[0:00] And today I'm going to be reading the whole of chapter 2. Chapter 2 in 1 Timothy.
[0:12] First of all then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be! made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Saviour, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
[0:39] For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time. For this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle. I'm telling the truth, I'm not lying. A teacher of the Gentiles, in faith and truth. I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarrelling. Likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls, costly attire, but with what is proper for women who profess godliness with good works. Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man. Rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve, and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing if they continue in faith and love and holiness with self-control.
[2:02] Thank you for that reading, Cheryl. I posted to our Bible readers group and asked any volunteers to read today's passage and only Cheryl gladly accepted the challenge. So thank you for that.
[2:14] We have lots of questions, I'm sure, but let's bring them all to our King of Kings as we hear what he has to say for us. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for the beautiful worship we have experienced here in your presence.
[2:32] And we ask that beautiful worship be what we look for in this passage and in your word. Help us to see beautiful worship that pleases you, our Savior. Help us to see it through godly women, men who pray, and godly women who learn, and everything else you have to teach us today.
[2:53] I pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. I've titled this sermon Beautiful Worship. So when I say this phrase, though, what comes to mind for you?
[3:04] Any takers? Anyone want to just volunteer? Beautiful worship. What's the first image that might come to mind? I don't know. Something that's pure? Okay.
[3:15] Is there a particular scene or a moment that you can think of? I don't know. Some of you might have seen a church choir singing really beautifully together. Maybe you think, oh, that's a picture of beautiful worship.
[3:27] Anyone else? No? Everyone's just stunned. Okay. All right. Maybe you might think back to a band that's led you and kind of gathered worship before.
[3:40] And just a powerful, holy moment when you praise the King of Kings together. Well, our passage suggests beautiful worship looks like men who pray in Jesus' powerful name.
[3:51] It also suggests it comes through women who learn and live out the good news of Jesus. All right. I think that's the main point that we see in this little second half of 1 Timothy, chapter 2, but also the wider context.
[4:05] Of course, a passage like this in 2025 can seem so confusing, even confronting, or even offensive to some of us. Let's acknowledge that. I mean, no braided hair.
[4:19] Must be quiet or silent, depending on your translation. Save through the childbearing. In our age of female CEOs and pop stars and politicians, how can words like, She must be quiet, possibly be good news for us?
[4:34] But let's rewind back to last week, right? Because in chapter 2, how do we start? We hear that from Paul. The church is first of all to pray.
[4:46] To pray for all people, for all things. Do you remember that coloring page that kids you guys worked on? That first one? Right? That picture of praying for all people, for all things.
[4:57] Why? To change our hearts and to change other people's hearts. And verse 3, you remember, reminded us, this is good. All right? Good could also be translated beautiful.
[5:08] This is good and pleases God, our Savior. So Paul's main concern in this chapter, in this part of the letter, is to sketch out what beautiful worship looks like when men and women, young and old, gather in Jesus' name.
[5:23] That's our context. It's interesting that Paul addresses men and women, right? Specifically. Because we, unfortunately, live in a world more and more confused about gender and sexuality.
[5:36] We live in a world, if you look at the headlines, for example, where we're no longer sure about who we go to bed with. And we're also no longer sure about who we go to bed as.
[5:47] So maybe in this context, maybe a vision of men and women beautifully worshipping together does matter.
[5:58] Maybe, actually, as you colour in your pages, kids, continuing on this journey, you will see and you'll be reminded that as we guard the gospel, as we share it with a world that desperately needs Jesus, maybe the Bible has something to say to us as men and as women as well.
[6:16] Right? We can move to the next slide, Donald. Yes, we do this all in Jesus' name. Remember, Jesus is the same Jesus who affirmed the Bible's teaching.
[6:26] God made us male and female in his image. And Jesus calls both women and men to take up their cross and follow him. And Jesus, as we heard last week, wants all people, man and woman, to be saved to truly know him.
[6:42] And this Jesus personally appointed Paul to give us our passage today, with all its complexities as men and women who worship Christ. So I hope you've been praying.
[6:53] Lots of people have been praying about this passage and interested. But let me just frame this with two points today. What does beautiful worship look like? What does beautiful worship that pleases God, our Saviour, look like?
[7:05] I think our passage teaches us two things. It looks like godly men who pray and godly women who learn. All right? Say it again. Godly men who pray. Godly men are women who learn.
