Walk in Wisdom -- Family

Good morning. Welcome. We are studying a passage that is going to be near and dear to many of us, and we're doing something a little different. So if you have a child and they don't have one of these sheets that will help them follow along with the children's section or the section of the passage for them, raise your hand. Someone will bring you one. We normally have the children go to what we call the praise factory, but this morning we wanted them with us because God is speaking directly to them. Our topic this morning is family. This is an emotional word. For almost everyone, this is a very emotional word, some because of sadness, family lost, family that's moved away or moved out or have never been. For many, it's exciting, you're engaged, or you're expecting, and you're looking forward to the family that you're hoping for. For others, it's being equally thankful and overwhelmed in the midst of marriage and raising young children. Family is full of joy, it's full of difficulty, it's a struggle, it's a great responsibility, and it's a great blessing. I want us to walk through before we get into these very specific commandments that Cheryl just read, that Paul has given us, and I want to see just a bigger picture of how family is really important throughout all of Scripture. So we can actually just go right back to Ephesians chapter 5, right before Ephesians 6, on page 979 of a Pew Bible, if you have one, if you need that. And I want you to see there, In verse 29 of chapter 5, or verse 31, sorry. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother, and I hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. Paul says this mystery is profound. It is referring to Christ and his church. What we hear is that God has already designed a family, our families, based upon the family that he has prescribed, and that is Christ being the true bridegroom of his bride, the church. There's a greater picture of what the family means. We can actually go back a little further and see something even more interesting. In chapter three of Ephesians, verse 14. For this reason I bow my knee before the Father from whom every family or father in heaven and earth is named. There is an eternal God who is eternally Father and Son. And he, in his great wisdom, has put his fingerprints in the way he designed us, in our relationships, and who we are, and how we relate to one another. But we have to realize first, there is an eternal, divine father-son relationship. This isn't a social construct that we've come up with. No, this is a divinely ordered pattern. created structure that reflects God's own character, even God's own being, as a triune God. God the Father is eternally Father because He has been eternally Father to the eternal Son. So when we think about Father, Son, as we think about husband, wife, we need to see that these have greater divine and eternal truths behind them. We can go back to Genesis 1. In creation, before sin, God made man. He said it wasn't good for you to be alone, so he designed woman. And the first words out of man's mouth, the male's mouth, is praising God for woman. He gave him the great commission of procreation. Fill the earth. Childbearing, becoming parents. This is good in God's created order. So as you think about it, when you just step back into the bigger theology of family, there's first that divine family. God the Father, God the Son. Forever Father, forever Son. Then there's the church. This is remarkable. If you're a believer in this building right now, we're a unique kind of family. We're all brothers and sisters because we've all been adopted into the family of God. We get to call God Father. And he listens to us as if his own son. And then there's the households. Those are the individual husbands, wives, children, whatever your household looks like. Your household includes your, according to scripture, your spouse, parent, child, servant, roommate, guest. If you look at where we are in Ephesians, I want us to go back to Ephesians 1. We've been away from Ephesians for a few weeks. We need to see here that what Paul begins with, look at, again, we see this eternal relationship. Verse 3, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. That eternal divine family has given us all those blessings of being chosen. Beloved, forgiven, redeemed. That's our new identity. We can look at this identity even more. Chapter two, verses one to three, it talks about how we were dead in our trespasses. And then verse four, one of the most powerful two words in all Scripture. But God changed our story. Gave us life when we had death. Gave us forgiveness when we were guilty. And then we see that great transition in chapter four, walk worthy therefore of that calling. And he went through and talked about how we're supposed to be the family of God, being built up in the unity because we've been purchased by the same blood. And then he talks about how we need to put off sin and put on the new man. And then he talks about how we need to walk wisely. And then verse 22 of chapter five begins what we call the household code. The gospel doesn't just change the way we relate to one another when we're gathered as a church, it changes the way we relate to everyone at all