Winning your Kids to Jesus
Father’s Day
June 17, 2007
There was a little first grade girl who wondered why her father brought home a briefcase full of work every evening. Her mother explained, "Daddy has so much to do that he can’t finish it all at the office." "Well, then" she asked, "why don’t they put him in a slower group?"
Our Daily Bread, 9/8/89
Today is Father’s Day. Congratulations all you dads! I want to ask all you guys a simple question this morning.
Have you ever had something go “bad” in your refrigerator?
Now here is the really important question, when something does goes bad in the refrigerator how long does it take you to figure it out?
I hate to admit it but some guys can go for as many as six months and never notice the green mold all over the veggies that have wilted into a green mush in the bottom of the vegetable drawer.
So how can you tell when food is spoiled?
Well, one of the first hints might be – when you open the door - it smells like something has died inside. But someone has come up with a list of ways in which we can determine whether our food has gone bad without having to smell it:
Ways to tell if food is bad:
• Canned goods that have become the size or shape of a softball – should be disposed of… very carefully.
• If you can take Chip Dip out of its container and bounce it on the floor – it has gone bad.
• Any carrot that you can tie a clove hitch – is not fresh.
• Potatoes that are edible – generally do not have roots, branches, or dense, leafy undergrowth.
• Milk is spoiled when it starts to look like yogurt – and smells like a goat.
• Yogurt is spoiled when it starts to look like cottage cheese – and smells like a dead goat.
• Cottage cheese is spoiled when it starts to look like regular cheese – and doesn’t smell any more – or maybe your nose is just burned out.
• Cheddar cheese is spoiled when you think it is blue cheese – but you realize you’ve never purchase that kind.
There are number of ways that you can tell you have spoiled food in your refrigerator. But when it does become rotten… what do you do with it? You throw it away.
That’s easy for food – but when it is your kids the issue is different. Kids aren’t something you throw away when they go bad. In fact none of us are disposable – that’s why Jesus came to our world – to redeem us and our kids and to make a way back to God’s perfect world.
So here is the real issue dads, how do you make sure your kids don’t go bad? How do you help them discover the great life that Jesus wants us to have with him? How do you win your kids to Jesus?
Well let me tell you a story. It’s the story of two boys and their father. Let’s call it the story of… Hophni, Phinnias, and the bad dad. We can read the story in 1 Samuel 2:13-17. You ready? Here we go…
Hophni, Phinnias & the Bad Dad
Eli’s own sons were a bad lot. They didn’t know GOD and could not have cared less about the customs of priests among the people…
Ordinarily, when someone offered a sacrifice, the priest’s servant was supposed to come up and, while the meat was boiling, stab a three-pronged fork into the cooking pot. The priest then got whatever came up on the fork. But this is how Eli’s sons treated all the Israelites who came to Shiloh to offer sacrifices to GOD. Before they had even burned the fat to GOD, the priest’s servant would interrupt whoever was sacrificing and say, “Hand over some of that meat for the priest to roast. He doesn’t like boiled meat; he likes his rare.” If the man objected, “First let the fat be burned—God’s portion!—then take all you want,” the servant would demand, “No, I want it now. If you won’t give it, I’ll take it.” It was a horrible sin these young servants were committing—and right in the presence of GOD!—desecrating the holy offerings to GOD.
1 Samuel 2:13-17
The Early Days of Misplace Priorities
Eli was High Priest and Judge over Israel
This is just the beginning of what happened with Hopni and Phinnias. These two men were about as evil and corrupt as you get. They skimmed off the most valuable and best cuts of meat for themselves, they chased the good looking women who served at the gates of the temple and they treated the people, who they were supposed to be serving as priests, with contempt.
How did this happen? Let’s go back in time to when Hopni and Phinnias were just boys playing in the temple grounds while their father Eli ran the temple and the nation.
Eli was a very important man. He was the High Priest of Israel. He was the head elder, senior minister, and the first among all the priests, servants, and workers in the temple. Every year, on Yom Kippur, the day of Atonement he would dress in his robe of the ephod, a sleeveless tunic, an ephod which was a dress of four variegated colors, blue, purple, scarlet and linen intertwined with gold that went over top of the robe of the ephod. It was fastened at the shoulders with clasps made of a kind of stone that were engraved with the names of the twelve tribes of Israel – six on each clasp.
Over the top of this he wore the breastplate, a four cornered plaque that hung from a gold chain around his neck. In four rows there were three precious stones – on each was engraved one of names of the 12 tribes. In a pocket of the breastplate were two stones called the Urim and the Thummin. The mitre was a hat made entirely of linen. The plate of the crown of the hat was pure gold so that it sat firmly on his head.
He wore these clothes whenever he acted as the High Priest and interceded on behalf of the people for their sins.
