The part of the chapter that I'd like to focus on is toward the end of the chapter beginning in verse number 26 where the bible reads "Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil. Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you."
What I want to preach about this morning is the attributes that should be found in a godly woman. Now some sermons that I preach are more geared toward men, some are geared toward women, and some are just geared toward everybody. This morning, sermon is mainly geared toward women because of the subject matter that the bible deals with here, but honestly, a lot of things can be applied to men too and you can be the judge of that as we go forward in the sermon, but one of the main subjects that this passage talks about is anger, and it starts out in verse 26 by saying "Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath." The first thing I want to point out about this is that anger is not always a sin. In fact, the bible is saying in the first 3 words there, verse 26, "Be ye angry," so if anger were always a sin, then it would be impossible to be angry and sin not. That would be a contradiction.
If anger's a sin, it wouldn't make any sense to say "Hey, be angry, but don't sin," and we see that there was a time when Christ was angry in Mark chapter 3. We see that there was a time when the spirit of the lord came upon king Sol and he became very angry as a result of the holy spirit being upon him, so it's not that anger in and of itself is wrong, but let me tell you something. Most of the time, we as human beings, when we're angry, it's wrong most of the time because the bible talks a lot more about anger in a negative way than it does about a positive way. Are there times when anger is right and justified? Of course, but most of the time, anger is not a good attribute in our lives. The bible talks about the fact that we should be slow to anger, so if we're just quick to get angry, that's a sin.
The bible talks about the fact that we should not let the sun go down upon our wrath there in verse 26. When he says being angry and not sinning, he's saying "You're not letting the sun go down upon your wrath," meaning you're not holding a grudge. You're not remaining bitter from day to day after the sun goes down, which will give place unto the devil according to verse 27. Anger is a big subject in and of itself, but when we look down at verse 21, it says "Let all bitterness," and again, that goes with what I was just saying about verse 26, "Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice."
Now with all that in mind, and we're going to come back to this passage a little bit, go to Proverbs chapter 21. We're going to be in Proverbs a lot this morning because proverbs is a book that has a lot of guidelines for how to be a godly man and how to be a godly woman, and so we're going to look at a lot of things about being a godly woman in Proverbs and you'll see why the sermon is directed toward women here when you see these scriptures in Proverbs. It says in Proverbs 21 verse 19, "It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman." Now according to this scripture, an angry woman is not someone that you want to dwell with, it's not someone that you want to be married to, the bible says you would rather go out and dwell in the wilderness than to dwell in a comfortable house and civilization with an angry and a contentious woman.
Go with me to chapter 19 verse 13. It says "A foolish son is the calamity of his father: and the contentions of a wife are a continual dropping." Go to chapter 21, and while you're turning to chapter 21, I'll read for you from Proverbs 27:15 where it says "A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike." Look at verse 9 of chapter 21 there. "It is better to dwell in a corner of the housetop, than with a brawling woman in a wide house." You don't have to turn there, but it says in Proverbs 25:24, "It is better to dwell in the corner of the housetop, than with a brawling woman and in a wide house."
These are a lot of scriptures. I just read for you 5 back to back verses that are all talking about the same thing, saying "Look, you don't want to dwell in the house with an angry, contentious, or brawling woman." Those are the 3 words that are interchanged, but all 5 verses are talking about the same type of person. The person who's angry, bitter, fighting. What do you think of when you think of brawling, fighting? What do you think of when you heard contending, fighting? Just anger, fighting, bickering, this is what's being referred to in these scriptures. This is the last thing that a woman should want to be according to these scriptures, so if we're going to talk about the attributes of a godly woman, the first thing that we need to see is that a godly woman should be kind and forgiving, not angry and clamorous.
Now go if you would to Proverbs 31. Proverbs 31 is the famous passage about the virtuous woman, and it takes the form of a mother instructing her son, and she's warning her son to stay away from alcohol and she's warning him of the strange woman, she's warning him and then she also decides to tell him what he should look for in the right kind of a woman. He gets a description of a virtuous woman that he should seek to find, and in this description of the virtuous woman, you'll see a lot of scriptures about this woman doing a lot of good work. She's doing a lot of hard work around the house, she's cooking, she's sewing, she's doing all these domestic type things, but look what it says in verse number 26 about the virtuous woman. It says in verse 26, "She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness."
Now with that in mind, go back to Ephesians 4. In Proverbs, we see that godly attributes of a woman are that she is not angry, not contentious, and not a brawler in the home, 5 scriptures that said that this is one of the worse things that you could be, and then it says in Proverbs 31 that "In her tongue is the law of kindness." Now look what it says in Ephesians 4 again. Of course we saw in verse 26, "Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath." Again, the warning against bitterness and being angry from day to day. Then if you jump down to verse 31, it says " Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind," so what's the opposite of being a wrathful, angry, and clamorous, bitter woman? What's the opposite? Being what? Kind.
