ONE GENERATION FROM EXTINCTION
Judges 2:6-15
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR:
1. Someone has said, “Children seldom misquote you. In fact, they usually repeat word for word what you shouldn't have said.”
2. You spend the first two years of their life teaching them to walk and talk. Then you spend the next sixteen telling them to sit down and shut up.
3. The main purpose of holding children's parties is to remind yourself that there are children more awful than your own. We child proof our homes, but they still get in.
4. Mothers of teens now know why some animals eat their young. Grandchildren are God's reward for not killing your own children.
B. TEXT
6 After Joshua had dismissed the Israelites, they went to take possession of the land, each to their own inheritance. 7 The people served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Joshua and of the elders who outlived him and who had seen all the great things the Lord had done for Israel. 8 Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of a hundred and ten. 9 And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath Heres in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. 10 After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. 11 Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. 12 They forsook the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They aroused the Lord’s anger 13 because they forsook him and served Baal and the Ashtoreths. 14 In his anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who plundered them. He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist. 15 Whenever Israel went out to fight, the hand of the Lord was against them to defeat them, just as he had sworn to them. They were in great distress. Judges 2:6-15
C. THESIS
1. This passage tells the unbelievable account of how a nation which was totally committed to God – in one
generation – walked away from God and became an idolatrous nation.
2. They then lost the Lord’s protection and began to have troubles and war on every side and were the losers.
3. There’s an eerie parallel in America where it’s beginning to look like the same thing might happen. That’s why we MUST contend for a spiritual revival!
4. The title of this message is “One Generation From Extinction.”
I. HOW URGENT IS THE NEED?
A. CURRENT ENVIRONMENT
1. 2 Tim. 3:1 says, “…in the last days, perilous times shall come.” They certainly have: especially perilous times for raising kids.
2. Modern Problems Our Youth Face:
a. Violence at School d. Peer pressure
b. “R” on TV e. Drinking/ Drugs
c. Serious STD’s f. Gangs
3. TERRIBLE SOCIAL POLICIES
a. Atheism is the Law of the Land; keep God out of schools, courts, Gov’t, policy decisions.
b. No Moral Boundaries officially; situation ethics.
B. NEED FOR FATHERS TO BE FATHERS
1. Many boys today don’t know what it means to be a man because they don’t have a man in their lives. Sadly, children will go to bed tonight without saying goodnight to their father because he just isn’t there.
2. Nearly one-fourth of America’s children live in mother-only families. 35% of these children never see their father and 24 percent see their fathers less than once a month.
3. In addition to no male at home, most males are taught by a woman at school. So how are they going to interact with positive male role models? How will these boys learn what it means to be a man? From television? Movies? On the street?
4. Even in homes where the father is present, research shows that the average father spends less than 10 minutes a day one-on-one with his child.
5. So it’s no surprise that there’s such gender confusion today! Now it’s not hard to figure out what your gender is; you were assigned that by God before birth. The Bible says that God made them “Male & Female.”
6. Former Johns Hopkins Hospital psychiatrist-in-chief Paul R. McHugh, M.D., says that 'Gender confusion' is a temporary mental disorder. If left alone, 70 percent to 80 percent of children who reported transgender feelings spontaneously lost those feelings later (Vanderbilt University and London's Portman Clinic). A 30 year study in Sweden of transgenders showed that 10 years after gender reassignment surgery, a sizable % of patients began having mental problems and their suicide rate went up 20-fold. http://www.onenewsnow.com/culture/2015/04/30/prominent-md-gender-confusion-a-fleeting-mental-disorder
7. Men and women are very different and it’s not just a matter of plumbing. Males are normally heavier, taller and stronger than females. They have larger hearts and lungs than females. A male is bolder, more aggressive.
Men Women
1 Driven by logic More emotional
2 Work oriented Relationship oriented
3 Goal oriented Enjoy the detailed processes
4 Learn by analysis Know intuitively
5 Physically strong Physically weaker
6 Feel inadequate Feel depressed
7 Only cope w/ one issue Better multi-tasking
8. Parenting has become, of course, one of the main enterprises of those of you who have children. It’s an assignment that has been given to you by God.
