The Godly Woman
Titus 2:2-4
Well, that’s just outstanding! I was thinking as I was hearing our students sing and lead us in worship. First of all, I thought earlier, boy, that’s a good way to wake up from a Sunday afternoon night! They were rocking the place earlier. Then just to see their faces as they have led us in worship and we appreciate them so much.
It’s just one month, students, from beach camp! And we’re looking forward to that. We’ll be going down to Pensicola Florida area once again… Destine, Florida area for our Youth Camp, and it’s a great experience and we’re looking forward to that! But thank God, in a time… in a generation when sometimes there are question marks about the future and the future of this generation, we see so many fine students living for Christ, sharing their faith, and growing in their commitment and developing as disciples, fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. That’s exciting, isn’t it? Give them a hand once again. Give those students a hand!
Take your Bibles and turn with me to the book of Titus… the book of Titus. And tonight on this Mother’s Day evening it’s appropriate that we speak about “The Godly Woman… The Godly Woman.”
I heard one day that the Lord came to Adam and said, “Adam, I’m going to make you a helper, a completer. I’m going to make you a wife.” And Adam said, “Lord, what’s a wife?” And the Lord said, “Well, a wife is going to be someone like you, but not just like you… very different from you. She’s going to be beautiful and she’s going to be soft and tender and loving and wonderful. When you come home in the evening from working hard in the fields all day, your wife is going to meet you there, Adam, with your slippers, and the remote control to the television and a wonderful meal will be wafting… the smell of it will be wafting through the house, and she’s going to attend to your every need. She’s just going to love you. When you awaken in the morning, you’re going to smell bacon and eggs cooking, and it’s going to be a great day and every day’s going to be a great day because she’s just going to make sure that your life is absolutely perfect, Adam. You’re going to be glad that you have a wife.” And Adam said, “Well, Lord, that sounds wonderful! But that sounds expensive! How much is that going to cost me?” And the Lord said, “Well, Adam, that’s going to cost you an arm and a leg.” And Adam said, “Well, what can I get for just a rib?”
Now God created male and female. And it didn’t happen just like that, but it did happen. And God had a perfect plan and design for all people and that is that he created us male and female. And the distinctiveness and the differences between the genders… the sexes is a remarkable thing! It’s a good thing, it’s a God thing! And above all, later on in the book of Proverbs God’s Word would say of the woman… the priceless, valued woman… that her price is far above rubies. You can’t buy… you can’t purchase at any price a godly wife, a godly mother, a godly woman who gives herself in living for Jesus Christ and devotes herself to Christ, His church and to the family of faith.
Now, it’s very important that we take our cues not from the world, but from the Word concerning our roles and responsibilities in life as both husbands and wives, men and women, males and females. We all are aware that there is a great deal of cultural confusion and even chaos regarding these roles and responsibilities and the identity of the man and the identity of the woman.
Well, did you know the Bible is very radical on this subject… revolutionary, in fact. And when you read your Bible you discover that above all, the woman is elevated to an exalted position by the Word of God. And though some would suggest that the Bible subjugates women and puts them in an inferior position in life, that is absolutely not true. That is a caricature of Scripture. It is a caricature of what God has said.
In the ancient world family… marriage was a disaster. Talk about dysfunction! Whether it be among the Romans or the Greeks or even the Jews who attempted to live according to the Old Testament laws, there was a great deal of confusion about womanhood and basically women in the New Testament era were treated like a piece of property… just chattel, like cattle. They could be put away with reason and abused verbally and physically and in any other fashion that a man chose to abuse a woman. But when Jesus Christ came, He changed all of that. The greatest friend to women and to all people is the Lord Jesus Christ. And He will take your life and possess it and by His power make you the person… the man, the woman that God wants you to be.
So we need to make sure that we’re not listening to the world, but that we’re listening to the Word when it comes to our roles and responsibilities in life. And that goes for our dear ladies as well. The family is the one environment where your devotion, ladies… where your faithfulness and your consistence matters the most. It is where all of our greatest blessings are received… both husbands and wives, males and females. There is no greater privilege than being a part of a family and loving one another and raising our children if God gives us children to the glory of God.
Now there are many passages that I could have chosen for this text and for our sermon tonight. Certainly we could have picked the Proverbs 31 woman. We could have picked the passage in Ephesians chapter 5 when it speaks of wives and husbands working together in cooperation and mutual submission and love and devotion to Christ, and serving one another. And we could pick as we will look in just a moment 1 Peter chapter three. But at the outset I want you to look at Titus chapter two beginning at verse one:
1 But as for you, speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine:
2 that the older men be sober, reverent, temperate, sound in faith, in love, in patience;
Now ladies, listen.
