23 - Lesson 12: The Christian Home, Part 2

Well, welcome to the Striving for Eternity Academy's School of Discipleship. This is our class on an Introduction to Discipling. We have been going through a book called Growing in Grace, which is about 12 lessons long.

As we look at those lessons, we notice that there are 12 of them and this is class number 23, which means I've kind of been going at two classes per lesson. I don't know how I managed that, but we've been going through each of these lessons with the goal of teaching how to disciple someone.

That's been the goal. We've been using this book, Growing in Grace, just to facilitate the means of discipling. This is just an introductory class. This is something you can purchase from our store at store .strivingforeternity .org if you want to get that.

If you're interested in enrolling as a student in the Striving for Eternity Academy, you can do that at strivingforeternity .org. We welcome all of you who are viewing this, maybe for the first time, and you're going, well, gee, I'm in lesson 23, the last lesson of the class, well, maybe you should start back at the beginning, just saying.

It's usually good to start things at the beginning and not the end. My encouragement to you is go back to lesson 1, just maybe. We've been going through this and discussing the issue of discipling, how to go about it, how to encourage one another to do just that.

As we've been going through this book, you notice the first half of the book was kind of more theoretical, discussing things like how to read the Bible, what salvation is, prayer, church membership, baptism, just general theoretical type of things.

Then we got into a little bit more practical, where the rubber meets the road and we're doing more counseling with the person that we're discipling. We're talking about holy living and obedience, oh, that one hurts, I don't want to talk about that one, temptations and trials.

We've talked about things like that. This week, we are finishing up our lesson, lesson number 12, The Christian Home, which we're calling A Legacy for Our Lord. We went over guidelines for Christian families.

We looked at that last lesson. We also, last lesson, looked at the institution of marriage. We looked at the husband's role and the wife's role. We talked about all of those things and how we have the marriages set up by God.

He gets to define it, just saying. I know that there's some that say, wait a minute, I'm not married. Why would I need a lesson on the Christian home? Hold on, we're going to get there. But, my encouragement, even though you may say, well, I'm not a husband or a wife, but do you plan to be one day?

Then you should review that last lesson because if you want to be somebody that someone is going to look to marry, someone would want to marry you, well, then you're going to want to be that type of person that we looked at there, that type of person who is going to be a godly husband, is going to be a godly wife, so that whoever you go to marry, they're going to look for those characteristics.

And that's what you should be looking for in a spouse. Look at the characteristics that God says is a godly husband or a godly wife and look for someone that has those characteristics. That's what you should be looking for.

That's why that lesson, even if you say, well, I'm not married, those lessons are still important because that helps you to know what to look for. Just a little side note, long before I was married, I had the privilege of being very close with my pastor.

I would go to his home every Sunday night after evening service. I'd get to spend evening with the family, got to know the family very well. And it became a thing where I really learned what to look for in a godly wife by looking at my pastor and his wife and their relationship together.

And I learned what I should be as a godly husband from watching them interact. Now I say that for two reasons. One, if you are a married couple, may I encourage you to bring singles into your home so they have a godly example to what to look for?

And you go, maybe you're not a godly couple. Well then work on that first and still invite them in the home so they know what not to look for. But if you're single, look for godly couples whose lives you can be part of and watch the example of them so you can learn from their example so that you don't have to make mistakes that you can learn from others how to avoid them.

So that's just some encouragement. This week we're going to deal with, we dealt with the husbands and the wives, so this week we're going to deal with children. Oh yes. You know those little bundles of sin that you bring into your home.

They are. They're little sinners. I know. We're supposed to say, they're cute. You know why children are cute? I think God gives us a love for little, adorable little children so we don't rip their heads off.

They're a viper in a diaper. I mean, if they could, if they were big enough and strong enough, that infant would rip your head off. It's a little, selfish sinner. You don't believe me? Don't give it some milk and see what happens.

They start crying. That's all they know is selfishness and you hope they grow out of it after 20, 30 years. But, this is something that God has given children. He's decided that in the way of reproducing the human race, He would do it through children growing up within a home, which means God instituted the family for the specific reason of not just the husband-wife relationship, but also the parent-child relationship.

