WEBVTT 00:00:00.820 --> 00:00:05.219 All right, we're going to read from the New Testament together, from the book of Ephesians, 00:00:05.219 --> 00:00:11.820 the letter, Paul's letter to the Ephesians, chapter 6, verses 1 to 4. 00:00:16.600 --> 00:00:21.599 It's printed in the bulletin, and it'll be on the screens for you as well. And this is the word of 00:00:21.599 --> 00:00:30.339 the Lord. Paul writes, children, obey your parents and the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father 00:00:30.339 --> 00:00:35.920 and mother. This is the first commandment with a promise, that it may go well with you and that you 00:00:35.920 --> 00:00:41.600 may live long in the land. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the 00:00:41.600 --> 00:00:47.359 discipline and instruction of the Lord. This is God's holy word. Let us pray together before we 00:00:47.359 --> 00:00:53.439 look at it. Father, we ask now that you would open the eyes of our hearts, that you would give us ears 00:00:53.439 --> 00:00:58.379 to hear. Lord, you promised that you love to work through your word and that when your word goes 00:00:58.380 --> 00:01:04.500 forward, it never comes back empty. And so we appeal to that promise today and ask that you would open 00:01:04.500 --> 00:01:10.520 our minds and hearts to hear from you. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, well, there's 00:01:10.520 --> 00:01:15.960 very, very little in life relationally that's more important than the relationship between parents and 00:01:15.960 --> 00:01:21.480 children. And Paul talks to us about that in this passage, and it just worked out so well that as we 00:01:21.480 --> 00:01:26.420 work our way through the back half of Ephesians, we come today, we had to switch one week around, but we 00:01:26.420 --> 00:01:31.579 come today to this passage about children and parents. And so if you come today and you're not 00:01:31.579 --> 00:01:38.159 a child, a kid, you're not under your parents' roof, or you're not a parent, it could be tempting to come 00:01:38.159 --> 00:01:43.020 and think, I'm going to shut off for this. This is the one week that I don't really have much to think 00:01:43.020 --> 00:01:47.760 about. But it's really important to remember, first, let me say a couple things to you, if that's 00:01:47.760 --> 00:01:52.599 you today. Number one, all of the Bible is for all of us. Every single word from God is for 00:01:52.599 --> 00:01:56.640 every single one of us. And one of the ways that that applies today is, secondly, 00:01:57.479 --> 00:02:02.560 if you are a member or regular attender here, you have absolutely at some point made a vow. 00:02:03.299 --> 00:02:12.139 So during baptism, I've asked you, do you promise to pray and support the work of caring and nurturing 00:02:12.139 --> 00:02:18.259 the children of our church unto their instruction in the faith, in the gospel? And if you were here, 00:02:18.259 --> 00:02:24.479 probably most of you said, yes, we do. And so you come today having made a vow to care for the work 00:02:24.479 --> 00:02:29.159 of the children of our church, to be covenant parents, even if you're not a parent of one of 00:02:29.159 --> 00:02:34.259 the kids that were up here, some of the kids that can't be here today. But more importantly, even than 00:02:34.259 --> 00:02:40.019 that, is the fact that in this passage, Paul takes us all the way back to the Old Testament, 00:02:40.599 --> 00:02:45.939 and he appeals to the fifth commandment, and he says in verse two, honor your father and your mother. 00:02:45.939 --> 00:02:53.020 Now, no matter what your situation in life is today, it's important to know that the command to 00:02:53.020 --> 00:02:59.300 honor your mom and dad, your father and your mother, is a bigger overarching command of God, 00:02:59.620 --> 00:03:06.500 where obey your parents stands underneath that. So he, the Bible, God had to say, honor your mom and 00:03:06.500 --> 00:03:12.079 dad first, and then only later could he turn to the kids and say, now kids obey your parents. Why? 00:03:12.080 --> 00:03:19.260 Because obedience to parents for kids is a way, just one of the many ways we honor our parents. And it's 00:03:19.260 --> 00:03:25.480 important to distinguish that, because you may come today as an adult, and you've got parents alive, or 00:03:25.480 --> 00:03:30.740 you may come today as an adult, and you've got grown-up kids. And it's important to hear that the command to 00:03:30.740 --> 00:03:37.980 honor is far bigger than the command to obey. Why? Because you may come, and you may have evil parents. 00:03:37.979 --> 00:03:43.299 So some of us might come today and have really difficult parents, or have had really harsh parents. 