9. It’s also an assignment that you chose when you made the decision to bring children into this world. The Bible gives us guidance on this and every area of need in our lives.
C. SERIOUSNESS OF REACHING OUR KIDS
1. 80% of people in Church – saved by 12 yrs old
2. Children are like the Mississippi River. At its beginning it’s small enough to step across. But by the time it reaches the Gulf of Mexico, it’s miles across and impossible to ford.
3. Bad habits are easily formed. They’re easy to stop at first, but later they may take a year or two at an addiction center to break the hold they have on you.
4. Like wet concrete. A leaf once fell on a freshly poured driveway. Its impress left a clear impression on the wet cement. But after it had time to dry, an elephant might walk over it and not leave a trace.
5. We must make godly impressions on our children when they’re young. Soon they’ll become hardened and then it will be too late.
II. PROBLEM OF THE POST-JOSHUA GENERATION
They failed to introduce the next generation to God! How could this happen? They failed to transfer two things:
A. THEY DIDN’T “KNOW THE LORD”
1. There’s a difference between you knowing and you transmitting Jesus to your kids.
2. It doesn’t matter how much money you leave them, or how much education they get – if they don’t love God.
3. If you give them faith it will sustain them through every difficulty, heart ache, trial of life, and save them for heaven.
4. YOUNG PEOPLE, YOU MUST GET TO KNOW THE LORD YOURSELF! God doesn’t have any grandchildren, just children! You must be directly descended from Him.
a. Just going to church/ youth isn’t enough.
b. In Mt. 7:23, Jesus says, “I never knew you” – a frequent rebuke.
5. SCRIPTURES
a. “No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know Me,
from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the Lord. Jer. 31:34.
b. 8 Yes, furthermore, I count everything as loss compared to the possession of the priceless privilege (the overwhelming preciousness, the surpassing worth, and supreme advantage) of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord and of progressively becoming more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him [of perceiving and recognizing and understanding the wonders of His Person more strongly and clearly]. For His sake I have lost everything and consider it all to be mere rubbish (refuse, dregs), in order that I may win (gain) Christ (the Anointed One). Phip. 3:8 Amp. Cl. Ver.
c. The Greek word “know” is ‘ginosko,’ not “knowing” from a distance, but knowing by actually making contact!
NO ONE CAN DO IT FOR YOU! YOU MUST reach out and TOUCH HIM YOURSELF!
6. HOW CAN YOU DO THIS?
a. Search the Scriptures (John 5:39).
b. Set apart TIME to be with Christ, regularly scheduled. Get quiet. Worship Him. Talk to Him. Ask Him to live in you and through you.
c. Take Him with you to school, work, malls. Walk with Him, be conscious of Him at all times.
B. THEY FAILED TO TEACH the mighty works of God
1. Life went on. The opening of the Red Sea, the preservation in the wilderness, the conquest of Canaan – slipped into the past. (Like our salvation exp., deliverance, etc.)
2. Their parents ceased to speak of it. They just enjoyed their current peace and prosperity. They enjoyed life. The kids knew nothing of the former acts of God.
3. The kids only saw the natural. No signs of God. Their parent’s priorities seemed the same as other nations.
4. So the kids came up without a firsthand knowledge of the Lord. God wasn’t a priority for them either.
C. ILLUS.: INFLUENCE OF GODLY PARENTING
1. The outcome of godly & ungodly lives, and the effect they have on our children has been studied.
2. GODLY LINE OF JONATHAN EDWARDS, who was an outstanding Christ & minister. The scholar Benjamin B. Warfield of Princeton has charted the 1,394 known descendants of Edwards. He found there were 13 college presidents, 65 college professors, 30 judges, 100 lawyers, 60 physicians, 75 army and navy officers, 100 pastors, 60 authors of prominence, 3 United States senators, 80 public servants including governors and ministers to foreign countries, and one vice-president of the United States.