[7:16] Of course, girls need to pray without anger too. Okay? And of course, guys, we have plenty to learn about all kinds of things. All right? You can ask my wife. She can tell you that. But here's teaching, though, that does address us as men and women who face distinct gender-specific challenges, at least in Paul's time here when he wrote this.
[7:38] And perhaps our time too. So let's hear verse 8 again. All right? Let's look at godly men who pray without anger or quarreling. Actually, in verse 8 in our Bibles, it says, my version here, NIV, says, I want men everywhere.
[7:54] Actually, in the original text, it actually says, I want men therefore, or you can add just the word therefore, comma, I want men everywhere to lift up holy hands in prayer. Okay?
[8:06] So it's telling us it's looking back to the start of the chapter. What's the context? Actually, we've seen through our journey through 1 Timothy so far. The context of this letter. Why is Paul writing this letter?
[8:17] There's been false teaching, hasn't there? Ravaging the church of Ephesus. Causing a shipwreck of people's faith. We heard that, 1.19. There's been an inward obsession in the church of God with things like myths and genealogies.
[8:33] And it turned the church into a battleground filled with arguments and heated exchanges rather than a mission post to win the nations. Actually, if you peek ahead at 1 Timothy chapter 6, 3 to 5, Paul actually specifically mentions teachers who quarrel about words that result in envy and strife and malicious talk, evil suspicions.
[8:53] That's no way to be united in service. That's no way to be united in service, is it? And so it's against this background that Paul's instruction to the men is plain.
[9:05] Please settle your differences, not with a sparring session, but with a prayer session. Godly worship, particularly for the brothers of Ephesus, and I think for the males of PCBC at least, at least for me, looks like lifting our hands in prayer to God and not lifting our fists against each other, whether in real life or just in our hearts.
[9:27] Godly worship, we've got a couple of guys here. We come in all shapes and sizes and personalities, right? We just heard there's a couple of introverts among us, and there's extroverts too. Paul wrote this letter in a first century world where peak manhood was measured by your physical strength and your conquests, how many people you could execute or defeat on the battlefield.
[9:50] Now, where guys in Ephesus might kill each other with a sword to show how powerful they are, how manly they are, guys today, maybe we're tempted to yell in the office, to shout at our kids, or sadly even lash out at our loved ones, our wives, behind closed doors.
[10:08] It's the same broken heart behind it. And so the Bible tells us real masculinity, it looks different to how the world paints it. We don't run it at each other, no.
[10:22] We don't try and show how much stronger, higher, and faster we are than the next guy. I think real masculinity, if we think about the Christian faith, it looks like the granddad who has worn his knees out praying before the Lord.
[10:38] That's real manliness. It's the quiet uncle, this is a true story, who pulls you aside and prayerfully tells you something that you needed to hear. That you weren't doing quite right.
[10:50] It's the disabled brother who pleads with God every day for strength to get through the next one. I think these are the real men among us who please God, our Savior, and worship, don't you?
[11:06] And if verse 8 is true, then Paul's word to the fellas, actually firstly, is this. Where are you? Where's the praying men? Our tendency to get things done, sure, gets us lots of places.
[11:23] We might get promotions, do well, and at work, and at school. It comes at the cost of having a relationship with our Father in Heaven. And He already loved us before we even learned to breathe, let alone achieve anything.
[11:37] So we need to pray. Guys, our love for faster, stronger, higher might get us places, but it just chokes off our connection when we fail to depend on our Lord in prayer.
[11:52] What does our Bible verse of the month say? Physical training, it's of some value. But godliness has eternal value. And it starts, guys, with how we pray. So men, you and I need to pray.
[12:05] Don't leave it to the women. Let's show up for prayer meetings. Let's be quick to reach out to people and offer a prayer for someone. Let's lead our families to give thanks.
[12:18] Let's exchange our angry posts online for our prayers offline. And I think to relearn what our priorities are, to pray even like this, we learned so much about prayer last week.
[12:33] Thank you, Isaac. But I think we can, let me suggest two things we need to guard so that we can pray like this, guys. Firstly, we need to guard our hearts. So much can make us angry, well up with rage.
[12:46] I think of myself, I'm prone to fits of rage. It may not look like fists, but it can look very, very hurtful. And for those of us, myself included, prone to this kind of outburst, one of our sisters shared a wonderful analogy recently.
