You may be seated. We are going to dispense with Children's Church for just this morning. So, we have baptism, Lord willing, at the end of the service, and it's already twenty five till, so my sermon will have to be brief. And y'all look at me like he doesn't know what that means. But anyway, we will see we will see this morning.

So children can just stick on in here with us for a few minutes this morning. Appreciate that. Alright. Mothers to emulate. Be one.

Now, obviously, this doesn't apply to some of you this morning. Mother's Day and Father's Day are unique, as we honor mothers and and later fathers. Some years, I bring a message on children honoring their parents, and some years, I feel led to bring a message on parents, mothers, and fathers being the examples that they ought to be. So we're gonna go with this one this year, mothers to emulate. Hebrews eleven eleven says, through faith also, Sarah, that would be Abraham's wife, herself received strength to conceive seed and was delivered of a child when she was past age, that is past 90 years old, because she judged him faithful who had promised.

Hebrews 11, we often call the faith chapter. It begins with a verse on faith. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. By it, the elders received a good report. We're told in the word of God, by grace are you saved through what?

Faith. Faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God not of works, lest any man should boast. The Bible says if you're trying to work your way to heaven, if you're trying to be good enough to make the cut, you will never make it because the only one who is good enough is Jesus Christ our Lord. And it is he who came and gave his life for us and offers us salvation by his grace through faith in himself and in his work on the cross of Calvary that we might be saved, that we might be forgiven, that we might be given a home in heaven.

So this chapter in Hebrews 11 is it is all about faith and many examples of faith. It says of Abraham, he believed God and it was counted it to him for what? For righteousness. Abraham was by no means a perfect man. He had some glaring failures in his life.

But nonetheless, he was a man of faith. He put his trust in the Lord. He left his homeland to follow the Lord where he would lead him. He trusted in the Lord to make of him a great nation and to give his descendants the land that he led him to. And the Lord counted that to him for the righteousness that he lacked.

And praise God, he will do the same for you and for me. He will count our faith for the righteousness that we lack. The righteousness of Jesus Christ that he died to give to all who come to him in faith on the cross of Calvary. Sarah is an example of that faith and she is mentioned here in Hebrews 11 with many others. If you would let's see.

Now I have it up here. We'll come back to Sarah in just a second, but I wanna read from Titus two, this passage this morning. Titus two three through five. The aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as become of holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things. That they may teach the young women to be sober, 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 blasphemy.

Let's go to the Lord in prayer once more. Lord, thank you for your word today. Thank you for the encouragement to us all to be examples to others, to be willing to help others, and to be willing ourselves to look up to others who have gone before, who have much wisdom that we can learn from. Lord, we pray that you would knit us together as a church family and that we all would exhort one another and so much the more as we see the day approaching. And we pray today particularly for moms, young moms, older moms.

We pray, that you would encourage them and that you would exhort them to be the examples in their household and in the church and in wherever place they are. Lord, to the grace of Jesus Christ and the love and mercy that he has bestowed upon all of us. And may we all learn as we grow together. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Paul's writing Titus here in Titus chapter two. Titus has taken on the role as pastor in some churches on the island of Crete. Titus was a longtime associates of Paul's. He traveled with him for a while, and then Paul sent him to Crete to help establish several churches on the island there. And he's giving him instruction on things that he needs to instruct the church in.

So Paul instructs Titus, Titus instructs the the church. Okay? And this is one of those. He also speaks to older men and younger men in this passage, but seen it's Mother's Day, we're gonna focus in a little bit on the older women and the younger women in this passage today. And though we're talking about mothers, the passage isn't only speaking of mothers, but women in general as well.

That the older women should be examples that the younger women can learn from and follow as wives, if that be the case, as mothers, if that be the case. And also, therefore, encouraging the younger women to not ignore the examples of their mothers and the older women in the church and what they have learned. And, of course, this is something we all can learn. The Lord has put us together that we might encourage and learn from one another. We don't see a lot of that, by the way, in the world in which we live today.

It seems like the generations get further and further and further apart as one generation doesn't seem to care to learn from the other. But that is not the way God intended it to be and is not the way it ought to be in the church. We ought to be both willing to look to others to learn, particularly those with greater wisdom and years than us. And we also ought to be willing to share and to look for opportunities to help those younger in age or in the faith than we. There are many examples in the scripture of women of faith.

We'll take just a few minutes to mention a few of those this morning. Examples that really all of us can learn from today. We'll start with Eve. Now you think, well, Eve? Wasn't she the one that took the the fruit and gave it to Adam and we're in this big mess?