00:03:43.719 --> 00:03:49.359 And the command there is not to obey them, but to honor them. So even if they were very evil, 00:03:49.479 --> 00:03:53.079 we've got to seek ways to honor, even if not obey. Or you may come today as an adult, 00:03:53.599 --> 00:03:58.459 and you look at your parents, and the command over you is not adult children in the room, adults in the 00:03:58.459 --> 00:04:03.579 room. The command is not obey your parents. No, it's honor them, right? So this comes for every single 00:04:03.580 --> 00:04:10.360 one of us, what Paul has to say to us here. So let me turn and talk to the kids first. So kids in the 00:04:10.360 --> 00:04:16.500 room, I'm going to talk straight at you, directly to you for a little bit, okay? And teenagers in the 00:04:16.500 --> 00:04:22.020 room, I'm including you in this, because when he says, when Paul says, children obey your parents 00:04:22.020 --> 00:04:26.620 in the Lord, he's meaning they're anybody that's under the roof of their parents still, that hasn't 00:04:26.620 --> 00:04:32.379 sort of left to form their own life. So that's teenagers, kids, little kids, all of you in the room, 00:04:32.379 --> 00:04:36.800 this is for all of you for a few minutes. And I want to say to the teenagers especially, 00:04:37.620 --> 00:04:43.480 I'm going to talk to the kids in the room, to all of you, like I'm talking to a five-year-old, 00:04:44.019 --> 00:04:49.180 all right? So don't feel awkward about that, but know that all the adults in the room know too, 00:04:49.339 --> 00:04:54.659 that they need to be talked to as well, like we're all just five. That's the best way we can 00:04:54.659 --> 00:04:59.319 receive it, is to hear it as if we're all just five, okay? So I'm going to talk to the younger kids, 00:04:59.319 --> 00:05:03.659 but I think in saying it to the younger kids, we'll try to catch everybody in the room, no matter 00:05:03.659 --> 00:05:10.779 how old you are. Now, what does Paul tell you kids in the room, little kids in the room, big kids in 00:05:10.779 --> 00:05:18.779 the room? He says, children obey your parents. Now, that is simple. So there's no, we don't need to 00:05:18.779 --> 00:05:24.180 explain it very much, because you know exactly what it means to obey. So, but I will say a little bit 00:05:24.180 --> 00:05:30.540 about it. It means to listen, right? So to listen to what your parents say, to do what they tell you 00:05:30.540 --> 00:05:36.360 to do. So that's what it means really to obey outwardly. But then the third aspect of obedience 00:05:36.360 --> 00:05:43.139 is to not do it annoyed and angry, right? So to have an attitude in your heart that says, 00:05:43.519 --> 00:05:49.060 I actually long to obey. And the parents are in the room saying, you'd get them, you'd tell them, 00:05:49.060 --> 00:05:55.920 right? Tell them, obey and obey without, this is not a word for five-year-olds, but without begrudging, 00:05:56.060 --> 00:06:00.360 right? Without drudgery in your heart. In other words, without rolling your eyes and being annoyed. 00:06:00.759 --> 00:06:05.480 That's Paul's command. Now you say, why? Why do I have to obey my parents? Is it just because the 00:06:05.480 --> 00:06:10.620 Bible tells me so? And the answer is no. Why do you have to obey your parents' kids in the room? And 00:06:10.620 --> 00:06:17.100 the answer is, Paul says right after that, because this is right. Okay, so what does Paul say? Paul is 00:06:17.100 --> 00:06:23.980 saying that there is such a thing as right and wrong in this world. And that every kid, all of us 00:06:23.980 --> 00:06:29.180 adults, we all know that. No matter what we believe in today, we all know there's such a thing as right 00:06:29.180 --> 00:06:34.939 and as such a thing as wrong. And we're being commanded to walk in the way that's right. And God 00:06:34.939 --> 00:06:42.240 says it's right to obey your parents. Now, kids, adults, everybody, I teach across the street at the 00:06:42.240 --> 00:06:48.860 seminary. And at the seminary, I teach the preaching class. And one of the things I say at the preaching 00:06:48.860 --> 00:06:55.019 class is I say, never use a prop in a sermon. All right? So I know that lots of churches do that. 00:06:55.340 --> 00:07:00.379 And the word, the Bible is enough. Okay? You don't need props because you got the word and the word is 00:07:00.379 --> 00:07:07.900 enough. We have a book that God's given us. But today, I'm going to break that rule for one time a year, 00:07:07.899 --> 00:07:13.060 one time a year only, and use a prop. All right? To help explain this. All right? So don't look for 00:07:13.060 --> 00:07:18.379 this next week. Okay? No props next week. But all the kids in the room, I want you to look at this. 00:07:18.459 --> 00:07:24.120 This is a piece of wood, right? A nice, fresh piece of wood. And one of the things you can see, 00:07:24.199 --> 00:07:28.919 all of you have looked closely, is you can see that there's this stuff in the wood that we call grain. 