What has gone wrong with America’s Children?
· Did you know that in the US, every 8 seconds of every school day a child drops out of school?
· Every 26 seconds a child runs away from home.
· Every 47 seconds a child is either abused or neglected.
· Every 7 minutes a child is arrested for a drug offense.
· Every 36 minutes a child is either hurt or killed by a gun.
· Could it simply be that America’s Parents haven’t read the Bible and haven’t taught their kids to obey & honor?
Our focus this morning by the Holy Spirit is caring for our kids…
· With all of the books & seminars, packets & pamphlets on raising kids… the Holy Spirit uses just 4 verses to lead us & teach us.
Maybe you’re not a parent this morning… well you’re still a kid.
· You’re a child of God, our faithful Heavenly Father.
· And as His children, we have the joy of relating to a father that never leaves us, never hurts us, and never gives up on us.
NOW Parents we have an awesome PRIVILEGE…
It was BILLY GRAHAM who said: Children will invariably talk, eat, walk, think, respond, and act like their parents. Give them a target to shoot at. Give them a goal to work toward. Give them a pattern that they can see clearly, and you give them something that gold and silver cannot buy.
· IN our care are given the moldable, changeable, & unpredictable little persons who grow up so quickly!
YES… there are times, those difficult times when you might want to parent the way Mark Twain suggested:
When a kid turns thirteen, stick him in a barrel, nail the lid on top, and feed him through the knot hole. When he turns sixteen -- plug up the knot hole. But not even that plan will work. Neither you nor I have ever seen a teenager who could get enough food to survive through the knot hole of a barrel!
· We feed them, clothe them, house them…the PRACTICAL side.
· That’s the PRACTICAL SIDE… BUT MUCH MORE IMPORTANTLY…
· We feed them God’s Word, clothe them with prayers, and house them in a spiritual, God-honoring home…
Proverbs 22.6 Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it.
Dorothy Law Nolte once wrote down these thoughts…
If a child lives with criticism, He learns to condemn.
If a child lives with hostility, He learns to fight.
If a child lives with ridicule, He learns to be shy.
If a child lives with shame, He learns to feel guilty.
If a child lives with tolerance, He learns to be patient.
If a child lives with encouragement, He learns confidence.
If a child lives with praise, He learns to appreciate.
If a child lives with fairness, He learns justice.
If a child lives with security, He learns to have faith.
If a child lives with approval, He learns to like himself.
If a child lives with acceptance and friendship,
He learns to find love in the world.
So our attention is turned toward children and parenting…
Q: What voice are you obeying as a parent? Is it pop psychology? Is it the latest videotape series? Is it nothing at all? Are you flying by in life by the seat of your pants?
· There is a Book out there that will help you parent.
· It’s the all time best seller – God’s Word!
· And I ask you to let the Holy Spirit speak to you this morning, open yourself up His leading and prompting…
I. (6:1-3) Obey & Honor.
1. (1) Children obey…
a. There’s God’s word to kids… OBEY YOUR PARENTS.
b. Wow… what a difference our world would experience if OBEDIENCE ruled the land!
The Greek Word “OBEY” is an interesting one…
· It carries the idea of a soldier ready to engage in battle…
· He’s listening carefully for the orders and instructions of his commanding officer. -- It’s a word of action
NOW NOTICE, Paul is not addressing the PARENTS here…
· He doesn’t say, “Hey, you parents, have your kids obey.”
· Instead he speaks directly to the children…
· But it’s not to just children who are young and dependent.
· The word Paul uses here ‘teknia’ doesn’t mean little ones, but refers to any person living under the roof of a parent’s home.
APP: Whether you are 9 or 19, 3 or 23, if you live under your parent’s roof, then you are a ‘teknia’.
· If you eat their food, use their bathroom, then this is the Word of God for you. OBEY your mom and dad.
2. (1) How is this obedience to take place? IN THE LORD.
a. Isn’t life much more fulfilling in the Lord Jesus Christ?
b. A Christian home is supposed to be IN THE LORD!
That’s the environment, the atmosphere, the climate of the Christian home, of your home and mine…
· UNDER THE LORDSHIP OF Jesus CHRIST!
· Experiencing His Love, Extending His Grace…
AND In this we see a picture of us as children relating to OUR Heavenly Father… God is a Father and we are submitted to Him.
· If your kids are to obey you… then I have to ask…
· Are you obeying your Father?
· In order to see our kids obey, they must see us obey.
