The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things;
Paul is writing to Titus, a young leader he mentored, who was overseeing newly formed churches on the island of Crete. This verse is part of a practical section giving guidance for different groups within the community. 'Reverent in the way they live' means their entire manner of life — not just their Sunday words — should reflect their faith. The word translated 'slanderers' is actually the Greek word diabolos, the same word used for the devil — Paul treats destructive speech with startling seriousness. 'Addicted to much wine' addressed a real cultural pattern in Crete. Most significantly, older women are named as bearers and teachers of wisdom — not because younger women lack wisdom, but because lived experience carries something that can't be shortcut.
Lord, make me someone worth watching — not for show, but because the way I live quietly points to you. Root out the sharp words and the small escapes I reach for when things get hard. Grow in me the kind of depth that gives other people courage just by being near it. Amen.
There's something quietly countercultural about this verse. In a world that worships youth, novelty, and whoever has the most followers right now, Paul points a young church toward the older women. Not celebrities. Not platforms. The women who have lived long enough to know what actually holds when everything else gives way. The word 'reverent' here doesn't mean prim or decorative — it means a life that has weight to it, a settled quality you can feel when you're near it. We all know at least one person like that. You walk away from them somehow more grounded than when you arrived. But there's an edge here that's worth not skipping past. Paul is honest that age alone doesn't produce wisdom. The years can just as easily produce bitterness, sharp tongues, or a glass of wine that became a wall. The path of a life lived well is a choice, made again and again over decades. So here's the question worth sitting with: What kind of older person are you in the process of becoming? Not someday — right now. The habits you're building today, what you say about people when they're not in the room, what you reach for when the pressure climbs, how you spend your quiet hours — those are the threads you're weaving into the person someone younger will one day look to.
Why do you think Paul specifically addresses different groups — older women, younger women, older men, younger men — rather than giving one set of instructions for everyone in the community?
Who is an older woman in your life — or from your past — whose way of living has left a mark on you? What specifically about how she lived made that impression?
Paul places gossip (slander) in the same category as addiction. Do you think most people — most Christians — take the damage of gossip as seriously as they should? Why or why not?
Whether or not you're formally 'older,' how does your way of living right now influence the people around you who are younger, newer, or more vulnerable?
What is one habit you're building today that you'd want someone younger to learn from you — and one habit you'd want to break before it calcifies into who you are?
But (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works.
1 Timothy 2:10
Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives;
1 Peter 3:1
Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel;
1 Peter 3:3
That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children,
Titus 2:4
For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands:
1 Peter 3:5
Even so must their wives be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in all things.
1 Timothy 3:11
For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre;
Titus 1:7
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;
1 Timothy 2:9
Older women similarly are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor addicted to much wine, teaching what is right and good,
AMP
Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good,
ESV
Older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips nor enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good,
NASB
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.
NIV
the older women likewise, that they be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things—
NKJV
Similarly, teach the older women to live in a way that honors God. They must not slander others or be heavy drinkers. Instead, they should teach others what is good.
NLT
Guide older women into lives of reverence so they end up as neither gossips nor drunks, but models of goodness.
MSG