Battlefield on the Homefront

Amen. Thank you, Gunnar, for leading us in singing psalms, as the

Bible commands us to do as a New Testament church, to sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.

I want to tell you this morning about a couple of battles of World War II by the

Americans that you may have never heard of.

These battles include battles like Victory Gardens, battles like rationing, battles like blackout drills.

Of course, these battles I'm referring to are battles that American citizens participated in on the home front.

So as World War II is happening, as America is involved, as we're fighting the war, as it were, on foreign soil, the idea is, back on the home front, there was still much to do.

And these are the things that people participated in, and any ground advanced on in enemy territory was actually fueled by the battle on the home front.

I'm turning your Bibles this morning to Ephesians chapter 5. We discussed this morning the battle on the home front.

Now we're going to cover a lot of scripture this morning. We're going to look at a big section, fly over a big section, and then we'll come back and hit the individual parts of this section together.

But what I want you to understand this morning is that godly homes play a crucial role in our advancing

Christ's kingdom. So we want to understand this morning what the battle on the home front looks like, and how we should think about this institution of the home.

Now, to my knowledge, this will be the longest section that we've covered, and it'll be a long section for you to stand,

I understand. But for those who are physically able, I ask that you stand this morning and we're going to begin reading in Ephesians chapter 5, verse 22, and we're going to read this whole section down to chapter 6, verse 9.

So earlier in the service, we read the parallel passage from Colossians. It was much shorter. This is a little bit longer, but it does us good to read it all together.

So Ephesians chapter 5, beginning in verse 22. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the

Lord. The husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.

Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.

In the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies.

He who loves his wife, loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

Therefore man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

This mystery is profound, and I'm saying that it refers to Christ and the church.

However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother.

This is the first commandment with the promise, that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land.

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the

Lord. Slaves, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart as you would

Christ. Not by the way of eye service as people pleasers, but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, rendering service with a good will as to the

Lord and not to man, knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the

Lord, whether he is a slave or free. Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this text. We pray, Lord, that you would bless it, bless the preaching of it, that the

Spirit would be present in our service to apply it to the hearts of your people. We pray the gospel would be made plain, that Christ would be exalted, help us to understand the battle on the home front today, and help us to be a people who are willing to trust your scriptures, even when they push back against cultural norms and ideas.

We pray that we would be the people of your word, for the glory of your name.

We pray it all in Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. We enter now, as you see, the final section of Ephesians 5, and this section, of course, as you see, takes us into Ephesians 6.

So think about this, Ephesians 6 is the last chapter of Ephesians. So we see the light, right?

We see on the horizon, perhaps somewhere off in the distance, there is the end of this sermon series in Ephesians.

But what I want to do today is I want to give an overview of this section, and then we'll come back and we'll walk through the individual parts together, which, by the way, means next week on Mother's Day, I'll be preaching about wives, be subject to your husband.

So follow me for more church growth tips, right? So happy Mother's Day and all that. But what we want to understand,

I mean, you understand, we want to know the Bible, right? Like we want to understand what the Bible says, because this section is so relevant to the day in which we live, okay?

We're losing before our eyes, or at least obscuring before our eyes, once well -established definitions, definitions like woman, definitions like man, definitions like family, definitions like husband, definitions like wife.

We are downgrading today the role of parents with their children. We believe, we tend to believe, like the culture tells us, that our children are owned by the state, or that our children, that the state should have oversight of our children, or the state should be the primary caregiver of our children.

We laugh in our culture today at children who are disobedient, and we've thrown away manners and respect and maturity in children as antiquated.

We tell children and young people, oh, you're only young once, enjoy this while you're young.

We devalue the home today. We think the roles of men and women are interchangeable.

We degrade the role of a woman as though the only way that a woman can have real value in our world today is if she's a man, or acts like a man.

We sneer at biblical manhood. We laugh at the immaturity of men who stay boys for too long.

We laud effeminacy in men as courage, when the Bible condemns it as sin.

