August 24, 2020 Show with Angelo Valle on “Developing Biblical Family Worship in Your Home”

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Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation, to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions, and now here's your host,

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Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity who are living on the planet

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Earth, listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com. This is

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Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Monday.

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On this 24th day of August, 2020, before I introduce my guest and topic today,

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I just want to remind you that I will be manning an exhibitor's booth this Friday and Saturday in Scranton, Pennsylvania, at the

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Association of Certified Biblical Counselors Conference on the Basics of Biblical Counseling.

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I hope that as many of you will join me in attending this conference and will greet me at the

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Iron Sharpens Iron exhibitor's booth there. Dale Johnson, the

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Executive Director of the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors, also known as ACBC, will be speaking on a number of topics, the need for biblical counseling, the definition and goal of biblical counseling, progressive sanctification, qualifications of a biblical counselor, secular and integration theories, what makes biblical counseling biblical, and a

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Q &A session with the audience. This is going to be held from Friday night all day

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Saturday until 5 p .m. That's August 28th and 29th, this Friday and Saturday.

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And the event will be held at the High Point Baptist Church in Larksville, Pennsylvania, which is a suburb of Scranton.

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For more details, you can go to biblicalcounseling .com

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forward slash Scranton -PA -training. That's biblicalcounseling .com

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forward slash Scranton, S -C -R -A -N -T -O -N -PA -training.

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You can also go to highpointbaptist .church. Highpointbaptist .church.

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I hope to see you there this Friday and Saturday, August 28th and 29th in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

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And now I am thrilled to have back on the program someone who I've interviewed once so far, and I am very confident,

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God willing, that this is just the second of many interviews to come. I really thoroughly enjoyed my first interview with this dear brother.

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His name is Angelo Valley, not only a fine

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Orthodox Presbyterian pastor, but his name is also the name of my favorite vineyard.

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I'm only kidding. Angelo is pastor of Christ Reform Church of Alexandria, PA.

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And today we are discussing developing biblical family worship in your home, and we're also going to be introducing

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Illuminance Bible Curriculum. That's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Shrub and Zion Radio, Angelo Valley.

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Thanks, brother. I appreciate the opportunity to be on with you again and to think about these very, very important matters.

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Yes, I was excited last time when we spoke about John Owen, but today we can talk about family worship and development, and this new

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Bible curriculum my wife and I developed at www .kbbpublications .com.

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Great. Well, first of all, tell our listeners about Christ Reform Church of Alexandria, PA. Sure.

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Christ Reform Church of Alexandria, PA is an independent Reformed church.

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We're actually the only Reformed confessional church in Huntington County, central

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Pennsylvania. I've been here seven years, and we have really seen a transformation in the culture and life of the church.

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It was formerly a United Church of Christ congregation until the late 2000s, and our ministry here since 2013 has been to lead them back to their historic

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Reformed faith. And we've done that through expository preaching, robust historically

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Reformed liturgy, and the singing of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, being very self -consciously

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Reformed and catechizing our people in that way. And so we've been very grateful that we've been able to spend our time here in preaching and teaching, again, the

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Reformed faith that we've inherited from our faithful forefathers before us. Amen.

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And although this is an independent Reformed church, you are yourself an ordained Orthodox Presbyterian minister.

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That's right. According to the Book of Church Order, which of course stays by my bedside as I read it for fun,

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I am a minister laboring out of bounds, so that means I am credentialed with the Central Pennsylvania Presbyterian Orthodox Presbyterian Church, but our congregation is not part of the

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OPC. Well, if anybody wants to find out more information about Christ Reformed Church in Alexandria, Pennsylvania, go to crcalexandria .org,

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crcalexandria .org. Now, let our listeners know about this

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Bible curriculum that you and your wife developed, Illuminance. Sure.

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So my wife and I have taken family worship very seriously, and it's a long story, but it seems we have some time, so it's useful.

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My wife came into the Reformed faith first thinking about the question of how should we understand the relationship of children and salvation, and that's of course where we really wrestled with Dr.

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Sproul's wonderful book, Chosen by God, and all these years later as we've grown to love the three forms of unity, being the

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Heidelberg Catechism, Canons of Dort, Belgic Confession of Faith, as well as the Westminster Standards, Westminster Confession of Faith, larger and shorter catechism.

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We were struggling to find a curriculum that was both robust in theology as well as useful for children.

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It seems that you would either get one that is robust for children, robust in theology, but it was written as if it wasn't aware of other children or how to speak to them, or it was written for children and the theological substance could be akin to powdered sugar.

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You could survive on it, but it won't do you well. And so in our endeavor to do that, we've worked together using our strengths.

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Again, I just finished the THM at Westminster Theological Seminary in Historical Theology, and her own training both as a bachelor's in children's ministry and now she's working on her master's in biblical counseling.

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We paired those items together so that we could have a unique Sunday school experience, but not just for Sunday school.

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It's this interesting blend of going for a classical model in education so that there would be a theologically robust explanation of the story of Scripture.

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It's primarily a biblical theological overview of the stories of Scripture, as well as having a catechism that we pen together, and it's in a cyclical format.

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So the way we've designed it is that every year is a cycle. There's four cycles total, and each cycle would have 36 lessons, and each lesson you would have

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Bible studies for all ages, and we are designing this for elementary, middle school, and high school. It would have games, activities, discussion questions, further study, but it would also, again, be built on the classical model.

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So for the younger children, we'd be looking at the grammar stage of pure memorization.

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This is where the catechism my wife and I pen together could be utilized.

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For the dialectic stage, this is the conversational portion. This is where you would get your middle schoolers really going back and forth, and then for high school and up, you'd hit the rhetorical or the rhetoric stage.

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You'd be understanding the grounds or reason to what's going on. And so what we wanted to do was to have what we were naturally doing at the dinner table and our family worship experience be a means or gateway to more substantive curriculum.

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And again, that's something you can find at kvbpublications .com. K, V as in victory,

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B as in boy. Publications .com. Okay.

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Well, we also have some exciting news for our listeners. For the remainder of this month, which is only until this weekend, if you go to that website, you can get a free download of this curriculum by typing in the code word

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IRON SHARPENS IRON, and that's all one word. There's no spaces. IRON SHARPENS IRON.

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And it's also all caps. That's right. IRON SHARPENS IRON. And we'll be announcing a little bit later a repetition of this information, but it's kvbpublications .com,

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kvbpublications .com. And then the code word IRON SHARPENS IRON will get you a free download for the remainder of August.

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That's right. It's the family worship booklet that's available. That's part of what

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I wanted to talk about. It's a seminar that I gave a couple times already on the grounds for family worship and what worship looks like in the pew with your children, and then also what worship looks like at home.

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It's something that's very near and dear to my own heart and my wife's heart as well. Great.

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Well, our subject is developing biblical family worship in your home. Why is this important?

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There are Christians who might be thinking, even if they would never say it out loud, hey,

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I take my wife and kids to church every

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Sunday twice, morning and evening. I take them to Wednesday prayer meetings.

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We work long hours. We're all really tired. Can't that suffice?

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Why are you adding something else for us to feel guilty about? Why is this an important thing for families to be participating in?

