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TITUS WOMEN
The aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as become holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things; That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children. To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed. Titus 2:3-5
TITUS WOMEN BIBLE STUDY- MONDAY - 7-10PM Prayer Room
Intercessory prayer Thursday evenings from 6 pm - 7:30 pm
TITUS WOMEN WILL STRIVE:
•To provide a safe haven for women to come to
•To grow in the word and ways of the Lord
•To educate, encourage, and discover your gifting(s) and talents the Lord has given to you and put into action
•To mentor and disciple the young to the wise – to learn from one another
•To Love one another
•To grow in HIS Grace and Love
•To help others fulfill their destiny in Christ
TITUS WOMEN BELIEVE:
Older (spiritually) women are to teach the younger. That includes all of us, because there is always going to be someone younger. Some of us are better at certain things and have different qualities, skills, and knowledge. Like any other thing in the body of Christ, as Christians, we all have a place and a role to fill.
Aren't you glad God gives us simple commands? Where we don't have to go out and read a book or take a course to fulfill the task? Mentoring other women involves the knowledge and skills that we as women already possess or are in the process of acquiring, in addition to living a holy life.
Obedience
Do you want to be free to know God and believe Him, glorify God, find satisfaction in God, experience His peace, and enjoy His presence?
Do you want generational yokes shattered and desire Christ to bind up our broken hearts, bring beauty from ashes, restore our virtue, and surpass our dreams. So how does liberty in Christ become a reality in life?
In a word: obedience! Obedience to God’s word
James 1:22-25
What is the relationship between God’s word and freedom?
Reading and rightly responding to the word of God is our ticket on the freedom train
God’s word is the perfect law that gives freedom. Sometimes we have to address other issues because sometimes we are in too much bondage to imagine living an obedient life.
Often we want God to move a wand and somehow magically remove every hindrance w/o requiring anything from us.
If God simply waved a wand over us and broke every yoke w/o our cooperation – what would probably happen? We would soon pick up another.
God desires to change us from the inside out – renewing our minds, starving our self-destructive tendencies, and teaching us to form new habits.
These results come only to those who learn to walk all over again, this time with their Deliverer.
The Book of Isaiah addresses the duel theme of captivity and liberty more than any other OT book.
God did not leave His nation wondering why they had gone into captivity
Isaiah 29:16
God displayed their problem like a marred piece of pottery on a wheel. What is God’s point?
Isaiah has more to say about the authority, rule, and complete uniqueness of God than virtually any other book of the Bible
Let allow God to engrave this truth on our hearts: liberty and authority will always go hand in hand.
During the ministry of the prophet Isaiah, captivity was imminent for the children of Israel because they had a serious authority problem.
In essence God was saying you got things turned around. “Let’s get this straight: Me, God. You human. Me Creator. You creature. Me Potter. You clay. You obey….. not for My good but for yours”
My daughter - seem to think she could break, bend, and even make the rules as she was in her teenage years - I don’t know how many times I had to remind her - Me parent - You child – Now I am reaping the harvest of those gentle – firm reminders she is a parent herself now teaching the same lessons to her children
Over and over in the Book of Isaiah, God perfectly underscores the same three principles:
• He has the right to rule
• He sets a high price for rebellion
• He pours out safety and blessings for obedience
Isaiah 30:8-21
Pretty confrontational, isn’t it? Think about your own human nature
W/o the Holy Spirit controlling your life
Consider how rebelling against God’s authority is not just foolish it is an insult to Almighty God, our Creator and King.
Let’s consider rebellion from a selfish point of view
How did God’s children cheat themselves through rebellion Isaiah 30:8-21
Rebellion means what you’d probably expect.
Words like defiant and disobedient are accurate synonyms.
The Hebrew definition also uses the English synonym refractory – it means – pigheaded – obstinate – stubborn –
Resisting authority = stubborn
Can you recall a situation in which you acted pigheaded toward God?
Let’s face it without God’s intervention in our lives we all tend to be pigheaded. We want to boss ourselves. One of the primary purposes of this week is to prove that bossing ourselves is a ticket to slavery.