We celebrate autonomy in our culture as though a man who gets a woman pregnant has no obligation or responsibility toward her and that child, or as though a woman who becomes pregnant has the right to have the child in her womb dismembered and murdered.

We laugh, or disrespect at least, authority and hierarchy in the workplace.

We think that every person simply has the right to make a certain amount of money, no matter their work ethic, no matter their level of experience, or their time on the job.

And friends, what I'm telling us this morning is, this is why the Bible remains so relevant to us today.

Because all of these things, every single one of these things that I just mentioned are all addressed directly or indirectly from the text that we read this morning.

And I want to encourage you with something. In a world that's gone crazy, and in a culture that is full of chaos, we do have a sufficient book that speaks rationality and clarity and hope and wisdom into the age in which we live.

So let us hold fast to these scriptures. So over the next several weeks, we're going to examine these things from the book.

And our goal is not to try to deal with every falsehood. You understand, like each day a new falsehood comes out, right?

Like we've got people in schools today who are, I forget what it's called, but there's some word for it, but they identify as pets, right?

Like I can't possibly address every single falsehood, but what I can do is to look at what the

Bible has to say about the home front, about the truth that speaks about marriages and men and women and children, and even application there from the end on masters and slaves, an application

I think today even for the workplace. And this is God's good book, and its truth is sufficient for how we ought to live the

Christian life, okay? So where we need to begin today, as we dive into this, kind of an introduction, where we need to begin today is just a reminder that we don't preach this section from Ephesians disconnected from the context of Ephesians.

Paul did not start out in Ephesians 5 for a reason, right?

So remember, Ephesians 1 through 3 is our wealth in Christ. When you read

Ephesians 1, 2, and 3, you get this great and deep and weighty theology about all that God has done for us in Christ, about who we were apart from Christ, our deadness and following the prince of the power there, and how we were undeserving and miserable and wretched, and yet we see that God had a plan from eternity past, and we see even when we were dead and trespasses and sin, what did

God, God didn't pour his wrath out on us, but in his mercy and his sovereign grace, he poured his grace upon us, and what happened, he brought us from death to life.

And then in Ephesians 4, 5, and 6, so that's our wealth, then we have our walk, that is how we, in light of all this grace that we've been shown, how does the church live?

We see, we've been seeing this in Ephesians 4, and now in Ephesians 5. And then in Ephesians 5, let's remind ourselves of some context, so let's just look at some verses.

Ephesians 5, we have a little bit of context, remember verse 1 of Ephesians 5 says this, therefore be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

Then later on in Ephesians 5, you have verse 15, that says, look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil, therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the

Lord is. And then of course, our immediate context, we have verse 18, and do not get drunk with wine for that is debauchery, but be filled with the spirit.

So tune in for just a moment, actually, that's just preacher, like I hope you're tuned in the whole sermon, but tune in here if you're untuned.

This context of the household, that is how we understand the household, is directly connected to these things

I just read. That is, it's connected to our walk of love. It's connected to our walk of wisdom.

It's connected to our making best use of the time. It's connected to being filled in the spirit.

One of the greatest issues that you face in your home today is simply not understanding the areas of the battle that you are losing.

That is, when we separate our home life from our Christian walk, like we think our

Christian walk is here on Sundays, and we've compartmentalized our home life over here. The home is just where we eat and where we rest, where we relax, where we watch our

Netflix. Well, when you see the home in that way, you're losing the battle already that the world is waging against the home in our day.

So what I'm saying is, you have to see instead the home, our home life, our relationships in the home, blow out of a regenerate heart.

Christ conquers our homes because He has conquered our hearts.

Okay, so this leads now today just to some observations I have of the text.

Just some big overview things that will lead us into the following weeks. So the first observation

I have is this. I didn't put blanks in your outline and all that. These are too long. You can shorthand them if you want in notes.

But the first observation is this. The gospel transforms the household because it transforms the relationships and responsibilities in the household.

The gospel transforms households because it transforms relationships and responsibilities in the household.

