Shepherding Children Amongst Wolves

I know what my wife feels like when she's trying to prepare a meal and have everything on the table and have it hot at the same time. Trying to lean singing and thinking about preaching is mind boggling. I want you to play for me while you're sitting there because I had two sermons worth of notes and I got a preaching in one sermon, so I'll be able to do that. A couple years ago we were able to go on vacation with my mother and father-in-law and usually that's about the only time we get to go on vacation is when they feel sorry for us and they take us and my kids will have to go on vacation with their grandma and grandpa. They'll have to be with them and we went on a vacation to the Russian River and one of the things we wanted to do is we wanted to be able to take our kids to the beach and see the ocean because they'd never done that before.

We drove down to the ocean, I can't remember which one or what beach it was but we drove down there. The boys, when they saw this massive space of water and all this sand, they were just off-struck. They were younger then. The only problem was my wife wouldn't let them get 30 feet close to the water. They had to stay back. They started going towards the water and she just went berserk. I don't know if she thought the sharks were going to get in and we'd watch jaws or if the undertow was going to take them out to sea and we'd never see them again. I decided that me and the boys were going to walk out of mom's view and let the boys run around and see the beach and try to rake the waves. We did that and we got hungry and it was time to come back until we began to walk back and these little boys were kind of tuckered out.

I was leading away and I knew that they were behind me and every now and then I checked and the last time I looked back and I checked and make sure that they were following me and it was an amazing thing. There was these three little boys, this high, this high and then this high and every one of them was trying to jump and follow in my direct footsteps. The littlest one was having the lead to make sure that he could get his foot into my footprint. And then that's really cute. That's really neat that they want to follow in daddy's footsteps. But then I began to think about it. What an incredible responsibility that we have his parents to lead our children. To take our kids down a path with their experience, blessing, and I think the question I want us to think about this morning is where are we leading our families?

If you're a parent, a grandparent, an aunt or an uncle, we all have a responsibility to provide an example for our children. And it's an absolutely incredible thing to think about the responsibility we have. In Exodus chapter 20, in verses 4 and 5, you don't have to turn there, but this is what it says. This is the beginning of the Ten Commandments and it says this, you shall not make for yourself in verse 4 a carved image, any lightness of anything that isn't heaven above, or that it's in the earth beneath, or that it's in the water under the earth. You should not bow down to them nor serve them for I, the Lord, your God, and the jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but show mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandments.

When I first read this verse, I was trying to figure out what it is, what is God trying to say? It's God trying to say that He's going to punish my children for my sins. If He's punishing me for the sins of my grandfather, well, I know that's not true because I found that in Deuteronomy 24-16, the Bible says that God does not put the death a father for the sins of his son, and he doesn't put a son to death for the sins of his father. But what is he speaking about? I think what he's talking about is that our children, the path that we take is going to have incredible influence in their life. But whatever path we choose, we are sowing seed, and we're going to reap the consequences of the path that we choose.

And if our kids follow in our footsteps, they too, as well, are going to reap the consequences of the seed that they sow, so we have an incredible responsibility. This is the account of history. If you look at the children of Israel, this is exactly what happened. When the fathers abandon God, more often than not, the children abandon God as well. In fact, in 1 Kings 22, we have this commentary on Godly parenting and ungodly parenting. In 1 Kings, if you know at the time, at this time, there were two kingdoms. You had the Southern Kingdom and the Northern Kingdom, the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom. And Israel and Judah, and Judah had a godly king, his name was Asa. And listen to this commentary about his son.

It says, Jehoseph, the son of Asa, had become king over Judah in the fourth year of A-Had king of Israel. Jehoseph, that was 35 years old when he became king and he reigned 25 years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Azuba, the daughter of Shilha. And he walked in all the way with his father, Asa. He did not turn his eyes on him, doing what was right in the eyes of the Lord. He followed the example of his father. His father walked in the way of the Lord and he saw his father do that and he too walked in the ways of his Lord. But look what happened to the king of Israel. A-Had was, Azaya was the son of A-Had, who was one of the most wicked kings in all of Israel. This is what it says about Azaya.