Do you see that? He said "Be kind one one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you," so if you are a young, single woman, you're goal and desire should be that you would grow to be a woman that is a kind woman, that is a forgiving woman, that is gentle and not angry, wrathful, bitter, bad attitude, bad mood, angry. You say "Well there's nothing wrong with being angry." Wait a minute, most of the time, in the bible, angry, anger is negatively spoken of. Now the times when anger is positively spoken of is you'll see people getting angry with righteous indignation. For example, Jesus Christ became angry when he saw that they were selling merchandise in the house of God. Do you remember that? But notice, Jesus Christ was slow to anger because he didn't just see it and just blow his top.
The bible's clear to tell us that when Jesus saw that spectacle of the house of God being made into a house of merchandise, he went outside the temple and he sat down and made a whip of cords. He manufactured his own whip. Now who's ever made your own whip before? Few people have, a couple of people have. Now, how long did it take you? Brother Charlie?
Charlie: About 35, 40 minutes.
Pastor Anderson: 35, 40 minutes.
Speaker 3: A couple of hours.
Pastor Anderson: A couple of hours. Depending on how many whips you made or whatever, it's going to take a few hours, or maybe 35 minutes, you must have known what you're doing, but it's going to take time. I don't know how long it took Jesus, but he didn't just blow his top, did he? No, he thought about it, he's premeditated when he sat outside the temple, made his own whip, and then took that whip into the temple, flipped over the tables, and used that whip to drive out the money changers, to drive out the merchants out of the temple, and pronounced them that they should not make his father's house into a house of merchandise. Now here's what I've noticed in life. If you ever get angry, people will accuse you of being quick to anger no matter how long it took you to get angry. This is not right. You can't just sit there and just condemn all anger because Jesus was right to be angry what they were doing in his house.
Jesus was right to be angry with the Jews and the synagogue when they didn't want them to heal on the Sabbath day in Mark 3. It says "He looked upon them with anger." Sol was right to get angry about the foreign occupiers that were enslaving his people and that wanted to harm his fellow Israelites when he got angry and hacked up the oxen and mailed them out to everybody and rallied the troops to fight against the enemies of the lord, so it's not that anger's wrong, but let me tell you this. Most of our anger is not righteous indignation about God's house being desecrated, about innocent people being killed. That's not the type of things that we're often getting angry about. We often just get angry because just says something that we don't like or because somebody spills a glass of milk, and there's no use crying over spilled milk, but we get angry over little things sometimes, and the bible does describe a type of person that is an angry person.
For example, in Proverbs 22, the bible say, and you don't have to turn there, but turn if you would to Proverbs 29, but in Proverbs 22, it says "Make no friendship with an angry man; and with a furious man thou shalt not go: Lest thou learn his ways, and get a snare to thy soul," so the bible is describing a type of person that is an angry person, and it's saying "Don't hang around with that person, don't be friends with that person, or it will rub off on you and you will learn his ways, and you will become an angry person." Jesus wasn't just an angry person, just ... All the time, just mad everyday, no, but certain things made him mad it was appropriate for him to get angry, but he was also slow to anger. The bible says the lord is slow to anger. When anger becomes wrong is when it just becomes a part of our character, where we're just an angry person, or how about this.
Are you angry more often than you're not angry? Are you angry every single day, on a daily basis? Are you angry, and then you go to bed and you wake up and you're still angry? You're an angry person, and this should not be something that characterize us, and not only that, God says "Don't hang around with people like this or they'll rub off on you." Now, again, the reason I'm directing this toward women is because there are a lot of verses that specifically talked about how bad it is to live with an angry woman and telling women to be kind and to speak kind words and not to be filled with anger and wrath, so that means that for a woman who doesn't want to be this kind of a bitter woman, she should not hang around with a bunch of bitter women. I've seen it before where women will hang around with other women that are bitter, and then they start getting bitter.
For example, they're happily married, but then they hang around with some woman who's been divorced multiple times and has all this man-hating bitterness all pent up, and she wants to just complain about "Oh, men" or maybe she's even married, but just mad at her husband, doesn't love her husband, doesn't respect her husband, that's all going to rub off on a godly woman if she hangs around with that type of person, listens to that all the time. That's why God said "Make no friendship with an angry man, and with the furious man thou shall not go." The same could be said angry woman, furious woman. Don't hang around with friends that are going to turn you into an angry, bitter, mean person instead of being kind and tender hearted and forgiving of things that wrong, people that do you wrong. Now if you would, let's talk about the word "Clamor".
Flip over, if you would, to Proverbs 19. You're already in Proverbs, so just to chapter 19. Proverbs 19. Actually, before I talk about clamor, let me talk to you about discretion. Discretion is a word that God also says should characterize a godly woman, so so far we've seen that a godly woman should be kind and forgiving, not angry, bitter, and brawling and contentious. What's contentious mean? Arguing. Just fighting, arguing.
Now look what the bible says in Proverbs 19:11. It says "The discretion of a man deferreth his anger; and it is his glory to pass over a transgression," so isn't the bible saying in verse 11 here that if we are people who have discretion, that will help us to control anger? Because the bible says "The discretion of a man deferreth his anger; and it is his glory to pass over a transgression," so is a discreet man or a man with discretion one who blows up about everything? No, it says "It's his glory to pass over a transgression." Someone does something wrong, someone says something wrong, and he lets it go. That's what discretion does. Well the bible also says in Proverbs 11:22, if you flip over to there because we want to apply this on to women, it says in Proverbs 11:22, "As a jewel of gold in a swine's snout, so is a fair woman which is without discretion."