So let me just give you an example from our text. We'll go down to Ephesians chapter 6, verse 1. Notice this.

It's not just children obey your parents, right? We want to bring the hammer down and say, obey your parents.

But Paul says it in a different way. Children obey your parents in the

Lord. For this is right. Okay, so commentators have conjectured as to Paul's usage of the

Greco -Roman household in our text and the pattern of that household and applying the

Greco -Roman household codes to the church at Ephesus. The reality, I'll tell you this about the

Greco -Roman household. The reality of the Greco -Roman household is that they got some things wrong and they got some things terribly messed up and all of it was knotted up and twisted.

But what Paul is doing is this. Here comes the gospel of our

Lord Jesus Christ and it comes to a child, for example, and they embrace

Christ as king. And so now Paul tells the child, it's not just about obeying your parents.

It's about obeying your parents as the text says, in the Lord. And so if you read all this as we did this morning, this applies across the board.

So listen to me, husbands, wives, masters, slaves, children, parents, this applies across the board.

Each of these groups no longer operates upon a worldly pattern of superior and inferior.

Rather, they now operate under God's pattern of order and hierarchy and the driving force in all of these instructions now is love.

That's why I read Ephesians 5, 2, walk in love. You understand the relationships in the home are to walk in love.

A husband walks in love and is full of the spirit when he loves his wife as Christ loves the church.

Likewise, a wife walks in love and is full of the spirit when she submits to her husband.

And a child walks in love and is full of the spirit when he or she obeys mom and dad in the

Lord. And likewise, of course, the relationship between masters and servants. Okay, the point

I'm making here is this, the gospel transforms our hearts and thus it changes our relationships in the home to be in line with his will.

The ideal that we must look to, hold on to this, please. The ideal that we must look to, the standard that we must look to for the home is not

Facebook. It's not 21st century memes.

It's not what the culture today tells you about men and women and children.

It's not even this idealized sort of conservative belief from the 1950s.

I don't remember the lady's name, June Cleaver or whatever, you know, leave it to be, like that's not our standard.

The model that we look to is the Bible. So as Christians, we need to let the

Bible confront us and confront our culture and even to make us uncomfortable.

And then we need to yield ourselves to its teaching and faith, believing that God's design brings his church the most good and his name the most glory.

Okay, second observation. Second observation I have from this text is this, it is typical of local churches to have entire households.

It is typical of local churches to have entire households.

For example, consider Ephesians 6, 5 through 9. Why all this conversation about slaves and masters?

Slaves obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart as you would Christ. And then why down in verse 9, masters do the same to them.

Why is Paul addressing masters and slaves? Because the idea is both masters and slaves are what?

They're in the church. So the church is composed. It's typical for a church to have within its membership entire households.

So let's back that up from Scripture. So keep your place, but let's spend a little bit of time this morning in Acts 16.

So keep your place in Ephesians 5, but turn over to Acts 16 for a moment.

Okay, so my observation here is that it is typical for churches to have within its membership entire households.

So I'll read two passages from Acts 16. The first will begin in verse 11. So setting sail,

Acts 16, 11. So setting sail from Troas, we made a direct voyage to Samothrace, and the following day to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a

Roman colony. We remained in the city some days, and on the Sabbath day, we went outside the gate to the riverside, where we suppose there was a place of prayer.

We sat down and spoke to the women who had come together. One who heard us was a woman named

Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods who was a worshiper of God.

The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. And after she was baptized, and listen to this, and her household as well, she urged us saying, if you have judged me to be faithful to the

Lord, come to my house and stay. And she prevailed upon us. That word for household in the text means the family consisting of those related by blood and marriage, as well as slaves and servants living in the same house or homestead.

The gospel came to Lydia, and it came to her household. Second passage, go down to verse 25,

Acts 16, verse 25. About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.

And suddenly, there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately, all the doors were opened, and everyone's bonds were unfastened.

When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped.

But Paul cried with a loud voice, Do not harm yourself, for we are all here. The jailer called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear, he fell down before Paul and Silas.

