What the Bible says
What does the Bible say about old age?
Scripture honours old age: “Gray hair is a crown of glory; it is gained in a righteous life” (Proverbs 16:31), and God’s people are to stand up before the aged and honour them (Leviticus 19:32). God promises his people, “even to your old age I am he, and to gray hairs I will carry you” (Isaiah 46:4), and older believers still bear fruit, declaring his might to the next generation (Psalm 71:18; Psalm 92:14).
Key Bible verses about old age
- Proverbs 16:31
Gray hair is a crown of glory. It is attained by a life of righteousness.
- Proverbs 20:29
The glory of young men is their strength. The splendor of old men is their gray hair.
- Leviticus 19:32
“‘You shall rise up before the gray head and honor the face of the elderly; and you shall fear your God. I am the LORD.
- Isaiah 46:4
Even to old age I am he, and even to gray hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear. Yes, I will carry, and will deliver.
- Psalm 71:9
Don’t reject me in my old age. Don’t forsake me when my strength fails.
- Psalm 71:17-18
God, you have taught me from my youth. Until now, I have declared your wondrous works. Yes, even when I am old and gray-haired, God, don’t forsake me, until I have declared your strength to the next generation, your might to everyone who is to come.
- Psalm 92:12-15
The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree. He will grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the LORD’s house. They will flourish in our God’s courts. They will still produce fruit in old age. They will be full of sap and green, to show that the LORD is upright. He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.
- Psalm 90:10-12
The days of our years are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty years; yet their pride is but labor and sorrow, for it passes quickly, and we fly away. Who knows the power of your anger, your wrath according to the fear that is due to you? So teach us to count our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.
- Job 12:12
With aged men is wisdom, in length of days understanding.
- Titus 2:2-5
that older men should be temperate, sensible, sober minded, sound in faith, in love, and in perseverance, and that older women likewise be reverent in behavior, not slanderers nor enslaved to much wine, teachers of that which is good, that they may train the young wives to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sober minded, chaste, workers at home, kind, being in subjection to their own husbands, that God’s word may not be blasphemed.
- 1 Timothy 5:1-2
Don’t rebuke an older man, but exhort him as a father; the younger men as brothers; the elder women as mothers; the younger as sisters, in all purity.
- 2 Corinthians 4:16
Therefore we don’t faint, but though our outward person is decaying, yet our inward person is renewed day by day.
Scripture: World English Bible (public domain). Short quotations in the introduction are from the ESV. Read each passage in its chapter for the full context.
From the Baptist Catechism
- Q70. What is required in the fifth commandment?
The fifth commandment requires the preserving the honor, and performing the duties, belonging to every one in their several places and relations, as superiors, inferiors, or equals.