We see here that to be a godly, righteous woman, you definitely do not want to be a woman that is without discretion because he says no matter how beautiful you are, it's like a jewel of gold in a swine's snout if you are a fair or beautiful woman which is without discretion, and in Titus chapter 2, when he lists off the attributes of a godly woman, the first thing he says that a godly woman should be is to be discreet. He says "To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed," so in both old and new testament, we have the admonition for women to be discreet, to have discretion, and that this discretion will also defer anger and cause them not to blow up or be angry about every little transgression of anyone in their lives, whether that's their children, their husband, their friends, whatever, relatives, on and on.
The bible's teaching that a godly woman should have kindness, forgiveness, discretion. Now let's talk about the word "Clamoring." Go if you would to ... Let's see here. Chapter 9 verse 13 in Proverbs. Chapter 9 verse 13, because one of the things that God told us that as Christians, we should put it off as clamor. He said "Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." He associate anger and clamor. Put off anger, put off clamor, put off wrath. Look what the bible says in Proverbs 9:13. "A foolish woman is clamorous: she is simple, and knoweth nothing," so again, when we look at this contrast of an ungodly woman in the book of Proverbs, which comes up over and over again, one of the things she's described as is clamorous.
Now what does it mean to be clamorous? Clamor means a loud noise. Clamor also means complaints or outcry of dissatisfaction. Just crying out, complaining, loud, bitter. These are all the things that should not characterize a godly woman. Look at Proverbs chapter 7. It's a couple of pages to the left in your bible, Proverbs chapter 7, and we'll see another attribute of a godly woman. Here is its antithesis in Proverbs 7, we see the negative side, it says in chapter 7 verse 10, "And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtil of heart," verse 11, "She is loud and stubborn; her feet abide not in her house."
Now is anybody seeing a pattern here? I think we've literally looked at like 12 scriptures that have specifically said "You know what, women? Don't be loud, don't be clamorous, don't be angry, don't be bitter, don't be brawling, don't be contentious," and they all are talking about pretty much the same type of an image that you get of just a loud mouth, obnoxious, angry, bitter, fighting woman. Do you not see it in the scripture here? This picture that's being painted? Now what's the opposite of that? Go to first Peter chapter 3. Over and over again, we're seeing the same patterns, and you know what? If this didn't matter so much, then God wouldn't have been so repetitive in the book of Proverbs that he's bringing this up literally in almost chapter of Proverbs.
Just over and over again, and it's the same thing that keeps coming up. The same anger, the same bitterness, the same clamor, the same getting upset about every transgression, the same contentions, the same strife, the same brawling. Loud. Stubborn. These are not feminine attributes. Look what the bible says in first Peter chapter 3 verse 3. "Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price," so the opposite of this loud, clamorous, angry, bitter, brawling type of woman is one who has a meek and quiet spirit.
What's the opposite of being loud? Being quiet. What's the opposite of being one who throws your weight around? It's being meek. Now meekness is not weakness. Meekness does not mean that you're a weakling because if you remember, the bible says that Moses was the meekest man on the face of all the earth. Was he a weakling? Was he a wimp? No. He was a great leader, but he was meek, meaning that he basically was not puffed up, proud, and the bible says "Only by pride cometh contention," so you can't be a contentious woman without being prideful and arrogant. It's not possible because "Only by pride cometh contention," so what's the opposite of being proud? Being humble or meek, and the bible says here "Meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." Let me point out another thing that's ... Flip over, if you would, to first Timothy chapter 2.
So far, we've seen that a godly woman should be one of a meek and quiet spirit, kind and forgiving in the words that come out of her mouth, gentle in her speech, and her tongue is the law of kindness. You know what that means "And her tongue is the law of kindness"? It means that unkind things coming out of her mouth is the exception of the rule. "The law of kindness", meaning that the law of her tongue, what's typically going to be coming out of her mouth is kindness. That's the default setting, not anger, clamor, bitterness, wrath, malice, and so forth. We saw that a godly woman should be kind and forgiving, she should be meek and quiet, not angry and clamorous and all these other things, but not only that, a godly woman should be a hard working woman, not idle.
Look if you would at first Timothy chapter 2 verse 9. It says "In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array; But (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works." That's the word that I want to point out there. "Works". "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection," verse 11, "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety." Now flip over to chapter 5 and you'll see how this passage in chapter 5 ties in perfectly with this passage in first Timothy 2.
Some people that are here this morning are probably just "I can't believe what I'm hearing. I'm just blown away by ... " because a lot of these scriptures never even get read in church because they're considered offensive to the modern eardrum. Modern day feminazi ideology does not go with everything that we're hearing today. "Women should be ..." Thank you for proving my point right now, loudmouth. We have women today screaming and yelling and clamoring and ... "Give us our rights!" I'm telling you, it's not of God, and we need there to be one place, the house of God, the local church, where somebody gets up and actually reads what the bible says about godly women are supposed to be like, because let me tell you something.