Then he brought them out and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said,

Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.

So here, in Acts 16, then, we see two examples that the

Gospel doesn't just convert one member of the household, but it converts the whole household.

So this, then, is the efficacy of the Gospel. By the way, this ought to be another motivation for evangelism, right?

As you preach, as you share the Gospel, as you pass out tracts, your potential goes beyond just one member of the family.

It goes far beyond just one individual. Lydia was saved. God sovereignly opened her heart, and she was converted, and then so was her household.

And then the jailer was saved, and so was his household. Now, our baby -baptizing friends want to point to these texts, and they want to say these household baptisms include infants.

Two arguments to that. Number one, that's an argument from silence. It says nothing in these passages about infants.

But number two, from the text, we know it's not infants. How do we know? Look at verse 32.

Let's continue on Acts 16, verse 32. And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.

In other words, do you imagine Paul taking a little infant child in his arms and saying, let me speak the

Gospel to you, and now repent? Well, of course not. We understand that these people were of age and were able to understand the

Gospel. Verse 33, he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds, and he was baptized at once, he and all his family.

Then he brought them up into the house and set food before them, and listen to this, and he rejoiced along with, who?

His entire household that he had believed in God. In other words, this is talking about people who were able to hear the

Gospel and were able to rejoice. This is not talking about infants being baptized.

This is not a proof text for infant baptism. So what you have then is the

Gospel come in, you have it transform hearts by God's grace, and you have it reaching not into just one area of the home, but the entire home.

There may be similarities in the home in how we relate to one another, but each relationship now is fundamentally transformed as we encounter the power of the

Gospel and surrender to the Lordship of Christ. And that's why Paul addresses these groups of people like this in Ephesians, because the

Gospel is conquering homes. Third observation. So it's typical of local churches to have entire households.

Third observation I have is this, and now we go back to Ephesians. The preeminent household is the household of God.

So you have churches that have entire households in the church, but the preeminent household is the household of God.

Don't forget Ephesians 2. So we know this in context, so go back to Ephesians 2, verses 19 through 22.

The preeminent household is God's household. So Paul says, so then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of, ha, the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets,

Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the

Lord. In him you are also being built together into a dwelling place for God by the

Spirit. Okay, so a couple of things then are happening in the church. First, there are entire households coming to Christ.

We see that in Acts 16. The entire household comes under the saving influence of the gospel.

But these households come together and they comprise the preeminent household, which is the household of God, which is the church.

The church is the preeminent household. So here's what happens. Sometimes, not all the time, sometimes whole households come under the saving influence of Christ and they surrender to the

Lord. Mom is saved. Dad is saved. The children are saved.

And in the first century, that of course included the masters and the slaves. They're all saved. But then at other times, the gospel does not work in this way.

According to God's power, according to God's grace, according to God's wisdom and sovereignty, the gospel doesn't bring the whole family to Christ, at least not all at once or perhaps ever.

It only brings one individual. Maybe a single woman, or a single mom, or a single man, or a single dad, or a married man, or a married woman.

It only brings that person to Christ. Or maybe it's a teenager brought to Christ.

What are we to think of this? I've just got three things to mention about this. What should we think about this?

Number one, it's no surprise. Number two, it still transforms relationships.

And number three, it reminds us of the big family that God has built. It's no surprise. It still transforms relationships and it reminds us of the big family

God is building. So first, let's tackle that first one, one by one. First, it's no surprise. What do

I mean by this? For this, another cross -reference here. Turn to Matthew 10. I want you to see this.

I want you to feel this. I want you to know this. It's no surprise,

Matthew 10, it's no surprise when only one member of the family ends up coming to Christ.

Because Matthew 10 says it this way. Matthew 10, verse 34. Matthew 10, verse 34.

Jesus says, do not think that I've come to bring peace to the earth. I've not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I've come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter -in -law against her mother -in -law.

And a person's enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.

And whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.

Whoever finds his life will lose it. Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

Okay, so understand this. The response of the gospel is not a communal response.