Yeah. That Eve. Yes. So she made a big blunder. By the way, we've all made big blunders too.

Despite Eve's failure in the garden, she took on the responsibility responsibility of being the first mother and she took it on particularly in faith. When she conceived and gave birth to Cain, she declared that she had received received a seed, an offspring by the power of who? By the power of God. In fulfillment of a promise, she believed that God made to her in Genesis three fifteen. You see, after Adam and Eve sinned, God made this promise.

He said, I will put enmity between thee, that is the serpent or the devil, and the woman, that would be Eve. And between thy seed and her seed, her offspring. It, that is this offspring of the woman, shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel. Now which is worse, to be bruised in the head or to be bruised in the heel? Obviously, the head is much worse than the heel.

The seed of the offspring of the woman, God promised before he kicked Adam and Eve out of the garden, would one day redeem mankind and would set things right again and would defeat the plan of the devil to rob God of his precious creation, mainly man crying created in his image. And how was God going to do it? He was gonna do it ironically via the offspring of the woman. I say ironically because she was the one who first was deceived by who? By Satan and sin.

And yet, God was going to deliver mankind through her what? Through her offspring. Do you think Eve believed God? Oh, yes, I do. I do by her statements concerning her son Cain.

Now Cain didn't turn out very well, did he? Cain was a incredible disappointment, but God gave her Abel and Abel was different. Abel was, in a matter of speaking, more like David, a man after God's own heart. But you know how that ended. Again, in great disappointment and sadness for Eve.

But she continued to have children and she had another son eventually. His name was Seth. And again, when Seth was born, she continued to express her faith that God was going to keep his what? His promise to send the offspring of the woman to defeat the plans of Satan. And indeed, Seth was the one through whom one day Christ whose lineage Christ would be born, who was also uniquely the seed of the the woman for he didn't have a human father.

But when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his son made of a woman made under the law to redeem them that were under the law that we might receive the adoption of sons. Though Eve failed, Eve did not lose her faith and I believe God redeemed her and we will meet the mother of all living one day in heaven. And unlike the rest of us, Eve didn't have a lot of examples before her to follow because she was the first. We go from Eve to Sarah, already mentioned her from Hebrews 11. Again, Sarah, like her husband Abraham, wasn't perfect and neither are any of us.

But what did she do? Well, she left with her husband to go to who knows where because who said so? Because God said so. She was a woman of faith who though at times her faith was a little weaker than others and she thought, hey, well, God's gonna keep his promise. Maybe maybe he needs a little bit of help.

It's always in danger when you say, well, God needs a little bit of help. And the Hagar situation didn't turn out too well, did it? But in the end, she believed in the Lord. She trusted him. She found her way into Hebrews chapter 11 as an example of faith for all of us.

And God took her child Isaac, meaning laughter, and made of him a great nation of people. We see Rebecca. Rebecca is the wife of Isaac, Sarah's son. In Genesis 24, and we don't have time to read this this morning. In Genesis chapter 24, you can read the story of how Rebecca came to be the wife of Isaac and it's it's an interesting story.

You see, Abraham sent his servant back to his homeland to find a wife among his kins people for his son Isaac, so Isaac wouldn't marry Canaanites. And when the servant got to his hometown, the servant felt this tremendous burden because his master and God had entrusted him to find a wife for Isaac. And so you know what he did? He prayed. That's the right thing to do.

And he said, Lord, would you help me? Well, why about this? I have all these camels here and I'm gonna stop the well and the first woman that comes and offers me a drink and then offers to get water for my camels, let that be the one. And few minutes later, who here comes who? Here comes Rebecca.

What does she do? She offers him a drink and then she waters his camels. Now camels can drink like, ten, twenty, 30 gallons a piece. So you a lot of water. You know, hand crank well with a bucket.

Alright? What did we learn about Rebecca right off? She was she had a servant's heart. She wasn't afraid of work because that was work. And then when the servant came to her parents' house, she responded in faith.

Faith that God knew what he was doing and she left with a servant she had just met to go to be wife to a husband she had never met. It being the will of God. And then we have Rahab. Rahab. What what was Rahab when we first meet her?

Rahab is a harlot. She is a prostitute of some sort or another. Not a pretty description. Not one you associate with somebody that turns up in Hebrews 11. Why did she turn up there?