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One of the things I always like to highlight is that my wife and I were not raised in a Reformed world.

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In fact, I think my wife was raised in whatever is the very best that evangelism can produce.

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She was at a church that had several hundred attendees. They didn't believe in membership.

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They had a youth pastor. They had a kids pastor. They were so large they even had an assistant kids pastor.

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And what I regularly saw was that it was possible to go to public worship and not see public worship until you were seventh grade.

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We had this segmenting of families. That was a normal feature. So on the one hand, the one part I want to talk about is the importance of including children in public worship.

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Secondarily, I also saw that often one of the issues was that parents thought that the children's theological, spiritual development was not their own job.

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It was the job of the kids pastor until the kid tapped out, and then it was the job of the youth pastor until the kid tapped out, and then it was the job of the senior pastor.

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And that's not necessarily a biblical model to have this kind of segregated or sectarian view of ministry, because on one level it inherently abdicates the role and responsibility of the parent to the child, which is their

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God -given duty. Well, for those of our listeners who are not yet doing anything more than praying before meals and praying before bed with their children, tell us some practical advice and counsel on the bare bones starting point on how they should begin developing this kind of habit and tradition in their home that actually becomes something that they grow to look forward to, enjoy doing, and I don't mean to be blasphemous or heretical by saying this, but fun and everything else that would be involved in family worship that of course has

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God and His glory first and foremost in priority. I think that's a brilliant question.

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So again, I would encourage the listeners today to take advantage of that pre -download at kbbpublications .com

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with the Iron Sharpened Iron coupon code in all caps, because the booklet that they'll download for free is to that end, to practically say, what do

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I do? What does this look like? So I'm just going to be talking about some things from there. The first thing I would recommend is taking a deep breath.

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Often we can get very stressed out about thinking about, how do I lead my family? Is it going to be weird?

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Is it going to be awkward? It's only that fear that's there because we've been programmed in some way, shape, or form to think that theological education is this foreign, abstract, bizarre thing.

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But the first thing I'd like to say is, if you're looking to do that, the first step is to read the Bible. Pray that God would help you and your family to understand it, and just open the

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Bible at the table. Maybe do it at the meal, breakfast or dinner, as the kids are still eating.

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They still have things in their mouth so they can't interrupt. Read the scriptures out loud, and pick a portion, pick a section of scripture that's comfortable.

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Maybe the Gospels. Everyone loves a good story. Maybe something like that, and begin to read.

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And after you read a section, a paragraph, whatever you feel is appropriate for your family, ask some basic questions.

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And the goal, again, of this family worship is to involve the family in this discussion.

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So you're not looking for trivia questions. I mean, you could ask trivia questions like who was there, who was speaking, but I think there's a richness in asking more open -ended questions, like, what stood out to you?

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What does this passage teach us about God? Why do you think this passage was necessary in the

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Bible? How do you think it's meant to affect its listeners? How does this passage point to the need for Christ, especially if you're reading an

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Old Testament passage? In what ways does Jesus Christ fulfill this passage? One of the great joys

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I've had as a parent is because we model this with our children so often, is that my son is more naturally beginning to look at the

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Old Testament story and try to read it from a more redemptive historical angle. And I think that's what we're trying to do when we look at the

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Old Testament. How does Jesus recall it? And again, the questions go on and on, but we also want to add the practical dynamic of, how should

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I respond to this text in my daily living here and now? Now, again, those concepts can be reworded to be more age -appropriate.

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I don't anticipate my four -year -old or five -year -old daughter answering the question, well, how does this text properly fulfill

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Christ? You know, I might expect her more to say, well, how does it make me think of Jesus?

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And talk to her about that. So we read Scripture, we discuss Scripture, and then we sing.

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One of the things that my family loves to do is sing. And so we take turns singing. We go in an order.

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We have set seats, unless my children freak out and change places. There's an explosion of noise from them on that.

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But we take turns singing. And so my youngest daughter loves singing the doxology, and the other one loves

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Calm Thou Almighty King. The other one sings Crowding With Many Crowns. And so we'll sing just one verse of that.

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And then after we sing, we pray. Now sometimes we might ask our kids to pray, because we want to model to them that their prayers are important, that they can talk to Jesus.

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It's not just Mommy and Daddy who get to pray. And so sometimes we'll say, who wants to pray? And we'll have hands.

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No, I'm going to talk to Jesus. No, I'm going to talk to Jesus. Which, of course, becomes another issue that you need to take care of.

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But we want to model to them the importance of that. And so all it is really is read, sing, pray.

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If you can remember those three things and just commit yourself to that, that's really the skeletal structure that you can build off of in all sorts of ways.

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We have an anonymous listener who asks the question, if there is no saved male in the household, is it appropriate for the mom to lead family worship?

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I think that's a great question. I think the answer is yes. We can think about Timothy. It's very important that when

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Paul identifies the reality of Timothy's godly lineage, he points to his grandmother and his mother, which

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I think is rather interesting. He points to Lois and Eunice and his own catechesis. I think it is appropriate and proper for a godly mother to raise a child.

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We might think of St. Augustine. His mother, Monica, didn't stop praying until his conversion later in life.

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If there is no godly male, it does not prevent the woman from teaching the children. That's their job.

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That's where they come in, and I think that's appropriate. I think there's something really special and beautiful. Again, we could look at 1

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Corinthians 7 in greater detail to see that role and importance. Thank you,

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Anonymous, and anybody else who would like to join us, let me remind you of our email addresses, chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. As always, give us at least your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. Please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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We do have RJ in White Plains, New York, who asks,

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We who are Reformed tend to be very meticulous about the regulative principle of worship, the idea that we are only to be conducting things in the corporate -gathered body of saints when at worship that are specifically outlined in Scripture.

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I was wondering if home and family worship would have the same strictness about the regulative principle, or do you believe that there is more freedom and creativity to do things as long as they are not against the teachings of Scripture but might involve things that are more fun for children, etc.?

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That's a great question. So, let me first start by saying I do think that there is a difference between public gathered worship and the

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Lord's Day worship as the assembled gathering of God's saints than home, personal, private worship.

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I do think there is that distinction. I think there is a uniqueness. For example, I can participate in the

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Lord's Supper on the Lord's Day with His people at a church, whereas I would say that is entirely improper in family worship at the home.

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But to that end, yes, I think there is an appropriateness in doing fun things with the children.

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For example, one of the things I do with our children when we're reading narratives is that they hear trumpets.

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Sometimes they'll make trumpet noises, or they'll hear of animals who are going through the Book of Numbers, and you hear a lot of animals.

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And if you hear an animal that you don't sound to, my youngest might make the noise of that. Finding age -appropriate ways to encourage them to listen was so incredibly important, and it helps engage them where they are developmentally.

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And so I think there are fun and appropriate ways that are not counter to both catechetical purposes but also doxological purposes in glorifying

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God. I think that's really important and crucial. Great question on the RPW, or the

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Regulative Principle of Worship. Yes, and obviously if animal noises break out in your corporate gathered worship, you might want to find a new congregation.