First and foremost, the response to the gospel is an individual response. The gospel comes upon a man or a woman or a little boy or a little girl, and essentially says this, what will it be?

Here you have Christ, the seed of the woman. God in the flesh, who fulfilled all righteousness, who bore

God's wrath for our sins on Calvary, who was punished as our substitute, who was punished in our stead, who rose again from the grave in victory.

And the gospel comes to us and says the cost to follow this man can be summed up in one word, everything.

What will it be, husband? What will it be, wife?

What will it be, child? And the answer is, if it's the world or Christ, it's

Christ. If it's my family or Christ, it's Christ. If it's my life or Christ, it's

Christ. This is the response the gospel demands, turning from sin, turning in faith to the finished work and person of Christ, and this is complete and total surrender.

And we have been deceived in our day and that we have believed that we can negotiate with God our terms on how much we'll give up or not give up before bowing our knee to the

King. But this is what true faith and repentance entails. I forsake all else for the treasure that is in the field.

I give it all up. I give it all away. As Song of Solomon says,

I found the one in whom my soul loves. I see Christ as my ransom and as my pardon and as my forgiveness and now as my very life.

You can have all this world. Just give me Jesus.

Okay, so that is a high demand from the gospel. And therefore it is no surprise that at times there will be individuals in the family that reject that cost.

And then you'll only have one member of the family come to Christ. And what can happen even is at times it can alienate members of the family.

It's not just that one is converted and another is not, but what happens is sometimes is that one is converted and the rest in the family hate this person now or they cast this person out or they reject this person or they turn their back.

Okay, so the second thing is this. It still transforms relationships. Number one, it's no surprise when only one person of the family comes to Christ.

Number two, you understand the grace of God means it's not that why don't more people come to Christ, but it's more like why does anybody come to Christ?

It's only by the grace of God. It's no surprise that only one member of the family may come. Secondly, it still transforms relationships.

So here's what I mean back in Ephesians 5 verse 25. Let's talk about husbands. Husbands love your wives if they're converted as Christ.

Wait, that's not what it says, is it? It doesn't say that. It just says husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church.

What I mean is this is for believing husbands. Whether or not their wives are converted, if you are a

Christian husband, this is how you are to love your wife, even if she's not a believer.

The converse is true. This is same for wives. Even if your husband is unconverted, it's the same for children to parents and slaves to masters.

That is, there is a Christian obligation in these roles regardless of whether or not the other party is a

Christian. So if the party leaves you or turns you out or rejects you, so be it, but you don't have the right to ignore your obligation now before God unto them.

And then the last point, it reminds us of the big family God is building. So it's no surprise when only some individuals come to Christ.

It still transforms our relationship. And then thirdly, what happens when your church is only a member of a family in the church?

Well, it reminds us of the big family that God is building the church. And so the point here is a local church is not going to just be made up of households, right?

There are going to be singles in the church. There are going to be partial families in the church.

But what this reminds us is that God is building His family just the way

He desires it to be built. And that's what He's getting at in Galatians 3, 28.

I'll just read that. There's neither Jew nor Greek. There's neither slave nor free. There's no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

This is what Paul is getting at there. This is the beautiful reality of what God is doing in the world today through the church.

He's building His household. He's building His glorious and beautiful family.

So a couple applications and then our last point. So first, if your entire family is not converted, do not dismay.

First, don't dismay because it's possible they'll be converted one day.

So as long as they are alive, you have hope. So bear witness. Bear the witness of Christ to them.

Share the gospel. Pray for them. You say, you don't know how far gone my wayward family member is.

Maybe I don't, but I do know this. If not for the grace of God, you would have never been converted.

So your family member who's wayward, who hates Christ, who's living like the devil as it were, they're not beyond hope.

And perhaps God will use you as a means to their conversion. Secondly, don't dismay that your whole family is not converted because you are part of something that is much bigger and more beautiful than just a physical family.

Your physical family is good. It's a gift to you from Christ. But your church family and the family that God is building goes much thicker than blood because it's wrought in the blood of Christ.