There are not a lot of great feminine godly role models out in the world for our daughters to follow, and we need the house of God to be a place of godly feminine role models for young ladies to follow, and not to be sucked into the world's mentality of just a loud, clamorous, "We can do it" type of mentality amongst women. It's not biblical. It's not what the bible teaches. If you say it is what the bible teaches, you're a liar. If you say that the bible teaches equality for women in the sense that they have all the same roles in society as men and they should be speaking in church, you're a liar. That's not what the bible says. The bible is crystal clear on this subject. You know it and I know it, so don't play games with me. This is what the bible says, and honestly, we need some hair-legged preachers to stand up and preach this from the house tops because honestly, what we have out in society today is a terrible example of women.
Now look, again, when I preach something like this, inevitably, someone will say "Why don't you get on the men?" That was a different sermon, and I have whole sermons where I'm getting on the men for being a bunch of queer little feminine sissies and being a twinky, but that's a different sermon. I can't preach the whole bible in one sermon. Right now, I'm preaching what a godly woman should be like, and if you're a woman today, under the sound of my voice, don't you get angry at what I'm preaching because remember, that was point 1 about what you're not supposed to be. See how I set up this sermon, and it start in the way on purpose?
I start out with anger plate just to kind of diffuse you, like diffuse that bomb before I start getting into the really contentious points. Don't be contentious. Don't get angry. Don't get bitter. Why? Because today, this stuff lies in the face of society, but that's why it needs to be preached more today, not less today because otherwise, we're going to forget about it. People aren't even going to know that this is even out there, so we see that a woman should be hard working and not idle. Look at first Timothy chapter 5. This goes hand in glove with chapter 2. It says in verse 13, "Withal they learn to be idle," speaking of women, "Wandering about from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not. I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully. For some are already turned aside after Satan."
In first Timothy chapter 2, it talked about how a woman's outward adorning should not be decorating herself like a Christmas tree, but rather it should be good works. She should be adorned with good works, and then here, he's saying that women should not be idle, but that they should marry, bear children, guide the house. That's the opposite of being idle because when you get married, now you're no longer idle anymore. Why? Because you have a household to take care of, you have a husband to take care of, you have meals to prepare, you have cleaning and cooking to do. That keeps you busy, guiding the house. That keeps you out of ... When you have children, that keeps you even busier, and it keeps you from becoming idle.
A woman that is a godly woman is a hard working woman. The virtuous woman in chapter 31. It talks about her making clothing, it talks about her preparing food, it talks about her rolling up her sleeves and working hard and getting a lot of work done, not being lazy. Today, we have a lot of conveniences, and go if you would to first Corinthians chapter number 11. Today we have a lot of conveniences that make all of our lives easier. The lives of men have become easier in many ways, and I mean physically, and the lives of women have become easier because if you think about it, most of us men today, we don't go out and work a job where we're just really breaking our back 6 days a week by the sweat of our face. Some people do, and that's great, but a lot of people here today have a job that's an easier job in the sense of it's not as physically demanding.
You might be driving machinery or you might be behind a computer or you might be just directing other and you're not really having to work really hard. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but we do have to be careful that we don't become too sedentary and too idle or too lazy, maybe because we don't have to work as many hours as we used to, so we need to find godly things to use our time on. Productive things and not just become one who just works the minimum and then just fools around. Plays video games, sits around, watch TV, scratching our belly, and so forth. That's not the way we want to live our lives, and see, ladies' lives have become easier also, and I'm all for technology. I don't think that we should go back to "Hey, let's just be like the Amish and shun all technology." That doesn't make any sense to me.
I don't believe that's a biblical philosophy, but ladies' lives have become easier in some ways because of the fact that they no longer have to wash clothes by hand. They have the washing machine, and instead of having to scrub dishes by hand, they have the dishwasher, and instead of having to make their own clothing, it's much cheaper to buy clothes than it is to make clothes in 2014. It's just so easy to just have an abundance of durable clothing, it's not difficult. Now in some ways, our lives have gotten more difficult because there's men, sure we don't have to go out and break our backs as much, working hard, but we have a lot more stress and our lives are more complicated.
Think about it. Do you think that Abraham just had a deal with all these weird stuff showing up in the mail everyday and just all this paperwork and banking, and he's having to sit there and figure out his taxes and everything, he's trying to take inventory on all his goats and everything so he can figure out his taxes. He didn't have to deal with a lot of the mental stress and anguish, and also, going out and working hard actually makes you feel pretty good, so now we have other problems. People getting depressed and idle and sluggish. There are pros and cons of technology. I'm not against technology at all, but I will say this. Don't let technology turn you into a lazy person. That's what we need to be careful of.
I'm not saying technology is bad, but if technology makes us lazy because our dream life and our dream job is to be like George Jetson where he just push a button and then just sits back all day for 8 hours a day, that's not what our life should look like, and so today, because our lives have gotten easier in some ways, it could be easy for us to fall into a trap of becoming a sluggish, slob, idle as male or female. Both male and female can fall victim to this, okay?
