I see that, but I didn’t grow up with that. I didn’t have a godly mother; I didn’t have a godly father.”

Here’s what I’m saying to the God of the Universe: “God, I understand what Your Word says, but my circumstances were not anticipated by You, and You’re not powerful enough to overcome them.”

Don’t you dare. And if you are an immature woman, what do you do? Find a godly mature woman and glean from her whatever you can.

My wife and I spent so much time doing this. When we got married, we got married the summer between my sophomore and junior year in college. I just turned twenty years old. This year I have officially been married longer than I wasn’t. (applause) Glory to God. So, here we were. We didn’t know how to do it. We didn’t know “come here” from “sic ‘em.” We didn’t get it. We didn’t understand. So what did we do? We found godly mature couples and hung out with them until they looked at us and said, “You know what? Could we have some space?” (laughter) Do that.

Look at the second leg: godly, manly elders and pastors in the church. Why do I say that? Well, here’s what’s interesting: With older women and younger women, there’s a list, there’s guidance there. You older women, you give them these things; younger women, you look for these things from the older women.

Then for the younger men, you look at the next one, and it says: 

Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled. (v. 6) 

Yes, that’s it. Younger men ought to be saying, “Wait a minute. Where’s our list?” By the way, women ought to be saying this, too, because men are walking around going, “Yeah, I’m looking for a Proverbs 31 woman and a Titus 2 woman.” Young women are walking around going, “Yeah, I’m looking for a . . . man” (laughter) Where’s your passage? Your passage is in Titus chapter 1. Let’s look at it. Titus 1:5: 

This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remains into order, and to appoint elders in every town as I directed you.

Now, here comes the list. The first part of the list goes to his life in his home. Look at this part of the list, and I just ask you: Are you willing to give up on any of this for your sons? It says: 

If anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife. (v. 6)

Next verse:

And his children are believers not open to the charge of debauchery and insubordination. (v. 6)

“Uh, uh. I want him to raise my grandkids to be the worst, baddest kids that you ever saw in your life.”

No!

Well, now. Let’s look at his character. Look at the next part of this: 

For an overseer, as God’s steward, must be above reproach. He must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain. (v. 7) 

They’re the negative ones. Again, none of us is willing to give up on any of those. Look at the next ones, verse 8: 

But hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined.

Again, we’re not willing to give up on any of those. Look at verse 9. "Well, verse 9 goes specifically to his teaching ministry, right? So maybe that doesn’t apply to every man.” Really?

He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught.

Anybody want to raise a son who’s a heretic? No! Look at the next part. 

So that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine. [Finally,] And also to rebuke those who contradict it. (v. 9)

He has to be an apologist.

Here’s the beauty: God gives us godly, manly elders and pastors to model for us what manhood is. This is extremely important.

There’s a last piece—remember the third piece? There’s godly mature men and women in the church; there’s godly manly elders and pastors, and the last piece is biblically functioning homes. Now, we’ve already seen evidence of that in Titus 2, because when you look at the instruction of the older woman to the younger woman, that instruction centers around her role and function within the context of her home. You see that? To love your husband and children, to be sensible and pure, to be a keeper of your home, or a worker at home, all of these things center around the context of that ministry that a woman would have.

There’s another thing I want you to see that you may not have ever seen before. Keep reading in Titus 1. Look beginning at verse 10: “For . . .” Now, for what? What’s that “for” for? Remember, in verse 9: “Holding firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he can instruct in sound doctrine and rebuke those who contradict sound doctrine. For . . .”

Why does he need to have this kind of character and this kind of teaching and rebuke unsound doctrine?

For there are many who are insubordinate, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision party. They must be silenced, because they are upsetting whole . . . (v. 10)

Sunday school departments by teaching . . . (laughter) That’s not what it says. “They must be silenced since they are 

. . . upsetting whole families by teaching for shameful gain what they ought not to teach. (v. 11) 

They’re upsetting whole families. Here’s what you need to know: The primary teaching and discipling unit that makes up the church is the home. 

For some of us in this room, you don’t have one of those things or more, not because of your own sin or your own fault, but because of things that are out of your control. Here’s what I want to say to you: God’s bigger than what you don’t have.

Now you know what to pray for. You know what to ask Him for.

“I don’t have godly mature women in my life, so I’m just going to give up.”

You better not. You beg God for it, and you look for it.

“I don’t have a godly, biblically functioning church, so I’m just going to give up.”

You better not. You get on your face, and you beg God for it.

“Yeah, but my husband won’t go to church. My husband won’t take us to church. My husband has us in a church. . .”

You get on your face and beg God. You know what to look for. You know what to ask for.

You don’t have a biblically functioning home? God is bigger than what you don’t have.

Freshman year in college, a young man comes to the locker room and shares Christ with me. He spends three-and-a-half weeks with me—three-and-a-half weeks answering my questions. I came to faith in Christ Friday, November 13, 1987. Six months later my Buddhist mother is converted. Six months after that my garden-variety pagan father who abandoned me and my mother when I was two years old was converted.

God is able.

Here’s what else I wanted you to know, because some of you are out there and you’re saying, “Yes, but my situation is less than ideal.” Hear me when I say this: I am a frail, fragile, and imperfect man, but I’m grateful to God for a seventeen-year-old girl who got pregnant with me when she was in high school, who did the best she could with what she had. And I’m grateful to God that in His providence, in spite of what we did not have, God has made me a man that my mother can be proud of. (applause)

Nancy: We’ve been listening to Pastor Voddie Baucham, reminding us that, no matter what your family circumstances may be, God is able. He is at work. And He is redeeming and making all things new. Voddie’s words are just as moving and timely today as when he first gave that message fifteen years ago at True Woman '10. They may be just what you needed to hear today. 

We had to edit Voddie’s message for time today, but you can listen to all of it or watch the video at our website. Go to ReviveOurHearts.com, select today’s program, and there’s a link in the transcript to the full message. 

Now, Voddie is with the Lord. Please pray for much comfort and grace for the Baucham family, for Grace Baptist Church, and Founders Seminary in Cape Coral, Florida, as they grieve this loss and let the Lord meet them in their time of great need.

And a quick reminder that True Woman '25 is starting tomorrow. It’s not too late to sign up. If you can’t make it to be there in person, you can watch online. You’ll find information at TrueWoman25.com. 

Thanks for listening today. Tomorrow we’ll look at the super important habit of your personal devotional life. I’m Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, inviting you back for Revive Our Hearts.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

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