times. It changes the way we relate to our spouses, our parents, our children, our coworkers, our employees, our employers, our neighbors. This morning we're looking at the specific household code for children and parents. The sacred and divinely appointed relationship of fathers, mothers, children. Now before I get into those details, again, I want to do one more thing, and I want you to see that Jesus is at the center of what these relationships are supposed to look like. Children, obey your parents in the Lord. Parents, fathers, do not provoke your children, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Jesus is central to who we are and how we relate to one another. We don't just now seek to have relationships that are self-fulfilling. No, we have relationships and we seek to make them Jesus Christ glorifying. We depend upon his grace and the way we relate. We seek to make him great in the way we relate. He must be the central focus of our relationships. How are you testifying to Jesus in your different relationships? That's a very important question to ask yourself today. How you relate to spouse, parent, child, teacher, student, employer, coworker, church member. How are you testifying to Jesus in these different relationships? Not, what am I getting out of this? Not, how can I count the ways in which everyone is failing me? How can I bring glory to Jesus Christ? As we look to Jesus being the center of this, we need to understand who Jesus is. He is the divine Son of God. Right, if you're looking at your sheet children, number one, He is the divine Son of God. He has all authority in heaven and on earth. And He's come down to you. to give you everything he has so that you can live the life that God has designed for you, so that you can truly live the happy life, being forgiven of your sins, of your disobedience. He's risen again so that you can have a new life where you get to enjoy God and this world the way God intended it. The most important thing I want you to hear, children, about what he's done for you is this. He said, let the little children come to me. That's our number one desire for you. To hear that Jesus says that to you. He desires for you children, let the little children come to me. He desires you to know him and for him to know you, to give you that life. And what that means is you believe that you have disobeyed, and you believe that Jesus Christ did die on the cross for your sins, and that He rose again, and that you trust Him. Now children, let's look at this specific command for you. Children. All right, let's first define who's a child. This word for child typically represents someone from the age of 2 to 13. So if you're from the age of 2 to 13 and you're in this room, stand up. Stand on the pew if you need to make sure we see you. All right, everyone look around. These are the children according to this passage. Stay standing. No, no, no. Obey. Keep standing. All right. Everyone else, I'm glad you're delighted and looking around. And what you're gonna do is you're gonna look around and you're gonna pray for that child who's closest to you during this time. Okay? These are the children that Paul has specifically in mind in this passage. All right, you may be seated. Thank you. Now, I also have to address that there's that other age group of like 13 to 19, This word doesn't directly apply to that age group in a certain way, but you're also not off the hook. You see, if you're 13 to 19 in this age, you're starting to learn a trade, to get a paycheck, to pay your own bills. You're starting to think about marriage and how to actually become a young adult into an adult. We have this thing in our culture called adolescence that's very confusing. And it creates this confusion that, am I a child? Am I a young adult? You want authority and freedom before you really take on responsibility in our culture. So here's how I want to further define what a child is. If your mama cooks most of your meals, primarily transports you, and you don't pay bills, consider yourself a child. And it's important that you understand this, you are to obey your parents in the same way the other younger children are. Some people will be children until they're 18, 25, and 30. And they just need to understand that in their dependence, they're obedient. Okay, so what does the command obey mean? This is number three on the question list. It's simply this. Active listening and doing. Active listening and doing. I'm trying to make that as simple as possible. It requires activity to obey isn't passive. To obey doesn't mean you just sit there. To obey isn't something that just happens. It's actively wanting to hear instruction and to do that instruction. It's very important they understand active listening. It's not hearing just whenever you casually might catch something. It's when your parents speak, you perk up. There's a desire to listen to your parents and do what they say. So what does this actually look like? What does obedience include? Or what are the elements of it? This is number four. Obedience is quick, full, and happy. Obedience, in order to be true obedience, it must include you being quick to obey. It must be a full obedience. And it must be a happy obedience, or it's not really