00:07:29.299 --> 00:07:35.079 Yeah? And it all flows in one direction, the grain. And when you look at the grain of a piece of wood, 00:07:35.079 --> 00:07:41.399 what does it tell you? Who knows? Anybody brave? What's it tell you? It tells you the direction 00:07:41.399 --> 00:07:45.800 that the tree grew, right? So when you look at the grain and it points one way, that's telling you 00:07:45.800 --> 00:07:51.839 that the tree grew that way. And so when a carpenter gets a piece of wood and they want to make a table, 00:07:52.279 --> 00:07:56.500 what do they do? They know that if they're going to smooth it out to make the table as smooth as 00:07:56.500 --> 00:08:03.579 possible, which direction do you try to smooth and sand? You don't go against the grain. No, 00:08:03.579 --> 00:08:08.019 you go the direction that the grain is pointing, right? So in this day, this would go this way 00:08:08.019 --> 00:08:12.879 because the grain's pointing that way, right? Now listen, in the same way, in the exact same way, 00:08:13.199 --> 00:08:20.419 God made the world with a grain to it, a direction, a way things should go and be. 00:08:21.139 --> 00:08:26.899 Yeah? And one of those ways, those directions, is to obey your parents. And that's why in the next 00:08:26.899 --> 00:08:32.240 verse he says, Paul says, this commandment, honor your mom and dad, obey your parents, comes with a 00:08:32.240 --> 00:08:38.259 promise. And the promise in the Old Testament was so that you could live long in the land. So you say, 00:08:38.360 --> 00:08:43.200 wait, you're telling me if I obey my parents, that means I'll live a really long life, right? And 00:08:43.200 --> 00:08:48.000 that's not exactly what the Bible's saying. Instead, what it's saying is this, generally speaking, 00:08:48.580 --> 00:08:52.919 the way God made the world is that when you obey your parents, your life tends to go better, 00:08:53.740 --> 00:08:59.200 right? So if you struggle at home to obey your parents, you'll probably struggle at school to obey 00:08:59.200 --> 00:09:04.940 the teachers. And then maybe later on, if you get stuck in a little bit of a life where you're having 00:09:04.940 --> 00:09:09.960 a hard time obeying all the time, eventually you'll have a tough time at work and a tough time 00:09:09.960 --> 00:09:15.379 participating in normal life when you're an adult or in university, right? And so God's saying, 00:09:15.840 --> 00:09:22.300 you got to walk with the grain of the universe. And the grain of the universe is the way God made 00:09:22.300 --> 00:09:27.240 things, what is right. That's what Paul means, what is right. Now, I don't think that that was probably 00:09:27.240 --> 00:09:31.659 five-year-old. That was probably more like nine, ten, eleven-year-old level, but hopefully at least 00:09:31.659 --> 00:09:36.519 that group got it. Walk in the grain of the universe, the way God made you. It's right to obey your 00:09:36.519 --> 00:09:40.919 parents. That's what Paul's saying. Now, let me tell you one more thing before I give you a few 00:09:40.919 --> 00:09:46.840 takeaways and turn and talk to your parents for a little bit and all the adults in the room. And it's 00:09:46.840 --> 00:09:52.159 this. Paul says one more very important thing in this verse to you. He says, children, obey your 00:09:52.159 --> 00:09:58.779 parents for this is right. This is the grain of the way God made things. But then he says, do it 00:09:58.779 --> 00:10:05.539 in the Lord. Now, I want the kids in the room to think about this. Listen to this for just a second. 00:10:05.620 --> 00:10:08.919 You're going to have to, what you're going to have to do is you're going to have to turn to your parents 00:10:08.919 --> 00:10:14.659 or to the adults next to you, and you're going to have to whisper the answer in their ear because 00:10:14.659 --> 00:10:19.259 the adults don't go to Sunday school. And so I doubt that the adults are going to know this. 00:10:19.259 --> 00:10:24.840 But I think the kids in the room will know this, and that's this, that when in the New Testament, 00:10:25.639 --> 00:10:33.460 when the Bible says the word the Lord in the New Testament, who is Paul? What's the Bible talking 00:10:33.460 --> 00:10:37.620 about? Who is the Bible talking about when it says the Lord? So when it says obey your parents 00:10:37.620 --> 00:10:44.659 in the Lord, the kids, I bet you know who it's talking about. And the answer is Jesus. All right. 00:10:44.659 --> 00:10:49.860 Now, you might have to tell your parents that. And the reason Paul says that is because he's saying 00:10:49.860 --> 00:10:55.839 that the real reason is not just, the real reason to obey your parents is not just because it's right. 00:10:55.939 --> 00:10:59.799 It's part of the grain of the world, the grain of the universe, but also because he wants you to look 00:10:59.799 --> 00:11:06.500 at Jesus and say, I want to obey my parents because I want to give honor to Jesus, my Redeemer, 00:11:06.600 --> 00:11:11.019 who saved me. That's what he's saying. So he's saying, I want you to obey your parents because you turn 00:11:11.019 --> 00:11:17.399 and you say, because it's a way of actually serving Jesus in my life. Now, let me give you three really 00:11:17.399 --> 00:11:23.159 practical things to think about. All right. Before we turn to the parents. Number one, you know what 00:11:23.159 --> 00:11:28.079 that means? And this is really important, I think, for all the adults to listen to as well, as well as 00:11:28.079 --> 00:11:35.159 the kids, all the kids in the room. What that means is that Paul is saying you are never too young to 00:11:35.159 --> 00:11:41.539 follow Jesus. Never too young. He says, children, obey your parents because of Jesus in the Lord. And 00:11:41.539 --> 00:11:47.600 that means he's saying that he doesn't think you're ever too little to start trusting in Jesus. So we 00:11:47.600 --> 00:11:52.419 even think that in the