Azaya, the son of A-Had, became king over Israel in Samaria in the 17th year of Jehoseph at King of Judah and reigned two years over Israel. He did evil in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of his father and in the way of his mother and in the way of Jehoseph on the son of Me that who had made Israel sinned for he served there and worshipped him and provoked the Lord God of Israel to anger according to all that his father had done. The life that you live has incredible influence on your children, on your grandchildren and on their grandchildren. It is the way God intended to be. We are to live in such a way that we provide shade for our children. There is a Chinese father that says, one generation plants trees and another gets the shade.

There is no question that our society today is in the moral and spiritual decline and what we need to understand is what kind of shade are we providing for our children? What kind of life are we living? Are we living lives that they are going to experience great blessing or lives where they are going to experience great sorrow? We have to provide shade for our children. And now in that, we are up against an incredible time in our society where God is no longer popular. Last summer, we took a group of families and some children down to Mexico to minister for the Lord Jesus Christ and just recently, I got this letter from Hugo, listen to this what it says. It says, you are franked to you. Are you concerned about the spiritual development of the teens in your church?

Whether they are your own children or other youth in your church, I am sure that you are. And so are we here at Hugo Ministries. Do you know that 80% of the 13-year-olds in the church today will quit attending church and be drawn away into the world in the next five years? Josh McDowell, researching his recent book, Light vs. Wrong, helped the commission study by noted Christian poster, George Barna, his survey of 13 evangelical denomination confirmed these facts. Our best churches are losing the battle for the hearts of our youth. Teens today are under tremendous pressure and need help, our help in many ways. May I share some information on this critical subject because some of these teens may be your children.

Bill McCartney, one of the founders of Commerce Keepers Court, the 1990 survey, which he guided the top five influences and teenagers' lives today, it's quite revealing. The number one influence is peer pressure. The number two influences television, almost 50 hours per week. The number three influences school, about 35 hours per week. The number four influences the family, less than two hours per week. The number five influences is the church, less than one hour per week on average. These statistics are startling. The first three influences alone, total more than 100 hours per week of mostly negative influence. It is any wonder that teens, two or three hours per week of family in church contact is so often overwhelmed by all the sex, violence, profanity, and anti-god sentiments to which they are exposed every day.

If they're in public school, they are taught every day that there are no absolutes, only their experience is valid. They are our children and our grandchildren. It helps us to understand another shocking survey result, God and the church no longer seem relevant to them. One, it concludes that teens don't know what the blue, or why they should believe what church's teachers, teenagers are cynical, influences of peer pressure television in school, all mitigated against Christian teachings. Perhaps most importantly, their daily experiences often do not encourage them to test and apply their Christian beliefs at a young age. This is what we're facing. This is why our society is in such incredible turmoil and bad shape.

It's because we as parents are failing to do what God has called to do, and that is the shepherd, the heart of our children. What are we going to do? Parenting has become a huge industry today. If you go to a Christian bookstore, you can find a hundred different books on parenting and they'll give you a ton of different advice. There are those who say that pathism is the key, that what we need to do is we need to sit back, let our kids be who they're going to be, don't put any restrictions or any boundaries on them because they'll ruin their creativity. And basically children are good anyway. The Christian little splank on that is just let go and let God. But the problem is the Bible says that foolishness is bound up in the heart of the child, and as parents it's our job to drive it far from them.

Then there's another approach, and that is the idea of behaviorism. That what we have to do is we need to control our external behavior. We need to be authoritarian, and we need to rule our kids in such a way that we demand that they respect us and that we demand all of these things, that they have to have good manners, and they need to know how to address adults, and all of those kinds of things. And don't get me wrong, I think manners are great. My wife does an incredible job of teaching her kids manners, and I'm so thankful for the Lord for that. But that's not the key, that's a shallow goal in comparison to what God has called us to do. I want to recommend a book for you if you're a parent or thinking about being a parent or a grandparent, it's called Shepherding in Child's Heart.

It's probably the best book I've ever read on this subject of parenting. And this is what he says about us as parents. He said, God calls you by His Word and His example to be authorities who are truly kind. God calls you to exercise authority, not in making your children do what you want, but in being true servant authorities that lay down your life. The purpose for your authority and the life of your children is not to hold them under your power, but to empower them to be self-control people living freely under the authority of God. If your kids are only doing what you want, and not what God wants, then you've missed the mark. Then there's the other idea of isolationism, that what we need to do is completely isolate our children from the world.