obedience. So what does it mean to be quick? It means you jump to it, that there's an eagerness. When you hear a command, when you hear an instruction, yes, mom, yes, dad, I want to do that. It doesn't mean you try to delay with questions. All right, so for example, mom or dad says, go get your pajamas on. You don't ask the question, can I have a snack first? That's disobedience. It's delaying. What you do is you first obey. You go get those pajamas on. And then you ask whatever it is you think you might want afterwards. That's how you obey and have that open conversation. Now here's the kind of question you can ask when given an instruction like put on your pajamas. Mother, will it be chilly tonight? Should I put on pants or shorts? Now you don't have to ask it like that. But here's the issue. You don't ask questions that say, why do I have to do it? You ask questions, how can I best do it? You see the difference? We don't ask questions, why do I have to do it? You ask questions that ask, how can I best do it? That's quick. Full obedience. Full obedience. When I was a child, I did not like cleaning my room as much as I don't like cleaning my office. But my parents made me. They told me, you have to go clean your room or you don't get so-and-so. So I'd go in my room and I would clean it. You would walk in and the floor would be uncluttered. The bed would be uncluttered. But it wasn't clean. Why not? It was in the closet or under the bed. I didn't actually clean. I actually put my family in danger because if they were to open that closet, they were in certain danger of everything falling upon them. See, that's partial obedience. It's not really cleaning things, it's just making an appearance of obedience. Another example, if you were to be asked to take the trash out. This actually involves a couple things. First, you pick the trash up in the bag, you take it out, and it's not a complete job until what? You put the liner back in. That's a full job. Getting the trash out and putting the liner back in. Happy. Happy obedience. This means we don't mope, moan, complain, grumble. We don't try to sulk and make our parents realize you really shouldn't ask me to do this. We don't take our toys to the back room while crying. We happily say our parents know what's best. It's recognizing that it is a joy and a privilege to be part of a family and to be trusted enough by your parents that they're going to ask you to do things. That's what it means to be part of a family. You participate in the work. Children, whenever you get chores, that is actually a privilege. Your parents are saying, be part of the family program, be part of the family process, take on more responsibility. It's a great honor to be asked to do something in a family. All right, now Paul gives us some reasons why you should be obedient. This is something that's very helpful about Scripture children, that it's reasonable. Okay? Number five, why should you be obedient to parents? Notice in the passage it says, for, right, that's a reason. Why should you be obedient? For. This is right. Something I love about children is they get what's right and wrong. We confuse this as we get older, don't we? But right and wrong are very clear. Children are very black and white in terms of thinking about right and wrong. So children, let me just give you an example. Let's say you're playing with your favorite toy and somebody comes up and just snatches it right out of your hand and takes it. How do you feel? Hurt. Angry. That's not right, is it? It is not right for someone just to come and take something that you are currently playing with that belongs to you. It's not right to steal. It's not right just to take it. Children, when you do not obey your parents, it is not right because your parents have the right to give you instruction. It's their right. It's their responsibility. You're also not just robbing them of that privilege and honor of being able to instruct you, you're robbing yourself. It's a real privilege. To have the kind of structure and safety that says I don't have to figure everything out, I can just obey. It's right according to the nature of what God has said. Secondly, It's commanded. For this is right. And then look at verse 2. Honor your father and your mother. Honor is a way of loving and obeying. The way you best obey God, children, is by obeying your parents. The best way you will, the most clear and direct way to obey God, by obeying your parents. God is good. He's given you the good gift of parents. It is for your good that you can honor them, which means love and obey. And then we see that that command has a promise. And I believe the reason this is the first promise is that there's a personal promise here. It will go well with you. You have to understand that the family, it needs to be a, what Paul Tripp calls a circle of blessing. Whenever a family is unified and everyone is doing what they're supposed to be doing, there's a circle of blessing. And you, child, when you're obeying, the blessings are yours that you will get along with others. You'll experience God's peace. You're going to be trusted by your parents to do the right thing. That is so important for you. Live in such a way that your parents grow in their trust for you. You'll