Because God changed her life And he changed her life and he saved her life. And he forgave her because she was a woman who put her faith in Jesus Christ. By faith, the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believe not when she had received the spies with peace. In case you're not too familiar with the story, two spies were sent into the land before the Israelites went into Canaan to spy out the city of Jericho to see what was going on there and report back to Joshua. When they got to the city, it somehow, somebody caught on that there were spies and they started looking for them.

And Rahab hid them in her house. And she showed courage and she showed faith. And she expressed that she believed in the power and the greatness and faithfulness of their God. And they said, you put a red cord out that window and when we come back and this city falls, everybody in this room, this house will be saved. And why were they saved?

Because of the faith of Rahab. The faith of Rahab, the harlot who was a harlot no more. She is a woman of faith, a woman of courage, a woman forgiven. A woman who then, having been forgiven and saved, married a man named Salmon, an Israelite. Now you may not know who Salmon is and know he's not a fish.

Salmon is the father and Rahab is the mother of a man named Boaz. And in case you don't know Boaz, you might recognize the name Ruth because Ruth became the wife of Boaz. And the courage and faith we see in Rahab seems to have been passed down to who? Her son. And how he responds to a lady named Ruth.

In Ruth one sixteen and seven, we read this, and Ruth said Ruth said to Naomi, her mother-in-law, after her father-in-law had passed, after her husband had passed, after Naomi had said, I'm going back to Israel from Moab, which is where Ruth was from. Ruth said unto Naomi, entreat me not to leave thee or to return from following after thee for whether I thou goest, I will go Whether their lodgest, I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, thy God, my God. Where thou diest will I die and there will I be buried. The Lord do so to me and more also if ought but death part thee and me.

Naomi had begged her to stay in Moab and nurse said, no, I'm not staying. Don't don't ask me to do that anymore. No matter what may come, I will stay with you. What a testimony this young lady had. And she left with her mother her mother-in-law to go back to a place she didn't know to a people in which for many she was an outcast.

But not only did she show herself a woman of faith, a faith in the God of Israel, but a woman of diligence and grace. As she went out the next day to humbly glean, pick up leftovers from fields to have enough food for her and her mother-in-law. And that's when she happened upon the field of who? When she happened upon the field of Boaz. Ruth and Boaz became the mother of Obed.

He said, I don't know who Obed is. Okay. Obed became the father of Jesse. That doesn't mean a lot, maybe. Jesse is the father of David, a shepherd boy who became what?

Who became the king of Israel and the ancestor of Jesus Christ. Both Rahab and Ruth made it into Matthew chapter one in the lineage of Jesus Christ. They're named there for a reason. They are testimonies to the grace of God who took a Canaanite and a Moabite and placed them in the line of Jesus Christ who died for the sins not only of the Jew but of the Gentile of the whole world. But also they are examples of faith, examples that all of us can learn from and follow.

They are examples of courage. They are examples of diligence. They're examples that young ladies could certainly learn from today. There's Hannah, young lady who didn't have any children. She came to the temple.

She pleaded with the Lord. She wept great tears. To one standing off, thought maybe she was intoxicated. But no, she was in earnest praying that God would give her a son. And she told the Lord, if you'll give me a son, I'll give him back to you.

She was a woman of prayer. Moms and dads alike need to be people of prayer to pray for their children, to pray for their loved ones, to pray for God to do great and mighty things in their families, in their churches, in their life. Hannah was a woman of prayer. Her prayer was sincere. She didn't care what others thought about her because she was talking to who?

To God. And she was willing to give back what God gave to her in his service. And so when Samuel was born and after he was weaned, she took him back to the temple and he became one of the greatest judges and greatest prophets and teachers in all of the word of God. And God gave her more children and I'm sure she was a wonderful mother to them as well. It's sad that some parents today are so concerned about raising their children to be successful and make a lot of money and forget about the thing that's a far greater value, and that's serving the Lord.

We need moms that bring up servants of the Lord and not just people that can make a lot of money. Because the money comes and the money goes. But we need to lay up treasure in heaven. And we as parents need to be teaching our children earnestly to give themselves to the Lord that they might do the same. Then we have Mary.

We have Elizabeth in the New Testament. Stop for just a moment on Elizabeth. I had Mary here on my outline, but I wanna talk about Elizabeth for just a second. Elizabeth, Hannah, was getting up in years and didn't have any children and she had been praying for the Lord to give her a child. Well, the Lord spoke by an angel to her husband Zachariah while he was serving in the temple and said, I'm gonna give you a son.

But he's not gonna be just any child. No. He is gonna be the forerunner of Jesus Christ. He is the one I am sending to prepare the way for the Messiah. And who did God give this special person to?