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I think you might be experiencing one of those false charismatic revivals. We will not be having the third blessing of mooing in the

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Spirit. Let's see here.

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We have CJ from Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, who wants to know, would you recommend that there be at least on a certain day of the week as a part of family worship, the watching of a

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Christian video? Great question. Yes, I call that the Lord's Day.

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I think we should have family worship every day. But we try hard at our own home to make the

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Lord's Day special. We want it to look different than other days, and so sometimes that involves watching screen.

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So we really try to control screen time at the house. We have little ones who are aged, we have a newborn, we have a two -and -a -half -year -old, we have a five -year -old, we have a seven -year -old.

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We try to control screen time until the weekend to help them. But on the Lord's Day, we might watch something fun like VeggieTales.

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We might watch one of the animated stories of the Pilgrim's Progress or a missionary story. We try to do things like that on purpose to help highlight the specialness of the

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Lord's Day and also fun things. But we also have very unique kids. So, like, my son really likes

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Dr. Sproul, and so he likes to listen to that or watch a video of that. But, yeah, there's also

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Theo Presents. That's another excellent resource.

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It's very useful. There are some resources out there, but it's tough. That's how come my wife and I did design the

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Illuminance program, which you can get at kbbpublications .com. We wanted to design something that was substantive to help families, even in family worship.

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It's not just for Sunday school, but it can be useful for family worship, as a catechism, as lessons, and it has practical guides.

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So if you're a person like me who is terrified of the idea of having to lead something practically, it can help you.

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And that's why we designed it the way we did. We have to go to our first break right now.

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If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. As always, please give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Angelo O 'Valley and more on developing family worship in your home, right after these messages from our sponsors.

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Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen. If you just tuned us in, our guest today for the full program is

34:52

Angelo Valley, pastor of Christ Reformed Church of Alexandria, Pennsylvania. We are discussing developing biblical family worship in your home, and we are also introducing

35:03

Illuminance Bible Curriculum. And as a reminder, if you go to the website for the

35:13

Illuminance Bible Curriculum, and you enter in the password

35:19

IRONSHARPENSIRON, all one word and all capitals, no spaces, you will receive a free download of the family worship booklet that is being offered, and that is at KVB.

35:36

That's King Victory Boy, kvbpublications .com.

35:45

And send me an email if you're having any difficulty downloading that free booklet.

35:51

And by the way, what does KVB stand for, Angelo? Great question. I was hoping you'd ask me.

35:57

It's about Katerina Von Bora, of course. Martin Luther's wife. That's right.

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So part of my family, we spent a couple of years helping at a local OPC church, which is how

36:09

I was able to come into the OPC. A good friend of mine was a pastor there, and he had some vocal and chord issues, so I preached for him in the evening.

36:16

And they had this brilliant library, and so we made it our practice to get a special book for the

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Lord's Day to read together. And so Simon Etikhar, who's a brilliant, brilliant author, with such a talent for taking the brilliance and the breadth of church history and making it palpable for children, had various books.

36:33

And so it's been a love of ours as a whole family to study church history and see how God has been faithful through the ages.

36:41

Well, eventually Banner of Truth did these wonderful little cardboard books, and I got one for my kids at a

36:47

Banner of Truth conference on Katerina Von Bora, which was, I think, written by Rebecca Van Doodyward.

36:54

And it was such a fascinating story of how Luther's ministry was really upheld by his wife in many ways, that she was able to maintain the home, to feed these various guests who were coming in by the droves at who knows when, provided a safe context and a healthy context for Luther to work and study.

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And it was this foundation that the Black Cloister, their home, was just this wonderful nest egg where they were able to train their children and help others to grow in the knowledge of the

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Lord. And so with that in mind about the importance of family working together for theological education, my wife and I utilized

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KVB, Katerina Von Bora, for that end. That's great.

37:43

And we have had Simonetta Carr on this program as a guest, and I'm sure we'll be having her back as well in the future.

37:51

That's excellent. She's a wonderful, wonderful author. Let's see here.

37:59

We have B .B. in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know,

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Is there anything that you can counsel us about in regarding keeping children quiet and attentive during this time when they might normally in church do so, but when they are in the confines of their own home, be less intimidated to act out?

38:31

I want to make sure I understand the question. Would you read it again one more time? Basically, she's saying how do you keep your kids still and quiet during the family worship as opposed to at church, especially if your kids are used to going to church.

38:46

They're usually well behaved. I mean, at times at the church where I attend, you hear outbreaks of this and that occasionally.

38:56

But I mean, kids might be more intimidated to act out and misbehave in a corporate worship setting than they are in the home.

39:04

Sure. Well, there's a lot of different ways to approach that. One of the reasons I'm so glad that we're working together on this today is in the booklet that we're having on kbbpublications .com,

39:15

there's a practical guide to parenting. We use a recommended guide throughout various ages on how to approach worship, whether it be family worship, but more particularly public worship as well.

39:27

It depends on the developmental stage of the child and where they're at. For example, my wife had a baby recently, and a dear brother of mine was kind enough to fill the pulpit for me.

39:40

So I took my three kids to church, and I got the opportunity to sit in with a few of the kiddos.

39:48

One of the things we do is we encourage our children to take notes in appropriate ways. My seven -year -old is very literate.

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He reads all the time. We encourage him to take notes. He has his own special notebook, his own special pen for taking notes.

40:02

My five -year -old daughter can't write as well, so we encourage her to draw pictures that are reflecting and relating to what the sermon is talking about.

40:10

And then my two -and -a -half -year -old, who is not ready for either one, we utilize goldfish, those delicious little cheddar cheese cracker goodies.

40:20

It got me nervous when you said delicious after goldfish, and then I realized what you were talking about.

40:26

Times are hard, brother. We have to adapt to what we have. No, we utilize those little mini goldfish.

40:34

And every time she hears a word that she recognizes, I give her goldfish. So we might hear a sermon, and she says,

40:41

Jesus. I'm like, yes, good job. He said Jesus. Or the Baptist. Okay, good. Yeah, he talked about John the Baptist.

40:46

Or sin. Yes, sin. And so depending on where they are, we have these different methods.

40:51

Again, that's in the booklet that we're giving away for free for the rest of the week on kbbpublications .com

40:57

with the Iron Sharpens Iron code. I really hope you guys take advantage of that. We do work hard to get these pragmatic things, because that's where people really get nervous.

41:05

They're all about, yes, we want to include children. Yes. But how do you do it? That's always the hard part.

41:11

We've developed that tool to that end. I hope that answers the question.

41:17

Yeah, I'm sure it did. We have Harrison in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, do you have any knowledge of church history in regard to private home worship?

41:31

Is this something that has gone on for centuries, or is this more of a new concept? Well, in my church history reflection,

41:42

I haven't gone exhausted. I didn't go exhausted in the church history. I haven't in a lifetime been able to do that.

41:49

One thing I did think that was interesting was in my perusal of the Church of Scotland in the 1600s, it was a punishable offense if a family failed to perform family worship.

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It was actually worthy of church discipline. Wow. And so to go back to the initial question, if there was not a father or someone able to do that, they would expect whoever was in charge of the home to provide for it.