And all of the bad things that might keep them from being who we think they should be. And the problem with that is in the book of Proverbs, it condemns the simple mind. It condemns somebody who is naive. Now I'm not saying, we as parents, we need to protect our children. I don't recommend that you allow your teenagers or your children to search and assert the web in parental guidelines or parental supervision. I think that's just a form of insanity because of all of the garbage that's out there. We do need to protect our kids, but simply isolating our kids from the world is never going to accomplish what God wants to accomplish in their life. We have to train them to think biblically. We have to teach them to live in an ungodly world and be godly and be ambassadors for Jesus Christ.

And then there's the idea of getting involved in a lot of activities so that they stay off the streets. For seven years I taught Christian school and I can remember this one mother said that, you know, my goal is to make sure my child is so busy with all these activities like dance and this and this and this that they don't get into trouble. Now I think the problem with that is I think sports and all that's great, but I think the problem with that is is that what we end up doing is we end up creating an idol for our children. They begin to love that hobby and that activity more than they love God and we need to be careful about that. So what is the purpose of the Christian home? What is the goal for the Christian home?

What should be our goal? What should be our method? I think the goal for the Christian home is transformation. It's seeing your children transformed into the image of Jesus Christ. This is God's goal for his children so I don't think there can be any other greater goals than for our own children. In Romans chapter 8 verses 29 God said that he said his affection on his children in an eternity path and he predestined that they would be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. God is committed to this purpose to making us like Jesus Christ and we need to be committed to our children and to God's purpose that he wants to transform them into the image of Jesus Christ. How are we going to do that? Well how does transformation take place if you take your Bible real quick and turn to the second Corinthians chapter 3 verses 17 through 18?

Paul tells us how God intends to transform us and second Corinthians chapter 3 verses 17 through 18 it says this. Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. I am so glad that when Jesus died and he was resurrected that he went back to the Father and that he kept his promise of sending the Spirit of God because the Spirit of God is the Spirit of freedom. He freed us from the penalty and from the power of sin. We no longer live under the demands of the law in trying to earn acceptance before God because the Spirit of God is the merciless in the Christ and now we stand complete but he goes on to say how he intends to conform us into his image. He says in verse 18 but we all with unveiled faith to be holding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

The way transformation takes place is that transformation is the work of the Spirit using the Word of God in the life of a believer who is believing and loving God. As we expose ourselves to the Word of God the Spirit of God mediates the presence of Christ in our life so that we see Him and we become more like Him. Ultimately he is going to do that when Christ returns. In verse 3 2 it says that when we see Him we are going to be changed and we are going to be like Him because we are going to see Him just as He is. Now we don't see Christ perfectly now but we get a good picture of Him in the scriptures and the Spirit of God takes the presence of Christ and he mediates to us so that we become more and more like Jesus Christ so you need to understand something.

In order for transformation to take place in the life of your child we have to see that we are completely dependent upon God. Everything is a work of God, it's not our work. In Psalm 127 it says unless the Lord builds a house they who build it labor and vain. We need to show our kids that we are very needy, that we are very dependent upon God. So what will do we play in? If it's God's work should we just sit back and do nothing? No. What I wrote is that we are the primary human instruments God intends to use to dispense His grace in the life of our children. This is God's design for our family. God's design for the family is to propagate the gospel from one generation to the next. Take your bibles real quickly and turn to Psalms 127.

I'm sorry, Psalm 78. The greatest means of dispensing God's grace to your children, that God is going to use I believe is you. Notice what he says in Psalm 78, he says, give ear to all my people, to my law, incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark things of all which you have heard and known and our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from our children, telling to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and his strength and his wonderful words that he has done, for he established the testimony in Jacob and appointed the law in Israel which he commanded our fathers that they should make them known to their children that the generation that might know them, the children who would be born, that they may arise and declare them to their children, that they may set their hope in God and not forget the works of God but keep His commandments.