Old Testament, it teaches that from the time of your birth, you can already 00:11:52.419 --> 00:11:58.740 be trusting, dependent on Jesus in a way. So you're never too little. So some of you may need to turn to 00:11:58.740 --> 00:12:05.620 your mom and dad soon and say, you know what, mom and dad, I know that I need forgiveness for my sins. 00:12:05.720 --> 00:12:09.980 I trust in Jesus. Right? So you, it may, maybe it's time for that. Maybe it's time for you to think 00:12:09.980 --> 00:12:14.879 about that. You're never too young to trust in Jesus. Now, the second takeaway that we have for you here 00:12:14.879 --> 00:12:22.500 is that parents, you guys know, parents are not always at their best, right? They're not always at 00:12:22.500 --> 00:12:26.480 their best. But what I want to tell you today is when we are at our best, when the parents in the room 00:12:26.480 --> 00:12:32.620 and the covenant parents in the room are at our best, we think one thing, one thing. There is only 00:12:32.620 --> 00:12:39.279 one thing we want for you. Only one. So you might come today and you might say, my parents, maybe the 00:12:39.279 --> 00:12:43.399 older kids in the room, you can recognize this. My parents have too high of expectations for me. 00:12:44.420 --> 00:12:48.659 Maybe you feel that way. But let me look at you and say, and I know this for all the parents in our 00:12:48.659 --> 00:12:55.480 church, we don't need you. We don't want you. We don't care if you're the best athlete. And we don't care 00:12:55.480 --> 00:13:02.379 if you are the smartest kid in your class. And we don't care if you are cool. We don't care about 00:13:02.379 --> 00:13:08.920 that, right? And we don't care if you grow up to be just like we are. Now, sometimes we can care a 00:13:08.920 --> 00:13:13.779 little bit too much about some of that, some of us parents. I know I can struggle with that. But at our 00:13:13.779 --> 00:13:18.000 best, that's not what we care about. What we want for you, every kid in the room, every person under 00:13:18.000 --> 00:13:24.940 somebody's house, what we want for you is to follow Jesus. We just want you to trust Jesus all of your 00:13:24.940 --> 00:13:30.460 days. So we don't care what you grow up to be. We don't care where you end up in life as long as 00:13:30.460 --> 00:13:34.600 you're following Jesus. That's what we really want for you, okay? And then the third thing I want to 00:13:34.600 --> 00:13:40.940 say, the last thing I want to say to you is, why do you have moms and dads? Why do you have moms and 00:13:40.940 --> 00:13:48.460 dads to obey, to honor it all? And the reason moms and dads exist in this world, the one reason is that 00:13:48.460 --> 00:13:57.420 they are there to remind you that they are not your ultimate parent. Moms and dads exist to point away 00:13:57.420 --> 00:14:03.620 from themselves and to say, you know the love that you really need is the love of your heavenly father. 00:14:03.620 --> 00:14:11.460 So moms and dads exist to grow you up so that you're independent of them, but dependent on God. 00:14:11.820 --> 00:14:15.779 That's the real goal of parenting, right? So I want the kids to know that, that the real goal 00:14:15.779 --> 00:14:21.299 is that you'll grow up and be dependent on Jesus, independent one day of your parents. And so let me 00:14:21.299 --> 00:14:29.279 finish talking to you guys with something that's called a bedtime blessing. This bedtime blessing comes 00:14:29.279 --> 00:14:34.100 from one of the favorite books that we've discovered at our house recently. It's called Habits of the 00:14:34.100 --> 00:14:41.019 Household. And in it, the author writes a bedtime blessing that he tells to his kids. And I think that 00:14:41.019 --> 00:14:46.720 every parent in the room would want you to hear this, okay? Would want you to know that this is true 00:14:46.720 --> 00:14:51.919 for you as well, okay? And so here's the bedtime blessing. Mom or dad, the parent says this to you at 00:14:51.919 --> 00:15:01.819 bedtime, I say to the, to you, the kids, do you see my eyes? And you say, yes. And then your parent says, can 00:15:01.819 --> 00:15:10.399 you see that I see your eyes? And you say, yes. And then your parent says, do you know that I love you? And 00:15:10.399 --> 00:15:16.059 what do you say? Yes, right? You say yes. And then they say, and this is what, this is what I really want you to 00:15:16.059 --> 00:15:25.039 hear. This is what's most important. Do you know that I love you no matter what bad things you do? And you say, yeah. 00:15:25.839 --> 00:15:31.359 And then they turn and say, and do you know that I love you no matter what good things you do? And you say, yes. 00:15:31.759 --> 00:15:38.559 And then they say, do you know who else loves you like that? And then you can't just say yes this time, all right? 