Dear Older Women,
Be honored it’s your title, not ashamed. You have a beautiful calling that explicitly honors God’s Word.
We – the younger women – need you Titus 2 women desperately.
You’re our examples of how not to be malicious gossips, enslaved to things like “anti aging” or social media. And speaking reverence for what God calls holy.
With our youth and charisma, we may seem like we have it all together, know how to do our hair and makeup and have the right bag for every occasion, but our generation is starved of spiritual mothers. We have influencers galore, which is why we MAY know how to do our hair, but we need someone to enter into our actual living rooms and encourage and advise us specifically.
We are designed to need encouragement to love our husbands in a world that attacks marriages. Exhortation to love our children and risk offending us to share how to raise them with biblical convictions. To teach what is GOOD in the noise of googling everything we don’t know. We have more knowledge on any subject than ever, but we are stressed, because we lack the wisdom and discernment to apply it.
We need help to manage our homes in a way that what matters outlasts the cravings for aesthetics. Ground us on the eternal and not what the latest life hack link will solve. Declare to us what is sensible and pure.
We desire to hear God’s word affirmed in the testimony of your years lived out. What do you wish you knew in your early years of marriage? We need flesh and blood mentors who we can see have imperfections and gray hairs, and yet God was faithful all the way.
We might be too shy to ask for help or think you don’t have time, but we truly need your gracious encouragement and pointing to the gospel. Side by side worship and learning more about our Savior.
Teach us the old-fashioned joy of working at home, kindness, and submission to our husbands SO THAT the Word of God will not be dishonored. Consider the mother and grandmother of Timothy who simply acquainted him with Scripture.
The heart of our community and learning should be from our local church. Please pray for us younger women to be humble and ask to receive discipleship. Do not be afraid to reach out and initiate. As Howard Hendricks said, “the pedestals are empty.” A little motherly wisdom and love will go a long, long way.
Love,
The younger women who hope for the courage to be older someday soon
Titus 2:3-5
“Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored.”
Abigail Rehmert 
This was so beautiful! Thank you for writing it! As an older woman myself, with older women friends, we do get the impression we are unneeded in younger women’s lives who have all the information they need at their fingertips and look so great on the outside (and on social media). So many of us feel that we have nothing to offer such a put together and busy generation of women. However, the Lord has blessed me with younger women who were brave enough to ask me to meet with them, and it has been such a rich blessing for me! I have learned so much from them and we’ve encouraged each other deeply.
My job as the older woman is not as scary as I once thought, in fact, it’s actually pretty easy: we go out to coffee, we catch up on life, and after that I ask her what she wants to talk about… and listen well. Mostly I ask clarifying questions, “What do you mean by that?” “Can you explain more?” etc. If I’m faithful to pray before we meet, and as we are talking, the Holy Spirit always assists by bringing verses to mind. In some cases we’ve gone through a book together, or a chapter or book of the Bible, but in some we just talk about what Scripture looks like lived out in day-to-day life.
Many of us older women think that since we had a messy walk with God, or children who have walked away from the Lord, or a less than perfect life, we don’t really have much to share. But, that is a lie that keeps us from doing what is clearly commanded in Scripture. I’ve found those less than perfect outcomes humble us and keep us dependent on Christ. They should not push us away from being obedient to Scripture and faithful to our younger sisters in Christ.
If you’re a young woman reading this, pray earnestly for the Lord to show you an older woman in your church who you might trust and talk with, and then ask her out to coffee and be real and vulnerable. Start by sharing your story with her and ask her to share hers. Ask her how she came to Christ and about her marriage and family. Tell her what you need help with in life and especially in your spiritual life.
If you are an older woman reading this, do the same, pray for the younger women in your church and then look around. Maybe serve in the nursery or children’s church and get to know the moms. Ask the Lord to show you who you might ask to go to coffee or tea and get to know better. Share how you came to Christ and what God has done for you. Ask her what is hard in life and what she is thankful for. And before you part ways, pray for her. Oh, that the Lord would make us all willing to be obedient to His Word!
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Kari, I’m so glad you commented. This is such a helpful perspective and visual and can spur on Titus 2 women of all ages. Thank you!
I love the examples you gave. I have been blessed with many wise women who have stepped in at different points of my life and on wildly different topics. None of it was formal or scary! Though it always takes initial courage to ask a vulnerable question, there is grace and laughter and fellowship that follows (and yes, sometimes tears). It is a JOY for all to obey the Lord in this way.
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