Ephesians 6:1-4 | Parents and Children

The last few weeks we have been pursuing the relational aspects. If Ephesians 1 to 3 is our identity in Christ, 4 through 6, this then is how you should walk. We've started in a section a couple of weeks ago on the relational aspects.

We started with wives and then last week husbands and continuing in the family tradition today is children and we'll go on then to those who work for others and they are calling it bond servants, obeying your masters.

But we're going to seek God's teaching because today it's not only how do children relate to their parents, but how do parents relate to their children. So Father we know that in your sovereign wisdom you established families, one man, one woman.

You gave the gift, you give the gift of children and then you give us your insights as to how the family that honors God looks in relation to each other. Pray that raising godly children and then being part of the families for grandchildren is a blessing.

So give us your teaching we pray today in Jesus' name, amen.

Amen.

A father came home from work. Came home a little early, child wasn't expecting him yet and as he drove up to the driveway he found his son's bicycle was in the driveway. So he had to get out of his car, move the bicycle to the grass, get back in the car, drive into the driveway.

As he opened the door he began to yell, junior get down here. How many times have I told you, you are never to leave your bicycle in the driveway? Well little junior came trembling and before he could speak a word the father continued to yell, continued to lecture.

I've told you time and again and this is your final warning. Next time this happens I am running over your bicycle with my car. I don't care if it damages the tires, I don't care what happens. I'm running it over because you leave your bike in the driveway.

So he goes on and on. Finally the little boy speaks and the dad said, what do you have to say? I had to use the bathroom. I dropped the bike and I ran in and I was coming right back out. I didn't expect you home, I'm so, so sorry.

But he continued to rail upon his son. Now if you were to ask this father what made him angry? What would the father say?

He had to repeat his instruction.

Well maybe that, but what did you say?

He had to stop, get out of the car, move the bike.

Right.

It cost him extra time. He was inconvenienced.

Yes, you're right. He was angry because the bicycle was in the driveway. His circumstance made him angry. According to James 1 .14, what causes anger and strife and sin? Desires within you. Ted Tripp is a wonderful family counselor who tells this story.

And he says, what the man in the driveway was really struggling with was the fact that he's not God.

He's not God.

He's not God. My will be done on earth as it is in heaven. He wants a world in which every time he comes home, it is just the way he tried to make it. But in this real world in which we live, it's not that your will will be done as it is in heaven.

Ted Tripp says, the man's sin was coming from his own desire. And there is nothing outside of yourself that makes you sin. It's not your circumstances. The problem is actually within. This man's anger was caused by his desire to control his world.

But he couldn't. And that anger rose and he took that out on his son. And he was not instructing in a godly and gentle way. Raising godly children requires two quintessential elements, according to the passage today.

And those are discipline and instruction. But that's qualified that it ought to be and needs to be without provocation. Without provocation. I would argue that what this man did in trying to discipline his son crossed the line into provoking his son.

Wouldn't allow him to speak. His anger was controlling his speech rather than a genuine concern and love and the biblical form of discipline. He was overcome by his own sin. And he was provoking his son, which will have ramifications in his son's life.

Raising godly children requires discipline. What's that? I'm glad we have a patient God, right? If God was not patient, we would never have made it to the point where we could have heard the gospel and been saved.

We would have been in hell the first time we sinned. But God is a patient God with us and a good father to us. So today we talk about raising godly children. John, would you just read the passage for us?

It's Ephesians 6, 1 -4.

Children, obey your parents and the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother. This is the first commandment with a 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 discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Amen.

Jonathan Edwards wrote these words. There is a difference between believing that God is holy and gracious and having a sense in your heart of that holiness and grace. This goes hand in hand with knowing God.

There's a difference between knowing about God and knowing God. Edwards goes on to say, It is as different as having the rational belief that honey is sweet and having the taste of its sweetness on your palate.

There's a difference between knowing that honey is sweet and tasting and experiencing. The great need of every child being raised in a godly home is not just that parents would know about God, but that parents would know God.