You are the greatest means for dispensing God's grace into the life of your child. Let me read something to you. In a book called Family Days Youth Ministry, it says this, it says, the first institute, 1990 National Study of Protestant Congregations indicated that the most important factor in a teenager's faith maturity was the level of family righteousness or religiousness. The particular family experiences most tied to greater faith maturity were the frequency with which an adolescent talked with mother and father about faith. The frequency of family devotions and the frequency with which parents and children together were involved in efforts, formal or informal to help other people. As might be expected to search studies, first recommendation for change in Christian education was to equip mothers and fathers to play a more active role in the religious education of their children by means of conversion, by means of conversation, family devotions, and family helping projects.

Over 200 years ago, Jonathan Edwards made this same recommendation. Jonathan Edwards is considered one of the greatest thinkers in all of America ever. This is what he said. He said, every Christian family ought to be as it were a little church consecrated to Christ and a holy influence and governed by his role. And family education and order are some of the chief means of grace. If these fail, all other means are likely to prove ineffectual. If these are doing maintain, all the means of grace will be likely to prosper and be successful. It's an incredible job we have. Our families ought to be like little churches, little congregations. And if you're a father, you're the pastor. If you're the grandfather, you're the pastor.

You have the job of dispensing the grace of God and His word to your children. It's a great privilege. How does God intend to use us in this transformation process when we spend, as we close, I'm going to spend these last few minutes talking about three biblical principles that we see in the scriptures about our role in seeing our children transform into the image of Jesus Christ. The first principle is found in Luke 6.40. If you take your Bibles and turn them, Luke 6.40, Luke 6.6, starting in verse 39, it says this. And he spoke apparently to them, can the blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into the ditch? A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is perfectly trained will be like his teacher.

The first principle that we need to understand is the principle of lightness. Our children are going to grow up to be like us. When I was in fifth grade, we had to write a paper on what you want to be when you grow up. And I always wanted to be a professional athlete. I was my desire to grow up to do either a basketball player, a football player, something like that. But my dad, at the time, happened to be a used car dealer. And I wanted to be like my dad so much that you wouldn't believe, I wrote this paper on, I want to be a used car dealer. And I wanted to detail about what I had to do. We had to draw this picture. I draw this picture of all these cars and this lot and this little shack, this little sign that said, FN Motor Sales and I started thinking about that as I got older and what in the world my teacher must have thought.

In fact, she put those things up on the Bulletin Board and we had a family and I opened house. And I can just imagine what those parents did. They came by and they saw, oh look at Johnny wants to be an astronaut. Isn't that great? And look at Virgo over here. He wants to be a doctor and Sally, she wants to be this, look at this kid. He wants to be a used car dealer. I can't imagine what they thought. But isn't it amazing how our children imitate us and if you watch your children, they mimic you. There are things that I know your children, I look at them and I see their mannerisms and it's amazing how I see you and them. When I was a, when my little son, he was about three years old, they were human, my wife were driving in the car and my wife kind of noticed out of the corner of her eye that my son was picking his nose and she was a little embarrassed by it and she told me, son, that's something that you shouldn't do.

That's not a good habit to get involved in and my son says, well, daddy does it. And what's even funnier is when I was three years old, I was confronted with the same issue and I said the same thing, well, my daddy does it. I can say that because he's not here, but there's the principle of lightness. Our children are watching us, they're going to follow in our footsteps. The second principle is found in the thesis chapter five. You take your bibles and turn there, the thesis chapter five verse one. It is the principle of modeling. As the principle of lightness is so true, we need to be aware of the principle of modeling. The thesis five one says, therefore, be imitators of God as dear children and walk in love as Christ also has loved us and given himself for us and offering an sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling aroma.

Our children are going to imitate us and we need to leave them a good example. We need to model for them an example that's going to have impact in their lives. Our Heavenly Father has modeled an example for us. He's modeled the example of love by sending his own son to suffer and die in our place. Do you know what God calls us to do? He calls us to love one another as Christ has loved us. We need to leave a model for our own children. In this transformation process, there is a progressive aspect and there's also an ultimate aspect. The ultimate aspect is that one day we're going to see Christ's face to face and we're going to be changed in the instant to over and what a day that will be when Jesus I will see and when I look upon His face, the one in the saved me by His grace, that's going to be an incredible thing.