42:12

There were actually directories for family worship. Just like there is in the modern -day

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OPC, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, or PCA, Presbyterian Church in America, Books of Church Order, there is within them a directory for public worship.

42:27

There was historically directories for family worship. The guy is that. It was a very big deal.

42:33

So at the very least, we have that evidence to go back to that era. But I would say that, and again, this is in the booklet, that we see this kind of family worship model as the norm of the

42:47

Old Testament. So to build on that idea, do you mind if I go down that rabbit trail there?

42:53

Of course. I should tell you, I mean, of course not. I don't mind. Continue.

42:59

That's okay. What I would argue is that what we see from the very beginning is that God created the family as a channel for redemption.

43:09

And what I mean by that is not that we have this 1950s nuclear family that has solved everything.

43:15

No, no, no. What I'm saying is that God, from the beginning, created Adam and Eve in the context of a family.

43:20

It wasn't like an awkward 90s sitcom where Adam saw Eve and he wondered if they were going to be friends and then go from there.

43:26

It wasn't really like that at all. God gave the promise of the Proto -Evangelion, the first gospel message, and it was going to come through the seed of a woman, and then we see this development of God's promise with Abraham.

43:39

And again, with Abraham, we look at Genesis 12, verses 1 through 3. He promises him and says, "...in

43:45

you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." And so we know, with the

43:51

New Testament in mind, that Paul is going to highlight us that that's going to be chiefly through the seed of the woman who is the offspring of Abraham, who is

43:58

Christ, he says in Galatians 3 .16, but that God used this family to bring forth the truth.

44:07

But it was also, and we look at this now in Deuteronomy 6, verse 4 and following, the importance of children in worship.

44:19

That the parents had a role in catechizing their children when they were walking, when they were sitting, when they were lying down.

44:25

There was this expectation that there would be a normative feature of the parents catechizing their children.

44:32

That their children weren't just neutral observers who happened to be there at church and took up space, but didn't have a role at all.

44:39

But rather, that they had a unique, special role. And we can even highlight as well the reality of the

44:45

Apostle Paul speaking to children, right? We think about Colossians 3 .20, Ephesians 6. They are the unique recipients of divine revelation at that point.

44:54

Children, are they your parents? Well, that means that they were there. We think about Jesus, feeding the 5 ,000, feeding the 4 ,000.

45:03

It says that there were 5 ,000 men besides women and children. Kids showed up. Kids were there.

45:09

Probably because there wasn't a daycare center available, but also because if you had the

45:14

Messiah in front of you, you'd want your kids present. You'd want the protection and the blessings of God. And so looking at that broader covenantal aspect of the

45:23

Old and New Testament, I would say that this idea of family worship has been since the beginning. And again, to highlight that, look at the

45:30

Passover feast. God gives us these explicit instructions. When your child says this, you will say unto him that.

45:37

You think about the memorial stones when Joshua and the people of God, after the death of Moses, enter into the promised land.

45:43

Make this memorial so that when your children ask this question, you can explain it to them. There is this inherent catechetical family dynamic in the

45:52

Scriptures which is great because it speaks out immediately against our American individualism. Well, that's an excellent answer.

46:03

And we have another listener question for you. Sure. Let's see here.

46:10

I was just looking at it, and it somehow escaped my screen. Oh, John in Bangor, Maine has a question.

46:21

Is it appropriate, in your opinion, to invite other Christian families over to your home while you're having your home family worship services, or is this something that should be regularly kept private for your own wife and children?

46:36

Well, that's a great question. One of the things my family loves to do is we love to eat. We're eating people.

46:43

And we love to get together with family and friends. I think it's interesting that if you look in the Bible, the food is always involved with the people of God.

46:49

And so if we say it's okay to have a physical, tangible meal with the people of God, why wouldn't we want a spiritual meal with the

46:56

Word of God, who is himself the bread of life, the Lord Jesus? I think one of the most beautiful things we can do as a church family is when we come together is to pray for a meal.

47:05

Nobody ever gets funny about that, if you want to pray for a meal. Even non -Christian, secular, nominal

47:10

Christians are chill with that. But I think the dynamic of including other families in the midst of your family worship, it becomes something very special at that point.

47:20

I think it's a way to model to them things that perhaps they need to be doing or aren't doing. Or they add another dynamic.

47:27

It adds further voices. You might think of Apollos and Priscilla and Aquila and the beauty of table fellowship and discussion of sacred things.

47:34

I think it is a great thing when you have family over, especially brothers and sisters in the Lord, to partake of family worship together.

47:41

It's a wondrous, beautiful thing. Could that be a means of evangelism?

47:47

Could you invite your non -brethren, your non -Christian brothers?

47:53

They're trapped, man. They are trapped at your table because you have their meal. They can't go anywhere.

48:00

It's true, though. We've done that before with non -Christians. And even family members who have lapsed in the faith. We have made it a point to, after the meal or while there's still food, to be delivering the

48:14

Word in that way, to read, sing, pray. And it's great because, you know, for people who may have gone cold in their faith or people who may be distanced from the

48:22

Lord, they can be reminded of beautiful, beautiful things. I won't go into great details about this one, but there have been even times where people have been in especially difficult situations where we've been able to comfort them because we sing together.

48:37

There's nothing more beautiful than hearing a child sing Amazing Grace. There's nothing more beautiful than having a child pray for you in the other room.

48:44

And I think that real evangelism, real, not just real evangelism, that's overstepping, real discipleship and community growth in the church happens when people's boots are under your table.

48:56

That's where fellowship happens. I think that's one of the reasons why, of the 12 Articles of the Apostles' Creed, Communion of the

49:02

Saints is there. It's important to remind us the importance of fellowship. Great.

49:09

We have, let's see here. We have a question from Susan Margaret in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania.

49:22

And Susan Margaret asks, You had just a little while ago, during your discussion, said you encourage your children to pray.

49:33

Why is it that we would, as Christian parents, encourage children to lead prayer in our midst when we would never do that with an unbeliever?

49:43

I am saying this because I'm not referring to children that we are convinced are truly saved and understand the

49:51

Word of God and have true faith. But for those children that we are very skeptical about, or they're just too young for us to have confidence in the genuineness of their faith, why would we have them lead in prayer?

50:08

Perhaps it would be too much of me to presume that this person may be a Baptist. Yes, but you know what's interesting?

50:16

Years ago, I attended an excellent conference on the

50:22

Puritans, led by a Presbyterian, Don Kistler. You may be familiar with Don Kistler, a

50:29

Presbyterian ordained minister and the original founder of Salve Deo Gloria Publications.

50:37

And he currently runs a publishing house by a different name.

50:43

And I will look that up momentarily, perhaps during a station break, so I can announce that.

50:49

I don't remember the name of it right now. I think it's Northampton Publications or Publishing or Northampton Press.

50:58

But he said that it was a common belief amongst the Puritans, who were

51:03

Paedo -Baptists, not to permit their little children to sing or to lead in prayer, unless the parents were confident that the child had genuinely come to saving faith in Christ.

51:18

So I just thought I'd throw that in there. It's not just a novelty of Baptists. And by the way, I actually think most

51:26

Reformed Baptists would not view their household worship in that way.