Now, let me give a warning. Parent-child relationship does not supersede husband-wife relationship. Your children will move out of the house one day. Your spouse never should. And there's too many people who focus on the parent-child relationship because there's an urgency to that.

There's a kind of a squeaky wheel type of thing gets the oil. You know, if you have a squeaky hinge or a squeaky wheel, all the wheels may need the oil, but it's the one that's making the noise that you give the oil to because the one that's annoying you or getting your attention.

It's kind of similar with children sometimes is the children get the attention and the spouses sometimes don't. If you're going to be discipling people, you are going to see people that are in bad relationships in the home a lot of times.

Bad marriage relationships, parenting, child issues, I mean, and you're going to have to deal with those things, okay? That's part of discipling. You need to come alongside and help them. And there may be situations that are just very, very hard.

Some people have really difficult family situations, family dynamics, some of it because of sin, some of it because it's just this is how it's developed over time and they didn't know any better. And so let us take a look at the children.

We're going to start with the responsibilities, the responsibilities, okay? And you may be a child watching this. We do have many homeschoolers and children who watch these classes and we are encouraged by you.

I've gotten some emails from young Christians, 12 -13 year old Christians who watch these programs and are encouraged by them. So maybe you're a child and this may be more specific to you on what you could be doing as the responsibilities you have as a child.

So let's look at those responsibilities. First is that children are to obey their parents. Obey is your blank there. They are to obey their parents. In Ephesians 6, 1, we read, children, obey your parents and the Lord for this is right.

It says after that this is the first commandment with promise. I knew of a, or heard of a family who the parent had so drilled this into his children that he had company over, an unsaved man that came over and every time the children would act up, the father would say, children, Ephesians 6, 1.

And the children would stop what they're doing, yes daddy. And they would behave. And this guy was like, by the end of the evening, he was like, what is Ephesians 6, 1, what does Ephesians 6, 1 mean because I've got to use this, this is great and you just say that and the kids get in line.

And the father said, well, it's not so much saying it, but living it. And what it was, was that he explained what the verse meant and that he had to, as a father, explain the meaning of this to his children that obeying your parents are not really for your parents' sake, but for God's.

It glorifies God when children obey their parents. And that's kind of like at any age. This is the idea of honor. And we should always be honoring our parents, even as adults, yikes, yes, even as adults, we should be honoring our parents.

Now maybe not in the same way, you don't live in their home anymore, but you also have the case where maybe you have parents that are not believers, like in my case, my parents are not believers. And there's certain things that they do not appreciate about me being a Christian.

There's certain things that I will honor when I'm in their home. And there's certain things that I will do in my home that they will respect me enough that they will, for example, we're in my home, we pray before a meal together.

Might be the reason they always want to go out to eat. When I am in their home, we pray as a family individually. We do not pray aloud, we each pray privately, because we want to pray, but at the same time it's something that my parents, I don't want to shove it in their face, and they don't like that.

And so it's a way of, I'm still honoring God, but I'm still showing honor to them without disobeying. Now if they tell me I can't pray at all, well that would be different. I could still pray. But, you know, some of the things that we sometimes in the family make big deals over, for example, in my family, in my house, if you stay in my home, you come to church with us.

My parents don't like that rule, so they don't stay in my home. Okay, they want to get a hotel room, that's their choice. But these are the rules for my home, and we still show honor in that way, okay?

So there are things you can do, but even as adults we honor our father and mother. We also see the same thing in Colossians 3, 320, it says, For children are to obey in all things. Look at what this one says.

Children, obey your parents in everything, for this is pleasing to the Lord. Now that doesn't say parents, or children, obey your parents in some things. What does that say? Obey your parents in all things.

Now this doesn't mean, and I want to leave that up for a split second, because this gets into the thing. What if my parents are not believers? Do I obey them if they ask me to sin? Well, of course you don't.

But it does mean that we are to be looking to obey them in everything that we can, okay? Obey your parents in all things. It is also where we get this from, when in Ephesians 6, 2, and 3, where it says, This is the first command with promise.

That goes back to the Old Testament. In Exodus 20, verse 12, Honor your father and mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God has given you. So children are to honor, that's your next blank, honor their father and mother.