[13:03] All right? Anyone ever seen a blocked toilet before? Ever experienced it, you know, at home? Yeah? Okay. All right. Smells foul, terrible to look at.
[13:15] Nothing's moving, right? And yet so often, that's what our hearts are like. Our hearts are blocked up with thoughts of rage and revenge. What do we do when our hearts are like a blocked toilet?
[13:29] Just like with a real blocked toilet, we need to flush it out. We need to unplug it, right? All those angry thoughts of vengeance and destruction can't just stay there, but we can't scoop it out ourselves in our own strength.
[13:43] It needs to be the Lord who flushes it clean with his living water. All right? As we lean on and rely on God's love, remind ourselves of the goodness of Jesus, only that can flush away all that hurt and anger that we have been holding on to.
[14:01] As one older author once put it, turn to the expulsive power of a new affection. Let Christ's love fill you with his Holy Spirit to the point that what overflows from you is not gunk and waste.
[14:16] It would be blessing. Let us be filled by the love of Christ. Let that then drive us to true prayer, true worship, without anger or quarreling.
[14:28] Guard our hearts, gents. And to pray well like this, guys, we also need to guard our screens, I think. I kind of bemoan what's coming up on my Facebook feed these days because I'm gradually noticing half of it is all AI generated.
[14:44] That's one story. But in particular, I think our phones learn from us, right? So the more we look at angry things, the more it'll throw angry things at us.
[14:55] And I think especially we need to beware the poison of particular influences online, right? Masculinity influences that our world puts on a pedestal.
[15:07] And they teach that rage and self-promotion and being horrible to others is the right answer. Some might even quote scripture to justify a man-up approach to life's problems.
[15:21] But don't be scammed, guys. What does our chapter say earlier on? Verse 6. Christ Jesus did not give himself up as a soldier for all. He didn't give himself up as a thug for all.
[15:35] He gave himself up as a ransom for all. So let Jesus be your pattern and power for true masculinity. All right? Not someone else.
[15:47] Let it be the real Jesus who shapes your manhood. He walked with the wounded. He wasted time with the lonely. He made peace between God and mankind.
[16:00] And so we look to that man, Christ Jesus, who prayed for his enemies, who cried to his father. And he blessed the nations with a saving death and resurrection for our sins.
[16:11] Beautiful worship looks like godly men who pray without anger and quarreling. That's the kind of worship that can guard the gospel here at PCBC and beyond.
[16:24] That's the first way I think we see beautiful worship that pleases God, our Savior. And then in the next couple of verses, Paul, from verses 9 to 15, lays out a complementary way that the church can be worshipping beautifully.
[16:39] And that is through, this is my second point, godly women who learn. I've chosen to frame it this way because amidst all the controversy, every verse here has been argued over by well-meaning Christians.
[16:52] It can be really easy to miss what's in plain sight, right? It says here in verse 11, a woman should learn. In the Greek, this is actually the only command in the whole chapter, right?
[17:03] Let her learn. You should learn. Learn from me, our Lord Jesus said. Imagine how freeing that was for the first sisters that heard the gospel.
[17:18] How liberating it was for women who flocked to Jesus in a first century culture that did not think that they were worth the time and attention to teach anything. That they couldn't learn.
[17:29] Oh, learn from me, says Jesus. And women still do. They still flock to Jesus. You still flock to Jesus and learn from him. But what do you think might happen next in this context?
[17:45] Let me illustrate. Cast your mind back to a time when you learned something for the first time. Here at Peace Bees English, we train young, so we often celebrate people who get their driver's license, right? Who remembers how it was nerve-wracking enough to drive their car, right?
[18:00] Who remembers their first moments learning to drive? I know for me it was like, first you figure out how to work the pedals, right? What? There's more than one? Hang on. What do you do? And then eventually you learn how to steer the car out of the parking lot that you were practicing in for far too long.
[18:16] And then you suddenly think, I did it. I did it. I'm driving. What else can I do? Like maybe cruise around Lloyd-Elsmoore Park or maybe run an errand or two.
[18:28] You might eventually even start to wonder, how fast can this car go? Hmm. Maybe in the city of Ephesus, a place where the female goddess Artemis was worshipped.
[18:42] The temple of Artemis is like one of the seven ancient wonders of the world. Maybe in that context there were all kinds of different competing ideas about men and women and their worth and what they could learn.