51:33

I think that most Reformed Baptists would view things with more of a permitting of children to do these things.

51:44

In fact, I don't know of any Reformed Baptists that would agree with the Puritan practice according to what

51:50

Don taught. I would agree with you. Most of them, I know, treat their children just like Presbyterians do, that they are children of the covenant community, which is why we baptize our children.

52:01

We believe that they have a special gift in that view. Again, not that to be the

52:07

Donum Superauditum or something bizarre like that. They would, Baptists, pretty much universally believe that children are not in the covenant unless they are truly regenerate.

52:19

Yeah, that would be the more of a Baptist approach. Again, being Presbyterian Reformed, we are content with the inclusion of the children of believers in the covenant community, seeing the grounds for that to be

52:33

Genesis 17, Colossians 2, 11 -12, Romans 4. But also, just this idea that the believers' children are holy, that they're somehow different.

52:44

They're going to grow up hearing the words of God regularly. And so, I am of the persuasion,

52:49

I really like the language of the canons of Dort 117. Now, the canons of Dort 117 were primarily written for a pastoral comfort to those who lose their children when they're infants.

53:02

But in that article, again, 1618 -1619, it writes, Since we are to judge the will of God from his word, which testifies that the children of believers are holy, not by nature, but in virtue of the covenant of grace, in which they, together with their parents, are comprehended.

53:17

I am of the mind that I will raise my son in the church and believe his regeneration until proven otherwise.

53:29

I don't have a problem with that. It is his responsibility to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and repent.

53:35

But it's not a guilty until proven otherwise sort of situation. I do think that it's important and necessary to have them grow in the knowledge and fear of the

53:46

Lord. I think in Psalm 22, For my mother's breast I have trusted you, which we know is fulfilled in Christ.

53:53

So, I mean, at the point of belief, we have to ask, you know, what does it mean to be a believer? What does it mean?

53:59

I mean, that's a deeper question than what we're looking at in our purview today. Again, but very important,

54:05

I come with the approach that if a child is a covenant community member, if they've been baptized or in a believing household,

54:13

I don't have any reason to bar them from praying. In our home, again, if you have a child who's in complete apostasy, who's completely fighting against the

54:24

Lord, we have seen those things. I think that's up for a different discussion. But for my seven -year -old son who reads his

54:31

Bible and loves Sproul and reading about the missionaries who have given their lives, I think it's a different case altogether.

54:39

Well, I mean, would it have to be a case of extreme apostasy? So, suppose you have a tiny little child, two, three, four, who just says,

54:47

No, I don't want to. I mean, or is just completely indifferent and bored to the idea.

54:52

I mean, would you have them actually lead in prayer? Well, if they can say,

54:57

Jesus, please help, I would be okay with that, as my little one does. My kids do pray quite well.

55:03

I don't have a problem with that. Again, they've been sealed with the sign of the covenant.

55:08

There is an objective reality to that, you know, like circumcision. There is the objective reality that there was not a subjective aspect to that.

55:17

But in baptism, we know there is a requirement of faith. But I wouldn't treat them otherwise.

55:23

We have to go to our midway break. It's longer than normal, folks. So please be patient. Race Life Radio has to air their own public service announcements and other things to localize

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Iron Sharp and Zion Radio to Lake City, Florida. That is an FCC requirement.

55:39

So please, use this time wisely. Write down information provided by our advertisers so that you can more frequently patronize them and more successfully patronize them, which will mean that they will likely remain our advertisers because they are enjoying the responses they're getting from you.

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And that will mean that we stay on the air longer in the future, God willing. But also write down questions for Angelo Valley.

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And our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages.

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Iron Sharp and Zion Radio depends upon the financial support of fine Christian organizations to remain on the air, like the

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I also want to congratulate Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham for their recent appointment of Pastor Rich Jensen's co -elder,

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Pastor Christopher McDowell. For more information on Hope Reform Baptist Church, go to hopereformedli .net

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That's hopereformedli .net Or call 631 -696 -5711

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Hi, this is John Sampson, pastor of King's Church in Peoria, Arizona.

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Taking a moment of your day to talk about Chris Arnzen and the Iron Sharpens Iron podcast. I consider

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where you can click support. That's ironsharpensironradio .com. As host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, I frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations.

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A church I've been strongly recommending as far back as the 1980s is Grace Covenant Baptist Church in Flemington, New Jersey, pastored by Alan Dunn.

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Grace Covenant Baptist Church believes it's God's prerogative to determine how he shall be worshiped, and how he shall be represented in the world.

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God in spirit and truth. Grace Covenant Baptist Church endeavors to maintain a

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This is Pastor Bill Sousa, Grace Church at Franklin, here in the beautiful state of Tennessee.

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Grace Church at Franklin is an independent, autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture through the person and work of our

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Lord Jesus Christ. And of course, the end for which we strive is the glory of God.

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If you live near Franklin, Tennessee, and Franklin is just south of Nashville, maybe 10 minutes, or you are visiting this area, or you have friends and loved ones nearby, we hope you will join us on Lord's Day in worshiping our

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God and Savior. Please feel free to contact me if you have more questions about Grace Church at Franklin.

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Our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org That's gracechurchatfranklin .org

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This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our

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01:14:04

We will be back momentarily with our guest Angelo Valli, an Orthodox Presbyterian minister who is discussing with us today developing a family, a biblical family worship in your home.

01:14:19

And we're discussing Illuminance Bible curriculum as well, a curriculum he developed with his wife. But before we return to that discussion we have some important announcements to make.

01:14:30

First of all, I'm hoping again that you folks join me, as many of you folks as possible, this

01:14:36

Friday and Saturday, August 28th and 29th in Scranton, Pennsylvania for the

01:14:43

Association of Biblical Counselors Conference at the

01:14:49

High Point Baptist Church in Larksville, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Scranton.

01:14:56

And Dale Johnson, the Executive Director of the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors, also known as ACBC, will be leading the conference with such lectures as The Need for Biblical Counseling, The Definition and Goal of Biblical Counseling, Progressive Sanctification, Qualifications of a

01:15:12

Biblical Counselor, Secular and Integration Theories, What Makes Biblical Counseling Biblical, and a

01:15:18

Q &A session with the audience. It starts Friday night and continues all day

01:15:23

Saturday until 5 p .m. Please join me there as I man an Iron Trump and Zion Radio exhibitors booth at this conference this weekend,

01:15:32

Friday and Saturday, August 28th and 29th, For details, go to biblicalcounseling .com

01:15:38

forward slash scranton -pa -training that's biblicalcounseling .com

01:15:44

forward slash s -c -r -a -n -t -l -n dash p -a dash training and you can also go to the website of the venue

01:15:52

High Point Baptist Church in Larksville, Pennsylvania highpointbaptist .church highpointbaptist .church

01:15:58

See you this weekend in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Folks, if you love this show and you don't want it to disappear from the airwaves please,

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click support, then click, click to donate now If you want to advertise with us as long as whatever it is you're promoting is compatible with what we believe, you don't have to believe exactly as I do, but you need to be promoting something that's at the very least compatible with what

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I believe, then please send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com and put, I need a shirt

01:18:09

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01:18:16

I am really mixing myself up here Send the email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:18:22

and put in the subject line advertising. There you go Now, if you need a church, if you are not a member of a bible -believing church

01:18:31

I have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the planet earth I may be able to help you find one.