be able to participate in family fun. You'll belong. Children, the command is simple. Active listen and doing. It means you agree without disagreeing. Your parents are there for your protection, your provision, your promotion. Listen, respect, and trust them. Now, I want us all to back out for a moment. I want to think about what this means to honor your parents. Because for children, the ages two to 13, the way they honor their parents is very simple. It's mere, simple, clear obedience. But this is a pretty dynamic command that goes beyond just obedience. For instance, when I was a child, the best way to honor my parents was just simple obedience. As a young adult, I honor them by weighing their advice and taking it very seriously and needing to most of the time follow it. But mere obedience isn't what I do as a young adult. I honor them by listening, receiving, and weighing it heavily as I'm making decisions. And then when I'm married, I'm supposed to leave and cleave, right? I continue to weigh their advice heavily, but now my primary relationship responsibility is to my wife, not to my father and mother. And then as we get older, they're going to depend upon us more. But they never are commanded to obey us. That they might actually depend upon us like a child depends upon a parent, but they never are called to obey us. No, our way of honoring them is to provide for them, care for them. Honoring is a lifelong command for all children to their parents. We never graduate out of that. But it does look differently as we grow. Here are some simple kind of rules, I think, that'll help us understand what honoring means, or if we should be honoring, how to honor. The younger you are, the more you should weigh what your parents say. The younger you are, the more heavy your parents' advice should feel to you. I think an observation is true. The older you are, the more you know that you should weigh heavily what your parents say. I want you to speak to you, especially the youth. If you're going to disagree with your parents, what is your higher authority? If you're going to disagree with your parents, what is your higher authority? Is it what you want to do? Is it your friends and what they're doing? Or do you have a biblical principle? Do you have wise or godly counsel informing your decision? Here's a very simple truth we need to accept. Your parents are not always right. But if you disobey them, you are always wrong. Your parents are not always going to be right. But if you just flat out disobey them because of your sinful desires, because of your peers, you are always wrong. They're there for your protection. I understand youth, there's confusion because you're starting to understand how to self-express and self-understand and self-realize, and you're put in this very difficult situation, but it's for your protection that you have parents. Listen to them actively. Talk to them personally. You know, there's an interesting study on youth that remain faithful after they leave the home for college or work. And the study points out that the common factor for most youth that are going to stay faithful to Christianity after they leave home is that they have a significant relationship with someone in the church that's not their parents. This is data. It's not something I have a proof text for. But I think that's challenging. It's challenging for us parents. Are your children involved enough in the church that they're developing these kind of relationships with other Christians? Youth, are you making yourself available enough to have these kind of relationships with other Christians? Relationships just don't happen. They take time, prioritization, and encouragement. Before we move on to the role of parents, church, I want to challenge us in our role in this bigger picture of raising children, of teaching children. I want us to adopt that those children, two to 13, and then also those children 14 to 19, that's our primary mission field. We should be thinking about sending anybody over to Zambia if we're not primarily focused first on teaching those children what it means to believe in Jesus and to follow him. We have no business going anywhere else if we're not first and foremost thinking about these children here and those who are closest to us. So if you're a member of Jefferson Park, I'm going to encourage you to do a few things. First, speak to the children. When you see them, know their name. Look them in the eye. Expect them to look you back in the eye. Speak to the children, engage them. There's nothing I love more than watching my daughters actually engage other members in conversation. I'm mostly terrified of what they're gonna tell you, but I love seeing it. They're feeling more comfortable. This is their home in many ways. Secondly, one of the ways you can get another children to speak to them, serving our children's ministry. Work in the nursery. This isn't just childcare for parents. This is an opportunity for you to get to know those children so you know how to pray for them. So you get to know us and how to pray for us. It's an honorable service. Teach children Sunday school. Thank you for those who are teaching children Sunday school. Our children come and they tell us what they're