3 the older women likewise, that they be reverent in behavior,
Now let’s identify the older women at the outset. I’m not certain that this has anything to do with chronology or age. It can have to do with chronology or age, speaking of some of our senior citizens. But more likely it has to do with maturity and spiritual maturity… older in the Lord. And every woman can teach and lead another woman… a younger woman. High school students can speak to the junior high girls about what it means to live for Christ in high school, and elementary students, and so forth. A mother who has children… toddlers… could talk to another young woman and teach her from the word of God regarding the beginning years of marriage. And then a woman who has children that are teenagers could talk to a parent… a mother who has toddlers just getting started, and so forth. And certainly some of our wonderful ladies… our mothers and our wives and the dear ladies who have run a few more laps in this marathon we call life… this marathon we call marriage… Certainly older women have the responsibility of teaching and giving direction and living and modeling the message before younger women. So having said that, let’s read that :
3 … they are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, nor given to much wine (that is, not having a taste for wine), teachers of good things…
4 that they admonish the young women (what?) to love their husbands, to love their children,
5 to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed.
Now several issues are at stake here: biblical issues that God has given to the family of faith and to every child of God. One, of course, is the issue of submission. And you see here in this passage of Scripture as in other passages of Scripture that the issue of submission is really not a big deal when it comes to the way we’re to live biblically; because all are to submit to God. We are to mutually submit to one another. Like Jesus we are to wash one another’s feet as Jesus washed the feet of His disciples.
And in the spirit of submission and servanthood, we are to give life in the marriage relationship.
This does not include men submitting to men outside the marriage relationship. It does not have any suggestion that every woman is to submit to any man or every man. But rather within the boundaries and the beauties of the Christian marriage, there is a role… there is a responsibility that we all play and someone is to be the head and someone is to be the captain and someone is to run the plays. And in the marriage relationship according to the passage of Scripture that we have mentioned and others, the husband is the head of the house and the wife is the heart of that home. She is responding in love and in completing the ministry and the work of the husband and the father. And this relationship is not the relationship of a master to a slave, but rather it is voluntary. It is not dictatorship or lordship; it is leadership.
And I’ve discovered over the years when a man will submit himself to the Lord and love his wife as Christ has loved the church, then a godly wife, a godly woman will lovingly respond and respect her husband. To submit to your husband does not mean that you are second class in the kingdom of God. In Galatians 3:28 we’re told that in Christ “there is no slave or free, there is no Jew or Greek, there is no male or female.” That is, socially and racially and sexually there is no difference as to who we are in Christ. We all stand on equal ground at the foot of the cross. But in the organization of life and in the organization of the home and the family and the church, God has established a leadership role and a followship role.
It does not mean inferiority. It does not mean when the Bible says that you are to submit to your husband, ladies, that he’s to sit and just bark orders and say do this and do that, and don’t do this and don’t do that. It doesn’t mean just staying barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. But rather it means that you will lovingly give yourself to your husband.
Let me read just a quote that I brought with me from well-known Christian counselor Dr. Jay Adams in speaking of this issue of submission. “This means if a husband’s thinking is out of line, his wife’s task is to help him correct his thoughts. If his life is out of line, her job is to help him to return to God’s path. If he simply is perplexed in a decision, she must bring her best reasons to the decision making process. Help given respectively never conflicts with submission. That is because submission requires her to contribute… to give what she has to offer, and that is what she must do; always in s spirit of respect and with a willingness to obey, even if she may not agree.” And then he concludes, “As a body with more than one head is a monstrosity, so too there must be only one head to a home.”
Now, we know, of course, from 1 Corinthians chapter 11… In fact, I want you to turn in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians chapter 11 and I want to show you something regarding this issue of submission; because it does not mean inferiority to your husband as we’re going to plainly see. First Corinthians 11:3:
3 But I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.
Now you see that? Now here’s what I want to show you. We know the Bible teaches God and Christ are one and the same. Jesus said, “If you’ve seen Me, you’ve seen the Father. I and the Father are one.” And so we believe and the Scripture teaches clearly… plainly throughout that God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit are one. And certainly Jesus is equal… co-equal and co-eternal with God the Father, just as the Holy Spirit is co-equal and co-eternal with God the Son and God the Father. So in terms of their essence… in terms of the nature of God, Christ, God and the Spirit are one. But in terms of roles, the role and the function of Jesus the Son was different from that of the Father and that is why Paul introduces this subject here of marriage and the relationships within the home, because just as God the Father and God the Son, co-equal and co-eternal have different functions and roles, we know that Jesus left glory… he left the essence of the Father. He never left the essential deity of the Father, but He subjected Himself, He submitted Himself to human flesh. Philippians chapter 2 says He emptied Himself and became as a servant to the world.
