Transcript

Nancy: Well, Mary, we're coming to the end of this series, and we've looked at some amazing elements. Who knew that in just a few short verses here in Titus 2 . . .

Mary: . .  . three verses . . .

Nancy: . . . there'd be so much to unpack. We took one little word like "kind" or "pure" and find that there's much in God's Word on each of those subjects. And what I love about the part we come today is that it takes all of those subjects—those different things we've learned (loving husbands and children, working at home, being self-controlled, not slanderers, etc.)—and it says there's a forward motion from one generation to the next, a passing of the baton. A true woman is a spiritual mother; she's leaving a legacy.

And that comes out in this passage. It says what they're to look like, this is the kind of life they're to have, but then, they're supposed to be not only models, they're supposed to be mentors.

Mary: Exactly. What's interesting about this is that this is a letter the apostle Paul is writing to Pastor Titus, but Paul is not telling Titus that he needs to teach all the women. He's saying, "Make sure that your women are equipped to train the other women."

So there's this motion of the truth of God being passed on from generation to generation, not just in general terms, but from woman to woman.

Nancy: What it means to be a woman is to be taught from woman to woman, and it says older women are to be teachers. They're to teach what is good and so train the young women. Now, that's not always a chronological age thing. It can, of course, involve being chronologically older, but it may be just more mature in the faith. There's a responsibility not only to live the faith ourselves, but to be sharing it.

Mary: There have been women at every stage of my life that have had input. I think about when I was in high school—Diane North was the lady who was mentoring me. She was an older woman, but only twenty-three or twenty-four years old. Now, I considered her a lot older. I'm sure she wouldn't have considered herself to be "old" or to be an older woman.

Nancy: Every woman is an older woman to somebody.

Mary: We don't consider ourselves older women except to the women who are younger than we are!

Nancy: And this gal had an influence in discipling you?

Mary: She did. She was a sounding board for my ideas. She just really encouraged me right up front to get into the Word of God and to be a student of the Word of God and to be conscientious about how I used the Word. I learned a lot from her on how to conduct a Bible study, how to talk to other girls about my faith.

She mentored me on some aspects of leadership and drawing women in and taking them from stage A to stage B to stage C in terms of their growth, and discipling them. I learned a lot from her.

Nancy: How about when you were a young wife and mom? Were there any older women who invested in your life then?

Mary: As I said, I can think of women throughout my life. I think of a woman who actually was an oooolder woman, Pearl Purdy (that's a mouthful!). She was probably seventy-five years already, and she was one of those older women who remained engaged with younger women.

I was twenty-three or twenty-four, going over to Pearl Purdy's house. She would have tea with me, or invite my husband and me over, as a couple, and we would spend an evening with Pearl …