Eli was a very important man who followed closely in the footsteps of all the High Priests who came down from the line of Aaron, the first High Priest, who was also Moses brother.
But Eli was also the second to last Judge. Not only was he in charge of all the religious activities just like Aaron, Eli was also the leader of the people, just like Moses. Eli wasn’t just responsible for all of the Levites and all the things they did for the people, he was also responsible to lead all the other tribes.
Eli was doing double duty. He was a very, very important man.
Hophni and Phinnias were preachers kids. They grew up playing in the church yard. But they were more than this – they were also the sons of the leader of the people. It’s kinda like they grew up playing in rose garden at the white house.
That’s not a problem – but the neglect of their father was a problem. Eli had taken on too much and had not delegated enough. Eli had forgotten the leadership lessons that Moses had learned from his father-in-law. The division of leadership with captains over tens, hundreds, and thousands was forgotten and gone. No, Eli was the leader and he was in charge.
Everyday, Eli would sit at the gate of the temple where
The boys became familiar with the things of God without knowing the heart of God. On top of that their dad didn’t have much time for them – he was way too busy. Their absent father and familiarity with Godly things created in them a faulty view of God’s place in their lives. They thought God existed for them. They thought the temple was their playground and that his people were for their pleasure – because their dad was too caught up in his own importance.
What would have happened if Eli had said one day. “I quit.” What if he had said, you know I just can’t do it all. I can’t be both judge and High Priest. What if Eli had said, “I’m going to appoint people to lead with my authority so that I can spend more time with my boys.” What if… but he didn’t do any of those things.
He was trapped by his own need for significance like a man with a boulder crushing his arm and pinning him against the side of a cliff high up on the mountain of prestige and honor accorded to men – by men.
On April 26, 2003, Aron Ralston was enjoying a passion that he had. Aron loved climbing mountains in a remote area of Utah. While he was climbing through a tiny opening about three feet wide, he put his right hand on a nearby boulder to adequately brace himself to climb through the opening. When he did, his weight caused the huge boulder to shift and the shifting trapped his hand. He did everything that he could to free his hand but nothing worked. As darkness fell that night, he knew he was in trouble. By the way, April 26 was on a Saturday.
By Tuesday, he was completely out of water and had given up the hope that he would be found by any other climbers who were in the area. If he was going to survive, he was going to have to save himself. Now he was done to only one escape route. It was a morbid one but it was all that he had left now. Not only was it morbid, it was almost unthinkable. . . he was considering cutting off his arm directly below his elbow. The difficulty was the knife that he had. It was a small, dull pocket knife and he had earlier tried to begin cutting his arm but the dull knife wouldn’t even break the skin.
Aron spent most of Wednesday trying to think of exactly what he would have to do to amputate his arm. He knew that a tourniquet was imperative because he could not afford to lose much blood. After a day and half without water, he was in a serious state of dehydration and weak from the lack of food. Trying to think through more of the details, he thought that he was probably five miles or more from his pickup.
On Thursday, his fifth day, he decided that it was going to be now or never. . . His arm or his life.
I have met a lot of people in my life who were trapped just like Aron—not in some remote mountainous area in Utah but in habits and lifestyles. Some are trapped by habits and whims of their flesh. Others have fallen prey to thinking that around the next bend in life, they will finally capture the “big deal.”
But unlike Aron, they are totally oblivious to their entrapment. Death is looking them squarely in the eye and they lack perception of the matter. To their way of thinking, “I have just made some bad business deals. I have made a few wrong turns. I can quit anytime I choose to.”
However, when you get in that deep, getting out requires some drastic and immediate action. For Aron, it was his arm or his life. He had to make a hard, difficult, and serious choice. He could not have them both.
Aron was a man of valor, he made the tough choice. After a crude amputation, he rappelled down a 60-foot cliff and hiked nearly six miles before the rescuers spotted him. He then was air-lifted to a hospital ER where park ranger Steve Swanke told reporters, “I’ve never seen anybody like him. His will to live is unbelievable. I’ve been doing this for twenty-five years and I’ve never seen a warrior like him.”
The challenge for every man in this church is to determine what is going to get the most of your significance? Where is your ultimate legacy going to come from? Is it your job or your home? Is it your career or is it your kids? Is it your ego or your destiny? I know that those can be unsettling questions. . . but they are necessary questions and you may need to cut something off! Get your penknife and do it!
Eli needed to take some drastic measures to cut himself free – but he never did.
Every night he’d come home exhausted from his hours of listening to whining of distraught neighbors fighting among themselves over property lines, the ownership of some lost sheep, and the fair distribution of an inheritance. He would have to make sure that the temple duties were covered, the daily sacrifices were happening in an orderly fashion and the priests and levites were all doing their respective duties.