And this is the thing, and this is a lost thing nowadays, unfortunately, but parents are often training their children for behavioral modification, not honor. And there's a big difference between the two.

Behavioral modification is where you teach your children to behave because they better or they're going to get a spanking or something, or they're behaving a certain way, but they really aren't believing or doing it because they want to, they're doing it out of fear.

They don't want to be grounded, they don't want to have the consequences. That's different than a child who obeys out of honor, okay? And this is the thing. We want to train children to honor their parents.

So in other words, they'll be obedient because they respect their parents, not because they're afraid of their parents, and there's a big difference between the two, all right? So that's the responsibility of the children.

Let's take a look at their instruction. What is to be their instruction? Well, we see that a child can know the Holy Scriptures when they are young. Where do we know that from? Well, Timothy. In 2 Timothy 3 .16, Paul said to Timothy, "...and how from your childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred things which are able to make you wise for salvation through Christ Jesus.".

So you see there that the blank there is that a child can know the Holy Scriptures even when they're young. We should be training the children at a young age. This is why with my children who were young, I went through these books, these Grown Grace books with them, teaching them the Word.

I want to get them knowing the Word. We did family devotions and we tried to teach them, and we want them to understand from a young age. Now, with this I say this because people get into this, how do I do family devotions when I have a one or two year old?

Well, what I would say is you train them by starting at the level they're at. Now, if you have a one or two year old and then you have a maybe eight year old, it's going to be a little bit more of a challenge.

See, with the one or two year old, you just want them learning to sit still. They're not really understanding, but you want to talk at a level they understand. Keep it short. Add more time. One of the things that I've been encouraging people in recent times, I didn't think of doing this when my children were young enough, but is to have the children, there's a time for the children's family devotion, and then there's mommy-daddy time or adult time, big people time.

The children, maybe it's you put them to bed and look, you can't get out of bed because now it's time for the adult time of family devotions. When you're older, you can stay up later and you can be part of the bigger adult time.

When they're young, they get used to just sitting still and sitting quiet, but it gives them a longing to want to be part of adult Bible study, the adult family time. As they get older, you get a little deeper in explaining things to them and you extend the time a little bit more, but it isn't so much that you want to be entertaining them as much as teaching them.

When they get older and they can comprehend, I really found helpful is to ask questions with my children. One of the things that I found very helpful is to ask them, what do you think? You see in a storm, here you have the disciples, they're in a storm and Jesus is sleeping.

What were they going through? I mean, were they used to being on a boat? Yeah, daddy, they were fishermen, some of them were fishermen, so they were used to being on a boat? Yeah, they would have been.

So they know what a storm is like on a boat, don't you think? Well, yeah, so if they were scared, could this have been a big storm? Oh, yeah, maybe it was. Get them thinking through, putting themselves in the position of the events that are going on and thinking through what was going through people's minds.

Helps them to grasp and retain the Scriptures. Okay? Letter B there is, whose responsibility is it to bring the children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord? Yeah, this one's going to hurt some people, I'm just saying.

But let's look at what Ephesians 6, verse 4 says. Fathers, that's your blank there, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. It's not mom's job to train the children in the ways of the Lord.

Dads, it's time to stand up. I know you're tired from working all day. I understand that. It's your job, and it's more important than the job you're doing eight hours a day. Take the time, spend maybe an hour of time studying to prepare to train your children.

It'll be the most valuable time of your day, and your children will appreciate it. And it is time you can never take back. And when your children grow older and you see them training their children and discipling their children, then you'll know you did a good job.

Alright, that's how you know the next generation. But fathers, it is our job to train up our children. Parents are to teach the Word of God diligently, that's your blank there, diligently to our children.

This is from what's called the Shema, one of the most well-known passages of the Old Testament to a Jewish person, is what is wrapped in a scroll and put on the doorpost, on a Jewish door, what's called a mezuzah.

But this is what it says, you shall teach them, you're speaking of your children, teach them diligently, sorry, you'll teach them these teachings of God, you'll teach them diligently to your children, and you shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up.