But right now, we are in this progressive process of transformation and we as parents need to model that progressive process as we live out our life before it is. I think one of the mistakes we can follow through as parents is we want to model the ultimate aspect. We want our kids to think that we're perfect and we'll never say that we're wrong and we'll never say that we don't know an answer even if we don't know we might make something up because we want our kids to think that we're perfect and that is an incredible trap. It's a pitfall. We shouldn't fall into that. What we need to model before our children is this pattern of repentance and neediness for God to be at work in our lives. We don't have to be afraid to admit that we've sinned or that we've fallen short.

I can remember countless times where my mother and father spoke to me and told me that they were wrong and they asked for my forgiveness and I appreciate that so much. That proved to me that there was integrity in their lives. Listen to this poem that was written in the Daily Bread October 7, 1995 by an unknown author. It says, a careful man I ought to be, a little fellow follows me. I do not dare to go astray for fear he'll go the self same way. Not once can I escape his eyes whatever he sees me do. He tries. Like me, he says he's going to be that little chap who follows me must remember as I go to summer sun and winter snow. I'm molding for the years to be that little chap who follows me. Isn't that the truth?

They're following in our footsteps. We have a responsibility to model for something for them. And then the last principle is this, it's the principle of effective communication. If you would take your Bibles and turn to Deuterani Chapter 6 and we'll be here for the remainder of the time. Deuterani Chapter 6, the principle of effective communication, we need to understand the principle of likeness, the principle of modeling and last of all, the principle of effective communication. The context of Deuterani Chapter 6 is this, the children of Israel have just completed their 40-year wilderness journey. Forty years prior to this, they stood at the brink of going into the Atlantic Canaan. The problem was, is that generation didn't believe God could do it.

He didn't believe God could give them victory over their enemies. They were afraid. Rather than fearing God, they feared man. And so what God decided to do was to take them on a 40-year wilderness trip so that that generation would die off because they weren't going to go into the land because they didn't trust God. And so now, here they are again, on the brink of crossing the Jordan and going into Canaan, taking the land and experiencing the blessing that God had promised their fathers. And so Moses and Deuterani is giving them their last minute instructions before they go into the land. He's telling them what's going to be important, what they need to know. But they're going into a land that is filled with people who are practicing all kinds of painstaking, immoral practices, and their children are going to be exposed to these things.

And so what Moses does in Deuterani Chapter 6 is he gives them some guidelines. What they need to do, what they need to do in their own life, and then in turn, what they need to teach their children, how they need to teach their children in order to face the situation that they're going into. One of the things we need to remember is that the Spirit of God uses His Word to transform. The Word must be communicated by the present in such a way that the child experiences the transformation of life. In order for that to happen, three things are necessary. First of all, there must be a valid model. If you're going to teach your children to follow God, then you must be following God as well. There needs to be integrity in your life.

With the Deuterani Chapter 6, starting in verse 3, he says this, therefore, hero is real and be careful to observe it, that it may be well with you, and that you may multiply greatly as the Lord God of your Father has promised you, a land flowing with milk and honey. Hero is real, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall keep them jokingly to your children and talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way when you lie down and when you rise up. The first thing that most of you get to tell them is, you need to deal with the issues of your own heart.

You need to have the ear of a disciple. You need to listen up. This passage is the great shamah of Israel, that devout Jews still today quote this text two times daily, because they see it as one of the most important texts delivered in the Old Testament. And we notice first that what Moses tells them is that they need to listen up. He says, hero is real, we need to be people who listen to the voice of God. It's Psalm chapter 8, actually it's Proverbs, sorry, it's Proverbs chapter 8. Verse 34, am I right here? Yeah, I said, blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the post of my doors, whoever finds me finds life and a taped favor from the Lord but he who sins against me wrongs his own soul, all those who hate me love death.

We need to be people who are listening who have a tin of ear to the wisdom of God. How does that take place? Well, it takes place by us spending time in his word, by spending time meditating upon the Word of God. In Psalm chapter 1 it says, blessed is the man who meditates on his word day and night because he'll be like a tree firmly planted by the streams of living water. We need to be men and women who see the priority of hearing God's Word. And let me ask you, whose voice are you listening to? Are you listening to the voice of Michael Savage? Are you listening to the voice of Rush Limbaugh? Is it sports talk 680? What voices are ringing in your ears? It ought to be the voice of a living God as he spoken to us in his word.