It could be easy for ladies because they can just turn on the dishwasher, turn on the washing machine, turn on the microwave and so forth that they could basically fall into a trap of just sitting around and just watching the soap operas or just being on Facebook all day, just surfing the net, just on the phone, just not really getting anything done productive and becoming what the bible describes you in first Timothy 5 as just being idle, tattler, busybody, gossip, these are the things that ladies should be careful of. I'm not saying "Hey, just to have some busy work to do, just get rid of the washing machine and go out on the backyard and start scrubbing ..." That doesn't make any sense. That'd be silly, wouldn't it? There's no point in doing that or "Get rid of your dishwasher." It doesn't make sense, but you know what does make sense? Using your time to produce something that matters.
There are so many things that you could do with your time and work hard, like for example, instead of sticking a hungry man frozen dinner in the microwave, you could actually cook a nutritious meal from scratch, and that can help you from being idle, because some this technology is not good when it involves just eating a bunch of nutritionally void, pre-packaged meals that are cooked in a microwave that don't taste good and that are not nutritious to your body at all.
It's getting kind of quiet in here, but it's the truth, what I'm saying, and look, as a man, we should go to work and take our job seriously, and we should go to work and not just punch in and punch out and do the minimum all day, we're expected by God, we're expected by society, and we are expected by our wives and children to go to work and to do our best and make something happen and to go there and give it 100% and bring home the bacon. That's our job, and we take it seriously or we ought to take it seriously, and shame on you if you're a lazy man who goes to work and doesn't give it 100%.
Let me tell you something. It should be the same for the wife. She should be giving her job 100% too, and not just saying "Well, throw in a ready made frozen meal, sit down, watch TV, play on the internet, do nothing, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, whatever," and I'm not saying that those are bad things, but I'm saying if you're not doing your job, that's bad. Just as it's bad if a man is not doing his job, and we need to not have a double standard that says "Hey, men work hard, women do nothing," and here's the thing. A lot of women, they say "Well, I'll go out and get a job. You want me to work hard? Okay, I'll go out and get a job." No, that's not what God told you to do, Cain. Cain, God told you to bring of the firstlings of the flock and to work hard at what he told you, not your own works that you've device out of your own mind.
Cain worked hard. Produced a bunch of fruits and vegetables, offered it to God, and God said "That's not what I want, okay?" Abel brought what God wanted. The firstlings of the flock, the fat of the lambs, and today, God's saying "Hey, be a hard working woman. Work hard. Don't get lazy. Don't get idle, and the woman's response is "Okay, I'll go get a job." No, why can't you work hard at home? Why can't you work hard at home? You say "Well, you're preaching antiquated ideals because it's impossible for people to live off one income anymore." No, it's not. It's a matter of priorities, and honestly, the bible teaches, and I just read you the scriptures ... We'll come back to first Corinthians 11. Go to Titus chapter 2.
The bible does teach that women are designed to be the home maker. This is what the bible teaches. Now again, I'm not upset at women who work a job or anything like that. I'm not trying to condemn people or tell people "Hey, live your life exactly the way I'm telling you to live it." You know what I'm doing? I'm teaching the bible, okay? Sometimes, people's life puts him in a situation where sometimes, people, for example, are divorced and people are in a situation where the wife is going to work or maybe the husband is saying "Hey, I want you to go to work" to the wife and sending the wife to work. There are all kinds of situations that you may find yourself in in this world, but let me tell you something.
If we are living our lives according to God's will and following God's plan for our lives, we know that the ideal that God holds up is that the man works and that the wife stays home and takes care of the house and takes care of the kids. That's what the bible says, okay? He said it in first Timothy 5 that God's will was that they marry, bear children, and guide the house. That's God's will. When we see the virtuous woman, that's what we see her doing. She's taking care of the house, she's taking care of clothing, she's taking care of food, she's doing things of that nature, but look at Titus chapter 2 verse 4, it says "That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet," discreet, we talked about what that means.
Here's what discretion is. It's knowing what is acceptable and what is not. That's what discretion means. It's the wisdom to know what you should be doing, what you shouldn't be doing and so forth. It says "Discreet, chaste," chaste, he's talking about purity, "Keepers at home." Now look, that's a pretty clear phrase there. God's saying "Teach the young women to be discreet. Teach the young women to be chaste. Teach the young women to be keepers at home. Teach the young women to be good." Look at verse 5 there. "Teach the young women to be obedient to their own husbands," why? "That the word of God be not blasphemed." Now would you like to be a cause of God's word being blasphemed? Now who in the bible was a cause of God's word being blasphemed? Somebody was told "Hey, God's word is going to be blasphemed because of you." David, right? It is possible for God's word to be blasphemed as a result of what we do.
David committed adultery and caused God's word to be blasphemed, but here he's saying "Look, if women don't listen to this, God's word is going to be blasphemed because of them if they don't follow this." "To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed." Now again, I'm not saying "Hey, it's a sin for a woman to go to work," but you know what I am saying though? It's not the perfect world of God. I'm saying that it is not ideal.