That they would be experiencing Him, knowing Him, relating to Him, filled with the fruit of the Spirit from having been with Jesus. And that will result in a natural overflow of godly instruction and the fruit of the Spirit in the home.

It's not something that can be manufactured. It's something that has to come from a genuine experience with God. You need God in your heart if you're ever to parent well. That's the starting point. Now, this passage begins, first of all, with instruction to the kids.

And children, the instruction, the command is very simple, isn't it? Rick, would you read Ephesians 6, 1 for us?

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

What's the command?

Obey.

It's very simple. Command's given and we ought to obey. Children ought to obey their parents in the Lord. Is that in everything, regardless of what the command is? It's in the Lord, which, of course, implies what's taught elsewhere, as far as it doesn't contradict God.

Like, if the child is told to go do something sinful, even a parent cannot command a child to sin against God. There's a higher authority over God. This is in the Lord. But there is a hierarchy in the home.

Do you know that the world in which we live is even seeking to erase the distinction between parents and children? The hierarchy in the home is under attack. But here, it's very clear that there is a hierarchy, and children's command is to obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

In other words, this is how God has built the universe. It's just, it's the correct arrangement that there would be authority in the home. But notice also that it's not only, in this case, built on an appeal to authority, just the way things are.

There is one commandment, of all the ten, that includes a promise. Remember what that is?

The Lord.

And that's verse two. Maybe, Sandy, could you read verse two and three?

Honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment, with a promise, so that it may be well with you, and that you may live long on the earth.

All right. So, there's a promise in the Ten Commandments, and it is what? What's the promise?

That you live long with your parents.

Yeah. Long life.

In practical terms, when would we see the opposite of that occur? How could disobeying parents and dishonoring parents result in a short life? What are some examples of that?

Someone could get drunk, drive a car too fast, get killed in a crash.

How many times have parents said, don't drink, don't drink and drive, don't smoke?

Right.

And yet, all of these things reduce life expectancy. So, on the face of it, we say, well, that's true, right? But this is also, I think, spiritual, as well, that there is some kind of blessing attached with that.

Is it a promise in the sense that if you do X, then necessarily you will have a long life? Or are there other factors that could contribute to this? Many other factors. This is very important, because Job's friends didn't understand this.

That suffering, or death, is caused by sin, and personal sin in some cases. You smoke, you get cancer, you die. You drink, you get drunk, you drive, you die. Those kind of connections. But there are other kinds of suffering that are not related to your own personal commission of sin.

Right?

You can be a victim of a crime. That's not your fault.

Right?

We don't blame the victim of murder when someone breaks in the house and shoots someone. That's not what this is saying. It's not saying that this eliminates early death from children. It is saying, however, that there is a connection between disobeying and the negative outcome of early death.

Right?

So there's other factors here. There is a promise here given from the Old Testament. Now this raises an interesting question. Are we under the law, or are we not? It raises the question because Paul is quoting from Old Testament law, and we're in the New Covenant.

We're not Israel. So does this even apply to us? What do you think, Ivan? Absolutely, because Paul's applying it to us.

And we're also in Romans, where he first is. Should we get rid of the law? Absolutely not.

Well, Jesus actually teaches, Matthew 5, 17, Don't think that I have come to abolish the law, but to fulfill the law. So we have to understand what is meant by the law when we say that.

One of the underlying assumptions, too, that we haven't focused on is that the parents should be in agreement honoring your father and mother. You know, you might be trying to please one, and the other one may not be on board with that.

It doesn't say father or mother, it says father and mother. Fathers and mothers should be in conjunction with regard to the things they want to discipline their children about.

Right.

Absolutely.

Don't turn and go get your father.

Right.

If there's a disagreement between the parents and the call to the child is unclear, how will he ready himself for battle if he can't hear what he's being called to do? If there's inconsistency, wouldn't that fall into this category of do not provoke your children?