And it's a big thing that God is doing. So another application is the local church must see one another as family.

We are to love and to serve one another. We are to be concerned about temporal needs and eternal needs.

We are to be concerned about one another's sanctification. Because we are members of God's household.

This is why our physical households are not shut out, shut out, shut to one another, not closed to one another, right?

What I mean is we open our homes to one another. We share meals with one another. We support one another through triumphs and defeats.

We carry one another's burdens, really. And all the one another's in the Scriptures, they're centered in this one grand reality.

And that is God is building His family. And Christians are part of that family.

And that family is realized most beautifully in local visible congregations that we call local churches.

Now our final observation then. Hierarchy.

Can you even say that word anymore? Hierarchy within households is established by Christ and is a blessing for order, for peace, for unity.

Back to chapter 5, verse 21. Well, you say, wait, we start in verse 22. We did, but remember verse 21.

Submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. Hierarchy within households is established by Christ and is a blessing for order and peace and unity.

These rules that we read in the text about authority and submission and relationships and love, these are to be followed, friends, out of the fear of Christ.

Out of reverence for Christ. Because Christ has given these to us and He has done so for the good of His people.

So for example, your child is going to do something.

Start, oh, here's a good illustration. They're going to start a mowing business and you give them advice.

Here's how you should do it, this, this, and this. And then they do it their own way. Maybe even cut their pinky.

But they do it their own way and then you say, you're hurt.

You're like, why didn't you listen to me? Okay, Christ has given instructions to the homes.

How silly would it be to ignore Christ's instruction? You say, though, yeah,

I hear you, but if you follow this pattern in Ephesians 5 that you read, if we follow this pattern, it's like you're promoting patriarchy.

To which I respond, no. I'm not promoting patriarchy.

The Bible is. I don't mean by patriarchy what egalitarians or the secular pagans would say.

But in the sense that God has established order and headship in the home, it's just undeniable.

For example, I'll read verse 23. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church.

His body and is himself its Savior. Okay, not when you hear the word patriarchy it's a loaded term, that's why

I wanted to use it. Because it's biblical, but not in any way that promotes abuse or any such thing like that.

We're talking about God's appointed roles. And the point here is that hierarchy and structure and headship and submission and all these things, they may grate against your 21st century self.

They may grate against us, but that's only because of our sinful flesh. And it's only because of the lies that we have believed from our decaying culture.

Listen, husband, listen to me. For you to sacrifice your time and to give up your preferences and to give up your hobbies, you may not be able to go golfing every

Saturday or maybe not ever for several years. But for you to do this in order to love your wife and to serve your wife and to bring your children up and the nurture and admonition of the

Lord and to treat your wife as the vice regent that she is and the fellow image bearer of God that she is and the heir of Christ that she is, you're not missing out on life.

You're fulfilling your God -called purposes.

To raise your children in the Lord, not in the priorities of the major leagues, baseball or whatever.

I know I said that funny. To raise your children in the priority of the Lord, not the world, is living a life that honors

God and glorifies God and enjoys Him forever and is the best life for your children. Of course, the same is true for all these other relationships.

Ladies, for a woman to prioritize her home and to subject herself to the leadership of her husband, that's not degrading.

It's God -honoring. It's a pathway to household flourishing. And this is what we have to ask about the household.

Listen, ask yourself this because we get into some weighty things next week. It's hard.

I'm just going to tell you as your pastor. It's hard. This is a hard passage because of our culture.

It's an easy passage to understand. It's hard because of our culture. The easiest thing for me to do as your pastor, for myself, is to just preach this passage and overview and let's get into Ephesians 6.

Instead, we're not going to do that. Next week we'll preach about wives to husbands and then the next week we'll preach about husbands to wives and then we'll get into children and all these things because this is important.

And the question that we have to ask about the household is simply this. Does God know what

He is doing or not? Is God all -wise when it comes to the family or is

He not? Does God love our families more than we do?