There could be a situation that you're in as a result of your sin or the sins of others that might force you into that position, but in a perfect world, following God's plan, following God's rules, and you say "Why do you say that?" Because somebody asked me recently that they said "My husband is commanding me to go to work, so what do I do? Do I obey my husband, which the bible tells me to obey my husband or do I refuse to go to work and stay home and not work?" You know what? I would say that she should obey her husband because it is clearly a sin, that's like a clear right and wrong where the bible commands wives to obey their husband. Whereas there's no commandment in the bible which says "Thou shall not go to work" as a woman. Do you understand what I'm saying?
That's how I would judge that situation based on scripture, and say "Hey, if your husband's telling you to go to work, then go to work and do not rebel against him, but I'm saying this, that the bible teaches that the husband should provide." You say "Well it's not possible," but see, you might just have to make different priorities in your lifestyle, the husband might have to work more hours, and by the way, if the wife is doing her job as a wife, it can often be more financially feasible. For example, people think that they're making so much money by sending their wife to work, but in reality, when you send your wife to work, it puts you in a different tax bracket. A lot of that extra money that's coming in is just getting taxed, then you got to have a separate vehicle for your wife, then she's not there cooking, so what are you doing? Eating out, getting food out, or getting ready made food.
The more home made the food is, the more economical it is, so if you have your wife at home as a full time home maker, then she's actually going to be able to save you money by making meals from scratch which is cheaper, by not needing another vehicle which is cheaper. You say "Oh you want your wife cooped up all day with no vehicle." No. My wife and I have shared a vehicle the whole time we're married, and look, if you have 2 cars, that's great. I'm not against that at all, but I'm saying that if it means the difference between your wife staying home and raising the kids, having 1 vehicle versus 2, wouldn't it be better to have 1 vehicle and have your wife be a godly keeper at home and so forth than to have your wife go to work so you can have 2 vehicles, so that she can have that vehicle to go to work in? You know what I mean? So you can pay more taxes and give the government more money because you love the government so much.
Honestly, when my wife and I were first married, we had 1 vehicle, and here's what we did. She dropped me off at work if she wants to use the car, and I would walk to work, ride a bike to work. Right now, my wife and I share 1 vehicle. We had 2 vehicles for years because I would take my vehicle for several days on business trips, obviously that's not going to work. That kind of sharing arrangement didn't work very well for me to take the car for 3 days at a time, but I'm just saying that if you prioritize this in your life, you can make this happen, and by the way, even great corporations have something called a "Purchasing agent". A full time employee whose job is just to buy things and to get the best deals on those things. It's called a "Purchasing agent".
Here's the thing. A godly wife can be a great purchasing agent because Proverbs 31 says that the godly wife is like the merchant ships. "She bringeth her food from afar." What does that mean? It means she doesn't just go to the most expensive grocery store and just throw everything in the cart. What it's basically saying is that she is getting the best food at the best prices, and thank God, my wife is very good at that. She does an excellent job at that, of just getting things for a good deal, and it saves you money. Whereas when you're both working, you're both busy, you're both tired, it's just "Just whatever's the quickest. Just buy it. Just grab it. Just go to the closest store. Let's just eat out. Just order it."
Whereas when you have the time as a woman and you're not idling it and frittering it away doing nothing, you could actually prepare good, nutritious home cooked meals, you could actually shop around and get the best food at the best price, you could actually save some expenses, vehicles and gas and taxes and child care and all this other stuff, so a lot of it's just an illusion, my friend. You say "Well no, we would be financially better off if she's at work." Okay, but are you spiritually better off?
Let me tell you something. The one who pays the bills is the one who makes the rules, and if you want to have a home where the husband is the head of the home and he's in authority, you probably need to pay all the bills, because as soon as your wife goes out and starts making a bunch of money, you know what she's going to start thinking? "Yeah, I'm making some of the money, then I'm going to start making some of the decisions. This is an equal partnership here," but it ought not be because that's not what the bible teaches. Go to first Corinthians 11 if you would. So far, what have we seen from the bible? Look, everything I'm preaching has been biblical. Could somebody stop me and tell me what I'm preaching is not biblical right now? Yet people are offended by this, I don't understand it.
I don't understand what people expect when they come to a baptist church, like they're just going to come and it's going to be some communist liberation fest or something? It's a baptist church. It's a King James only bible believing church. You're going to hear what the bible teaches. In season, out of season, popular, not popular, these are timeless truths, not telling you what to do. I'm not trying to dictate your life. I'm teaching you what the bible says. You want to go live your life another way? You want to go out, women, and have your own career and get loud and get stubborn and get contentious and get your college degree and your career and you're going to be an independent woman? Then you go girl, but you know what? It's not biblical, I'm not going to condone it, I'm not going to say it's Christian because it's not. This is what the bible teaches.
Now look at first Corinthians chapter 11 because so far, we've seen that a godly woman is kind, forgiving, she's not anger, clamorous, she's meek and quiet, not loud, stubborn and obnoxious, and literally, some women today think that it's cool or virtuous to be loud and obnoxious, like that makes them cool or powerful as a woman, but really, all it is is a shame unto a woman to act masculine, but the bible says in first Corinthians 11 verse 7, it says "For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man. For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man." This is a timeless truth here that goes all the way back to the garden of Eden. Adam was first formed, then Eve. God did not create the man to be a workhorse and a helper unto his wife. That's not what the bible teaches.