The vivid portrait of a rebel in Isaiah 30:8-21 helps us recognize rebellion when it wells up in us. Each of the following phrases characterizes rebellion. Several of the characteristics signal impending disaster! A rebellious child of God
1) Doesn’t act like a child of God
2) Isn’t willing to listen to the Lord’s instruction
3) Prefers pleasant illusions over truth and
4) Relies on oppression
1. A rebellious child of God doesn’t act like a child of God (Isa30: 9)
(Vs9)
The original word for deceitful in this verse is = kechash – it means – not acting like sons…. Giving a false impression of who you are
If you are in covenant relationship with God but not acting like His child, you are living a lie!
If you have received Christ, the only time you are true to who you are is when you are walking like one of His children
Think about the last week or two
Identify a way you believe you gave a true impression of who you are acting as if you belonged to God:
Now, for private introspection and not group discussion, identify a way you may have given a false impression by not acting as if you belonged to God
The preachers the “be – true- to- yourself” philosophy. Christians can only be true to self when demonstrating that they belong to God
2. A rebellious child of God isn’t willing to listen to the Lord’s instruction (Isa. 30:9)
The Hebrew word for listen is shama meaning – to give undivided listening attention
Are you like me at times? Do you have a difficult time in giving anyone your undivided attention – from time to time?
Isaiah 30:9 however, doesn’t describe the accidentally inattentive.
Rebellious people don’t want to listen. Sometimes we’re unwilling to listen to God because we are resistant to being corrected, redirected, or challenged to change.
That’s rebellion!
The tragedy is that God would never tell us anything to defeat us.
He has a one-track mind – as far as we are concerned. He wants us to live like the over comers we are
Read Exodus 23:20-22 and Psm 81:10-14
What is the relationship between listening to God and prevailing over your enemy in warfare?
3. A rebellious child prefers pleasant illusions over truth (Isa 30:10-11)
One of the greatest prevelgious we enjoy in the United States is freedom of speech. I could not begin to count the number of preachers, speakers, and teachers that speak what the itching ears want to hear
When we are living in rebellion the last thing we want is to be confronted – especially from the Holy One Of Israel. – Notice the demand of the people of God in verse 10: “Tell us pleasant things” KJV “Speak unto us smooth things”
Who doesn’t like to be flattered? If enjoying flattery puts a noose around our necks, then seeking flattery hangs us! Satan could have written the book Flattery Can Get You Anywhere.
Go did not write His Word to condemn or flatter.
Paul wrote that scripture “is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2Tim3: 16-17)
2 Timothy 4:1-2; what did Paul give Timothy?
2 Timothy 4:3-4
Isaiah 30:10-11
Let’s make sure we are not looking to people to scratch our itching ears and hiding us from the truth
4. A rebellious child of God relies on oppression (vs12)
Here’s a shocker. Not only can God’s children be oppressed, but we can become reliant on the oppression. The word relied in (vs 12) is batach in Heb. – meaning “to attach oneself, to trust, to confide in, feel safe,”
The Heb. Word for oppression (osheq) indicates oppression by means of fraud or extortion…. A thing deceitfully gotten
We might say this: People who detach themselves from truth inadvertently attach themselves to lies that defraud or extort.
God created us to be attached to Him; therefore He made us with a real need to be attached. Our number one job here on this earth is to stay connected to God, not partially but fully connected!!!!!!!
To entice us Satan offers us alternate attachments masquerading as fulfillment to our inner needs.
Any attachment other than God is a fraud.
Please understand the word attachment in this context differs from healthy relationships with things or people. The key word is reliance
Wrong attachment means growing independent on something other than God
Think of your own situation
I grew up in a stronghold of fear
I longed to find a safe place to hide – for someone to take care of me
From the realm of my own painful experiences let look at the toxic emotional cocktail:
• A relationship made up of someone who has an unhealthy need to be taken care of mixed with someone who has an unhealthy need to care take
• The relationship ended up extorting God-given liberties and proved fraudulent relationships were affected, and wrong behaviors projected onto others I taught others and even my children to fear.
• Any place we have to hide is not safe.
• Through the fear wrong decisions were made (out of fear)
• ETC
• In Christ, we find the freedom to be safely exposed!
• If only we could begin to understand that God’s authority does not imprison, it sets us free!
• We need to know who we are in Christ and we have to know who God really is and how great, mighty and BIG our God is!
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