The boys would clamor for a story, a game, or some wrestling with their dad but he always said, “Not tonight boys, maybe tomorrow.” After a while little Hophni and Phinnias stopped asking. After a lot of little whiles Hophni and Phinnias made some fundamental decisions about God, his temple, and the people of God.
Days of Selfishness and Plunder…
Hophni and Phinnias were no longer boys. They were young men and since the office of priesthood in the days of Israel was hereditary there was no real question about what they would do. Hophni and Phinnias had gone to the best schools. They had sat under the most eloquent teachers in all of the land and they had been trained in arts, duties, activities, and work of a Priest of the Almighty God.
Somehow they missed the lesson on giving their heart to God. Instead, their hearts were filled with a selfish determination to make sure that they got whatever they wanted – when ever they wanted it – no matter how.
The way it was supposed to work was that people would come to the temple to worship with their animals and sacrifice them for the altar. The animal would be killed and butchered on the spot with the help of the levites who worked there. The fattest and best portions would be burned on the altar as a gift to God while the rest would be dumped into a pot of water and boiled up. The priest would come with a three pronged fork and stick it into the pot to grab into a portion of meat. What ever he hauled out – that would be his portion for the daily food. There were no second chances or putting back a bad piece for a better one. This was the way he was to take care of his family.
This was not good enough for Hophni and Phinnias. When the people came with their best oxen and sheep to the alter and began to prepare them for burning as an act of worship Hophni and Phinnias would wander by to get their cut. They didn’t wait for the best and the fattest portions to be offered to God – they simply demanded and got the best right then and right there.
And then there were the women who worked in the temple. Hophni and Phinnias did whatever the wanted with these women – in the very temple. They made the stories we’ve heard about politicians and their affairs today look like boy scouts. Hophni and Phinnias didn’t just have clandestine rendezvous with these women – they were brazenly open about their conquests. The things of God were simply a job they did that had some really great benefits in their eyes.
Eli was still the High Priest and before long there were a lot of complaints about these young arrogant men. God even sent a prophet with a warning but when the reports came to Eli about the activities of his boys, he refused to see the facts. He said, “not my boys” and “you just don’t understand them, they had a rough time growing up here in the tent of the assembly. It’s not easy being a pk.” Eli never held them accountable for anything. In fact, he refused to look the truth in the eye and simply ignored reality. But he must have ached inside to know that he was grandly successful at his job – and a failure in the home.
Eli was no different than so many dad’s I’ve seen. Father’s who are shocked when they hear of the misdeeds of their kids.
“My child would never be involved in something like this.”
Yet, children are left for long unattended periods and not supervised.
Children are left with computers that are not safeguarded.
Children are allowed to have friends that have less than optimal spiritual influences on them.
Children are allowed to attend events that are not God-focused or God-centered.
Children are allowed to date long before they really understand the responsibilities of dating.
Children are encouraged to pursue things that will get them out of their parent’s lives because it gets them out of their hair.
Still, in spite of all the warnings, Eli did nothing. He took no action. In fact, he continued to excuse their behavior, which became progressively worse and more outrageous every day. Eli could have censored his boys. He was the leader of the nation. He could have called them to account for their activities but he didn’t and so their defiant behavior went undisciplined. Each time this happened they were making withdrawals from their character bank and by the time they were fully mature adults, they were morally bankrupt.
The failure to discipline your kids and to teach them right from wrong shapes their life – for better or for worse.
An Amish father was on his way home from town to his farm some ten miles down the long hilly road when he recognized one of horses and buggies tied up at a local tavern. The man stopped his rig and went inside where he found his boys deep into a bottle of hard liquor. Each of the boys had a well painted lady pulled up close and in front of each was a handful of poker cards with a pile of chips in the middle of the table. At first they didn’t notice anything but when an Amish man walks into a bar it gets noticed eventually and the noise of the establishment diminished until it was a silent as a church in prayer. It wasn’t as comfortable as a church in prayer though. In fact it was pretty tense – and somehow it had suddenly gotten quite chilly.
The oldest boy was first to look up to see his bearded father standing just inside the door of the tavern. His dad’s eyes were full of shame and his face reflected a deep disappointment. When the older boy’s face froze and his carefully held cards began to slip one by one from his fingers to fall unnoticed to the table the second boy turned to see what was going on. It was then that this wise old father said, “Boys, I just wanted to tell you that I saw the horse out front and he looked pretty tired and a mite hungry. I’ll take him home and put him away for you… you boys bring the buggy.”
Eli could have done something… But he didn’t do anything… to STOP his boys from their behavior. He just gave them a “good talking to” but didn’t really do anything at all.