01:18:36

I've helped many people in all parts of the world in this listening audience find churches that they did not even know existed that are biblically faithful, sometimes really within a couple of minutes from their home, amazingly and they're not always that close, but that has happened on a couple of occasions

01:18:52

So please, if you need help send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com and put, I need a church in the subject line chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:19:00

I need a church in the subject line That's also the email address where you can send in a question to Angelo Valley That's chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:19:08

chrisarnson at gmail .com We are talking about developing a biblical family worship in your home and before we went to the break,

01:19:19

I think you perhaps misspoke, Angelo unless I misunderstood you but it sounded like you were giving a biblical,

01:19:27

I mean I don't want to be too presumptuous you were giving a Baptist prerequisite or requirement of baptism which with faith may have meant the

01:19:38

Lord's Supper I don't remember at this point what I was talking about at this point

01:19:47

Because I think you said faith is required for baptism obviously since you baptize infants you don't believe it

01:19:54

I do believe that faith is required for adults people who have come to riper years, use that older language and for adults there, but no, the children neither would be content with baptizing if their parents were professed believers, members of a gospel church

01:20:12

We have a fellow Orthodox Presbyterian who has sent in a question in fact,

01:20:17

I usually only give someone's first name, city and state and country, but since this person has been a guest on my program

01:20:24

I'll be more descriptive of him. His name is Charlie Liebert, and he is the founder of sixdaycreation .com

01:20:34

that's spelled out by the way S -I -X daycreation .com, he's a former colleague of Ken Ham and he is a dear brother in Christ and he has a question that is not really on our topic today, but since he's an

01:20:51

Orthodox Presbyterian, I figured I'd let him slide he says you talked about the covenant how often should the means of grace communion be held, weekly, twice monthly, monthly, etc

01:21:05

I think that's up to the wisdom of the local session of a church honestly so you don't have any personal preference that you think is biblical, there are

01:21:18

Reformed people, both Reformed Baptists and Pado Baptists, who strongly have views that it should be every

01:21:23

Sunday, and there are some who would just answer exactly as you did, and they don't think it's crucial they just don't think it should be too infrequent, but so I guess you don't have a personal conviction on that I have a personal preference, but I would say it's different than a conviction

01:21:44

I think a preference is what I would prefer, but a conviction is what I would stand on I would prefer weekly, I think it's important but our church practices monthly and that's where our people are, and the wisdom of our local spiritual council which is a

01:21:58

Continental Reformed parallel for us on the sessional idea we hold it monthly well thank you

01:22:04

Charlie, and send my love to your wife Terry, and I hope all is well with you, look forward to your return to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio well we have another listener who has a question and this listener is

01:22:23

Ronald in Eastern Suffolk County, Long Island, he says, forgive me if I miss this but what do you believe should be included in a family worship setting at home that would not ordinarily be a part of the gathered public worship services at the church building, and we did somewhat cover that a little bit when we talked about regulative principle really being respectful to the church public gathering but perhaps you have some things that you do or that you know are permissible or helpful even that maybe not something you do in the church service sure, so ordinarily in public worship services we would have the pastor or the elder read the sermon text or the scripture reading, is that a norm in your church as well?

01:23:13

Yes at our home we've had it where my wife has read before, especially if I've been feeling ill, or my son has even read before, but that's one minor distinction where we do that in private family worship that necessarily wouldn't happen in formal public worship and then even before I was talking about my children responding to the various readings of scripture with words or if you were discussing animals, doing things like that to help them pay attention those are some unique things that we did so if we were reading through numbers or something we talked about sheep, my two and a half year old might go bleh, or something like that just to be listening in doing that in public worship now can preaching take place in a public

01:24:00

I'm sorry, in a home setting, and would that be exclusively males that were involved in that?

01:24:09

According to 1st Timothy 2, 12, I really do believe that preaching is proper only for males for those who have been properly ordained or licensed by the presbytery, again holding clearly to my presbyterianism in that one but then you have to ask the question what do you do in situations where it's not safe you preach in public settings, you think about the

01:24:28

Puritans again going to Owen, people preaching in homes I think then that becomes something entirely different what

01:24:35

I'm talking about is simply family worship worship that is appropriate for your family, and should you have a guest to enjoy them as well but preaching,

01:24:45

I don't see that as a particular portion of family worship that doesn't make sense, there are didactic portions of explanation but that's not the same as preaching but it wouldn't be something that would be forbidden especially if your church your elders believe a man is a gift to preach, they have allowed him to preach in other settings even if he's not an elder or even an office bearer of any kind would that be something permissive?

01:25:20

Are you asking about public worship setting? No, in the private home setting Well I haven't had that come up before to be honest,

01:25:28

I don't have the experience to talk to that end we have allowed as a local church we are an independent church, we've allowed our intern to preach regularly and things like that but again

01:25:40

I'm just thinking more in terms of a Presbyterian setting has to go through the Presbytery but again family worship we haven't had preaching, we've had portions where I have expounded something to the children and my wife about an idea in scripture it would be like a study bible comment an extended note on what's going on or an extended parallel or connection or things like that but that would be something very different than preaching

01:26:10

We have a listener let's see we have

01:26:18

I was just looking at that one also and it escaped my screen sorry folks we have oh it's another anonymous listener ok and we have how many mysterious people for some reason sometimes even when the questions don't seem to be very private people are insisting on remaining anonymous, maybe they feel that their questions and I'm not saying this is a silly question it's not at all but perhaps sometimes people are just embarrassed

01:26:53

I don't know that's all good the anonymous listener wants to know what are some things that we may not have even thought of to include in a home worship setting that may be more encouraging for little ones to participate

01:27:11

I think by virtue of the question it's unknowable I'm not sure what you mean by that sorry things we haven't thought of I wouldn't know what she hasn't thought of or he hasn't thought of that's all good well

01:27:28

I mean obviously there are maybe things that you would recognize on the face of them that might be out of the ordinary sure sure so for example we might do something special so on the

01:27:39

Lord's Day one thing we do is we might do some special activities for example writing letters to people whom we love or something like that or reading about Paul being encouraged by letters maybe we should write a letter to someone we love or someone we haven't talked to in a while that would be something special again we might actually go and physically do that and go my kids may color something or write something or cut something or glitter something depending on the moon and the stars and all those things now one thing that is a very important element of studying the word of God is scripture memory do you have any counsel and ideas or perhaps traditions that aid in the memorization of scripture sure so one thing that we're doing with our oldest son is we're going in a very traditional scriptorial model so everyday he has to write a psalm and if it's a lengthy psalm he'll write part of it, maybe six to eight verses and it has to be all the correct words, spelling even we're having him write the psalms as they're printed in the text in terms of the causal breaks and things like that and so doing that regularly now that's another part of private worship we're doing that part for him as an individual we could also just sing a psalm so we sing psalms that's kind of something that we do as a church and as a family and so as our church has a psalm of the month that we sing regularly to help get it in our hearts we might sing it as a family over and over again and so I think singing is one of the best ways to memorize something again that's part of that classical model that we celebrate in the illuminance program and so like if I asked you what's four letters before the letter