Zechariah and Elizabeth. And they raised him to be that person, to be the voice of the one crying in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord. A young man who was not afraid to preach the gospel, to preach the good news, to point people to their need of repentance and the coming savior. A young man who was willing to follow the Lord whatever that may be and whatever that meant. God gave him to Elizabeth and God used her and God used him.

We not only learn from the scriptures and the Holy Spirit, but also from those wiser and more mature in the faith. While I am not a young woman, my mother is definitely one of the most godly women I know and certainly a good role model, particularly to her daughters in law. She's got to visit here once or twice on Mother's Day. They didn't make it down this year because my dad had knee replacement surgery last week. So it's gonna be a little while.

He's 87 years old and seems to be doing really well with it, so appreciate your prayers. But my mom may not be that well known. My mom may not be somebody out on the forefront, but she is a wonderful godly mother, grandmother, kind, industrious, extremely patient, modest, servant hearted, self controlled, forgiving, particularly with this one, Faithful as a mom, a wife, a church member. She is also confident but not overly so. She also happens to be smart and witty.

I didn't inherit most of that. Most importantly, she is a very loving person and a woman of consistent and genuine faith. Now I am sure she has some faults, but really, I'm not sure right at the moment what they are. But I thank the Lord for my mother for she had a great impact on my life. My dad worked evenings while I was growing up.

My mother was the home one I was home with every evening after school. And she impacted me in ways that I will probably never completely recognize. What a great opportunity mothers are given. And that doesn't end when kids leave home necessarily. There are still opportunities to be mother, grandmother.

It's not only my mom that impacted my life and others. I there was a lady in Georgia where I was youth pastor. Her name was Ann Black. Her and her husband were kind of parents away from home for us, and they impacted us. I think of miss Judy, and I will miss her.

She impacted our lives and many of your lives as well, and even the lives of our children. And there are several others, some in this church. There is so much you can learn from others more mature in years and in faith. But it's also the responsibility of those more mature to take time to assist those who are younger. Which side of the equation are you on?

Maybe both. Be a woman and mother to emulate. Set your sights higher. Be willing to learn. Be eager to learn from others God has placed in your life, both men and women.

Don't settle, be more for Christ and others. Be willing to be used of the Lord. We need mothers and fathers, men and women, who are willing to say, I wanna help somebody else. I'll be there. And we need young people who are willing to say, you know, there is I don't know everything.

I have a lot to learn. That we might fulfill God's command to exhort one another and so much the more as we see the day approaching. If you're here this morning and you don't know Christ as savior, we plead with you, we're gonna give a hymn of invitation. If you'll come, I'll be glad to meet you down here and share with you how you can be saved today and know it. And if you're here today, the Lord is working in your heart in some other way.

Don't brush him aside as we sing this hymn. You don't have to sing. Just bow your head and talk with him today. Let's pray. Dear God, thank you, for your word, for our moms, for the opportunity we all given to be encouragement to others.

We thank you, Lord, for Jesus Christ, our savior, for he is our perfect example. And, Lord, we do pray if there's one who's not received Christ as savior that today or soon they would make that most important decision. And we pray, Lord, you would use us, work in our hearts to help us to be a better example for those in our life. And then we might be willing to look up to those who've been examples before us. In Jesus' name, we do pray.

Amen. Take your hymn book if you would turn to 393. Yeah. 393 in your hymn book, and let's stand and sing together. Take my life and let it be.

Standing, please. The Lord has spoke to your heart. Please come as we sing. Three ninety three. All right.

So in the meantime, we're going to sing Victory in Jesus. It's number four ninety six in the hymn book. There's we don't have the words on the screen, so you'll just have to open the hymn book and read the words. Thank you very much. Again, this is Ian, and we're so glad to have him up here today to follow the Lord and believer's baptism.

Upon your faith in Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior, I baptize one brother in the name of the father, the son, and the holy ghost, pray the likeness with him, raised in the likeness of his resurrection, to walk with Christ in newness of life. Amen. Amen. Please keep please keep Ian in your prayers as he pursues the Lord's will in his life and seeks to serve the Lord in newness of life in Jesus Christ, his savior. I'd like to ask brother let's see here.

Brother Ed, can you pray? Could you close our service in a word of prayer this morning? You don't have to stand. You can stay seated. Thank Our dear heavenly father, we are certainly grateful to thee for giving us life and giving us life more abundantly in our fellowship with you.

Thank you for making it possible.