And in the same manner, just as we would never suggest that Jesus is inferior to God the Father, nor does the Scripture suggest that a woman is in any sense of the word inferior to a man. Rather they are equal… in Christ no male, no female… but we all have in marriage and in life and in the family different responsibilities. And if you really think about it, the godly woman has the greatest influence upon society and the next generation than any of us who are males. The power of the commitment of a godly woman is an awesome thing.
In the Ephesians passage when we’re told according to the Apostle Paul under the divine inspiration of the Holy Spirit that husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church, and then wives are to submit to their husbands as unto the Lord. Phillips and his paraphrase of that passage writes that “a woman is to adapt to her husband.” Now he is not lessening the impact of what submission means, but he’s simply pointing out and paraphrasing that passage to show us that it is a matter of a woman adapting to the love and to the needs and the fellowship of her husband; that a woman is not to be the competor to her husband, but the completor of her husband.
And so in this passage that we have in Titus… if you’ll get back to Titus with me. When it says to be lovers at home, homemakers at home, loving their children and loving their husbands and then obedient to their husbands, it raises that entire issue of submission. And I don’t think you as a Christian woman should ever be afraid of this. I don’t think you should rebel against this because to rebel against this is to rebel against the word of God. Don’t take a forty-something white male’s word for it, take the word of God’s word for it. And live according to the pattern of Scripture. This is God’s plan and God’s beautiful way of living life.
But it also raises the issue of sanctification in the life of the godly woman. And by sanctification I mean living a godly life and holy life. Look again here in this second chapter describing the older women, that they’re to be reverent, not slanderers or gossips, not given to wine, teachers of good things. And what are they to teach? ”Teach the women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chasted, homemakers, good, obedient to their husband that the word of God be not blasphemed.”
To be discreet and chasted… this has to do, of course, with the inner character and the inner beauty of the life of a godly woman, to be chasted and pure. Peter talks about this in 1 Peter chapter 3 when he talks about the sisterhood… the sorority of Sarah, the beautiful and lovely wife of Abraham. And she is a supermodel, if you will, of the godly woman and how a wife is to respond to God and to respond and relate to her husband and the world. And then he goes on to describe that women are to adorn themselves, not with outward adornment… external. It was the custom of the ancient world and particularly in the Greek and the Roman culture for women to dress extravagantly, to wear their hair high in these beehives and just be dripping with jewels and, if they could afford it, the gold and so forth, and to dress seductively. And he is saying to Christian women, to godly women that you’re to be chasted and pure, and major not on the externals but on the internals and the eternals.
Somebody said beauty is only skin deep, but ugly cuts clean to the bone. And some women are shallow and superficial because they’ve never cultivated the inner character that results in the outward countenance of a godly woman, a precious woman valuable and precious to her husband. And that’s a very strong word to you ladies and to you younger ladies… teenage girls. The way you dress… you don’t dress to kill, you can dress attractively according to Scripture, but never dress seductively, but modestly and carefully and never to attract the sensual or the sexual advancement of others. So be discreet and be pure and be chasted and be reverent.
And that phrase is interesting to me in verse four. It says that “they may admonish the young women to love their husbands and to love their children.” I thought that all women just loved their husbands and certainly they would love their children. But we’re living in a time where increasingly we are having to teach wives and mothers to love their families. And to live a life so that your faith will be believable.
Peter said even if your husband is not a believer, don’t leave your husband. People were coming to Christ out of the pagan world and some of the Christian wives were … they were seeing godly men in their church and they were thinking wouldn’t it be wonderful to be married to a Christian man? Wouldn’t it be great to leave this louse behind that I married? It must have been a mistake anyway. It was out of the will of God. I need to leave my husband and have a Christian husband. And Peter said, “Don’t leave your husband, but you stay with your husband; and with your godly life and your love and your devotion to Christ and your commitment to your family, you show with your life the difference that Jesus Christ makes. And ultimately your husband may be won without a word; without nagging him, without rolling up Scriptures and putting them in his toothpaste tube, and all that without badgering him, putting a Scripture on his shaving mirror, but just with your words… just with your life and the testimony of your faith, and the goodness of your life, you will point your husband to faith in Jesus Christ.