That's provoking of the child. Okay, but let's spend a little bit longer on this question of applying the law. Because would anybody here say that you can't eat shellfish?

No.

But the law says that you can't.

Ritual.

Well, what about the sacrificing of animals at Passover? Anybody here take part in that?

No animal? No.

Sacrifice?

No.

So how do we navigate then that Paul will apply directly a promise in the law related to obedience to the law under the new covenant? Would you say that that also applies to the mixing and matching of different threads in the garment?

And yet, the Ten Commandments, John?

Does he separate moral law from moral law?

Moral versus civil versus... Okay, so here's how I'd like to present it. As we apply the law of God, the Old Testament, particularly the law of Moses, which is given to us beginning in Exodus 20, but then there are many other commands that follow after that, more specific things.

There's a ditch on one side and there's a ditch on the other. If you say that the law has no regard to us at all, you've fallen into an antinomian ditch. If, rather, you try to establish your own righteousness by the law, you've fallen into the opposite ditch, which is legalism.

In either case, now some schools of theology emphasize either how much continuity there is between old and new or the discontinuity. So, I'm more of a dispensationalist, which means I emphasize discontinuity, that there are radical changes that happen.

The ceremonial law is fulfilled, the civic law, and we don't practice the dietary code or the mixing of threads. The new covenant is not... because we're getting this from the book of Romans, especially chapter 7.

It's like in marriage and divorce and there's an analogy to that, that you're no longer wed to the law. We're not under the law, but under grace, it says. So, there are discontinuities and dispensationalists emphasize that.

But the covenant theologians emphasize how much remains and how consistent it is between old and new and how much does carry over. So, they're focusing more on what does continue. Now, in either camp, you could kind of miss the mark a little bit and overemphasize one or the other.

Now, here's what the covenant theologians have done. And in this, I think they're helpful. And who was it, John, that started to get at it? They have divided the law into three sections, okay? And that is the moral, the civil, and the ceremonial.

And they'll say that the civil and the ceremonial were distinctive to Israel. They're fulfilled in Christ, Matthew 5, 17. Not abolished, but Christ fulfilled them. Yes, fulfilled but not abolished. But the moral law continues unchanged.

And so, they would see Paul here in Ephesians 6 simply applying the moral law, which would include, who said the Ten Commandments as unique? Was that you, Sue? The Ten Commandments are the moral law of God.

The first four are the first table of the law, which are vertical, how you relate to God. And the next six are horizontal, how we relate to parents and not murdering people or stealing from them or lying to them or coveting what they have.

That's horizontal relationship. Now, I think this is right to say that the morality of the Old Testament is still what is right and wrong. Right and wrong has not changed between the covenants. And that's important to emphasize.

Because many people will come to Leviticus 18 and say, well, a man shall not lie with a man as with a woman. It is toevah, an abomination. They'll say, well, that's just Old Testament law. You don't mix your fibers, do you?

You don't eat shellfish. So, how is it that you can selectively say that that still applies to the church?

Answer.

The civil ceremonial laws that apply to Israel, marking them as distinct from the nations. There might not have been a utilitarian reason to only wear a single thread, but it was marking them as distinct from the nations.

These are the people of Yahweh. And in that function, it had a purpose in that time until the fullness of the gospel came in the New Covenant. Jew and Gentile then brought together. We no longer need the distinction between Jew and Gentile.

See, there's no utilitarian function like staying healthy, as in the eating of shellfish. We eat shellfish today, and many people are healthy for doing it. More of a Mediterranean diet.

I love shellfish.

So, here's the point, though. Paul takes the moral law, and he does still consider that the definition of right and wrong. Just like in Israel, so in the church. Honor your father and mother. It's part of the commandments, and God's commandments reveal his nature, and the just relationships, and how he's made the universe.

Children are not equal with their parents. Because in the law, there's a hierarchy, and the child honors the father and mother. As they grow into adulthood, honor doesn't always mean direct obedience to whatever they say, but you honor by listening and being respectful.

