Something familiar was happening in my kitchen. I sensed that my husband was trying to back out of a commitment he had made to me. That wasn’t the familiar part; he rarely does that. What was familiar was the internal monologue of self-pity and self-righteousness that begins to drone in my head when I am disappointed or inconvenienced. There were the sentences that begin with “I always . . .” and “I would never . . .” But right in the middle of all that I heard myself say to my other self “STOP IT! Just stop thinking that!” Startled by this new option I acknowledged that God was trying to teach me something. I stopped the monologue and continued preparing for the errands I needed to run, assuring myself that I could complete them unaccompanied while my husband went on with what he was doing. It was a struggle at first. But gradually the feelings of disappointment and entitlement subsided.
“That’s it!” I pronounced to myself. That is “self-control!”
A few days earlier I had reached for my Greek-Hebrew Study Bible and Concordance to try to clarify just exactly what it is the “older woman” (me) is supposed to teach the younger women. Titus 2: 3-5 says,
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.
I know that self-control is one of the qualities I am expected to teach but I was not at all clear what the process was that led to this required end. Teaching, for me, always includes the tough learning part first. It is one thing to say a thing and quite another to be able to do it at the time it is needed.
How good God is! Having made this one small step in my understanding I returned to Titus 2 and a few verses later I found confirmation: (12-13) For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age,. . .. No surprises here. For, every time we are expected to do something that seems impossible, it turns out that God’s Grace is required, promised and provided.
©Tina Green 2009