[18:52] And so maybe these Ephesian Christians were still learning the road rules, as it were, of Christian worship. Look, we don't have the full picture. We weren't there when they were talking through all this.
[19:05] But actually, 1 Timothy, this letter, gives us some clues of what might be going on. We've heard that there were myths and conspiracy about, right? Chapter 1, verse 4. Chapter 4, verse 3, we hear some false teachers were forbidding marriage.
[19:19] And in chapter 5, we hear that some women were even going house to house teaching things that weren't necessary. 5.13. And it was actually leading young women to wander after Satan's lies.
[19:31] No joke. Paul, look, he was a single man called to preach the gospel. Yet he loved his sisters in Christ deeply. And so in this context, I think here he suggests three ways that they, like the blokes, can learn to worship beautifully.
[19:51] So three ways that women here can learn to worship beautifully. So firstly, in verses 9 to 10, he invites women to learn to be clothed with modesty and self-control in worship.
[20:06] In verse 9, we see this laid plain, right? And I, you know, I'm not a woman, so I recruited some outside help. And this is what my friend Haley helpfully pointed out about this verse.
[20:19] While men try to grab power and prestige through, you know, just brute force sometimes, Haley helpfully pointed out to me that behind this verse in verse 9 is a different kind of power play.
[20:30] Listen to her. I quote her. Women try to get power for themselves in different kinds of ways than men do. Less overt, more manipulative.
[20:41] We, she's saying herself, we don't have physical strength, so we are less likely to be confrontational, more likely to use our bodies or gossip or mental or social or emotional manipulation to get our way.
[20:54] And so when Paul speaks to the way we dress and how we are to listen and learn, it actually speaks of giving up control and power on a way that is relevant to women. Does that make sense?
[21:07] Yeah. This is not just a, you know, like a straight line dig at the shoes that you're wearing or the fact that you're wearing jewelry or something. That's too simplistic a way of reading this passage.
[21:17] The point here is that God is far more concerned about your humility rather than grabbing power by the way that you know best. He's far more concerned about things beyond your looks and what others think about your fashion sense.
[21:33] Look, our culture, right, preaches that. Preaches that your good looks, your success, that's what gets you power. But sisters, there is far more power than the fruit of the Holy Spirit washing your heart.
[21:46] Amen. Don't be scammed. Your Christ-likeness is the most beautiful thing about you.
[21:57] The gospel sets you free from needing to conform to the world's expectations on how you dress and look and allure. No. It sets you free.
[22:09] Christ does. And so, sisters, I haven't brought any rules or guidelines on how you should dress or wear makeup. Not that I would know much about makeup anyways. But I can affirm with Paul that being clothed with modesty and self-control, love and faith makes you beautiful now and in the life to come.
[22:31] A couple of years ago, this was when I first started at PCBC English. Someone once actually kind of jokingly said to me, I can kind of tell a girl from PCBC by how they dress.
[22:42] I was like, oh, well, I can't. I don't know how you can. But, you know, jokes aside, wouldn't it be wonderful if one day people came up to me and said, I can tell a girl from PCBC by how faithful and loving and holy and self-controlled they are.
[22:58] Wow. Girls, if you want to stand out, the Bible says, let's be because of your good works that reflect a powerful Jesus.
[23:09] That's true fire. As we learn to be clothed with modesty and self-control in worship. And that's what verses 9 and 10 lay out for us. So that's one thing that I think we can learn, ladies.
[23:21] Secondly, another thing that Paul says we can learn, verses 11 to 12, invites women to learn to be quiet under the authority of public teaching.
[23:34] Writing about this verse in her book, God's Good Design, Claire Smith, Dr. Claire Smith says when she shared this with her kind of Chinese friend in a Bible study, she replied, oh, that's so easy to understand, right?
[23:47] So women should just be quiet and learn, you know, in public teaching. If only that were true everywhere, right? That kind of response. Now, this sentence wasn't originally written in English and Greek.
[24:00] So a couple of things that will be helpful to learn. Some of your translations will say she must be silent in verse 12. But that word there in the original actually shows up in verse 2, scroll up, when it talks about a quiet life, that we may lead a quiet life.
[24:17] So I don't think this is saying that women should have a mute button at church. Clearly, they don't here at PCBC, right? We love it when our sisters pray and prophesy, exhort and encourage, read scripture and lead worship songs and all kinds of other things.