The bible says that when God made Adam, he said "It's not good for the man to be alone. I will make a help meat for him," so God made the woman for the man to be a what? A help, and he brought the woman to the man and said "This is your help," and he said "This is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh," and the bible talks about how man shall leave father and mother and cleave unto his wife, and they too shall be one flesh. This is what marriage is all about. This is what the institution started as in Genesis chapter 2, and so we need to understand that the woman is made to be a help unto her husband, not vice versa.
It's not the woman to go out and fulfill all her life and to ... I'm trying to think of the word, but I remember, my wife, when we first got married and she started having kids, she start drawing criticism from some of her extended family, and they were telling her that her wonderful humanistic education was going to waste, and how all of her education and college and learning is all being wasted, and they said, I'm trying to translate it into English, but they said "Don't you feel that you need to go out and fulfill yourself?" Is that what means Zsuzsa? [Foreign language 46:09]? "Don't you need to go out and realize your full potential? Don't you need to go out and be fulfilled?" Today, we have little girls that are being brought up, "When you grow, you could be whatever you want," and they all want to be a marine biologist. They all go through that phase. Is there any girl who never went through that phase of wanting to be a marine biologist?
They want to be a marine biologist, they want to be an astronaut, they want to be a lawyer, they want to be all these things. That's not what the bible says. The bible says that they should marry, bear children, and guide the house. That's what the bible says, so this attitude that just says "I got to get my career going, and I'm going to get my PhD and my career and my masters and my this my that, and then I need to find also a place for a husband in my life. When I'm ready, in my late 30s, I'm going to think about having kids." Is that what the bible teaches as a Christian lifestyle? No, so to sit there and just have this attitude of like "I'm going to add a husband in my life." No, when you get married, you know what you're doing? You're signing on to be that guy's helper. You're playing second fiddle to your husband for the rest of your life. You are not the main event in that family, in that household. That is what the bible teaches.
Let's read it again since you don't believe me. First Corinthians chapter 11:7. "For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man. For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man." In too many marriages today, the tail wags the dog, and we have a situation where the man is not considered the leader, he's not considered at the forefront. Does it always seem weird when you have these women that are running for president? What's their husband, the first husband? Like you said, the first lady, he's like the first boy? Why does it seem unseemly? Because he's taking a backseat unto his wife. "It's her goals, it's her ambition. She's leading."
That's not biblical, and you know what, ladies? If you can't look at your husband, if you can't look at the guy that you're thinking about marrying, young ladies that are single, if you can't look at them and say "You know what? This is somebody that I want to follow. This is somebody that I want to help. This is somebody that I want to submit to. This is someone that I want to lead me for the rest of my life," then you should not marry that guy because when you get married, that's what you're signing on for if it's a biblical marriage. Now some people will hear this sermon and say that this sermon is anti woman, patriarchal, antiquated, and the new buzzword, "Misogynistic". "Paster Anderson is very Misogynistic." It used to be called "Chauvinistic". You can throw all these big fancy words at me all you want, but what I'm really doing is being biblical.
Now I'm not against women and I believe that Christianity actually exalts women and exalts femininity. I feel that our society degrades women, drags them down. You know what our society tells a woman? It tells a woman that in order to have value, you must dress, act, and live like a man, and then they call this feminism? How is it called feminism to tell a woman dress masculine, act masculine, live a masculine life, then you've arrived as a woman. What would really be feminism would be to say "Be feminine. Exalt feminism." Feminism would be to say "Hey, being a mother is important, honorable, respectful job. Being a wife is a respectful, don't put her in the unemployment statistics." My wife is in the unemployment statistics. She fills up paper, it's like occupation or unemployed. Do you really think my wife is unemployed? She's employed with boss man right here. This is her employer.
Let me tell you something. Today, we live in a society where we go to a restaurant and a woman comes to the table at the restaurant, and she's friendly to you, isn't she? She comes and pours a drink for you, ask you if you need anything else, big smile, right? Isn't that what you expect? If you go to a restaurant and a woman comes and waits on your table, is that what you expect? What if she just came and just actually served the food? Let's say this is the food ... Would that be acceptable? "Here you go." What if she just never offered to fill the drink, and then finally, you're like "Excuse me. Can I get something to drink?" "Get up and get it yourself." It sounds ridiculous, but you know what? Here's the thing. If a woman, if that exact same ... How much is she really getting paid?
I don't think being a waitress is like the best paying job in the world. I'm not saying it's the worst paying job, but it's definitely not the best paying job in the world, but let's say that exact same woman, put her married, put her in a home where her husband's taking care of her every need and paying for everything and taking care of everything, and if a woman came up, brought the food, was friendly, smiled, "Here you go. Would you like anything else? What can I get you to drink? Okay, do you need a refill?" And took care of her husband in the same way, you know what they'd say? "Oh, she's a doormat. She's not liberated. She's a doormat. Her husband's abusive," but here's the thing. If she goes out and does it for strangers, totally normal. Think about how weird that is.