YET there is another way of looking at this… and this is key.
· Obey your parents in the Lord, according to the Lord’s will.
· Follow through with your parent’s direction as it’s in the Lord.
· If a parent tells a child to do something that’s contrary to the heart of Jesus & the Word of God.
· THEN he is not obligated to do it.
· Jesus would never have a child hide abuse, or cower in fear.
· “GO in King Soopers and steal tonight’s dinner.” No way.
· “Clean up your room and get ready for bed.” Hey mom and dad, my spirit doesn’t bear witness with yours, you know.
NOTE: A child, a son or daughter living under mom and dad’s roof, is to obey his parent in the Lord.
· Not according to God’s heart? Then Obey the Lord.
NOTE: This sounds almost too simple, too easy, too simplistic.
· Yet our homes become so spiritually powerful when
· Wives submit to their husbands & husbands love their wives.
· And children obey their parents…
· There’s success, peace, and a powerful witness.
NOTE: I like how he ends v1. This is right. Obedience in the home is proper, it’s good, it’s wholesome, it’s right!
· Respect & Obedience are the bedrocks of any home, any society, any relationship.
· You know what’s not right? Rebellion. Absentee parents. Homes that are run by the kids.
APP: ONE area that I’m concerned with over the past few years is a wave of kids, mainly teenagers, refusing to come to church.
· Oh, I don’t like the youth group.
· I don’t want to listen to the sermon. It’s BORING!
· I don’t like this church or that church or on and on the list goes.
· SO Mom & dad walk out the door and son/daughter stay home.
· They flip on the TV and catch the latest MTV videos, or they flip on the computer and surf the net… or whatever…
· BUT THEY AREN’T BEING SPIRITUALLY NOURISHED.
APP: I truly believe in these last days that our teenagers are being ripped off, right from under our noses!
· Our kids can slip away so quickly…
· 66% of our teenagers spend less than 30 minutes a week talking to their parents about what is most important to them.
USA TODAY 2/27/02, Girls are Drinking Like Boys: Teenage girls are almost as likely to drink alcohol as boys. Teenage alcohol abuse… 48% girls and 52% boys.
Underage alcohol use accounts for ¼ of all alcohol consumed in USA.
1 of every 4 beers is consumed by someone under 18!
In just a few years, those teenagers are going to be in college…
· Consider this report posted on the U. of N. Colorado’s website…
· As many as 70% of college students admit to having engaged in sexual activity primarily as a result of being under the influence of alcohol, or to having sex they wouldn’t have had if they had been sober.
· 60% of college women who are infected with STDs, including herpes and AIDS, report that they were under the influence of alcohol at the time they had intercourse with the infected person.
· According to the Center for Disease Control, 1 in 1500 college students is HIV positive, and the fastest growing populations of American people infected with HIV are teenagers and young adults.
Did that last statistic grab your heart?
· The fastest growing population of American people infected with AIDS are teenagers and young adults!
· Why? Because they don’t listen to mom and dad!
· They’re listening to MTV, or to their sociology teacher, or their friends, or the latest magazine…
· Our young people are ruining their lives because they are not LISTENING to MOM & DAD!
Moms… Dads… Bring your kids to church. Under your roof, church isn’t optional for you… It shouldn’t be optional for them.
· An area that I have been praying for is parents giving up church on Sundays for sports & other activities for their kids.
· Every Sunday, I pass this HUGE soccer field with hundreds of kids and parents there engaged in the game.
· A few weeks ago we were faced with the similar decision, a baseball game or church… WE CHOSE CHURCH.
· WHY? Our kids’ sports programs, our kids’ extracurricular activities… those things bow to the Kingdom of God!
· They DO NOT & CAN NOT take priority over our worship of God.
Matt. 6.31-32 "Therefore do not worry, saying, ’What shall we eat?’ or ’What shall we drink?’ or ’What shall we wear?’ 32 "For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
· There’s the whisper of the devil… oh you can miss a Sunday, you can skip that message, and you can skate by without the Word!
Luke 4.4 But Jesus answered him, saying, "It is written, ’Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.’ "
3. (2-3) That it may be well with you…
a. Now Paul draws insight from the OT, the 5th commandment.
b. Honor your father and mother… WHY?
c. Because there is a PROMISE ATTACHED.
In that day, if a kid messed up, they could stone him right there!