Not only ought to we listen to the Word of God, but we need to hear and understand with discernment so that we might know God. We need to know God instantly. I believe that when we come to listen to the voice of God, we'll discover who God is all and we'll come to know him in a greater way. The Bible says, let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, let not a mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts both of this that he knows and understands me. There's a lot of things we boast about, but none of them compare to the fact that we know and understand who God is. And then we ought to be people who love the Lord with our whole being. He says, in verse 5, he says, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.

If you're listening to the Word of God, you're going to come to know who God is. And I guarantee you, if you come to understand who God is, you will not, you can't help but falling in love with him. Growing up in the church, we used to sing a song called, I keep falling in love with him over and over again, over and over again. He gets sweeter and sweeter as the days go by. Oh, what a love between my Lord and I. I keep falling in love with him over and over again, over and over again. That ought to be the norm for Christian. We ought to love him more today than we did yesterday, as we seek him out and as we search for him. We need integrity. Proverbs chapter 20, verse 7, let me read this to you.

It says this. The righteous man walks in his integrity, his children are blessed after him. I can't tell you how blessed I am to have the parents that God put in my life because they were people of integrity. Let me just give you two examples, how I knew, how I became convinced that the gospel had to be true because of the way my mom and my father lived. In my family, the first one up was always my father and I was normally the second one up. I think I would get up and the light would be on in the living room and I would go and I'd make myself breakfast and I'd come and I'd sit inside the living room and there my dad would be. He'd have the word of God sitting on his lap and he'd be pouring over it, reading it, taking it in.

That was everyday practice. That's what I could count on. That's what my dad would be on his lounge chair, not flipping through the channels, but with the word of God open and pouring over it. You know what that impressed upon me as a child? That must be something pretty important in this book. If he's taking every day and he labors in reading the word and studying to find out who God is, then this God must be something that's pretty special and maybe I need to investigate. I'm so thankful that my dad gave his life to preaching and teaching of the word of God. But this was his practice even before he was a pastor, even when he was a used car dealer. He was reading the word of God on a daily basis and I saw that.

The other thing that showed me that there was integrity to the gospel was that my parents loved the people of God. They loved to be with his people. They loved to spend time with his people. They loved to minister to his people. We normally wouldn't go on vacations over the weekend very rarely did we because my mom and dad had the sense of commitment that they felt like they needed to be on church on Sunday. They had a ministry to perform. They wanted to minister to God's people and they loved being there. Not because they felt like they were obligated to do it because they loved the people of God. After church, we would go out after church and have dinner and it was with the people of God. And then we go to church at night and then after church at night people would come over to our house.

And I can't tell you how many times I must have fell asleep on the floor hearing the saints in our living room either singing praises or having a prayer meeting or talking about the Lord. And that had an incredible pressure on my life. And I want to tell you that your children are never going to listen to you communicating the word of God unless it has integrity in your own life. You don't love the Lord your God and you don't serve Him and see the need to hear from Him. Then I get and see it. It's going to have no impact in the life of your children. The second thing that needs to happen, if we're going to be effective to communicators with our children is that there have to be closeness of relationship.

We must invest in the life of our children. If we're going to have impact, Jesus Christ had impact in the life of the disciples. The reason why he spent day and night with them. He invested his life in those men because he knew that these men were going to go and they were going to take the gospel to the world and so he invested his time in them. He allowed them to be with him wherever he went. Stayed as true with Paul the Apostle in 1 Thessalonians chapter 2. Paul had an incredible ministry to the believers in Thessalonica. When the gospel came to them, it came with power. In verse 9 of 1 Thessalonians 1, it says, for they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to use, how you turn to God for miles to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his son from heaven whom he raised in the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

Why did the gospel have such impact in the life of these Thessalonian believers? I think the answer is in chapter 2. Starting in verse 8 he says, but we were gentle among you. First thing Mother cherishes her own children, so affectionately longing for you. We were well pleased to impart to you not only the gospel of God, but also our own lives because you had become dear to us. Do we live as though our children are dear to us, do we invest our lives in our children? I have to confess before you that I have missed many opportunities sitting in front of TV, watching 22 men try to tackle each other instead of spending time with my boys, instead of investing in them. I think we need to understand this, because the average middle class American home, time spent by a father with children under one, the estimated time is 20 minutes a day, the actual time is 37.7 seconds.