learning. They're clearly soaking up what you're teaching them. Thank you, John, Amanda, Sam, for how you've invested in that particular ministry. Pursue a relationship with someone younger. This could look like a few things. It could be a pen pal. It could be inviting a child and the parent over for a snack, for a meal. Pursue a relationship. Request this of the child. Don't expect them to do that. Think about who, what child would I like to build a special relationship with? Invest in the next generation. of believers, Lord willing. Brothers and sisters who have raised children, teach us. Paul actually commands you to walk alongside of us. Older men teaching younger men, older women teaching younger women. Specifically, how to love spouses and children. We don't see things that you see. If you're young and you're young in marriage or you're young in child raising, be teachable. Request it. I'm wholeheartedly committed that my wife and I are not going to be raising our child, that we cannot raise a Christian alone. Because what they hear us teach, they need to see us doing. And they need to see the whole church gathered together with the same witness. Thank you for so many of you who have walked alongside of us. being a witness to our child. Here's a pure selfish one. Organize a parent's night out. I didn't get an amen from that? All right. As we look at the generations, and I realize, I praise God, something about this church that we see generation and the different generations represented. Be careful in complaining about the different generations. Younger generations, the older, older to younger. If there's one thing that I think we need to be just very weary of about what happens and one of the ways that generations seem to be going more and more away from the things of Scripture, it's this. Dads are going more and more missing. So if you're upset about this generation, how they're acting, think about how the dads of the previous generation disappeared. If you're worried about that generation, think about the dads of the previous generation disappeared. That's the common factor I see in what's going wrong in a culture. And it shouldn't be wrong going wrong in the church. Every culture, every generation has its strengths and weaknesses. The goal is to invest. All right, now to the parents. It's really, yeah, this is the daunting one. It's very important we have the right expectations because there are so many wrong expectations in parenting. So let's look, we've got parent's address, we've got father specifically. What is a father? A father is someone who self-identifies as a man and has other people self-identifying as his dependents. I'm glad you all are looking at me like, what are you talking about? That's how our culture likes to say it, right? It's kind of that weird, I'm going to define everything about me based upon how I self-identify. No, you're a dad if you have a kid. It's biological. If you have a child, you are a father and you have a responsibility and you have clear commandments right here that don't end. Fathers, someone who has a child, mothers are implied here in the commandment, they're parents. They're supposed to be raising children. Let's look at this commandment, verse four. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Here we see that fathers have two commandments. There's a prohibition. Don't do this. And there's a prescription. Do this. Don't provoke to anger, but build up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. There's two parts to this. Now, let's go back to the marriage passage a couple weeks ago. Remember Paul talks to the wife first and he says, submit. And what's interesting there is he never tells the husband to lead. What does he tell the husband to do? Love. Why if your command is to submit, husband, your command is love, love, love, love, love. In the same way, Paul just told the children to obey and he doesn't tell the parents be demanding and command. What does he tell them to do? Don't provoke. Nurture. Build up. Bring a great care. Parenting is a incredible responsibility and one of the first ways I wanted to see it's a great responsibility in that it, you are, if you're a parent, the primary teacher of how your child will view authority. You are, by definition, teaching your child how they're going to view authority. And let's be very clear, this is a world of authority. God created it that way. There's authorities that He's designed all over the place. There's the police. There's our governing officials. There's the church. There's husbands. There's teachers. There's authority everywhere. And parents, I want you to understand most of all, you're teaching your children about authority. Is it a good thing or is it a bad thing? Is it something that they should rejoice in and delight in and feel freedom in because it gives boundaries for them to thrive? Or is it tyrannical? Is it something to avoid? Is it something to push against? Is it something to be fearful of? You're teaching your children how they're going to view authority. Period. What are you teaching your children about authority? There's also another way we need to consider about how we're thinking about authority and how we're teaching them. Are you submissive to authority while demanding your children to be obedient to yours? They're gonna learn a whole lot more by your example than they are by your words. Let's first look at this prohibition. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger. Do not exasperate, do not aggravate. Now, let's just be very clear, there are some people who are natural-born carers who are too much tended to being peacekeepers. And there's people who like to lead and they can be more of an aggravator. I'm thankful that I am at least self-aware enough to realize I am a natural-born aggravator. Knowing is half the battle. But we need to realize we all fit one of those two categories. Someone who flees in conflict and someone who can aggravate in conflict. Those are tendencies and sinful tendencies and we need to realize those are tendencies and avoid the sinful aspect and promote the strength. We sinfully aggravate our children when we demand things from them that ought not be demanded. One of the most convicting articles I read as a parent was a challenge not to discipline your child for being a child. Do not discipline your child for being a child. You discipline your child for being disobedient. You don't discipline a child for being a child. And it was convicting because as the article went on, I realized that I too often get upset because my child's childlikeness is an inconvenience to me, and I perceive it as discipline. It's not discipline. They're just being a child. Enjoy that they're being a child. Don't discipline them for the inconvenience of being a child. Likewise, we need to be careful in being harsh and restrictive for our own comfort and convenience. The kinds of words we might actually speak to our children, like, be quiet. Get over here. Stop it. Knock it out. When we say them in such a way that's harsh because they're an inconvenience to us and our comfort, we're speaking to them like we wouldn't speak to any other human beings and they're our precious children we're supposed to be nurturing. Another way we can aggravate our children is by demanding that they live up to our laws that are far beyond God's laws. Now, every family needs to know how to order itself, but whenever we, we're constantly setting up our children as they grow up, especially, that they have to meet our unbiblical expectations. And not setting forth, this is what God desires for me, and God, give them the freedom to see what God expects of them. We're putting burdens and boundaries on them that are unhelpful. We have to understand our number one objective as parents is that they would learn to know and love God. The number one goal as parents is that they would love God with all their heart. It's not making the child fit our convenience, not convince our prideful way of life. It's making sure that they have the freedom and God is leading them to put them in his plan. This requires that we trust God loves them more than he loves us. It requires that God knows better than we do. So that's the prohibition, do not aggravate. And I believe that usually happens when we have unhelpful expectations or unclear expectations. Here we are with a prescription. It first says, build up. Bring them up. This word is only used twice. The other time it's used is in chapter five, verse 29. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it. Same word. Nourish your child, feed them, care for them, provide for them. There's a tenderness here in this word that requires us to know exactly what each child is like, right? You don't raise every child the same. They're all so wonderfully different. You know each child and you seek to apply God's word specifically to them. That's the kind of nurture he has in mind here. You know what's amazingly hard about being a parent? It's not letting them go, because I don't think we actually do that. It's teaching them to let us go. Parenting, the most difficult part is teaching them to actually let loose of us so that they can become their own family. Teaching them to actually leave and cleave. Where we're taking this child that was so dependent upon us and we're actually preparing them to launch out. be their own human being, Lord willing, Christian. The kind of care that Paul talks about here, this tenderness, it makes a child confident and happy. You know what's amazing about God's word here, in that it commands husbands to love their wives, love their wives, love their wives, so that they become more confident and happy, and it commands the parents to love their children so they become more confident and happy. God's commands are good for us. The building up, the nurturing, it has two parts. First, discipline. There's discipline and instruction. First, discipline. This refers to the whole person growing. Socially, physically, spiritually, emotionally. Their affections. Maturity in Christ is supposed to be our goal. Which requires that maturity in Christ is our first goal. Discipline has two parts. There's positive, there's negative. All right, so whenever you're disciplining somebody, there's positive and negative. You may not realize this, but right now, everyone who's in this church is under discipline. You're being trained up with the word of God, Lord willing. We've sung God's word, we've prayed God's word. We're being