01:29:36

G or four letters before the letter P you might have to sing the ABC's in order to do it because you've been taught the

01:29:41

ABC's by song and so we sing the psalms to memorize them and hide them in our hearts

01:29:47

I think that's something that the Reformed Presbyterian Church does very well for their congregation as a whole we also try to model that in our family worship as well and we're going to our final break right now it's going to be a lot more brief than the last two breaks if you have a question that you intend to send in please try to do it fairly soon because we'll be out of time before you know it and our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com

01:30:15

C -H -R -I -S A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com and please as always give us your first name at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence if you live outside the

01:30:28

U .S .A and please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter don't go away, we're going to be right back with Angelo Valli and more on developing a home, a biblical home worship right after these messages from our sponsors

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01:43:03

This is Chris Arnzen. Before I return to my discussion with Angelo Valli on developing a biblical home worship,

01:43:16

I just received while on the station break some very exciting news that we got confirmation from Jeff Thomas, the world -renowned

01:43:27

Reformed Baptist evangelist and author and Banner of Truth conference speaker.

01:43:33

Jeff Thomas, who for over 50 years pastored the Alfred Place Baptist Church in Everest with Wales, well he will be on our show tomorrow and Wednesday.

01:43:45

Tomorrow he will be discussing the theme Christ in Gethsemane and on Wednesday he is going to be discussing a very creative theme that I think really vividly explains a truth.

01:44:01

Prayer is impotence grasping omnipotence. Prayer is impotence grasping omnipotence and that's the

01:44:10

Wednesday discussion. So tomorrow and Wednesday Jeff Thomas will be our guest here on Iron Sherpa Design Radio 4 to 6 p .m.

01:44:18

Eastern Time. So please tune in, mark it down in your calendar and let your family, friends, and loved ones know about this next two days, especially if they are

01:44:28

Banner of Truth fans and also fans of the publications known as Reformation Heritage Books.

01:44:39

He has written for both of those two publishing ministries. We are now back with our guest today,

01:44:48

Angelo Valli, and if you have a question please send it in as quickly as possible before we run out of time.

01:44:55

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

01:45:01

We have Christian in Suffolk County, Long Island, New York, who says,

01:45:06

I would imagine that an excellent thing to do during home family worship and devotionals would be to study the lives of great men and women of the faith.

01:45:17

Do you do this and do you have any specific biographies you can recommend? So one of the things that we highlight in that booklet, which is free for download on kbbpublications .com,

01:45:33

is we try really hard to stay to the scriptures in terms of our family worship time, and the only real deviations we do are primarily to the catechisms we're working through, whether it be

01:45:44

Heidelberg or the shorter catechism. But in addition to those, we do have kids' biographies.

01:45:51

I'm forgetting the name. It's a homeschool curriculum that does these wonderful biographies of Christian missionaries.

01:45:58

I'm thinking of people like Elgaradus Aylward, Hudson Taylor, Corey Tate. Your voice disappeared,

01:46:07

Angelo. Your voice is disappearing, brother.

01:46:14

You're very muffled. I can't hear you. Oh, I'm so sorry, friend. The series is called Christian Heroes, Then and Now by Janet and Jeff Benz, B -E -N -G -E.

01:46:25

That's a great series I recommend if you're looking to look at the lives of great saints. It's a really great work.

01:46:31

Also, anything by Simon Etikhar. She has these wonderful short biographies on so many wonderful figures of the faith that I would commend anybody if they're looking to grow, whether it be for family worship or in addition to their family worship.

01:46:45

Yes, and I happen to know, since I've interviewed her, that Simon Etikhar, I think that's how she pronounces it, her books have been published by HeritageBooks .org,

01:46:58

Reformation Heritage Books, and their website is HeritageBooks .org. I would encourage you to purchase them, however, at CVBBS .com,

01:47:08

since they sponsor our program. That's for Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CVBBS .com,

01:47:15

and look for books by Simon Etikhar, and even ask them for other biographies of great

01:47:22

Christian heroes. I've seen them there on the shelves. They're beautifully illustrated books, even one on Martin Luther's wife, the namesake of your own website.

01:47:35

Yeah, yeah, they're a great resource. You can always look at Reformation Trust, too. They have some really wonderful biographies on other great historical reformed figures.

01:47:44

And last but not least, don't forget Solid -Ground -Books .com, a primary sponsor of Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

01:47:50

They have many biographies, even beyond what they publish themselves. They carry other publishers' works, and they would include biographies, and even biographies for children.

01:48:04

So that's Solid -Ground -Books .com. We have Marie in Alexandria, Pennsylvania.

01:48:11

Why bother creating a new program for children? Isn't there enough on the market?

01:48:18

What makes Illuminance so special? And there'll be a follow -up question also after that. Well, I think the reason we were doing that initially was because we didn't find something that accomplished all the goals that we think

01:48:32

Illuminance does accomplish. There are really good curriculums out there that are about Bible stories, but they're not necessarily redemptively historically minded in a tradition akin to Gerhardus Voss, Richard Gaffin, and kind of the

01:48:47

Westminster Theological Model. Kind of also to drop another name, Edmund Clowney, in that kind of frame.

01:48:54

And then we also found works that were not necessarily narratival like that, but were more systematic.

01:49:00

But sometimes if they're more systematic, it was as if the people who had written them had never taught a child.

01:49:08

Just things that didn't seem to make sense pedagogically or even in terms of practicality. And so one of the reasons we produced the

01:49:15

Illuminance program the way we did is we found a way to blend together through these four cycles, and every cycle has 36 catechism questions and answers and proof texts that we've put together, a blending of both a grand narratival overarching theme of the

01:49:31

Scriptures, and that would be in the first three cycles, that would work for Presbyterian and Reformed Baptists alike, and then a last cycle on the systematics portion, which helps to highlight how all the pieces fit together.

01:49:45

And so I think that's really important, to see the grand drama of redemption through creation, fall, redemption, consummation, in a manner that it's in the classical tradition, and that is useful not only for little kids, but for middle schoolers, high schoolers, and adults.

01:49:59

And I think our curriculum does that, does that in questions and activities, further discussion, and recommended readings and projects.

01:50:09

We have another anonymous listener who says, sometimes when

01:50:14

I talk with parents and witness how they teach their children, I fear they are becoming too much focused on what appeals to the minds of young ones, and therefore

01:50:28

I think make the devotional life of children overly childish, and even trivializing those sacred and deep biblical truths.

01:50:41

Is there a way to presenting truths to children that does not become too goofy and childish, and too trivializing of these great themes of the

01:50:54

Scripture? Yes, I'll begin by saying, I think a great way to do that is to utilize the

01:50:59

Illuminance Bible curriculum on kbs .org. But also,

01:51:05

I think it depends on the child. Yes, so my son is very bookwormish. He would spend his, he's seven, he read

01:51:12

The Fellowship of the Ring like a couple weeks ago, because he got bored. And the kid's just atypical in that way. And so for him, he's going to be very propositionally minded, intellectually focused.