Children then have come out from under their parents' household. When they grow up, they leave their father and mother, and the husband of this new marriage relationship creates a new household. And so honoring looks different, whether it's a child versus a full-grown man, right?

But it's still honor your father and mother. That doesn't change. Just the function changes a bit. So I think this is a very important passage beyond just what it's saying to children, because it reminds us the law still stands.

God's morality has not changed with regard to sexuality, or the human family, or male and female, he created them. This is not just, and that was even prior to the law of Moses. But the law of Moses is still binding in the moral commands, teaching us what's right and wrong.

Does that help?

Yeah. A lot of important things come out of that.

Of the 613 laws, how are they distributed?

Well, I think those who would take the more covenant view of theology tend to set apart the Ten Commandments as a very distinct unit, and really emphasize that. But I think that there are more moral laws that are also sprinkled beyond that.

In fact, when Jesus summarized the law, where did he quote from? Deuteronomy 6, Leviticus 20, I think it is. Love your neighbor as yourself. So those were not even in the Ten Commandments. So I'd say that there are moral laws sprinkled throughout, Leviticus 18 being a prime example.

Somebody will say, yeah, well, we don't do that any longer. I like holding people consistent to the law and say, well, the previous verse says, or the subsequent verse, a man shall not lie with a beast as with a woman.

Do you condemn bestiality, lying with an animal? And they'll say, oh, yeah, we condemn that. But by what consistency do you reject that a man shall not lie with a man? In other words, these are moral issues.

I don't know the distribution of the 613, what it would be, but I think here's an important principle. Even in civil or ceremonial, often you have general equity that teaches some principle that we're to hold on to.

Which is why when Andy Stanley and some of these guys say we just need to unhitch from the Old Testament, New Testament only. No, everything has meaning and important abiding significance. What theologians call general equity in all of the law.

Things that teach us and instruct us in godliness. These things are for our instruction.

Through the epistles, Paul was fighting back against Judaizers that were trying to take all the old laws and put it into the salvation message. And confusing everyone there. Paul was very careful to single out certain aspects that apply to what our salvation is.

Comparatively to what the law was actually standing for.

And isn't that the point of Romans and Galatians? You're not justified by obedience to the law. And the law itself was good, but it's sin and death in you that causes you to be broken by it. Alright, so as far as the children go, the instruction is simple, right?

Obey.

Now, there's only one verse here. And so you might think, well, there's just not much to say. Or you could look at it another way, which is how I look at this verse. There are a couple things that Paul wants to emphasize so much that he only says those things.

In other words, if I only had one minute to train a young father in how to be a good dad. If I only had one minute or one sentence, wouldn't I say the most important thing? What I really want to emphasize.

And I think that's what happens here in 6 .4. John, would you read that again?

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

Okay, part A and part B. First is what's negated and then two things that are positive, that you're to do. What is it that you are not to do?

Provoking.

And we talked about the provoking father in my opening illustration. He just flew off the handle because the kid had left the bike. But he wasn't reasonable to listen and he was ranting and raving. And ultimately, he had come to the point of provoking.

What are some other examples of provoking a child that you can think of?

The father that communicates his love is conditional on excellent behavior, excellent performance, academically, sports. The love is not unconditional.

So the kid feels like he's just always trying to earn something from his dad, trying to earn love. Yeah, that's provocative. So we talked about the angry dad. I think anger is very provoking. When the father just leads with this emotion rather than, if he does have to discipline, it's by explaining, look, this is hurtful.

It hurts me. I love you and I'm doing this for this reason. I'm going to take this away from you because I'm wanting your character to be conformed. You explain it rather than, you just lost your iPhone.

You just lost this.

This anger controlling the conversation.

Or like John says, you see some parents on the soccer field having a car in a hurry if their children didn't perform the standard or expectations.

Yeah.