00:15:38.579 --> 00:15:44.439 This time you have to learn something new. You have to say, God does. And then it closes like this. The parent says, 00:15:44.440 --> 00:15:51.560 even more than I love you. And you say, yes. Child, rest in that love. All right? So what our parents want for you, 00:15:51.600 --> 00:15:57.300 all of you in this room, is to know this. And maybe you adults in the room didn't get this enough when you were 00:15:57.300 --> 00:16:04.440 growing up under your parents. But the most important thing you can say is, do you know that I love you no matter the 00:16:04.440 --> 00:16:10.540 bad things you do or the good things you do? Because that unconditional love is how the Heavenly Father loves me through 00:16:10.539 --> 00:16:16.620 Jesus. All right, now let me turn to the parents. Now, so far, kids, the parents have been sitting back 00:16:16.620 --> 00:16:23.559 saying, that's right. You get them. You know, you tell them you got to obey. But they're not off the 00:16:23.559 --> 00:16:28.719 hook, okay? So I'm going to talk to the parents and the covenant parents in the room. Every adult 00:16:28.719 --> 00:16:34.399 that's a member, a regular attender here is a covenant parent. And that means that's for everybody. 00:16:34.399 --> 00:16:41.500 But also, I bet this extends way beyond just those boundaries, what I'm going to say. And kids, I want you to listen 00:16:41.500 --> 00:16:47.399 as well, because it's very important for you to know what the Bible calls parents to do and be like. All right? 00:16:47.480 --> 00:16:53.759 So parenting, parents, covenant parents, parenting across the whole Bible. When you look at parenting across the whole 00:16:53.759 --> 00:17:00.000 Bible and pull all the verses and chapters together that are written about it, and you read the books on parenting, 00:17:00.000 --> 00:17:05.900 as I've looked through, one of the things that it says over and over again is the Bible basically gives 00:17:05.900 --> 00:17:10.839 you one main concept for thinking about what it means to be a biblical parent, a gospel-shaped parent. 00:17:11.200 --> 00:17:17.359 And it's right here in our text. Since the Industrial Revolution, one of the problems we face as parents is 00:17:17.359 --> 00:17:22.180 we tend to send our kids out more than they're at home. So we send them to school. We send them to 00:17:22.180 --> 00:17:28.400 extracurricular activities. We send the theological training. We farm it out to the church, to the local church 00:17:28.400 --> 00:17:32.620 through Sunday school, and things like that. And all of that's good. None of that's ultimately bad at all. 00:17:33.360 --> 00:17:39.120 But because of the post-Industrial Revolution realities, we're in danger sometimes of missing 00:17:39.120 --> 00:17:43.700 the main thing the Bible calls us to do as parents and covenant parents. And it's right here in verse 00:17:43.700 --> 00:17:49.420 4. And in verse 4 it says, raise your children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. 00:17:50.280 --> 00:17:55.900 But the word discipline there is a Greek word that probably most of you in the room know to some 00:17:55.900 --> 00:18:01.680 degree, paideia, which is an educational term. So the word discipline there has a real educational 00:18:01.680 --> 00:18:08.860 sense to it. So it's discipline, yes, but it's discipline or habitual training, instruction that 00:18:08.860 --> 00:18:13.920 comes with habit-forming training, discipline alongside that. The second word there that's 00:18:13.920 --> 00:18:18.200 translated instruction is the word neuthio in Greek, and that's the word for counseling. 00:18:19.019 --> 00:18:23.660 So another way to translate this is to say, parents and covenant parents, raise your children 00:18:23.660 --> 00:18:31.279 in habitual training and counseling in the Lord. And one of the ways to take the main idea that you 00:18:31.279 --> 00:18:35.600 see, I think, across the whole Bible then to sum it all up, when you look at that verse in the light 00:18:35.600 --> 00:18:42.440 of the Proverbs, is to say the Bible calls parents to be a nurturing teacher, a nurturing teacher, 00:18:42.940 --> 00:18:49.360 a teacher in the Lord with deep affection, with love, trying to point kids away from you ultimately 00:18:49.359 --> 00:18:53.719 and independence from you one day so that they can be dependent on the Lord. Nurturing teacher. Now, 00:18:54.099 --> 00:18:59.839 Paul is writing this, the book of Ephesians, to the city of Ephesus, and he turns and you see in verse 00:18:59.839 --> 00:19:06.399 four, he says, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger. Instead, raise them up in the nurture, 00:19:06.559 --> 00:19:12.159 instruction, and counseling of the Lord. And the reason I think that he says fathers is because he's 00:19:12.159 --> 00:19:17.779 writing in the Roman Empire where men had absolute authority in the household. They could do anything 00:19:17.779 --> 00:19:23.460 they want with anybody they wanted, and they could be quite harsh, and it tended to create a household 00:19:23.460 --> 00:19:28.399 that were, where dads were very harsh on the one hand, but very passive in parenting on the other 00:19:28.399 --> 00:19:33.079 hand. So they had high expectations for their children, very high. They wanted them to be great 00:19:33.079 --> 00:19:39.799 men and women, but they were removed from the actual work of raising the kids. And so that's why Paul 00:19:39.799 --> 00:19:45.579 turns, this is a revolutionary statement, and says fathers, stop being so harsh with your children, and 00:19:45.579 --> 00:19:50.879 instead, it is your job too to nurture them and counsel them in the Lord until they're independent 00:19:50.879 --> 00:19:55.659 of you, but dependent on Jesus. So that was a revolutionary moment, like we've seen the past 00:19:55.659 --> 00:20:01.579 couple weeks in these relational commands that we get. I think what that means is the biggest threat 00:20:01.579 --> 00:20:08.319 that Paul saw in his day, and the biggest threat that still faces us, is passivity in parenting. 