The Ageless Bible has Wisdom for Every Person’s Age
By Elizabeth Prata
The Bible is incredible for teaching us all we need to know about godliness in honoring Jesus, and more incredibly, through every stage of life and both sexes. Whether you are a child, young man or woman, adult, mother/father, or aged, widow or single, it’s all covered.
I’ve always paid good attention especially to the verses that pertain to me in my stage of life. As I age, I tend to pick up more on the verses that mention old women, because, I am an old woman now! Here is one in 1st Timothy-
In pointing out these things to the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, constantly nourished on the words of the faith and of the good doctrine which you have been following. But stay away from worthless stories that are typical of old women. (1 Timothy 4:6-7).
Other translations say ‘old wives’ tales’. This Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary article by Anderson Douglas offers some insight-
New Testament References to aging persons in the NT focus on-
— the responsibility of children or the family of faith to care for dependent or disabled aging persons (Mark 7:1–13; Matt. 15:1–6; 1 Tim. 5:4, 8; James 1:27).
—The young are urged to honor the aging (1 Tim. 5:1–2),
—and the aging are encouraged to be worthy examples (Titus 2:2–3).
—Christians are expected to care for widows (Acts 6:1–7),
If you have been wondering as you age, how we can serve the Lord while retired, or with diminishing strength, eyesight, energy, or mental faculties, as the case may be, this last part in the article is encouraging!
—and the aging are expected to serve God as did Zechariah, Elizabeth, Simeon, and Anna in Luke 1–2. Such service by the aging can bring blessings to their families, as did Timothy’s grandmother and mother (2 Tim. 1:5).
The biblical view of aging is unequivocally positive, though allowing for the possibility that an older person can be foolish (Eccles. 4:13). Generally older persons have a reservoir of wisdom and understanding based on past experience (Deut. 32:7). They can experience new family joys, even after many previous sad experiences (Ruth 4:13–17). Both youth and age have their unique worth; they are not in competition (Prov. 20:29). While advancing age results in diminishing strength (Eccles. 12:1–8), God’s grace and help are available to persons in each stage of life (Isa. 46:4). –end Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary article
Isaiah 46:4 says
Even to your old age I will be the same,
And even to your graying years I will carry you!
I have done it, and I will bear you;
And I will carry you and I will save you.
From conception to death and beyond The LORD ‘carries’ His own! If you are old,
Zechariah 8:4 says, “The LORD of armies says this: ‘Old men and old women will again sit in the public squares of Jerusalem, each person with his staff in his hand because of age.”
What the Lord is promising here is that war took the young and the very old. People did not live out their days due to famine, pestilence, siege, and war. But later, they will. Barnes’ Notes says of the verse:
In In those fierce wars neither young nor very old were spared. It implied then a long peace, that people should live to that utmost verge of human life.
How often have we seen the aged sitting on the benches along the sidewalks of the cities, or in the parks, or on front stoops or porches. Porch sittin’ is a favorite past-time of the elderly.
Barnes’ Notes continues,
The man, whose staff is in his hand for the multitude of days – The two opposite pictures, the old men, Dionysius), “so aged that they support with a staff their failing and trembling limbs,” and the young in the glad buoyancy of recent life, fresh from their Creator’s hands, attest alike the goodness of the Creator, who protecteth both, the children in their yet undeveloped strength, the very old whom He hath brought through “all the changes and chances of this mortal life,” in their yet sustained weakness. The tottering limbs of the very old, and the elastic perpetual motion of childhood are like far distant chords of the [range] of the Creator’s love. (Barnes’ Notes on Zechariah 8:4).
Sometimes “the tottering limbs of the very old’ can make a person feel like they have nothing to offer the Lord, nothing left to give in their age or infirmity. I myself have been wondering that, as I look at retirement. How can I serve the Lord if I am not serving hIs little children?
Yet we read in Luke chapters 1 and 2 that Zechariah, Elizabeth, Simeon, and Anna in Luke 1–2 served Him long and well. Timothy’s grandmother and mother (2 Tim. 1:5) Lois and Eunice brought blessing to their families and to the faith in the raising of young Timothy.
Older women are in fact charged with service, the older are to teach the younger as Titus 2:3-5 says. In 1 Timothy 5:5 we read,
Now she who is actually a widow and has been left alone has set her hope on God, and she continues in requests and prayers night and day.
Anna was the model here. If nothing else, an older woman can pray!
Older women seem to have some negative tendences, as mentioned in Titus 2:3, behavior which we must watch out not to drift into,
Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good,
In the verse we see slandering/gossip and wine paired. Perhaps too much drink caused loose lips, when Jesus demands we display self-control and use encouraging words. How unfitting for an older woman or widow to be staggering around under the slavery of wine, with a loose and slandering tongue! We should know better!
Matthew Henry Commentary says, “Teachers of good things are opposed to teachers of things corrupt, or to what is trifling and vain, of no good use or tendency, old wives’ fables or superstitious sayings and observances; in opposition to these, their business is, and they may be called on to it, to be teachers of good things.“
Never fear as you age, dear sister. If your earnest desire is to serve the Lord, He will make it so. Older women in the Bible impacted their children & grandchildren, served the church, prayed, taught, served as a living model of holiness and wisdom. I’ll finish with a quote from Warren Wiersbe,
When it comes to the older women, Paul’s emphasis is on teaching: “teachers of good things.” Experienced, godly women are usually excellent teachers. The word teach in Titus 2:4 is related to the word translated “temperate” in Titus 2:2, and probably should be translated, “that they may train by making sober-minded.” It is not only that the older women should show the younger mothers how to keep house, but that they put within their hearts and minds the right spiritual and mental attitudes.
One of the strongest forces for spiritual ministry in the local church lies with the older believers.
Wiersbe, W. W. (1996). The Bible exposition commentary (Vol. 2, pp. 264–265). Victor Books.