There's other ways to get their attention. It breaks your heart.

There's other ways to get their attention. I remember distinctly we were buying a winter coat for me and the kids were three and five and they were running under the coats and everything. And Joe was with me and he says, you boys get out here right now or I'm going to give you a big kiss.

And they both.

That worked.

Absence of a father.

It cracks me up.

Between the father and son.

You're not there.

There you go.

Yeah.

Irrationality.

Arbitrary kind of decision making. These kind of things just provoke a child.

Inconsistency.

That he's he's one way this day. The next.

Next.

And just there's no consistent or a difference between the parents. There's inconsistency between the the permissive dad who lets the kid do anything and the mom who's hard and or vice versa. And that inconsistency, it's provoking.

There's not a clear leadership there. And so that's that's called against. I opened with that story from Ted Tripp. Ted Tripp says that the family is a school of theology, sociology and redemption.

A school.

How are you going to live in this world? Unless first of all, you're taught who God is. It's a school of sociology. How do you know how to relate to people? You talk about the breakdown of society and fatherlessness.

It's because these kids are raised maybe in the inner city or wherever things are breaking down without a father to socialize them. This is how you relate to people. This is how you live in this world with others.

And of redemption, just to bring the gospel into everything. Let's talk for a moment about moving on to the next phase here. Instruction and discipline. We don't want to provoke, but we do want to instruct and discipline.

Let's talk about your home, your family as a school of redemption. What's wrong with this picture? And I'm sure nobody here has ever experienced this, but the kids in the back seat. The parents in the front seat, mom and dad driving.

And they're reaching across, poking, provoking, antagonizing. Keep your hands to yourself. You're in my space.

Stop touching me.

Stop touching me. Anybody ever heard this?

All right.

John made him sit on their hands.

Sit on their hands?

Okay. That'll work. All right.

So the father pulls the car over. This is another Ted Trip-ism. He pulls the car over and he yells, be quiet. From now on, there is a wall. I'm building a wall. It's not physical. You can't see it. It's glass bricks.

And nobody is allowed to penetrate this wall. There's a wall between you. You can't see through it. You can't talk through it. You can't relate through it. There's a wall between you for the rest of this rhyme.

30 seconds later, he's driving along. And the little boy has said, I pulled a brick out.

And he's reaching through. He's reaching through and poking through the brick.

Well, this method of parenting, what did that wall actually accomplish? Was that a gospel wall, as Ted Trip is describing it? Or is this an unhelpful parenting mechanism? What is it doing there?

Well, if there aren't any consequences as a result of pulling a brick out of the wall, and I would say the wall is not necessarily that effective, but if the consequence comes with the wall and it's carried out, then they'll respect the wall and the father will break the wall.

Yeah, so you're getting into discipline. I agree with you. We'll get to that in a minute. But even at the level of instructing in the gospel, here's another analogy. The parent says, you have five seconds to obey me.

Five, four, three, two, and with .1 seconds left, the little guy scurries. What has your countdown actually accomplished? It's taught them this is how long you can obey. You can disobey. It's not do it first time right away.

You're training them how bad they can disobey before the consequence comes, right? In all of these things, another example he gave was a timer on the toys. They both want to use the same toy. And so he says, all right, the parent, the dad says, we're going to give five-minute clocks here.

Here I go. Boom.

It's yours for five minutes. The other kid is sitting there and waiting.

As soon as that timer goes, ding, what does he do?

Grab.

That is mine and rips it. And the timer, I have this. So what has that particular parenting method done? In all three examples, you're dealing with the external, but you're never stopping to apply the gospel to the heart of the child.

What does a redemptive parenting, gospel-oriented parenting look like in any of these cases? With the toy, it's to talk about putting the other first. Would God be pleased if you let this child play?

Because what's going to happen is after five or ten minutes, they're done with that anyway, and you'll get to play with it all you want. But if you humble yourself and put the other first, then both of you will benefit from this, right?