00:20:09.179 --> 00:20:15.279 Paul was addressing the issue of passivity, of backing away and not taking up the role of a nurturing, 00:20:15.279 --> 00:20:21.220 counseling teacher, full of affection and love, growing up children that will one day be independent 00:20:21.220 --> 00:20:27.879 of you, yet dependent on the Lord. So let me start to draw things to a close, a shorter time in the 00:20:27.879 --> 00:20:34.420 sermon this morning, not too much more, but a little bit, by saying the negative thing he says to parents, 00:20:34.420 --> 00:20:39.399 and then the positive thing. So the negative thing is fathers and mothers. It's of course for both 00:20:39.399 --> 00:20:44.099 fathers and mothers and covenant parents in the room. Do not provoke your children to anger. 00:20:44.099 --> 00:20:49.879 That's the negative side, the thing we have to push away in order to train them in the nurture 00:20:49.879 --> 00:20:54.459 and instruction and counseling of the Lord. What does that mean? A couple things I think it means. 00:20:54.559 --> 00:21:01.500 Number one, like I've already said, it means beware of being harsh and overbearing, of letting emotion 00:21:01.500 --> 00:21:08.279 dictate discipline, and instead seeking their ultimate good by suppressing emotion and seeking 00:21:08.279 --> 00:21:13.740 justice for their good. So not letting emotion overtake discipline is what Paul's talking about here. 00:21:13.740 --> 00:21:18.099 In other words, to think about that twofold thing, raise them up in discipline and instruction. 00:21:18.519 --> 00:21:23.839 Okay, one problem is you can be all discipline and very little instruction. That's the one way you can 00:21:23.839 --> 00:21:31.940 provoke them to anger. And a subset of that would be having overbearing and overly high expectations 00:21:31.940 --> 00:21:39.819 for kids. I think that's less of an issue in Edinburgh, but I can tell you that when I was growing up, 00:21:39.819 --> 00:21:45.279 just a personal, my personal story, when I was growing up, I saw how many, especially young men, 00:21:45.379 --> 00:21:50.379 because I was always with the boys, but how many young men were broken by their dad's expectations. 00:21:50.779 --> 00:21:56.819 And that can sometimes be the case. And that's one way to provoke a child to anger, is over years and 00:21:56.819 --> 00:22:01.220 years and years, have far too high of expectations, where we want our children to be the best athletes, 00:22:01.319 --> 00:22:06.439 the smartest in the room, straight A's, the most polite people, the person who always shakes the 00:22:06.440 --> 00:22:11.380 adult's hand. In every environment, the best possible kid they could ever be. And what that 00:22:11.380 --> 00:22:18.500 tends to create is, as one person I saw recently put it, well-practiced Pharisees. Right? What's a 00:22:18.500 --> 00:22:24.360 well-practiced Pharisee? A well-practiced little Pharisee is one who is always performing on the 00:22:24.360 --> 00:22:30.019 outside because their parents expect it, but pretty hollow on the inside. And when that gap exists, 00:22:30.100 --> 00:22:34.400 they tend to grow up and eventually can despise what they've been taught through Sunday school and 00:22:34.400 --> 00:22:38.360 things like that because of that. So that's one way of provoking a child to anger. That would be 00:22:38.360 --> 00:22:44.820 all discipline, little instruction. Now let's flip it around. All instruction, all counseling, we might 00:22:44.820 --> 00:22:51.040 put it in modern vernacular, very little discipline. So the opposite error would be to provoke your 00:22:51.040 --> 00:22:56.019 children to anger, and I think that's an idiom, what does it mean, with underwhelming too little 00:22:56.019 --> 00:23:01.700 expectation. And so I think this is probably more of the struggle for our time and our day. I hear 00:23:01.700 --> 00:23:07.799 regularly from teachers that there's a crisis in education in the classroom with just being able 00:23:07.799 --> 00:23:12.880 to get kids to do what they're told and obey all the time, and that's because that might start at 00:23:12.880 --> 00:23:18.299 home with underdiscipline. And Paul calls us here to both sides of it, discipline and counseling, 00:23:18.880 --> 00:23:24.140 nurturing affection and discipline all together. So this is another way of just saying passivity 00:23:24.140 --> 00:23:29.519 when it comes to the things kids really need. So Paul, across this letter and the book of Romans, 00:23:29.519 --> 00:23:35.039 tells us what's the natural tendency of the human heart. And he has these long list of sins that if 00:23:35.039 --> 00:23:41.359 we're left to ourselves without the grace of God, we will become all sorts of things, angry, full of 00:23:41.359 --> 00:23:47.119 malice, full of wrath, full of violence. And one of the items on the list is disobedient to parents. 