3. UNGODLY LINE OF MAX JUKE. Benjamin Warfield has also charted 540 Juke descendants. They offer a stunning contrast to the Edwards’ legacy. Of Juke’s known descendants, 310 died as paupers, at least 150 were criminals (7 murderers), > 100 were drunkards and a large # of his female descendants ended up as prostitutes. 285 had syphilis. [attempts to paint this as an urban legend have shown the Jukes family worse than the above. See “In Defense of Max Jukes.”]
4. It DOES matter whether you serve the Lord or not!
III. HANDING DOWN YOUR FAITH
A. ILLUS – RELAY RACE
1. Probably all of us have seen the summer Olympics, which includes relay races. The most crucial part of the race is the passing of the baton.
2. Many races have been won or lost when the baton was being passed. The same is true spiritually. We must succeed at this crucial transfer.
B. WHAT ABOUT YOUR EXPERIENCE MOM & DAD?
1. You can’t pass something you don’t have. Do you really have a living relationship with Jesus?
2. Your kids aren’t looking at what you say, but what you do. Even more – what you love & what your highest priorities are.
3. If it’s money, they know it. If sports, they know it. If it’s fishing, they know it. If it’s watching TV, relaxing around the house, working in the yard, they know that too! You can’t hide from them, they live with you day and night.
4. But if you’re committed to God, your life revolves around the church, they’ll know that too!
5. ASK THEM: “What do Dad & Mom love more than anything?” (besides the kids?)
6. Like the lady who had a sudden visit by her minister. Wanting to impress him, she said to her 6 year old daughter, “Honey, go get the Book that Mommy loves so much.” The girl came back with a Macy’s catalog!
C. 5 PRINCIPLE TO RAISE A GODLY CHILD
6 “And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. Deut. 6:6-9, NKJV.
1. PRINCIPLE
a. “In your heart” – become emotional about these truths.
b. “Teach them diligently to your children.” Invest time, effort, and energy to teach them.
c. Vs. 7B – they should permeate your life, thoughts,
and conversation.
d. Vs. 9, Write on doorframes, wear on your body!
e. When was the last time you sat with your kids and explained a passage of scripture? A spiritual principle? This isn’t optional, it’s a command.
f. What’s the schedule in your home each evening? Most bolt down their food & plop down in front of the TV until bedtime. No time is spent on instructing them how to live based on the Word of God.
g. HOW DO I START? Pick & discuss what your kids are interested in, yet weave God’s Word into the discussion.
2. PATTERN – kids learn from our example, not our words.
a. If we complain, fret, blame others, lose control, they will pick up that pattern.
b. If we face difficulty at work, come home and say, “Let’s pray that the Lord may intervene. Or, if I lose this job, he’ll have a better one for me.” Kids learn a beautiful truth: ‘when you don’t know what where to turn, turn to God.’
c. You make principles stick by being an example.
3. PERSISTENCE. Repeating over & over again. Laying out the pattern when it’s convenient & when it’s not. Maintain your integrity.
4. PRAISE. We always tell them when they’re wrong, why not tell them when they’re right? Praise them when they make the right choices.
5. PRAYER. Parents who spend time praying for their children and with their children demonstrate the importance of prayer.
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION: Dying Father’s Daily Letter
1. A boy living in New Jersey waits expectantly every year for the mailman to deliver a special letter to him on his birthday.
2. When his father was dying of a terminal disease, he knew the boy wouldn’t have the benefit of his personal guidance and help as he grew into manhood.
3. So he wrote him a letter for each year and left instructions for them to be sent so they would arrive annually on the proper date.
4. A final envelope containing words of fatherly direction and advice will also be given to the son on his wedding day.
5. He didn’t have the privilege to influence his son. Thank God, we’re still alive to influence our kids and grandkids.
6. We only have a short space before the cement hardens. Be wise, give your best to God.
B. THE CALL
1. “David served his generation.” I plan to change my generation!
2. Young people, we’re only one generation from extinction. A lot is depending on you? If you’re willing to rise to the challenge of reaching our nation, then stand!
3. All parents & grandparents, why don’t we recommit ourselves to guiding the next generation into the things of God. Stand! [Prayer for young people & parents].
