Let’s read a bit from Titus once again:

The aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as becomes holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things; That they may teach the young women to be sensible, to love their husbands, to love their children, To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed. (Titus 2:3-5 KJ2000) 

Paul very specifically ties blasphemy of the Word of God to the actions of women, not to men.  Doesn’t this seem strange in light of the fact that he also places women in a subservient role to men in the order of nature?  Yes, until we understand why, and once again I have to give credit for this revelation to my own wife.  In the order of creation men represent God the Father while women represent Christ Jesus Himself.  The Bible teaches that the fullness of God dwelt in Jesus, that he was fully God and fully man.  Yet the Word also says that Jesus did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped.  How can this be when further study of the Scripture also shows that Jesus in fact IS the Jehovah of the Old Testament?  Because Jesus came to demonstrate life as a son of God.  The first command with a promise is to “honor your Mother and your Father.”  Jesus showed us how to do this.

Many chafe at the idea that a woman should be obedient to her husband.  We live in a feminist, evil age.  The ideals of feminism have brought many horrors to the world, not the least of which have been the destruction of the nuclear family in western societies and abortion on demand.  (But, I do not blame women alone.  Men allowed it to happen by accepting “liberal, advanced, and progressive” thinking.)  Many who desire to see women do all things men do point to Scripture and rightly point out that Paul also teaches that in Christ no distinction exists between male and female, etc.  Others go on to accurately teach that God Himself consists of both male and female attributes and that Adam, when first created, existed, like God, as both male and female.  True, true.  But, the plan of God included Adam and Eve eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the subsequent judgment of God that placed Eve under Adam’s authority.  None of this happened by mistake or because God was caught off-guard by mankind’s sin.  God created man with the ability to sin.  To have done otherwise would have been to create nothing more than a machine that could only do what God programmed it to do, even if those things were only “good” things.  To understand the Word and God’s purposes, we must always remember that God created man in His image and that His goal was to create a being like Himself.

This brings us back to the pattern of women in God’s creation.  Woman is no less important, no less worthy, than man.  To say so would be to say that Jesus is less important, less worthy, than his Father.  No, the pattern of woman is that she fulfill the role of Jesus in creation.  Like Jesus, she is called to willingly lay down her life for others, her children and her husband.  When she does this of her own free will she shows the world Jesus Christ in the flesh.  (By the way, this is the coming of Jesus in the flesh that John tells us identifies the believer in 1 John).  Woman’s calling is very high indeed.  And it is because women en mass have rebelled against this high calling that the Word of God is blasphemed today.

Christians make the Gospel of Jesus Christ both too easy and too difficult.  Too difficult because we often cling to a doctrine that says we can lose our salvation, our eternal life with God.  Too easy because we often teach that one must simply believe that Jesus died for our sins and ask him into our hearts in order to be saved.  The Bible teaches neither one.  Let’s consider some classic verses from John 3 to show what it means to come into a “saved” relationship to Jesus.

The King James Version says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”  (John 3:16-18 KJV)

In the Numeric Bible these verses read, “For :God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten :Son, that whosoever believeth unto him perish not, but have eternal life. 17 For :God sent not the Son into the world to judge the world; but that the world be saved through him. 18 Who believeth unto him is not judged: who believeth not hath been judged already, because he hath not believed unto the name of the only begotten Son of :God.

The word translated “unto” in the Numeric Bible really struck me, so I looked it up in Strong’s Concordance and found that this is the Greek word eis and means, “a primary preposition; to or into (indicating the point reached or entered), of place, time, or (figuratively) purpose (result, etc.)…”

Most translations say, “whoever believes in or on him” which makes us think that we simply have to say “I believe in Jesus” to join the club.  But, the word unto used in the Numeric Bible seems to bear the weight of what the Holy Spirit means to say here.  This word carries the idea that he who believes unto or into Jesus Christ as the goal of perfection, as the point one must reach in his quest for eternal life shall indeed receive everlasting life and will not be condemned as a sinner.  We believe unto Jesus in the sense that He Himself is the place, time, purpose, and result of our quest for all truth.  When we see faith in Christ this way we begin to see it in a more all-encompassing way.  Now we begin to speak about faith unto Christ.  He is our all-in-all.  He is both the goal of our pursuit and result of our pursuit, i.e., that we shall become like him.  “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.” (1 John 3:2-3 KJV)

Yes, he who believes unto him is not judged, for he shall be pure as Jesus himself is pure.