The Tragic End of the story
And ultimately his inaction led to their tragic deaths. Eventually, God got fed up with the contempt of these priests and others like them and he allowed the Philistine nation to rise up and to strike the Israel people with an army of marauding bandits. They would strike at harvest time and steal the grain, rustle the cows, and drive off the sheep.
Eli was now 98 years old. He had grown to be both old and fat. The Bible politely and with a political correctness ahead of his time says that Eli was “heavy.” He still sat at the gates of the city where the decisions were made about what was to be done on any number of questions. His eyes were dim and his hearing was not so good.
The elders of Israel – seventy men who were accorded honor in the nation – decided that they must go to war and they ordered that the Ark of Covenant be taken into the battle with the Philistines. That meant that Eli as the judge of Israel was part of the decision which led to Hophni and Phinnias to be among the priests leading the Ark of the Covenant in front of the soldiers.
The battle does not go well. It’s a slaughter and 30,000 Israelites give up their lives. On top of the huge number of deaths the Ark of the Covenant is captured and those who accompanied it are all killed – including Hophni and Phinnias.
One man, from tribe of Benjamin which was known for having a lot left-handed warriors with an uncanny ability with a stone and a sling, saw that the battle was lost and took off running. He didn’t stop until he stumbled into Shiloh where the tabernacle was located and where Eli sat at the gate. The runner’s clothes were torn and he was covered with dirt and dust. When he caught his breath enough to speak he told the anxious people gathered around him the terrible news that all was lost.
Old Eli heard the noise but didn’t know what it meant. He called out and the tired runner came to where Eli sat. Old Eli asked, "What happened, my son?" And the young man who brought the news told him with simple powerful words, "Israel has fled before the Philistines, and the army has suffered heavy losses. Also your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead.” And Old Eli heard the news without a sign of emotion – not even a flinching of his eyes or an involuntary gasp of breath. Then the runner said, “and the ark of God has been captured."
When he mentioned the ark of God, Eli slumped and fell backward off his chair by the side of the gate. The Bible reports that “His neck was broken and he died, for he was an old man and heavy.”
I don’t think it’s an accident that the Bible tells us that Eli was a heavy man. A commentator by the name of John Gill gives his take on what this meant: Eli was “full of flesh, a very fat man”
Now… how did Eli get to be a fat man? It’s really very simple HE ATE TOO MUCH! His sons had brought him the best food that they had stolen to curry his favor – and old Eli had eaten his fill – and then a little extra. And where would Eli get his food? From the sacrifices that belonged to God. Some of you might think that just maybe I’m jumping to the conclusion that Old Eli was complicit in Hophni and Phinnias’
In 1 Samuel 2:29 God rebukes Eli: “Why do you scorn my sacrifice and offering that I prescribed for my dwelling? Why do you honor your sons more than me by fattening yourselves on the choice parts of every offering made by my people Israel?”
Eli KNEW his sons were robbing the sacrifices. Eli was fat because he shared the food the boys had stolen. He may not have realized how brazen the boys had gotten about it… but he knew and he partook of their sin. He may have even done something like it as they were growing up.
It’s hard to rebuke your kids for sins you don’t want to confront in yourself.
• It’s hard to confront kids who lie when a parent takes his kids to the movies and tries to pass them off as younger than they are so they can get them in at a lesser price
• It’s hard to control child with attitude problems when the parent often loses their temper
• It’s hard to talk to your kids about drugs when you’re drinking alcohol or smoking cigarettes
This is the recycled reality of sin. Yesterday’s Lunch. . . becomes Today’s Litter. . . and Tomorrow’s Garbage. . . and eventually it will all stack up on the family’s front porch.
Eli was a bad dad who raised some very bad sons. So what is to be learned from this story about Hophni, Phinnias and their bad dad? I will not take the time to tell you what they are. If you can’t figure it out from the story my telling you won’t make much of a difference – will it?
It does make the words of Moses as recorded in Deuteronomy penetrate our hearts and minds with some fresh clarity…
Deuteronomy 6:6-9
These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.”
Now, we need to be honest with ourselves here. There isn’t a person in this building that is without sin. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
We have all messed up as parents, or grandparents, uncles and aunts, and if we haven’t yet – we will. The problem doesn’t lie in our sinning and failing as a parent. The challenge is in trying day in and day out to follow after God and his ways. The answer is found in following our friend and savior, Jesus.
He is the new command that replaces the old. The old was written on stone and placed in the Ark of the Covenant. The new was written on a heart of flesh and the crucified on a cross of wood. It is this new command that is to be …Upon your heart …Impressed on your children …Talked about in your home and on the road, at night and in the morning …Tied to what you do and what you think… and written on the doors to your home and on the gates of your life.