Time spent by a father with a first year sixth grader, a day, seven minutes. Why? Because they have to keep it so far, because they have to work such long hours to make sure that they make enough money in order to support their families. I'm off for supporting families, I believe that's important. God called us as men to support our families. God has called you to a much higher task, and that is to train your children, to declare the praises from one generation to the next, and if our job hinders us from that, something is wrong. There needs to be some changes, because you know why? You can't spend quality time with our children if we don't spend quantity time. It's not going to happen. The last thing that we see in Deuteronica for six is that we need to communicate the word of God.

We have to communicate the word of God. In Deuteronica for six and verse seven, it says, you shall keep 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, you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontaled between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorpost of your house and on your game. We need to be diligent in communicating the word of God toward children. When his parents have many responsibilities and many important tasks, but there is none greater than the task of communicating the word of God to our children. It has far outreach reaching implications than you being on the job.

It just does. Not only do we need to do it diligently, we need to do it incisively and accurately, including that word, diligence is the word, which means to sharpen, so that we teach clearly and accurately. We need to be students of the word of God. Just because you're not a pastor doesn't mean that you shouldn't know the word of God. As men, we are declaring the word of God to our children. We are the pastors of our home, and so we need to know the word of God accurately. That means that we have to study the word of God. It needs to have impact in our lives. We need to be clear and precise in our teaching. That means we have to be continually growing. In a book written by Howard Henry, it's called Teaching to Change the Life.

He says this, he says, this is the first law of the teacher. If you stop growing today, you stop teaching tomorrow. He gives an example of this. He says, when I was a college student back before the Earth's crust hardened, I worked in the college dining hall, and on my way to work at 5.30 every morning, I walked past the home of one of my professors. Through a window I could see the light on in his death morning after morning. At night, I stayed late at the library to take advantage of evening study hours and returning home at 10.30 or 11 o'clock. I would again see his death light on. He was always pouring over his book. One day he invited me home for lunch, and after the meal I said to him, would you mind if I asked you a question?

Of course not. He said, what keeps you studying? He seemed to never stop. His answer I learned later was in the words of another, but they had become his own. Son, I would rather have my students drink from a running stream than a stagnant pool. What kind of pool or stream is your children drinking from? It ought to be one where the word of God is continually gushing forth through our minds and through our hearts so that when we speak to them, we're not speaking still words, they don't mean anything to us. That's one of the things I appreciate about my dad is when I would go in and I would sit there and I would eat my cereal and he'd read the word. He'd always say, hey, did you ever think about this?

And he'd begin to share truth that he had just learned from the word of God. It was an incredible encouragement to me. Not only do we need to be in fights of an accurate and the way that we teach the word of God, we need to do it repeatedly. I think that's one of the biggest challenges for fathers and for grandfathers. It's easy to get on a kick and to do it for three weeks and be real excited about and be consistent and then something gets in the way and two weeks later, you realize you haven't read the word with your kids or you haven't conversed with them or talking about the greatness of Jesus Christ. We need to be careful that we're consistent and we're always taking opportunities. We need to do it naturally as well.

It ought to flow out of every day's situation. One of the things that I love to do is when I have to go on errands is take one of my boys. Because it's an opportunity for me to share with them about the Lord. To question them and to talk to them about their relationship with Christ, just recently I was with my oldest boy and I was trying to, I wanted to get across to him the importance of reading the word of God. He's nine years old now and he's able to read. And so I was thinking that I'll ask him a question and I'll say, you know, what have you been reading your word? Thinking that he would say, well, I haven't done that yet and so that I could tell him how important it is for him to read the word of God on his own.

And so I said to him, I said, son, what have you been reading the word? He says, well, today I read him, my brother's been a cleazy athlete and I kind of looked at him. I said, you did? He said, yeah, I said, well, what did you learn? He said, well, I learned about the prudent man. I said, well, what about the prudent man? He said, I learned that the prudent man is one who doesn't waste his life spending on his own pleasures that he invests in other people, that he helps other people. And I thought, that was awesome. I was like, overjoyed. That out of, that out of you happening all the time with our children, we had to be talking with our children about the Lord. Just yesterday, I was trying to prepare for the sermon and play with my little girl, three years old at the same time.