So that's basically all day long, as you go about your day, throughout your day, in everything you do, it should be seasoned with Scripture. It should be seasoned with the instruction from the Lord. That's what we should be about doing.

Throughout our whole day, when we're with our children, we should be instructing them on the ways of the Lord. That's actually what discipleship really is as well. I mean, throughout our day we should be discipling people, teaching them the things of the Lord.

So here's some practical ideas that we have in your Growing in Grace book for family Bible study, okay? Family devotions. One, set aside a set time each day, whether it be after dinner, before bedtime, some people I know do it during breakfast because that's the time their family is together, whatever time it is, try to have a set time.

I know some people, they do it three times a week. Well, if that's what you do, then three times a week, but make it a commitment and make sure nothing interrupts. I encourage people, if you have company over, they're just part of the family devotions, that's all.

I have done that with my family, yeah. My parents didn't really like it so much, but I involve them in family devotions. If you're in my home during a time when we're doing family devotions, you're doing family devotions with us.

That would be a way of doing it because you want to make sure that time is set aside and kind of sacred, kind of something that doesn't get rescheduled because it's very easy to get out of that schedule.

Schedule a time and keep it. The children will come to expect it. Number two, depending on the age of your children, read portions of the Bible, a children's Bible, or have them read if they're able. We would take portions, we'd go around reading a verse at a time, or sometimes two verses, and we'd each read, and we'd read a chapter, maybe a full chapter, sometimes up half a chapter or whatever, and then we'd discuss it, and if we kept going, we'd go around reading, but we'd want to read.

You could sing songs depending on your ages of your kids, but getting them used to singing some good songs, you could do that. My family really isn't into singing so much, so we never really did that much, but some people really enjoy that as part of it.

Have each child that is able to pray. Give them something specific to pray for sometimes. We would have a time after devotions where we would share prayer requests within our family, and then we'd take turns praying for one another, and we would do that differently.

Sometimes we'd pray on a different day, we'd have different people praying sometimes. We'd just kind of mix it up, so those are some practical guidelines. So that's the instruction with parenting. Let's go to the correction.

Now I know some children, I never needed it clearly, but some children actually need correction. Yeah, no, that's not exactly true. You could ask my parents, but don't. They could tell you stories about how much correction I needed.

My wife may tell you I still need, but let's take a look. Fathers are not, we already looked at this in Ephesians 6, 4, but fathers are not to provoke their children to wrath. And that's your blanks there, not to provoke their children to wrath.

So dads, do you know you can provoke your children? I mean, it's really, I think John MacArthur has a great sermon on this text, Ephesians 4, 6, and he goes through all the ways that as a father you can provoke your children to wrath.

I mean, just get on, nag them, be on top of them for every little thing and you'll get an angry child. Criticize them at every point, every step, you'll get an angry child. Don't trust them with anything.

I mean, treat them like they're incompetent in every area. You'll get an angry child. I mean, be overbearing with them. Be overprotective. Don't give them any freedoms whatsoever. You'll have an angry child.

I mean, there's so many ways that we're not even aware because we make a vital mistake. Someone said this to me recently, and this is really a great thing. The children that are in your home are not your property or your possession.

They're God's. They're your stewardship. You are responsible to God with how you raise them, but they don't belong to you. And that is a crucial thing to understand because that helps us to know that these children that we're raising, we're raising for God and not to obey us, but to obey God.

And so we got to be sensitive to what they're thinking and what they're going through. I know I've been guilty of that a lot where I've made mistakes as a father and not trained them well in that area.

But we got to be careful, okay? Also, there is, why should a father not provoke his children? Well, Colossians 3 .21 has the answer. Fathers, do not provoke your children unless they become discouraged.

So they don't become discouraged. We don't want them to be discouraged. They stop, they tune you out. Now, I deal with parents that are like, one day my child just woke up and doesn't listen to me. No, they've been trying to tune you out for a long time.

It's just now they feel old enough that they feel empowered to do it, okay? It's been building up. And that's the thing. Often when parents suddenly recognize that their children are discouraged, it's when their children are finally showing outward signs of what's been going on inwardly for years.

You've got to be watching for those little tiny signs. And you've got to be careful not to discourage them. Don't provoke your children, okay? Parents are, however, commanded to not, that's your blank there, not withhold correction.

