This past weekend my church held a “Meet the Author” event. I confess I was concerned about it being a bit too much “about me” but instead it turned into a very special opportunity for me to share about our ministry here at S.U.M.
These dear women at my church, who I am privileged to call friends, are now praying for us here, and there are some pretty fierce prayer warriors in this group!
During the Q&A time, I noticed one table in particular because there sat a group of young women ranging in age from late teens to early twenties. I think they’d migrated together to avoid us “older” ladies.
As I looked at them, it was as if God spoke to my heart, “This is a moment not to be missed.”
At the risk of sounding even older than I am (I’m not old, really…) I did as God lead me and spoke to these precious and young hearts because one, I wanted to try to save them from the heartache of a mismatched marriage. And two, God has been clear with me to teach His Word.
God's Word says not to be yoked with unbelievers. We all know that here at S.U.M., but at the age of these young women, I didn’t know this.
I shared with them that God didn’t put this in His Word to dictate to us. He’s not out to strike them with lightning if they date an unbeliever. He put this precept in the Bible to guide and protect us. Just like we as parents want to protect our children from pain, so does God.
There is a generation of single women coming up behind us that need to know what it means to be spiritually mismatched. They need to know what God’s Word has to say about it. They need to understand that to tempt such a path is to “play” with potential pain and unhappiness that God doesn’t desire for their lives.
Many of you have expressed concerns over this younger generation. I think God is moving not only to bring awareness to this ministry to help those of us in mismatched marriages, but also to help our daughters and sisters, our sons and brothers to understand God has a plan for them. For their future.
One young woman came up to me afterwards and shared her heart with me. I see this fear in these young women (as I saw it in my oldest daughter) that they will never find someone to love them. We need to let them know that’s not true. I was able to give her the reassurance that God had a man in mind for her (and I do believe this because I’ve seen how God worked this out in my daughter’s life) and that she needed to trust God and wait for His timing.
How do we help young women (and men) to entrust their hearts to God? Many of us stand in a place to be mentors. We even have biblical reference to this in Titus 2:3-5, a model of mentorship between the older to the younger.
Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God. – Titus 2:3-5
On the surface, this Scripture selection can seem a bit, well, old-fashioned, but based upon what we know about Paul, what his goals were (to spread the Gospel) and customs of the time, we can apply this model today and appreciate its wisdom.
Learning from the Past
As I studied these Scriptures I thought of the mentors I’ve been blessed with over the years-precious women who have shared their wisdom and knowledge with me and fed into my life with their own faith and experiences. I treasure those times sitting with our Bibles open and cups of coffee as we shared from our hearts and studied God’s Word.
Lending into the Present
As I learned from my mentors, I’ve been able to apply these lessons to my own growth and faith journey and apply the wisdom and knowledge they shared to my own life. Then as I’ve grown in age and faith, God has used me to do the same in the lives of other women and especially my own daughters. What a blessing and reward to see a younger woman bloom and grow in her faith because God used us in such a crucial way to help another grow closer to Him.
Launching into the Future
Even though my daughters are grown, I still play the role of mentor in their lives. And in this model they too will play the role of mentors to other women as they grow in their own faith and to their own daughters down the road. This is a precious legacy we carry from those who came before us to model in our own lives and to share with those to come after us.
Think about those who have mentored you and write three of their names in the spaces on the left. Then think and pray about three other women (include your daughters!) you can mentor and write their names in the spaces on the right. This is what I call The Titus 2 Legacy.
If you feel you are in need of a mentor, start praying for one. If you are feeling led to be a mentor, pray about that too. Maybe you see yourself in both positions, which is the best place to be! I can think of no better way to live out the truth and cement it in our own lives than to share it with others.
Praying and believing,
Dineen
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