And we were in the room and one of the kids in the neighborhood brought one of these parachutes. And we were playing with them in the house. My wife, I don't know where she was or else you probably wouldn't let us do it. But we were playing with the parachute. And something happened and I had to go in my room and she came in there. She was having a blast. She said, daddy, I want to do that some more. And I said, well, I got a study. She goes, well, why can't we do it a little more? So we can do it a little more. She goes, well, how about again and again and again? I said, no, not again and again, just again. And she says, well, why not, daddy? I said, well, I got a study because I got to go tell people about Jesus.

And she goes, well, why, daddy? I said, well, why do you think I need to tell people about Jesus? She says, because if you don't, they'll die in the fire. And I said, that's right. Here was the three-year-olds. And you had a preach, fire, and hell, and brimstone sermons. The people, if they don't come to know Jesus, they're going to die in the fire. Even as little as that three-year-old, her understanding in Jesus, she knows that Jesus died on the cross. And he died for sins to save sinners from a fiery hell. There's more, but I'm going to stop there. The third John chapter, verse 4 says this, John says this, I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth. I want to say it, the greatest joy that you'll ever have as a Christian parent is to see your kids walk in the truth of our Savior Jesus Christ.

There's no greater joy than that. My kid could hit a home earner in the world series. He could catch the winning touchdown in the Super Bowl. And it won't fill my heart with more joy than it was to see him walk in the fear in the admission of the Lord. The other day, I was working outside and I was trying to do something in the bathroom and I walked in on my nine-year-old son. He was sitting at his desk, we homeschooled, and he was doing homework on the weekends while his other brothers were watching TV or doing something. And as I walked in, I noticed that he had his head bow over his homework and I thought something's wrong with his picture. And he lifted his head up and I kind of questioned him.

I didn't know maybe he was sleeping or maybe he was, I don't know what he was doing, but I asked him, I said, son, I said, what are you doing? He said, well, I'm doing my homework. I said, no, but what were you just doing? He said, well, I was praying and asking for God's help. And that. I can't say that joy that brought to my heart. And the one that my little boy knows that he needs to go to hell and even the little things that we might consider to be trivial. I want to clear to his parents, there's nothing greater that we'll do in this life than the path our faith on our children. There's no greater task. And if we're going to do it, we need to get our hearts right. We need to be men and women of the Word of God.

We need to be people of integrity. We need to model for a kid the life of repentance. We need a model for a kid who's grown a thirsting for the Word of God. We need to do it. And we need to enrich our relationship with our children. Don't let your job steal the years of your child's life. Because, like, guarantee you get regret. It'll be a regret. Oh, we're caught on building your relationship with your child. So that when you share your life with them, and you're talking about spiritual things, they won't seem foreign to them. It'll seem natural. And last of all, be communicating God's Word during shared life experiences. Share the Word of God with your children. They need it. It's the greatest thing that you'll ever do for them.

If they confront them with the glory of our Lord, and say here, Jesus Christ, let's pray. I gracious and kind, Heavenly Father. Oh, we thank you that you're an all-wise God. We're thankful Father that you created families as a reflection of your own family. And God is parents. All you've given us incredible influence in the life of our children. And God, we have to ask ourselves this morning, what path are we going to take? They're watching us. They're looking at us, Lord. All help us to model for them a hunger and a thirst for Jesus Christ. So that we would be men and women who take delight in the Word of God and who meditate upon it day and night, because it's in your Word, Father, that we find Jesus.

It's in your Word, Father, that we see the glory of Christ. It's in your Word that we hear of a Savior who loved us like no other, who stripped off his glory, Lord, in a Word to a cross, and who suffered and died for us. So Father, I pray for the parents this morning, and I pray for grandparents, Lord. Help us to see that it's our God or Dane responsibility to pass our faith on from ration to the next. I pray for my children, Lord, and I pray for their children and their children, all that among them, Lord, you raise up mighty warriors for Christ, young boys and girls who see they have a need for Jesus. Do this Lord, only you can do this Lord, and empower us God to be involved in this process.

And Jesus made me pray. Amen.