made disciples. There's a lot of positive discipline that has to go into anybody's training. This is a positive discipline. Correction is a negative. We're supposed to be training our children and disciplining them with more positive than negative. You want to hear more words of encouragement than correction. You don't hear those words of correction unless you've heard that encouragement. Your kids are the same way, if not more. If your children, if you're constantly having to say no, and that's your primary discipline, You haven't properly laid out expectations and trained them. Here's the most important discipline that you can give to your child. Helping them develop what they should love. Discipline means they're learning to develop what they love and how they love it. Now kids naturally love a few things, right? Cake, candy, ice cream. My kids have never said no to any of those things. It's remarkable. They have a natural affection. Actually, if I ask them, what would you like to do today? Ice cream is always the first answer. They have a natural affection for some things, and it may be an instrument, a hobby, a sport. They're going to have natural affections that are good But if we let them choose what they're going to love without disciplining those loves, they're not going to grow up to be mature adults, much less Christians. We need to be disciplining their loves by teaching them what they should prioritize. It means we have to be disciplining our love, that love for Jesus is first and everything else flows afterwards. So that they might actually learn to love Jesus first and foremost. It's also interesting to see how discipline changes. At one and a half, Lillian, you know, she's walking. And as a walker, you know, that outlet was like eye level. And she loved to walk up because there's a hole there. Like, why not put my finger on it? And so we taught her, you know, we'd smack her hand, say no. Well, she eventually got to the point where she would walk up to the outlet, point at it, smack her hand, and say, no. You have no idea how prideful I was about this. I'm like the caveman who invented fire. I'm like, look at this. I've created a self-deflating child. Everyone, come learn. It was remarkable. But see, back then, at a one and a half, two year old, they're simple. Their life is simple. It's, this is good, this is bad, don't do this, do this. It's as simple because God created them to develop that way first. And then they start reasoning more. They start having their own loves, emotions come into play. It gets more complicated and more difficult. I'm overmatched, I'm outmatched and overwhelmed. But this is good to see, this is how children develop and we have to be training them and discipline them according to that development because it's how God designed it. This is why parent, your most effective instrument in discipline is prayer. It's praying for them. Don't forget that the most effective instrument you have, the most effective part of your arsenal of how you're gonna train up that child, it's prayer. Because only God can do many of the things they need, first of all, calling them to salvation. Instruction. Instruction isn't just what we say, it's what we're teaching all the time. It involves equipping. It involves teaching. It involves modeling. They're always learning from us, and our words are not the most important thing. They're learning. In fact, what we're saying is either empowered by what we do, or it's undermined by it. Now when Paul says instruction, it says instruct them in the Lord. Bring them up in the instruction of the Lord. There's an idea here that this primarily means gather the children at your feet and pontificate eloquently and lead family worship. I don't wanna say it doesn't involve that, but I'm pretty sure that's not primarily what Paul's thinking. Paul is a good Jewish man. I believe what would inform what it looks like to instruct the Lord would probably go back to Deuteronomy 6, 7. Listen to what Deuteronomy 6-7 says. It was the passage we read earlier. You can look it up in the bulletin. You shall teach them diligently to your children. That is the laws. You shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise. Paul doesn't have in mind here that every man's gonna be this seminary professor who's going to teach the children everything they need to know. No, he has in mind here that teaching a child is a lifelong process that takes the opportunities that life gives you because you're spending the time with the child necessarily so that they can see what happens when they fail, and you give them instruction, or they get to see when you fail. And you give them instruction. Teaching them and instructing them here isn't reduced down to a small teaching time in the home. No, it's a lifestyle of helping the child know what to prioritize. Making sure they understand that coming to church is a priority. That's a way that a father is instructing the child in the Lord. You're bringing them to the body of saints so they're instructed as well. Yes, it's teaching them the Bible, it's teaching them principles, but understand, when you sit down, as you're walking, from morning till night, the idea here is that the dad is so involved with the children's