It's not me that's backward up here. It's our society that's backward, where we say that it's dishonorable, demeaning, and it's just so offensive for a woman to serve and be kind to her husband and treat him well, but to go out and do it for strangers for minimum wage, well that is just a wonderful thing, and you are just the best waitress ever. You go out and be a teacher, "Oh, you're a teacher." Teach home school and it's like "Oh you don't have a job? Unemployed?" It doesn't make any sense, folks. I'm preaching this sermon because I want the ladies of our church and especially the young girls that are growing up just to know what it means to be a godly lady. You want to be feminine? You want to be godly? Here's what that looks like.
It looks like you being meek and quiet, not angry, bitter, blowing up about everything, losing your temper all the time, you know what it looks like? It looks like you being kind and forgiving, meek and quiet, it looks like you not being all decked out with immodest apparel, trying to draw attention to your body all the time. It means you being hard working, not idle, not lazy, it means you, by the way, being smart and not stupid because the bible says about a foolish woman, she knows nothing. She's simple, she knows nothing, and the bible says that the virtuous woman opens her mouth with wisdom, and in her tongue is the law of kindness. It's to be smart. You say "Oh, well that's college." No, college makes you stupid. College makes you stupid just like TV makes you stupid. Reading books makes you smart. Everybody knows that, and reading the bible is the book that makes you smarter than any other book.
Reading this book makes you smart. Reading other books makes you smart. Watching TV, going to school, going to college make you stupid, they make you a fool, and that is the truth, and it means a wife that is submissive and not contentious, and notice, the bible does not say that women need to submit to all men. It says they submit to their own husband. Okay, so we're not trying to say that all men rule over all women. That's not biblical, but the bible does say that a wife should be obedient to her own husband, to submit unto her own husband. What's the opposite of submitting? What does it mean to submit? It's when somebody tells you something that is contrary to what you were going to do or what you wanted to do or what you thought and somebody tells you something different, and you say "Okay, well I'm going to go with what I'm being told, I'm going to submit to them."
If it's something that you already agree with, you're not really submitting. You're just do what you're going to do anyway. What's the opposite of submission then? Contention. Contention is when you're told what to do and you say "No." Argue, fuss, get angry, lose your temper, there are literally people, and again, a lot of this sermon isn't just for women. A lot of this can cross over to men too. There are a lot of men that if somebody tells them what to do, they blow up and get angry. Whether it's a parent telling a child, the child gets angry. Boss at work tells the man at work, "Hey, do this." He gets angry. That's not godly. That's not a righteous indignation, and so I pray that every single person in this room would take these biblical truths and think about them, let them sink in.
I pray that every woman in this room would decide that they would want to be a virtuous, godly woman per the bible, not what the world considers a successful woman. You could go out and be a lesbian with so much metal on your face that you look like you fell out of a fishing tackle box, but if you're a businesswoman, the world's going to call you successful because you make a lot of money, even if it's through dishonest means, like being a banker or a lawyer, but honestly, I pray that every woman would just take from this sermon and say "You know what? I need to get anger under control in my life because that's a major teaching here, and I need to not be so loud and stubborn. I need to become a hard working person, not be idle, not waste a bunch of time. I need to submit to my husband and realize, "Hey, I'm here to help him." "You don't help me enough around the house. You don't do enough for me."
Wait a minute. Husbands helping around the house is great. I help my wife around the house, but you know what? To sit there and clamor, and say "My husband's not helping me around the house enough." You know what? That's not what he was born to do. He was not created to be your help meat. It's not what the bible teaches, and when you listen to most women that complain about their husbands and are clamorous, because that's what clamorous means, just loudly complaining, usually they're complaining about stuff that God never even told them to do. Some things they might complaint about is stuff that he should be doing, like he doesn't pay the bills or something. That's legitimate, but discretion would mean that you don't go around saying that to other people, if that's how you feel, but to sit there and complain that he's not doing enough of the things that God never told him to do, that's inappropriate.
I pray that every young man that's here in this room would hear these things and understand the red flags of the wrong type of woman. Loud, stubborn, obnoxious, lazy, idle. These are the things to beware of, and also as men, we can apply these principles and not become angry men, not become bitter, and not become any of these other attributes that apply into us. We should be hard working as well.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word, lord, and lord, without your word, we would be really messed up because our society doesn't teach us any of these things, and so without your word, we would have no clue how to have a good, happy marriage, how to have a marriage where men and women are in their proper roles and where we could love each other for who we are and not try to be something that we were not designed to be. God, I don't think there's any hope for our society out there that ignores your word to have a successful marriage and home life and raise godly children, but lord, thank you for church where we can get together and look in the pages of your word and get the truth.
Lord, I pray that we would be able to undo some of the brainwashing that even some people in this room may have been totally brainwashed by the television to think that what I'm saying is somehow radical, lord, when it's just the most basic teachings of your word. I pray that every single person would just go home and search the scriptures and see whether these things be so