00:23:47.519 --> 00:23:52.759 And so when we lack discipline, when we're all counseling, all nurture, no discipline within that, 00:23:53.160 --> 00:23:59.160 we can allow the tendencies of the human heart to just come out and grow and grow and flow and get 00:23:59.160 --> 00:24:03.220 bigger and bigger over time. So one of the questions maybe would be parents and covenant 00:24:03.220 --> 00:24:08.540 parents, Sunday school teachers, a calling from the Lord, a way of fulfilling the vow, by the way, 00:24:08.800 --> 00:24:14.820 teaching in Sunday school. Are we helping our kids fight screen addiction? Are we helping our kids 00:24:14.820 --> 00:24:20.580 fight underperformance in all sorts of avenues? Are we helping them fight their sins with nurturing 00:24:20.580 --> 00:24:25.560 affection? That's what he means here by discipline. Are we helping them fight the natural path of the 00:24:25.559 --> 00:24:30.639 human heart by giving them Jesus Christ? So let's turn secondly and think about the positive. 00:24:31.619 --> 00:24:36.379 And that'll be the last thing, and I'll close. That's the negative. That's what we've got to avoid. 00:24:36.559 --> 00:24:41.700 The positive, he turns to us and says, here's the positive. The twofold positive path, discipline 00:24:41.700 --> 00:24:47.079 and instruction. And I'm just going to give you a brief list. We could spend a lot of time on each of 00:24:47.079 --> 00:24:52.299 these, but a list of things I've seen in other writers, preachers, and I think that come directly out of 00:24:52.299 --> 00:24:58.720 these commands. Number one, positively, we've got to be aware when we're training our kids up in the 00:24:58.720 --> 00:25:05.139 Lord that children are human lie detectors, okay? So they are bunk detectors. And so they're amazing. 00:25:05.279 --> 00:25:10.279 Kids are amazing at seeing through the bunk. And that means that when they come to Sunday school, 00:25:10.480 --> 00:25:14.240 they come to church, they're in an environment like this, and they hear one thing, but there's no 00:25:14.240 --> 00:25:19.659 personal example at home on the other side. They see straight through it. They see straight through 00:25:19.660 --> 00:25:25.140 it faster than the adults do. And so we've got to be aware that personal example of living out the 00:25:25.140 --> 00:25:32.040 gospel is the most important thing we can do. Secondly, prayer. We all need prayer for our kids. 00:25:32.140 --> 00:25:36.660 I think raising our children up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord means praying for 00:25:36.660 --> 00:25:43.500 everybody who's under our house every single day with deep care, intimacy, and affection. I keep 00:25:43.500 --> 00:25:48.160 thinking, it keeps coming to my mind, I don't know about yours. If you're around St. Columbus very often, 00:25:48.160 --> 00:25:55.040 you might have heard Ryan Akers preach a few months ago, a couple months ago, about prayer. And one of 00:25:55.040 --> 00:25:59.960 the things he said that keeps convicting me every week, I can't stop thinking about it, is he talked 00:25:59.960 --> 00:26:05.420 about how he kicked open the bedroom door at his house when he was a kid, and he saw his dad on his 00:26:05.420 --> 00:26:10.820 knees praying, and how much that changed him, right? So our kids not only need our prayers, they need to see 00:26:10.820 --> 00:26:17.680 us praying. They need to see that we are people of prayer. Number three, quickly, just one of the ways you can 00:26:17.680 --> 00:26:24.880 seek the discipline and instruction counseling of the Lord is to have a time every day where you gather 00:26:24.880 --> 00:26:30.920 your whole household. Have a time every day, very simple time, where you gather your whole household 00:26:30.920 --> 00:26:37.580 and open something from the Bible, even if it's just a verse or two, and pray and send them on their way. 00:26:37.700 --> 00:26:42.420 Or maybe that's a gathering time at night where you couldn't do it in the morning, but at night you 00:26:42.420 --> 00:26:48.380 gather everybody, and you open the Bible, and you say, the Lord loves you unconditionally, and so do I, 00:26:49.259 --> 00:26:54.519 and you pray. So either a sending time or a receiving time every day. Gathering around the 00:26:54.519 --> 00:27:00.900 gospel is a great way, a simple way to practice what we're being told here. Now, I've got a number 00:27:00.900 --> 00:27:05.300 five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten on this list, but I'm just going to mention them, and that's this. 00:27:05.299 --> 00:27:11.159 I think Paul's telling us in this word, nephio, counseling, that there's an affectionate, 00:27:11.319 --> 00:27:16.419 nurturing teaching concept within it, and I think it means it's saying we've got to have good times 00:27:16.419 --> 00:27:21.159 together. There's got to be laughter. There's got to be joy. There's got to be playfulness. You've 00:27:21.159 --> 00:27:29.599 got to tell them every single day something like, you can tell me anything. So are we cultivating a 00:27:29.599 --> 00:27:35.220 