There was the Roman Law of pairia potestas, the father’s power. Under the patria potestas a Roman father had absolute power over his family. He could sell them as slaves, he could make them work in his fields even in chains, he could punish as he liked and could even inflict the death penalty. When a child was born, it was placed before its father’s feet, and, if the father stooped and lifted the child, that meant that he acknowledged it and wished it to be kept. If he turned and walked away, it meant that he refused to acknowledge it and the child could quite literally be thrown out.
NOTE: The word ‘honor’ literally means to ‘give value’.
· Honor, value, cherish your parents.
· They are God’s gift to children to lead, guide, and instruct.
AND SO as children obey their parents, value & honor their parents, there are blessings. -- Paul writes, “It will be well with you.”
NOW there are times when mom and dad might be making some real interesting and confusing decisions.
· Maybe they aren’t walking with the Lord.
· Maybe they are struggling with this issue or that.
· BUT… even if they are making wrong decisions, if you obey and honor them you will become the right person.
Q: What does it mean in v3 that you may live long on the earth?
· In those days, the rabbis taught that it referred to a QUALITY of life and not a QUANTITY.
· There will be fullness, an excellence to life.
4. (4) Paul closes this section addressing the dad…
a. He says, “Fathers” don’t provoke your children.
b. Some say this is referring to both parents and it can.
But here in context, I see it referenced directly to fathers.
· Earlier he addressed wives directly, husbands directly, children directly, and now FATHERS.
· I believe it’s natural for moms to care about their kids, to do whatever the kids need done, to care for them, mend them, support them, love them.
· There’s something about that 9-month head start that you have moms that draw you so much closer to the kids.
· A mom’s passion is to love and care for her kids.
· BUT you dads… Don’t provoke them.
APP: There are a lot of ways to provoke your children to wrath.
· Here are at least 10 ways a father can provoke his kids…
#1 Smother them. Never giving them a chance to take chances.
#2 Favoritism. Favoring one kid over the other.
#3 – Comparing your kids with one another.
#4 – Pushing their achievement beyond reasonable bounds.
#5 – Discourageing them.
#6 – Failing to make the child feel wanted. Always treating them like they are intruding on your life.
#7 – Using love as a tool for reward and punishment.
#8 – Failing to let them grow up in a normal life.
#9 – Physical and verbal abuse.
#10 – Teasing and taunting them.
We only get kids for a short time & once it’s over… it’s over.
There is a legend of a medieval sidewalk superintendent who asked three stone masons on a construction project what they were doing. The first replied that he was laying bricks. The second described his work as that of building a wall. But it was the third laborer who demonstrated genuine esteem for his work when he said, "I am raising a great cathedral."
Pose that same question to any two fathers concerning their role in the family, and you are liable to get the same kind of contrast. The first may say, "I am supporting a family." But the second may see things differently and say, "I am raising children." The former looks at his job as putting bread on the table. But the latter sees things in God’s perspective: he is participating in the shaping of lives.
SO Paul ends this section with a positive command…
Instead of provoking them… NURTURE them dads.
· You might be surprised at the root of that word…
· It literally means to discipline them.
· It’s the same word found in Hebrews 12:6
Hebrews 12.6 For whom the LORD loves He chastens, And scourges every son whom He receives."
So there is discipline & instruction needed in the home…
· Correction, reproof, and encouragement are all involved and on occasion a spanking or two on the rear end of those kids.
· Dads… you’re the chief discipliner… or a better way of putting it is that you are discipling your kids in the ways of Jesus.
In Ramsey Count, Minnesota, ninth and tenth graders were interviewed recently about their dads. They were asked this question: "What comes to mind when you think of the word ’dad’?" Answers came immediately from both ends of the spectrum. One end of the spectrum said, "I think of the word jerk." Others thought of the words angry, mad, and absent.
On the other hand, some of the young people said, "I think of wholeness, kindness, security, safety." Dad is an immensely powerful word.
CLOSE… What’s awesome is that we have the PERFECT example.
· We have a Father that is selfless & sacrificial.
· He gave His very best so that we can be our very best.
· He nurtures us, instructs us, teaches and disciplines us.
· He never gives up on us and is always encouraging us to higher levels of love and grace.
· He is faithful, reliable, dependable, and consistent.
And hey dads… and moms. We blow it in the home. We make mistakes, we say the wrong words and do the wrong things.
· But God is ready to forgive. He ready to help & support you.
· Go home today and humble yourself before your kids and ask for forgiveness… hug them, love them, and affirm them in Jesus.