[24:33] It's great that our women learn theology and disciple and make more disciples of all nations. Rather, I think the idea here is to learn God's word with a quiet attitude, an attitude of quietness, something like that.
[24:48] To save those text messages and long conversations for after the service, for example. Or to just put your full attention at what God might be teaching you. And look, that's an attitude that girls and guys are called to embody, by the way.
[25:02] But yes, Paul then does go on in verse 12 to say, I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man.
[25:15] Again, some tricky words here. The word for woman here could also mean wife in the original language. We'll explore this more next week in chapter 3. So actually, at least for some of us here at PCBC, we think that this verse is an instruction only for the married women.
[25:30] So I don't permit CMO to teach or assume authority over MUXI, something like that. It's possible since, you know, in the next few verses he's talking about a husband and wife, Adam and Eve.
[25:44] But notice that just before, Paul was talking to all women about kind of their modesty and self-control, right? So I kind of think it follows that all women are in view in this particular verse.
[25:58] But what about that next phrase, to teach or to assume authority? Literally here, word for word, it says in the original, but to teach I don't permit a woman nor to authoritize a man.
[26:10] But no one speaks like that, right, in English. So I think the idea here is that Paul doesn't permit a woman to teach nor assume authority over kind of adult men. But that leaves us with the million-dollar question, right?
[26:27] So can women preach? I think they can, but it depends on the context. But for most of us, this topic is very deeply personal, right? I think for us at PCBC, we read these verses and we think of real people, real sisters among us.
[26:44] We think of Eva, I do, one of our most theologically gifted members. I think of Jess, who came along with the SMBC team. I think of friends like Hayley or Alex or Siomai.
[26:56] They're all capable women in gospel ministry. And they teach God's word regularly. Many trees have been used up and books written about this topic.
[27:07] You can come borrow them from me if you want. I think this was really helpful. I was listening to this podcast and these two ladies lay out kind of two sides of the story about this particular question.
[27:19] And so if you are really looking to dig deeper and you have 70 minutes to spare, please make yourself have a look at that podcast episode. But my basic reading, I side with Deacon Danny there on the left.
[27:37] My basic take is that we reserve the authoritative teaching of God's word over the whole congregation for brothers of godly character who teach his word faithfully.
[27:47] And then we train and unleash our sisters and brothers to teach, preach, lead, and serve everywhere else so that everyone might know his name.
[28:03] So I'll leave it there. That's my basic take. For what it's worth, well, Pastor Albert and I, we've wrestled with this question a fair bit. No punch-ups, right, and lots of prayer.
[28:15] And some of you have probably noticed, if you've been to different services, that in the past five years we've made different choices for the preaching roster based on our convictions.
[28:28] And at the same time, both Pastor Albert and I see this as a secondary issue that doesn't divide us in ministry. Like spiritual gifts, or how old the earth is, or what on earth is going to happen before Jesus comes back, we can have slightly different views and be united in service.
[28:48] And rather, what we care most about here at PCBC is that whoever stands before you in each of our public worship services preaches God's word faithfully, points you and I to Jesus.
[29:00] And we care most of all that they would proclaim that the main point of the passage is the main point of our sermons. Nothing more and nothing less. And I just want to leave this section with a word for our sisters.
[29:15] Sisters, if you have a desire to preach and teach God's word, praise the Lord. Come and chat with me, or one of the core team. I promise you, we can find you a place where you'll be able to teach God's word.
[29:30] And God can fan your gift into flame. And yet perhaps for some of you, you're still confused, right? Hmm. The issue is not the what question, but why?
[29:42] Why can't she preach in an English service, for example? And what's Adam and Eve got to do with it, right? These last few verses. And so I think this is where in verses 13 to 15, we're nearly there, I think Paul wants women, and I think men as well, to learn to be settled in the saving story of childbearing.
[30:01] Beautiful worship will include godly women who learn to be settled in the saving story of childbearing. Again, every word and phrase here has been debated. It's very tricky to try and unpack this verse.
[30:14] But I think what's going on here is that Paul is supporting his argument, right, from the previous two verses, that women not give authoritative teaching in a mixed congregation of worshippers by appealing to the foundational story of creation, right?
[30:29] You notice he doesn't appeal to a cultural issue or a live argument in the church at the time. He goes back to Genesis 2. He talks about how Adam was formed first and then Eve.