It’s a matter of attitude. So much of life is about attitude, isn’t it? And if your attitude as a woman… as a wife is positive and uplifting, it’s going to point your husband to Christ. Your first priority is to God… in devotion of worship, in the walk of your Christian life, bearing the fruit of the Spirit. Your second priority is your family… giving yourself in an unselfish commitment to your family, submitting to your husband, raising godly children. And I might also add caring for your aging parents. And then you have a responsibility to the church to teach and disciple younger women and to do good works. First Peter 2:10 speaks of the hospitality and benevolence and missions and caring for the needy, and those who are distressed.
What a wonderful life God has given us all in the family of God, and this brings fulfillment and the focus… So often women today are buying into the lie that you can’t be fulfilled outside of your family, that you have to go searching somewhere else for fulfillment. But God says our greatest fulfillment to both men and women is in growing the family and developing that family and each of us taking our place in that family.
To love your husband, to love their children, to explain the older women to the younger women. Sometimes an older woman has to take a younger woman aside and show them and teach them what it means to be a mother. And when you’ve packed a lunch for the 5897th time and you don’t think you can look at another tuna fish sandwich, and you think you’re not going to get through this and you’re wondering why you’re so bored and why you’re so burned out, then a godly woman comes along and teaches you from the word of God and encourages you from Scripture and helps you through a tough time and teaches you about servanthood and teaches you about perseverance and so forth.
So there’s the issue of sanctification, there’s the issue of submission, then there’s the issue of service. Again, the first priority of a wife and a mother and of all woman is to live for Jesus Christ. And then if you’re married and you have a family, to take care of the needs of your family. Look in verse five again. I just want to comment on that word homemakers there. Keepers at home. First Timothy 5:14 speaks of the wife being the manager of the house which literally means to rule the home. The woman’s primary mission… the Christian wife and mother’s primary mission is to make the home a royal residence for the Lord of glory and for the family of faith. That is your mission in life. Caring for the home means loving your husband, developing your children and managing the household affairs.
Now there is nothing in Scripture that I can find that forbids a woman from working outside the home, but it is clear… it is absolutely clear in the Bible that the woman… the wife’s… the mother’s priority is in the home. Now we certainly understand when single moms who are playing both mom and dad are required to work just to make ends meet. We understand that sometimes it becomes a financial necessity for a mother to work. But (listen to this) make sure… make sure before you leave that home, wife and mother, to go to work that it is God calling you to do it and not the world calling you to do it. You understand the difference? The highest calling in life is your calling… if God gives you children… is your calling as a wife and a mother. Don’t accept a lesser calling if God doesn’t call you from that exalted place. Don’t let the world squeeze you into it’s mold. And if you’re called outside the home, make sure the Lord is leading you. And even then make sure that you somehow by all means possible make sure that your children have the best of care… Christian care, the loving care of Christians. And if they’re in school, that you’re working while they are in school.
Then be creative. You know, the Proverbs 31 woman was a creative wife and mother, and it speaks about her working at home and through her home. I think of Mary Crawley the mother of Don Carter and also Mary Kay… both of those single moms required to work, yet knowing their responsibility was also and first priority at home, so they developed a means by which women could work out of their home and through their home and still maintain the home as their first priority. And there are other businesses that have done that. And if you’re a business person, it’s good that if you have working wives and mothers, that you provide time off for them and make sure that they’re taking care of their home and that they have the time to do that. And with the computer generation more and more I think it’s going to be possible for wives and mothers to be at home and to make the first priority the first priority.
And let me just say to the men and to the husbands and fathers here… do your best to provide for your family so that she… your wife and mother of your children can give herself to the family. There are some guys… they’re always waiting around on the big hit. You know what I’m talking about? They don’t want to go get a job somewhere. They’re just waiting on the big hit… the next big investment to strike, the next big mother lode that’s going to come in. And all along their wife is doing double duty at home and at the office somewhere while they’re waiting on the big strike.
As a husband… as a father, make it your priority to provide a home and a family so that your wife can stay at home if necessary as God would provide and to teach your children and to raise them up in the nurture and the admonition of the Lord. Keepers at home… “and that they admonish the young women (verse 4) to love their husbands, and to love their children.”