Building the wall, the idea would be to stop and talk about what is it in your heart that makes you want to see him get angry? You ask a question like that. Why are you poking him? What is this for? And then you talk about the sin nature and you apply the gospel.

This is why we need grace. Why don't we stop and pray that you wouldn't want to see your brother angry, right? Those kind of gospel-oriented and grace-oriented things. Time around the toys. The countdown?

No, you don't give a five-second countdown. You keep telling your child when you're given a command, it's first time right away without question.

Yes, Stan?

There's another implication here. When you talk about going character or to discipline and instruct, you as a parent, you are training, you are instructing, but you don't follow your own instructions.

You are doing something different, teaching one way to your children, but you don't follow those instructions. Now you're sending that different signal to your child, because I was told that when I was disciplining my children, they would say, well, Dad, you don't do this.

You're doing this. So that opens your eyes pretty much.

Yeah.

So when you're instructing your child, if you're genuine and it's coming from your heart and you're living out what you're asking them to do, then it's going to have a lot more force than if there's that inconsistency.

Kids recognize hypocrisy.

Yeah. Yep.

And it goes back to the Jonathan Edwards quote. If you've been tasting the honey, you've been enjoying God, now you can talk about God. It'll be natural. You'll want to teach and instruct. So 6 -4-B.

But bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Let's get into discipline in just a second, but anything more about instruction. Dads, you know, there's going to be people listening online, young fathers that would love to hear from an older father.

Instruction.

Here's a question you could ask your kid while riding along. This is another Ted Trip. Obviously, I've watched some Ted Trip preparing for this. He said he would like to ask one of his kids the simple question, has God ever learned anything?

And now the obvious thought that the kid would have, like, oh yeah, we're always supposed to be learning, of course. And then you say, God has never learned anything. You're instructing in the Lord. You're turning your home into a school of theology.

God can't learn anything because he already knows everything. When you learn something, you're adding new information. When you change your mind, it's because something has come to change it, right? Something external.

Or maybe you were blindsided by some scenario. God is never blindsided by anything. He's never taken by surprise. These are theological conversations that you instruct. As you go along the way, you talk about God.

How did this world come to be so beautiful? What would that say about God? So everything is theology. You're asking questions about God, his timelessness, his changelessness, his perfection, his goodness.

What's the most beautiful description of love you've ever seen? Well, you know where, as a parent, that's going. To the cross of Jesus Christ, where he lays down his life for us. These kind of questions, they come out of the heart that's met with God.

So this is instruction.

These conversations, if it's the first time you have them, or the predominance of the times when you have them, are when behavior has been incorrect. Are going to have the effect that if this has been the pattern of your walking in the way, sitting at the table, and the instructions was there, when there's closeness of the relationship, not conflict and stress.

Yeah, amen.

That's when we should be talking. In good times, it's not just like using... God only comes out when I need to discipline you. What kind of view of God will that fashion in a child? A joyful one, you think?

Will it taste sweet as honey, Psalm 19? Or will the child begin to relate, the Bible is when I need to get clubbed? You don't want that. That's going to build resentment.

A grandson blew us away this past weekend. We were just having conversations around the table, and it came down to understanding Scripture and being able to draw it down. For years, Steph and Eric have written a verse up on a chalkboard, so that the kids could read it, memorize it, and everything else.

And Cullen says, yeah, it's like that verse I memorized, Philippians 4 .8, which that is not an easy verse to memorize. Whatever things are pure, whatever things are honest. And he just went on and on and on and on and quoted it.

Where did he come up with the concept of memorizing Scripture? It wasn't in a stressful point, it was seeing it every day on the wall. Living it out.

Amen.

That's beautiful.

You know what was beautiful? Martha Louise on the steps with her little grandkids and her son, singing those happy Bible songs, and the kids dancing as they learned to sing them. And then she goes to be with the Lord, and at her funeral, John Mack stands up and passes that truth, that gospel, on to those basketball players.