Proverbs 23, 13 says, do not withhold discipline from a child. If you strike him with a rod, he will not die. Wow. Now, I'm not saying that spanking is always the right punishment in all circumstances.

But, correction is needed. You should not be avoiding, and that's the point there. I understand that there are times where we just don't, there's some people that they don't want to correct their children because they want friends.

They want their children to be their friend. Your child won't be your friend if you don't correct them. In fact, children respond better to consistent correction. Children do not respond well when the correction is inconsistent.

In other words, sometimes you get a correction, sometimes you don't. They don't know where the limits are. And what they end up doing is testing those limits more often. And so, it's better to be consistent.

Don't make everything punishable, okay? Make those willful acts of disobedience punishable, but not everything, alright? Everything doesn't deserve the same exact punishment either. If a parent loves the child, they will discipline them promptly.

Proverbs 13, 24, and Proverbs speaks a lot on correction in children. So, whoever spares the rod hates his son, but whoever loves him is diligent to discipline him. So, you should be disciplining your children diligently.

You should not be withholding that correction if you love them. You actually hate the children. If you don't, if you train up a child in the way he will go. In other words, don't discipline him. Let him be selfish.

Spoil the child. Give him everything he wants. He's never going to change from that selfish mindset, okay? He's always going to be selfish if you've trained him that way. Most people understand that passage incorrectly.

I mean, the reverse is true. If you train him in the ways of the Lord, he's going to know the ways of the Lord. But it doesn't mean, it's not a promise that he's going to return to the faith because you've taught him that at a young age.

No, you teach him the ways of the Lord to break him of his selfishness so that he recognizes that he should be honoring God, not self. And it is an act of love to discipline. If you're disciplining out of anger, you're producing an angry child.

Okay? We discipline while there is hope. While there's hope. Discipline your son for there is hope. Do not set your heart on putting him to death. What does it mean to put him to death? Well, the idea of putting him to death is the fact that you put him on a path of selfish living.

Of living selfishly, he's going to be on a path of death and destruction. Alright? What is God's method for disciplining? Well, we already saw it, but Ephesians, Proverbs 23, 14 If you strike the child with the rod, you will save his soul from Sheol.

So, it is the rod. It is a spanking. Now, the rod is a switch. It's a stick of a kind which stings without injuring. That's a major thing. Spanking should never be done in anger. So, in other words, you've got to make sure your heart is right before you give the spanking.

And sometimes you say, you know what, little Johnny? You deserve a spanking, but Daddy's very upset right now. Daddy needs to deal with between him and the Lord first and then you and I need to deal with you.

Okay? Rather, it is only to be done for acts of attitudes of clear disobedience and only enough to correct the problem. It shouldn't be done for foolishness. And that's your next one. Foolishness, Proverbs 22.

Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him. And that's the point. Your blanks there. Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child and the rod of correction will drive it from him.

Children will be foolish. They will do foolish things. Now note, that foolishness is not childishness, but knowing right from wrong and not doing it. Okay? So, we have to know the difference when a child is just doing something because they don't understand right from wrong and they're just being children versus knowing it's wrong and doing it purposely.

Okay? That's the difference there. You spank when they know it's right and wrong and they're doing it purposely. Okay? So, next. Let a child... Well, let... Let me try and redo that. A child left to themselves without correction will bring shame on his mother.

The rod and reproof give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother. This is what I was saying already. If you train up a child in the way they will go, you leave them to themselves.

Put that back up for one second. A child left to himself. Notice that? Left to himself will bring shame to his mother. That's the idea. If you let the child have his way all the time, you'll raise them to be selfish children and they'll bring a shame on you.

Alright? Last one is a child who is loving and consistently corrected gives parents rest and delight for their soul. That's your blanks. Rest and delight for their soul. Discipline your son and he will give you rest and he will give delight to your heart.

And so, that's the thing. We should not be doing this instruction so that we get the rest. That's the side benefit. We do it because we want to honor God. And when you're discipling somebody, you're going to realize that some people have children already and this is tough.