I heard about a mom who read a book of parenting… being the best mom she could be, and she was convicted that she needed to be a better mom. And so she worked up her courage to go upstairs and talk to her teen-age son, to tell her teenage son that she loved him. It had been a while since she had really… because he was always up there playing his drums.
Now I can relate to that. We had a little house when I grew up and I had a drum set in my room, and I would turn the stereo up as loud as I could turn it up and bang on those drums. And I would hear my mother telling her friends, “You know, I just love drum music.” Must have been awful! But she loved me so she even put up with those drums.
But that kid was just incessantly beating on those drums and she could never get through. So she walked up to the door… up the stairs and to his door and knocked on the door and said, “Son, do you have just a minute?” He stopped playing and said, “Sure, Mom, I’ve always got a minute for you.” Mom said, “Well, you know, son, your dad and I have been thinking and talking lately and I just came up here to tell you that I like the way you play the drums. “Well, thanks, Mom. You and dad both like the way I play the drums?” “Yeah, we do.” “Well, thanks, Mom.” She began to go down the stairs and she said, “You know that’s not what I went up there to tell him. I went up there to tell him ‘I love you’,” so she went back up the stairs and knocked on the door and said, “Son, excuse me. You got another minute?” He said, “Sure Mom, I’ve always got a minute for you.” She said, “Son, really what I wanted to tell you is Dad and I… we think you’re great! You’re a great kid!” “Well, thanks, Mom. You think I’m great?” “Yeah, we think you’re great.” She left the room and she didn’t get very far, she realized, “I’ve got to go back and say what I came to say up here. And before she could even get to the room, he shouted out, “Yeah, Mom, I’ve got another minute.” She said, “Son, what I really came up here to tell you is I love you with all my heart.” And the son replied, “Well, thank you, Mom. Thank you so much. I love you, too.” And they hugged. It was a big hug. She turned around to leave and before she left, he said, “Mom, you got a minute?” She said, “Sure, son.” “Let me ask you a question. Have you and dad just been to a seminar lately?”
We have to learn how to show our love, to express our love and to give our love. And you know what I think children need in this generation more than anything beside the teaching of the word of God itself, is for moms and dads to be cheerleaders for your kids. Kids need cheerleaders.
I think of my mother. My mother was the greatest supporter a kid ever had. Always believing in me… encouraging me, showing up at the important times and sometimes times that were embarrassing frankly. But always being on my team, always encouraging me.
Rick Deboss who was the founder of Amway was asked, “What is the greatest management skill you’ve ever learned?” And Deboss said, “The greatest management skill I’ve ever learned is how to be a cheerleader to my employees.” And what’s true in the business world is more true in the home. And more than anything, ladies, your children need to know that you’ll go to the walk for them and if necessary, you’ll go through the wall. The praise, the affirmation, the encouragement… You know, no child, no matter what their age, ever outgrows the love of their mother and the need for their mother to love them. So keep loving, keep serving God, and you’ll leave a legacy that will last forever.
To close this sermon tonight, I have a living illustration of what I’ve been talking about. And I want May Jordan and Joanie Buster and Micah Buster… a daughter, a mother, and a grandmother to come up here, and Micah got in a conflict in a basketball game and she’s on crutches. And this is Joanie Buster, the wife of Mike Buster, and this is Mom Mae… right there… Jordan. And they’re going to share a testimony with us.
Joanie: One of the greatest privileges in my life is being a mom. And what a blessing it is tonight to stand before you with two people that I love so dearly… my mom Mae and my daughter Micah. You know the Scriptures teach us that we are to pass on our faith from generation to generation. And as a mother my priority is to do just that… to pass on my faith to my children, just as my mom did for me. My mom invested everything in me. She was my cheerleader and she taught me how to live and how to love. And she taught me that no matter what she did, she did it to the best of her ability and she tried to raise me the best she knew how. And she gave me everything that she could. And the greatest gift my mother ever gave me… the one that I am especially thankful for is that she taught me about Jesus and His unconditional love for me. And for that, I am ever grateful.