lives, they're with them regularly. And as they're not, as disobedience comes, as difficulties come, they're able to take the opportunities to teach. Let me say something very clearly. It's not quality time, Paul is saying here. It's quantity. It's regularly spending time with children with the expectation that you're going to be able to teach them as you're living life together. See, it's very important that we instruct what God's Word says. And what they see matters. Parents, children should see how we keep our cool in stressful situations by trusting God. Children should see how we persevere in painful circumstances. Children should be instructed by seeing how we keep our promises even when they hurt. Children should see us treat others as better than ourselves. Children should learn instruction by seeing us praying, studying God's Word. If you wanna know how to instruct a child, it's by living life with them and taking the opportunities God gives you. I believe that's the primary way that Paul sees this, and that's from Deuteronomy 6, 7, that idea. Now, when you're thinking about what does it mean to actually instruct? If I wanted to teach my child something, I'm gonna give you a suggestion on where to start. Go to the book of Proverbs. Proverbs is written as if a parent instructing a child on how to make the right decisions regarding a number of things that really matter in this world. Proverbs is written as a parent to a child on how to actually have the right relationship with money. Work. Friends. Most of all God instruction and a large chunk of it is on how to find the right spouse. Read a proverb a day. with your family. Go through the Proverbs and pick out each one that refers to God, money, sex, power, friends, and work, and start memorizing these together. So that when something happens while you're living life together, you're able to point out, here's a Proverb, this is why that Proverb matters, this is what instructs us. Proverbs is a good place to start. Something else I want us to see as parents. Everyone likes to lead when they get to be seen as the expert in that thing. We all love to teach and lead when we're the expert. Parents, we're never experts, right? This is kind of a trial and error practice. I want to encourage you because so many parents, I've heard parents say this, I've lost my testimony, I can never lead again. No. If you think that some sin has kept you from being able to be a testimony of Christ, your testimony was never really about Christ. It was about you. You see, a Christian testimony is this. I am a sinner. I get to confess my sins and Jesus Christ will forgive me. I am an imperfect husband, but Christ is the perfect bridegroom who perfectly loves you. Look to him. I am an imperfect father, but you have a father in heaven who perfectly loves you and will care for you and instruct you. Look to him. This is the hard thing about Christian leadership in the home, in the church, wherever it is. You're constantly pointing people past yourself by pointing out your failures and pointing out how much better Jesus is. Parent, teach your children the glory of the gospel by confessing your sins and teach them that's safe to talk about sin. To teach them the wonder of being forgiven of sin. As we conclude, parents, when we reflect upon parenting, the number one thing we need to do is look up. All right, my temptation is to look around What dads are doing things I like, what's the newest cool thing dads are doing these days? And what that causes me to do is I parent out of fear of man. A lot of my parenting has been done out of fear of man. What do others think about my children, and what are they gonna think about me? That's really unhelpful. For the glory of God, that is very unhelpful. For the well-being of my children, that's very unhelpful. No, no, when I'm thinking about parenting right, it's looking up to my father. And when I look up to my father and I think about what a parent he's been, he sure is patient. He sure is slow to anger. He sure is quick to listen to me when I pray. He sure does speak words of wisdom from his own word to me. He sure is full of mercy and steadfast love. Parents, let's first look up and reflect upon what a great Heavenly Father we have and then think about what kind of parent we need to be. And then when we really think about it, He didn't withhold His own Son. You know the way I think is, I've given you all this and you're gonna ask for that? That's not how my Father, my Heavenly Father talks. He said, I have given you my own son. What will I withhold from you? I'm gonna keep giving myself and giving myself and giving myself. Let's not appease our children with screen time and gifts and treats. No, let's give them Jesus because he wants to welcome them. Will you pray with me? Father, we thank you for your kindness, your patience, your instruction for your son and your spirit that give us life. Lord, as we, with parents with young children, give us the grace that we need that is sufficient to teach us, to teach your children, to instruct them in you. Father, pray that we as a church would be a witness to these children together. Jesus, we pray that you would be calling We thank you that you welcome us quickly. In his name we pray, amen.