They've already got angry children and now they've got a lot of work to do. It is never too late to start. And one thing I'd encourage you, if you have someone and they say, look, I already have children.

They hate me. We've been fighting. It's been horrible. Then maybe you encourage them. Sit down with your children and say, look, mommy and daddy parented very badly. We were bad. We did wrong. And we now are Christians.

And as Christians, we're going to try to do what's right. And it's going to be hard for all of us. You are not going to trust that mommy and daddy have your best interests in mind. But we're really going to try to do what's best for you and train you up right.

And there's going to be part of you that you just won't like it. And we understand that. But we're going to try to do this together. All right. So that's parent-child relationships. Let's move on to singleness.

Christian Responsibilities of Children

Guidelines for Christian singles. And let me be clear. Christian singles are not some sort of second class citizen in the church. They shouldn't be. I understand that some churches make them feel that way.

But it shouldn't be. All right. But let's give a perspective of singleness. All right. First off, it is good. That's your blank there. Good. If an unmarried or a widow person remains single. We know that from 1 Corinthians 7, 8.

To the unmarried and to the widows I say it is good for them to remain single as I am. So you see Paul saying it's good to be single. As a single person you have more time on your hands. Now that's not the case if you're a single mother or a single father.

And you have young children in the home. Suddenly you've got a lot more work. I mean you it's like never resting. Okay. I understand that. And some of us who are married or maybe have the time. You know if you have single parents in your church give them a break sometimes.

I mean just take the children off their hands so they can get a night out a night of rest. You know one of the things is that for single mothers single fathers they got very little chance to ever remarry because they don't have time to date.

Because who's going to take care of the children? You know they don't have time to meet somebody. And they feel drained. I mean they come home they got to go work. They work all day. They got to rush home get dinner ready get the kids homework done.

Get the kids to bed. I need to sleep so I can start all over again. I mean you could usually tell who it is that's a single parent in the home in the church. You know why? They come to church and they're just like huh huh you know because that's sometimes the only hour they have where they can rest.

That shouldn't be the case. Church it's our job to act like the church and help one another. Alright. If being single is God's calling for you at this time you must recognize that it's what's best. You know most people I knew especially when I was single when I was younger they really weren't content being single.

I wasn't. I was looking to get married and I was trying to find that right person because I really wanted to get married. And you know it wasn't until I finally said you know what Lord I think I need to learn to be content.

And it wasn't until I got to a point where I was actually content and I started saying Lord if this is how if I'm going to be single then I'll be single and that's when I finally met somebody. But I think we need to learn that to be content with this situation that we're in.

I know way too many people that rush into bad situations because they want to be married and they marry someone and they haven't thought it through. A lot of times people marry someone because they just want to be married and they want someone to share their life with and they marry someone that professes to be a Christian and that person is professing to be a Christian because they want to be married too.

And they're willing to say whatever it takes to marry you maybe I'll be a Christian. That's a real issue for many people. The benefits of singleness. What? There's benefits to being single? Yeah. There are.

Let's go through them. Paul recommends singleness would be good because of the present distress. He says there I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is. Your blank there is distress but you know it's funny Paul didn't live in this age and we go there's a lot of distress now what was Paul talking about?

That's always the case there's always going to be distress. As a parent you always have things that you're just like boy what are my kids going to go through? There's a whole bunch more you have to think about as a parent.

In 1 Corinthians 7 he also says this I want you to be free from anxieties. Wow did you ever think about that? Being unmarried helps you the unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord and how to please him.

He goes on to say if you're married you have to be anxious about the things of your family you have to be thinking about your wife. Same for the wife if she's single she thinks about the Lord but if she's married she's got to think about her husband.

So a person who is unmarried can care for the things of the Lord that's your blank and how they may please him. You have more time to spend serving God if you are not married. That is a blessing that's a benefit.

The person who is bound that's your blank they're bound and that's what it says the way it describes it in 1 Corinthians Paul describes that way bound by the law the person who is bound by the law as long as his spouse lives is because of this truth that a single should not rush into marriage.

In other words because marriage is for life you're bound by the law of God to remain in that marriage you shouldn't rush it. Do not make a mistake. It is a decision you're going to make for the rest of your life.