The Starting Point of All
Genesis 22:1-18
The Bible says that children are a blessing from God.
Psalm 127:3
3 Sons are a heritage from the LORD, children a reward from him.
(NIV)
The Bossier City First Church of God is thrilled to partner with your family in raising your children in a Godly home. The joy of Jesus’ birth was shared with the people of God in the house of God. Like most Jewish parents in that day, Joseph and Mary brought Jesus to the temple to be presented to God. Long before this time godly parents presented their children to God. And to this day, parents bring their children to God, asking for his blessing.
When you decide to dedicate your son or daughter, you are acknowledging the awesome responsibility God has given you in raising your child. A baby dedication is a ceremony that expresses your desire as parents to raise your son or daughter in the ways of the Bible and to ask God to use your son or daughter for his purposes. You submit your will for your child to God’s will. Parents should ask themselves if they really want to see their child serve God. Would they like to see their child become a preacher, a Christian businessman, a missionary, or a common laborer for Christ? When Hannah, the mother of Samuel the prophet dedicated him to the Lord, she promised to give him up to serve God in the temple.
Have you given your child back to God?
(Some of you are thinking, “I’d like to give them back—but I didn’t think God would take them back. I thought He had a ‘no return’ policy on kids! Besides, I lost the receipt!”) The truth is, there is not a parent here who hasn’t had a few moments or days when they wouldn’t have liked to package up that kid and take him/her back to God’s customer service counter and demand, “I want my money back!”
I’m not suggesting you return your kids to God and try to get your money back. What I am asking is,
Have you ever…
Recognized your children are precious gifts from the Lord?
Released ownership of your children to Him?
—understanding God is responsible for the way in which they were designed and already knows the plan and purpose for their future
Realized God has left it up to you to show them His way?
The Dedication of children to God means handing them over to Him to do with as He pleases. Christian parents who dedicate a child are making a promise to the Lord to do everything within their power to raise the child in a godly way, prayerfully until he or she can make a decision on his or her own to follow God.
As followers of Christ, we want to also make this public declaration to your family, and your church. It is invaluable to be able to tell a child as they are growing up that they belong to Jesus and that you have asked God to use them in a formal declaration as in a Baby Dedication.
What if my child is older and I have not dedicated them as an infant? It is still a good thing for Christian parents to dedicate themselves to raise their children for the Lord and to dedicate those children to the Lord as an act of worship.
Today I want to highlight a man in the Scripture who committed his child to God and what that meant. When God called Abram to start out on his own, away from the daddy and the comforts of home, God made a promise to Abram that was unbelievable.
Genesis 12:1-3
1 The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.
2 "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you."
(NIV)
God punctuated the promise after Abram obeyed.
Genesis 12:6-7
6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land.
7 The LORD appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.
(NIV)
What made this promise unbelievable?
1) Abram’s wife, Sarai, was barren
2) Abram is 75 years old
The first thing Abram does:
He commits himself!
Genesis 12:7 – “So he built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.”
When all Abram has is the promise, before Issac is even a glimmer in his father’s eye, He commits himself! That is the first thing we must do as parents: Commit ourselves to God! Dedicating a baby does not ensure that the baby will make it to heaven. You cannot make that choice for your children. But committing yourself to God as a parent will go a long way towards laying a smooth, solid foundation upon which your child can build their own faith.
Abram keeps on trusting and traveling, but still no Issac. After ten years of trusting and traveling, Abram and Sarai come up an alternative plan, a surrogate mother, Hagar, who gives birth to a substitute, Ishmael.
God punctuates His promise to Abram
and accentuates the promise,
even though Abraham, as God now calls him,
has to wait a total of 25 years before
the promise becomes apparent
and Abraham becomes a parent to the promised one, Issac.
Genesis 21:1-3
1 Now the LORD was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did for Sarah what he had promised.
2 Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him.
3 Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son Sarah bore him.
(NIV)
God finally comes through and the promise of many nations is packaged in a laughing, giggly, bundle of joy named “laughter”, because that’s what “Issac” means.
And they lived happily ever after. WRONG! The dedication of Abraham and Issac has just begun!
Giving your child to God is a
CONFIRMATION of your love for God.
Genesis 22:1-2
1 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!" "Here I am," he replied.
2 Then God said, "Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about."
(NIV)
When you dedicate your child to God, you are saying that you love God even more than you love that child.
This is exactly what Abraham proved by his willingness to offer Isaac. He was demonstrating that his love of God above all else.
Abraham loved God above the most prized treasure of his life...his only son Isaac.
Matthew 10:37-39
37 "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me;
38 and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
39 Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
(NIV)
Giving your child to God is a
CLARIFICATION of ownership.
Genesis 22:3-9
3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.
4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.
5 He said to his servants, "Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you."
6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together,
7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, "Father?" "Yes, my son?" Abraham replied. "The fire and wood are here," Isaac said, "but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"
8 Abraham answered, "God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son." And the two of them went on together.
9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.
(NIV)
When you give your child back to God, you are openly declaring that this child is a gift from God and only on loan to you. We’d better be careful how we treat and care for God’s property! God trusted you enough to place those children in your care to raise for Him and point them to Jesus.
Giving your children to God is a
CONFIDENT COMMITMENT!
Genesis 22:10
10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.
(NIV)
Abraham has Issac bound and gagged, with knife drawn ready to put an end to the promise, because he is committed to God no matter what. To give your child to God is not just a CEREMONY...It is a COMMITMENT.
And God always honors our commitment!
Genesis 22:11-14
11 But the angel of the LORD called out to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!" "Here I am," he replied.
12 "Do not lay a hand on the boy," he said. "Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son."
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.
14 So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said, "On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided."
(NIV)
It is a commitment that you are going to
• Be a Godly parent.
• Teach this child of Christ.
• Keep this child in church
• Love this child.
• Pray for this child.
• Train this child.
• Make your home a holy place.
• Live a righteous life.
Max Lucado, in his book In the Eye of the Storm, retells a story of Clovis Chappell, a minister from a century back. It was the story of two paddleboats. He says: “They left Memphis about the same time, traveling down the Mississippi River to New Orleans. As they traveled side by side, sailors from one vessel made a few remarks about the snail’s pace of the other. Words were exchanged. Challenges were made. And the race began. Competition became vicious as the two boats roared through the Deep South. One boat began falling behind. Not enough fuel. There had been plenty of coal for the trip, but not enough for a race. As the boat dropped back, an enterprising young sailor took some of the ship’s cargo and tossed it into the ovens. When the sailors saw that the supplies burned as well as the coal, they fueled their boat with the material they had been assigned to transport. They ended up winning the race, but burned their cargo.” Then Lucado says, “God has entrusted cargo to us, too: children. Our job is to do our part in seeing that this cargo reaches its destination.” Your family is precious cargo, and God has given you the sacred responsibility of refusing to race through life and bringing home that precious cargo to him.
Not only a Confirmation, Clarification, Commitment…
Giving your child to God is a
CLAIMING of God’s plan and promises for that child’s life.
Genesis 22:15-18
15 The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time
16 and said, "I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son,
17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies,
18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me."
(NIV)
Isaac inherited God’s blessings, protection and promises because his dad, Abraham, gave him back to God. Your children are blessed by your obedience to God AND cursed by your disobedience to God. (they have a free will, but you stack the odds in their favor or against them by the way YOU live!) As you obey God with your life, and as you give that child back to God, you are posturing that child to receive God’s very best for his/her life.
Proverbs 22:6
6 Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.
(NIV)