Of course, the Christian only has one answer to that which is what? Amen. And therefore, I am foolish,

I am rebellious, I am just unwise when

I ignore God's good hierarchy in the household structure. Let me ask you something.

Do you think that modern feminism knows better than the Lord of the universe? Do you think that the

LGBTQ letter, letter, letter, letter, letter movement has a better design for the household than God?

Do you think that the modern characterizations of manhood and immaturity is better for the home than God's plan or worse?

Here we see God's definition of the family with a husband and wife and children. Do we think that the destabilizing of the family the family is being destabilized?

Tell me it's not happening. Look at, look at, I'm not talking about places around the world.

I'm talking about states in the United States of America. The family is being destabilized.

Parents are taken away from important decisions of their children. In some states, it is becoming a law.

If your child says they identify as one gender and you as a parent, the God -given authority over that parent say, no, that's foolish, that's wicked, you're in rebellion, you can lose your child.

The family is being destabilized and being erased.

Are you going to look in the face of our culture today and say this is the better way? Do we think that society considering our children as wards of the state is what's best for Christian families or society in general?

And I know, I know, I know because I'm with you, I'm with you, I'm with you. I know you're tempted to get mad at politicians or the women on The View or Oprah or the media but I want to remind you of something not that there is not a level of anger there, righteous anger, they ain't nothing compared to the battle that we're facing.

Just quickly, Ephesians 6 .12 I need you to look at it and see it. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood right?

Our fight is not against ultimately the ladies on The View, I wish I knew all their names, I think Whoopi Goldberg's on there.

We don't wrestle against flesh and blood that's not our greatest battle if that was our greatest battle that's easy in one sense, still difficult but no, no, it's beyond that we don't wrestle against flesh and blood,

Ephesians 6 .12 but against the rulers, against the authorities against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places don't miss this reality the war on the family today is a war that is invented and continued on by the powers of darkness we're called to stand against this and those who are in word or deed that are pushing back on the biblical model for the home are, whether intentional or not they have become tools in the hands of the prince of darkness listen to me this war has no

Switzerland you understand? there is no neutrality you cannot say in this war on the home that you're like I just don't know about the stuff in Ephesians 5, that's kinda oh yeah but I'm against all these other things there is no neutrality we are either promoting biblical homes or we are vessels that are promoting the ideas that destroy the home where do you stand?

you understand that the question we've been asking a lot recently in Ephesians is this do we believe the bible's definition of a

Christian or not? will we submit to Paul's version of Christianity or are you satisfied to just trust these modern preachers

I don't understand who in their right mind could look at Kenneth Copeland and say that man is trustworthy you gonna listen to the

Beth Moore's you gonna listen to the Russell Moore's you gonna listen to the

Joel Osteen's I understand it's hard sometimes when you name names from the pulpit but I'm saying these things to warn you are you going to listen to the modern secular godless culture that has crept into evangelicalism or are you going to listen to the bible do you think our 21st century culture that is decaying before our eyes speaks something more profitable to your home than the scriptures?

the answer is obvious this is god's way we will trust him Christ is king not just king of my heart but in being king of my heart he's also king of my home can you say that this morning dads, moms children, men women, boys, girls, grandparents aunts, uncles can you say that right now with integrity listen to me that you're following Christ as king of your life all your life in your home, in the church in your workplace in the world is

Christ your king and if he's not your king then he stands opposed to you so the question the answer to the question must immediately be you repent hear the graciousness of our king today,

I say under his authority that all who bow the knee to Christ, who call upon him in faith will be saved he says come to me those who are weary and heavy laden you say

I just can't deal with all this burden of being a failure as a dad or a failure as a mom or a failure as a child that's just a burden to me

I can't do it, what do I do take your burdens to Christ come to me all who are weary and heavy laden and he says

I will give you rest this is the way my friends this is

God's pattern for our homes and it is the battle by grace that we must wage in the culture today let's pray, father we thank you for your word we pray that it would resonate in our hearts help us to be the people that you've called us to be