Mae: Thank you, Joanie. I, too, am grateful for a Christian mother that I had that taught me early to love the Lord, and she passed on her faith to me. It was because of her role model that I wanted to emulate her in rearing my children. I remember one time Joanie came home from high school and she said, “I’m so sorry… I feel so sorry for a new girl in our class. She has just moved here from New York and she doesn’t have friends, yet.” And she said that she had been a friend to her and had been introducing her to her friends. And she invited her to come to Sunday school and church. Chris came and she started to be a regular and she credits Joanie with winning her to the Lord. She now is married, has two children. She’s a very strong Christian and I’m sure that she’s passing on this faith to her children. I remember there were five neighborhood children Joanie and Julie (her twin sister Julie) age and they had gone through elementary, junior high and high school together and they made a pact. They decided that they wouldn’t drink, smoke, do drugs, or have premarital sex. I think that I could say for all the parents of these children how much that meant to us. It’s such a joy to see my daughter as a parent now and to see how she’s at work for the Lord, and how she continues in her daily life with the faith that was handed down through me and from my mother. And she’s also teaching this to her children and she continues this legacy and I’m her best cheerleader.
Joanie: As a mother we often ask, “Am I making a difference?” I trust God with my children’s lives, I pray for them daily, I try to set a good example and I’m trying to train them in the ways of the Lord. And sometimes though you look and you hope for a sign of confirmation. I remember when Micah was ten and she was talking on the phone with a friend from school who was Muslim. And she came in the room and she said, “Mom, I’ve been telling Gonause about Jesus. And she wants to pray and ask Him into her heart. Would you come help me talk to her on the phone about that?” And right then God was saying to me, “Joanie, it is worth it all.” Micah has a scripture she’d like to share with you.
Micah: In Proverbs 31 it says, “If you can find a truly good wife, she is worth more precious than gems. Her children stand and bless her. So does her husband. He praised her with these words: There are many fine women in this world. but you are the best of them all. Charm can be deceptive and beauty doesn’t last, but a woman who fears God shall be greatly praised.”
Joanie: Being a mom is a challenge. Being a godly mom is impossible without God’s love and mercy. I want to leave a legacy of faith for my children. And my prayer is that one day Micah and her two brothers Mark and Luke will look back on this and say, “Mom, it was worth it. Thank you.
Amen. That’s good! Just remain standing and we do stand to give glory to God for the privileges of life. And what a beautiful testimony of faith and I know so many of you could give that same testimony and thank you, folks, for sharing tonight our hearts as well. Would you bow with me in prayer?
Oh, Lord, how we thank You for the callings of life. We thank You that You have made us one in Jesus Christ. And in Your church and in the home the family that You have provided for us. We thank You for the privilege of living for Jesus and sharing our faith and loving one another. And, O God, help us to hold each other closely and never let go, because we know how fragile life can be and how precious our families are to each one of us. Thank You, Jesus, for Your love for us and I pray now that each person here tonight would know You. I pray for that person tonight… that child, that mom or dad, young man, young woman who doesn’t have a personal relationship with You would discover that joy and that purpose in life in knowing Christ. And, O God, I pray that tonight would be the night. And God, I pray that during this time of decision Your Holy Spirit would work, bringing these precious ones to Yourself because we know that You want to be a Father and a Mother to all who come to You. And to those who are hurting tonight, some in this room joining in this prayer right now are facing the breakup of their home and of their family and of the loss of life and, Lord, there are some who are in pain tonight as we talk about the happiness of the home and the joy of being a parent. And we know that there are some in this room tonight who are in great pain. May Your Holy Spirit comfort them and strengthen them and help them. Most of all, bring them… draw them close… close to You. We pray now as a church family that we would always commit ourselves to bringing families to You, and singles to You, and, God, that our entire church would be devoted to Your family… Your forever family. For we pray in Jesus’ name. AMEN
If you have never received Christ, we want to help you do that. We’ll take an open Bible and explain more fully what it means to be saved, what it means to know Jesus and you can walk out of here with Christ in your life. Maybe a mother… a dad have shared the faith with you and now it’s time to walk the walk and to live the life. We welcome you.
Maybe you’ve been a Christian in name only and now it’s time to truly belong to Jesus and to live for Jesus. And in a world in which people are so often saying, “Well, it’s my life and I do with myself what I want to do!”, isn’t it time that you turn over the reins of your life and the rule of your life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ?
For we are bought with a price. We are not our own. We’re bought with a price… the precious blood of Jesus. Come to our risen Redeemer tonight.
Others who belong to Christ, come and belong to Prestonwood tonight. As God the Holy Spirit is prompting you to join with us in sharing our mission, you come and be a part of this church family, transferring your membership. Lead the way. You’ll serve as an example and as an escort to others who need to come to Christ for the first time.
If you want to come and kneel here at this place of decision… this altar of decision, make your way. You can come and pray. You may want to come as a couple or as a family or just as in individual and do business with God here in church tonight. As we sing together. Purify My Heart. Let’s sing it together.