Titus (and my friend's dog)

Last year some friend's of ours bought a new puppy. She wanted to give the puppy a Biblical name. After covering the un-pronouncable Old Testament gamut (including the likes of Ahiezer, Jahaziel, Bealiah, Shephatiah, and Isshiah, none of which are quite helpful when you yell your escaping dog's name and your neighbors mistakenly think you're swearing in Hebrew) I piped up with a suggestion: Titus. They liked it, and so the dog was christened.

I'm not sure what it was about the name that I thought would be worthy of a golden retriever, but after a women's Bible study, I think I may have uncovered the answer. Titus 2:1-15. It's all about Titus' advice for older men, younger men, older women and younger women. Get into it deeper and we uncover something worthy of a head-scratching.

Older men are told to be:
temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, love and endurance.

Older women:
reverent in the way they live, not slanderers, not addicted to much wine, to teach what is good (unrelated question: why is it that the older women are the only ones told not to get drunk???)

Younger women:
love husbands and children, self-controlled and pure, busy at home, kind, subject to husbands

And finally, younger men:
self-controlled

What? That's it for the guys? The rest of us get a list a mile long and the young men get "self-controlled!?" BOLLOCKS, I SAY! After muttering to myself for a bit about the unfairness of certain passages of the Bible (and yes, the Bible IS supposed to be about fairness, what else would it be about?) I have to assume that there's a good reason for Titus' orders. I have two guesses. The first is that Titus was a young buck himself. Who would give themselves a laundry list of things to do? Understandable.

My second guess is much more likely (and preferable) and it's the one I stand by. Titus, in fact, was a wise older man. And being wise, he knew that everyone would be able to handle his list--everyone, that is, except the younger guys. Even in that era, it is apparent from Titus that they were not able to multi-task.

I've decided I like Titus. He has some good insights. And I like golden retrievers. Which is why I named one after Titus.