household where households where kids can come to us and tell us anything, things they've done 00:27:35.220 --> 00:27:40.000 wrong, things they're struggling with, and we're open enough to say, you can come to me, and I will 00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:45.620 not forsake you. I will not leave you. You will always be welcome at my table. I will walk with you 00:27:45.620 --> 00:27:50.860 through this problem, through this sin, through this struggle. I think that's what Paul means by the word 00:27:50.860 --> 00:27:56.579 counseling here, if we translated it literally from Greek, and the reason for that all that is the same 00:27:56.579 --> 00:28:00.880 as the kids, because we are in the Lord, because we've got to be able to say, I will love you like that 00:28:00.880 --> 00:28:05.620 for all of my days, because that's how God the Father loves me. Now let me close with this word. 00:28:06.360 --> 00:28:12.360 All right, kids, I don't know how much of that you got. Probably not that much, but that was for the 00:28:12.360 --> 00:28:16.480 parents and all the covenant parents in the room. But kids, I want to bring you back and listen to this 00:28:16.480 --> 00:28:21.280 very end bit, okay, as we close, and I'll pray, and we'll have a time to give you some books and things 00:28:21.279 --> 00:28:28.680 like that. You're not being asked, kids in the room, you're not being asked to be a perfect child. 00:28:29.339 --> 00:28:33.960 Not at all, okay? And parents in the room, covenant parents in the room, you are not being asked to be 00:28:33.960 --> 00:28:38.980 the greatest parent, to win an award for the greatest parent. What you're being asked by Paul to do is to 00:28:38.980 --> 00:28:45.039 be gospel-centered parent. Kids, what you're being asked by Paul to do is to actually, at a really early 00:28:45.039 --> 00:28:51.139 age, trust in Jesus and let the gospel shape the way you relate to your parents through obedience. 00:28:51.240 --> 00:28:57.960 That's all Paul's asking us here. And that means what we all really need, so whether we have kids 00:28:57.960 --> 00:29:03.319 today or no matter what our situation is in life today, what we all in this room really, really need 00:29:03.319 --> 00:29:12.420 is we need to know today that we have the unconditional love of the Heavenly Father. So every one of us needs 00:29:12.420 --> 00:29:17.480 that more than anything. We need family love. What's great family love? What's a great home look like? 00:29:17.519 --> 00:29:23.160 A great home is a home that's shaped by an unconditional love because you know that you have 00:29:23.160 --> 00:29:27.700 the unconditional love of the ultimate Heavenly Father. And what does it mean to have unconditional 00:29:27.700 --> 00:29:31.519 love in your life? What does that mean? Kids, do you know what that means, to have unconditional love? 00:29:31.960 --> 00:29:37.600 It means that you can come to somebody in your life and not perform in front of them. That's what it 00:29:37.600 --> 00:29:42.400 means. So you know that you have unconditional love or you're giving unconditional love when you can 00:29:42.400 --> 00:29:47.759 love somebody in a way that doesn't require performance of them. They can come and rest in 00:29:47.759 --> 00:29:54.180 your presence without the need to perform, to be a well-performed Pharisee, right? That's real 00:29:54.180 --> 00:30:00.440 unconditional love. The only way, kids, parents, we will have gospel-shaped homes that love like that 00:30:00.440 --> 00:30:09.700 is when we can look up and say, because of Jesus' unconditional love for me, I have the unconditional 00:30:09.700 --> 00:30:15.259 love of the ultimate Heavenly Father that will never go away. And so I can look up and I can know that 00:30:15.259 --> 00:30:22.400 God says to me, I will not love you less for the bad things you do. I will not love you less for the 00:30:22.400 --> 00:30:28.759 bad things you do. Because of Jesus Christ, I love you forever and forever. Let us pray. Father, we all need 00:30:28.759 --> 00:30:34.039 that love. We need to know that love, that grace today. We need the gospel. Some of us are adults in the 00:30:34.039 --> 00:30:42.220 room that had lousy parents. And so Lord, today we need to hear from you that you love us unconditionally. 00:30:43.599 --> 00:30:49.339 And in that, Lord, maybe you'll help us to forgive our parents. And some of us need to look up and 00:30:49.339 --> 00:30:54.339 change aspects of our parenting. Some of us kids in the room need to look up and say, boy, I'm always 00:30:54.339 --> 00:31:00.740 annoyed when I'm asked by my parents to do something. Lord, every single person needs the work of the 00:31:00.740 --> 00:31:06.960 Spirit this morning. And so we ask that you would give us gospel-shaped homes more and more and more, 00:31:07.380 --> 00:31:12.000 and that that would bleed into a gospel-shaped community in our local church. That we would feel 00:31:12.000 --> 00:31:16.539 the unconditional love even here in this building, because we don't have to perform for one another. 00:31:17.240 --> 00:31:21.660 Oh, Lord, we thank you for the gospel. We thank you for the gospel. We pray that in Jesus' name. Amen.