[30:41] Actually, just as Pastor Albert taught us in 1 Corinthians 11, when we went through it a couple of years back, God has built into creation a beautiful design where men and women share the same value before God.
[30:55] And we bear his image in different complementary ways. This is not a culturally bound argument. This is a timeless one. And then Paul goes on to say that the fall occurred when the beauty and order and creation with men and women was shattered when we were deceived.
[31:16] The serpent deceived Eve and then Adam. Don't forget, guys, Adam was right there. He could have spoken up. And don't get Paul wrong here, right?
[31:26] These verses do not say that Eve was more gullible or weaker or more to blame. You won't see that in the passage. I think verse 13 and 14 is just Paul retelling the events of the fall so that we place what he wants women to learn about beautiful worship in the Bible's context, not in the culture's context.
[31:47] So in 2025, surrounded by the stories of our culture about men and women, what's the way forward for us? How on earth do we look at this passage and then go, sisters, here's how we can be saved through childbearing?
[32:03] Like verse 15 says. Once again, there's a lot of debate around this. It certainly can't mean that you'll be actually saved, you know, and go to heaven through childbearing.
[32:15] Otherwise, that's pretty rude and hard for some of us who don't get the chance to bear children. So what does it mean? I think there's a meaning here in terms of salvation, like working out your salvation.
[32:29] But I think actually the clearer word in the sentence in verse 15 is actually further on, right, where it says, if she remains. Do you see that in your passage? If she remains.
[32:40] Or if she continues. In the sequel letter to Timothy, 2 Timothy, we're going to hear how Paul encourages young Timothy to remain in what you have learned and firmly believe, 2 Timothy 3.15.
[32:53] There it's an appeal to remain, to stick, to stay with the good deposit, the gospel, right, to be settled. That's why I've chosen the word settled, in the unchanging faith.
[33:06] Sisters, the world wants you to have a successful career, to be a hero mom or auntie, to look dazzling in the process, and to do all kinds of other things that the world demands.
[33:19] God has something to say about all of that, yes. But first and foremost, he wants you to remain in the faith and love and holiness and self-control, right?
[33:30] No debate about it. And Paul is trying to outline here, I think, that one of the most timeless and God-honoring ways to work out your salvation story is to live a fruitful life for the Lord is through the ministry and sacrificial service of bearing and raising children.
[33:52] And look, I feel like I'm in kind of like an odd crowd here, right? We have some parents among us, but not many. I think most of us parent fur babies rather than children, like, as well.
[34:05] And not all of us can aspire to be parents at this point in time. So I get it. But hear that what this verse means at the very least. It reminds us of it at the very least, is that in every age, even today, women who sacrificially nurture and disciple children to love Jesus like they do, they display God's marvelous plan for the nations.
[34:30] They are worth honoring and celebrating. Once, Jamie Peterson, married to a singer-songwriter, Andrew, she was asked, you know, by some really nerdy theology people, theology people, how do you bring light out of darkness?
[34:45] You know, they're asked in their kind of, I'm better than you tone. And she just gave the best reply. She said, I bring light out of darkness by raising my children to know the Lord.
[34:58] Paul will speak more about this mummy ministry. Paul will speak more about spiritual parenting in general that we all join in. But for now, mums, please see that this verse, as counter-cultural as it is today, honors you and your sacrifices.
[35:16] God values your distinct kingdom-building role so much. He honors it as you are a woman. He honors how you guard the gospel here as God's people.
[35:30] And the godliness you display, and the way that you learn, and in the saving story that you hold on to and pass on to, both to your physical children and to many other children here, spiritually as well.
[35:45] So there you have it. Beautiful worship. How wonderful, right? How beautiful that we can pray as brothers, we can learn as sisters, that God made us men and women to complement one another as we worship him together.
[35:59] And for those among us here who parent broken souls, who point young ones to the love of Jesus, thank you. Thank you for your beautiful worship.
[36:11] And it's a beautiful work that you do for God, our Savior. Let's pray together. Let's pray together. Our Lord Jesus, thank you for your Holy Spirit challenging us and convicting us through this unlikely of all passages.
[36:32] Thank you that you have beautiful worship in store for us as we listen and learn to your commands.
[36:44] And so be with us as we continue to unite in our worship together in song as we praise you and honor you through Jesus. May it be that for all of us, men and women, young and old, that our hope, our joy is in Christ alone.
[37:03] In his name we pray. Amen.