01:51:21

My daughter, who's five, is not like that. She's very much prototypical girl, and every way, in every positive way, every way in between.

01:51:32

And so if I was to approach her the way I would approach my son, that would be a problem. And I think sometimes that's one of the problems we have in our

01:51:38

Reformed circles, that we pretend that there is an intellectual aspect of Christianity and that's all there is.

01:51:44

But there is a heartwarming, devotional, experiential aspect that has to be engaged as well. And so I think you have to find that balance between devotional warmth and intellectual prowess.

01:51:55

And that requires wisdom. And there's no clear formula for that. But if there was,

01:52:01

I bet you know where you would find it. Well, do you agree, do you agree with the anonymous listener?

01:52:12

I came out of the evangelical background, so I've seen every sort of trivial nonsense machine you can do.

01:52:18

I traveled for five years, or for two years as an electric guitarist, going to ten years worth of youth camps.

01:52:25

I've seen trivial at its worst. But with that being the case, the answer is not to pretend that every student, every child we have, is preparing to go to Westminster Theological Seminary for their

01:52:37

MD. Or are already there. Or are already there, that's right.

01:52:43

I think sometimes when parents overdo that, they kind of teach their children that God is just this intellectual quotient, and they don't really know how to engage

01:52:51

Him in any other way. And I think the answer to that is to learn to teach them how to see God everywhere.

01:52:57

You know, we really do believe, Psalm 19 teaches us that all the heavens declare the handiwork of God, that every atom and proton and neutron, everything between that and the greatest galaxy, reveals the glory of God.

01:53:09

And it's not just in propositions that, yes, propositional truth is necessary and good. We also deal with beauty, and love, and other things like that.

01:53:18

Again, which are not necessarily not bound to proposition, but there's age -appropriate realities to teaching.

01:53:25

Yes, in fact, that leads me to a question of my own. What do we spare our children from, if anything, if they are very young, pre -teens, that might involve the more gruesome, violent, and sexual things taught in the very sacred and God -breathed words of Scripture?

01:53:50

I mean, there are obviously some very immoral things going on that the

01:53:56

Bible describes, and there are also very violent things. And, you know, sometimes

01:54:02

I get a little weary of seeing the Noah's Ark picture for kids, where you just see a bunch of happy animals on that Ark, and you're forgetting about why that Ark was necessary, and what was happening around in that water, you know, when that Ark was floating in the sea.

01:54:23

Well, I would ask a follow -up question. I learned this from a guy named Jesus. Let me ask you a question.

01:54:32

Do you subscribe to the Lectio Continua view of preaching, preaching through whole books?

01:54:38

Yes, I believe that, although I'm not like a strict expository preaching guy that says that you must do that on all occasions,

01:54:46

I'll give you an example. In the morning, and pretty much in the evening, we have gone through expositional studies of entire books of the

01:54:57

Bible, but we are, in the evening, doing topical messages that we just started last

01:55:04

Sunday on the means of grace. So, we will not be starting through one book of the

01:55:12

Bible. So, I think that there is a bit of freedom, but I do prefer and think it's more helpful to be involved in expository preaching.

01:55:21

It also prevents hobby -horsing and gets us to delve into the whole counsel of God. Sure. So, I would say that the same argument that you would use to argue for Lectio Continua preaching from the pulpits is the same thing

01:55:33

I would recommend at the dinner table. We preach, we read the whole thing. All of the Word is the

01:55:39

Word of God, not just the bits that are nice, but even hard, uncomfortable bits that cause your children to cry because of the sadness of it.

01:55:47

I think, on the one hand, it teaches them that the Bible is not just for Grandma and full of Noah's Ark, where the animals are smiling and everyone's cheering.

01:55:56

It deals with the reality that they're cheering because God in His mercy has saved them and not cause of the drowned death like everything else that just happened to be plummaged.

01:56:05

We just recently were working through Second Kings as a family, and one of the great horrors is that these...

01:56:11

I forgot where the instance happens, but it speaks about babies being ripped out of their mothers' wombs.

01:56:17

My wife just gave birth a couple weeks ago. It's a rather vivid image for my little boy. Congratulations! Thank you!

01:56:23

We're very grateful and thankful for another coming child. Her baptism is Sunday.

01:56:29

We're looking forward to that. But no, all of the Word is

01:56:34

God's Word, not just the PG portions. I think that's one of the dangers of a lot of American Christianity, and sometimes even in our own reformed bubbles, that we try to create this safe,

01:56:44

Pagan, PG version of life. It's not real. And it's not even done just for little kids.

01:56:50

It's done for adults, tragically. Oh, adults and teenagers. I mean, the Bible's graphic. I mean, I can't read portions of Song of Solomon with a straight face of my parents in the room.

01:57:01

You know, there is a reality that the Bible deals with all of life, and all life is not clean and neat.

01:57:09

You know, you deal with the reality of a miscarriage. You deal with the reality of suicide. You deal with the reality of violence and disease and plague.

01:57:16

And, you know, the Bible speaks to all of life. So when we censor the Bible, we shut God's mouth up.

01:57:22

Yes, and also deals with sin and repentance and damnation. And so many of the evangelical pulpits are cleansed of that, if you will, tragically, following the example of Joel Osteen and others.

01:57:39

But if you could, for a minute, summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today.

01:57:47

What I want to most solidify in the hearts and minds of your listeners today is that God is concerned about you and your family, and that all the

01:57:58

Old and New Testament reveal that. He is not indifferent towards that. He is concerned and that you have a unique role in caring for them and catechizing them.

01:58:09

And that though there are many ways to go about leading your family in the private and public worship of God, at the very bare minimum,

01:58:17

I would encourage you, in private worship, to read your Bibles as a family, to discuss it, to sing to God's glory, and to pray.

01:58:27

And a tool that I think would be useful for you is the Illuminance Bible Curriculum at kbbpublications .com.

01:58:35

And don't forget, you could download the free booklet by entering in the coupon code

01:58:40

IONSHARPENSION. Actually, is that IONSHARPENSIONRADIO or IONSHARPENSION?

01:58:46

It's IONSHARPENSION, all caps, and that is for our family worship booklet.

01:58:51

So most of the questions I got today are answered in that booklet, which is for free, just for the month of August.

01:58:58

IONSHARPENSION, all caps, no spaces. And let me know if you're having any difficulty doing that.

01:59:03

chrisarnson at gmail .com. You can send me off an email and I'll direct you to Pastor Angelo Valli.

01:59:09

And don't forget, folks, the website for the church where Angelo is the pastor is crcalexandria .org.

01:59:23

That's Christ Performed Church in Alexandria. And also, folks, don't forget, please join me this weekend, Friday and Saturday, the 28th and 29th of August, for the

01:59:32

Biblical Counseling Conference at High Point Baptist Church in Scranton, Pennsylvania. And the website is highpointbaptist .church.

01:59:42

I hope you all always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater