| “See How They Grow” |
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2/02/2003 Let's bow our heads. Yesterday we heard the news of the space shuttle blowing up in the sky and losing seven of our astronauts and loved ones of many people. Talked to our son-in-law last night in Texas and he actually saw the explosion in the sky. Wondered what is was and realized that it couldn't have been a shooting star and that it had to be something more serious than that. So, we know that there are many people mourning and are concerned with the loss. We need to pray for those families and the nation as it grieves for those national heroes. In a while we will be playing, the brass will be playing a song during offertory called, "The Heavens Declare the Glory of God:" and it is just amazing again that we have to be going eighteen times the speed of sound to try to get back into this atmosphere. We didn't create it, we just have to learn to respond to what God has made. The heavens again declare the glory of God to bring power and strength. Father we thank you that we have a God who is so great and powerful that we have to build things that can go 136 miles an hour just to break back into the atmosphere. Father, we know that this is an amazing thing, but Father, we also know that these deaths remind us again of the shortness of life. We know that we are all concerned about these flights as they go up and the danger involved and yet we have seen so many of them that they become almost routine and just remind us again that life is not routine, it just feels that way sometimes as we forget about the danger. Father, help our Christian life not to be routine either. Help us to remember that we are truly serving a righteous God, a loving God, but also a God of justice. And we do have an enemy to fear, and one to avoid. Father, we know that we are on your side and if you are with us who can be against us. We win the battle because we are in Christ. Help us to remember that, Father, pray for the souls of those seven. I don't know if they knew you or not, but Father we ask that they did. We know that there is nothing we can do at this point. Father, help us to be reminded again that the time to make our decision for you is in this life and not to wait until the end because we don't know when that might be. Pray for those grieving families. Father, help with their hearts, strengthen them Father. Give them a hope for the future in you. We ask it in Jesus' Name, Amen. I learned a poem a long time ago by, I don't know who wrote it but C. Peter Wagner, a seminary leader, was the one who is sharing it. He had just entered the time in life where you are called an empty nester. And had grandchildren and we had entered that, not to long ago, ourselves and the poem goes like this. I have seen the lights of Paris, and I have
see the lights of Rome. The lights I love to see most of all, are those
taillights of my kids, taking our grandchildren home. We always laugh because Katie and Cora are their names, three and two years of age. And we always laughed at Audrey because they are just like she was at their age and we thought "haha, paybacks". Well now we get them and so it is not wise to gloat because you may get them back and have to take care of them again. If you want to meet them, they are not in here right now, they are in Leota's class and Kate is staying with them this morning to just try and help them acclimate. If you see a lady who just enjoyed her fiftieth birthday, now returning to motherhood and she looks a little bit haggard that is why. All I ever needed to know I learned in kindergarten. Most of what I really need to know about how to live and what to do, and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sandbox at nursery school. These are the things that I learned. Share everything. Play fair. Don't hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don't take things that are not yours. Say you are sorry when you hurt somebody. Wash your hands before you eat. Flush. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you. Live a balanced life, learn some and think some and draw some and paint some and dance and play and work everyday. Take a nap every afternoon. When you go out in the world watch for traffic. Hold hands and stick together. Be aware of wonder, remember that little seed and the plastic cup. There roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why. We are like that. Then remember the book about Dick and Jane and the very first word you learned. The biggest word of all. Look. Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The golden rule and love and basic sanitation, ecology and politics and some sane living. Think of what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about 3 pm every afternoon and then laid down with our blankets for a nap. Or we had a basic policy in our nation and other nation's always to put things back where we found them and clean up our own messes. And it is still true, no matter how old you are when you go out in the world it is best to hold hands and stick together. So we are learning to give instructions to our little ones again. This is Grandma's, it is not a toy for you to play with. If you see it and want to play with it, you have to ask Grandma and if she says you can then you can. But that doesn't mean you can again without asking again. So it is like wow. I have to remember a lot of stuff again and then try to remember to consistently apply it. We'll learn. But it has been interesting as we have watched them and also as we have watched ourselves kind of prepare for this enjoyable experience. We think about growth and childhood to adulthood and what things we need to know and not know. So we have enjoyed the last couple of weeks, April giving birth to Jodie's baby, Jodie has the baby over here. And I think it might be Savannah's first time here, is that right? Savannah, where is Savannah hiding? Savannah Adams or has she been introduced before? Is she gone? Anyway Scott and Kelly's grandchild, given birth to by their daughter-in-law, Melissa and son. So we know that new life is always happening. And we are growing up and hopefully maturing. So if you look at the spiritual life, it is not really a lot different than the physical life. We see a little child grow from seven pounds or so at birth to whatever size they are now. Our little boy is now much taller than I, but he was only this big when he was born. There is a process of growing that we understand takes place. There is also a process of maturing that takes place as a child grows and eventually as the child, as their size grows, also their ability to understand and reason and accept responsibility should grow along with them. So when a person gets this size, they should have not only the size, but also the maturity to match.
When we were doing the study, a couple of years ago now, Growing Kids God's Way. It talks about a funnel of responsibility. And as a child is very young down here at the bottom and as they grow in age their responsibility also widen and increase. So a little child who is a baby, we do everything for them. We don't expect anything from them. We expect them to cry, we expect them to act like a baby. Well, when they get to an age where they start to get potty trained and things like that, we begin to expect a little bit more. We expect a little bit of responsibility there. And eventually when they are completely potty trained, we expect them not to do it anymore in their pants. Well, that is a little more responsibility. And then as a child gets older, you can tell them where they can play and where they can't play. What things they can touch and what things they can't touch. What things they can do and can't do. What things they can watch on TV and what things they can't watch on TV. And so as they grow to understand those and begin to apply them and practice them themselves, we allow a little more responsibility. So, when a child is a preferable 18, the age of responsibility, hopefully they have grown to this size, they have also grown to that size in responsibility. They are able to accept adult responsibilities because they have practiced the policies and procedures that we have instilled in them. I remember the story, maybe I have told you before, about President Eisenhower when he was growing up he and his brother were teenagers and they grew up in a United Brethren home way back when. Our church has been traditionally non-dancing. Most people don't know that now days, but in the olden days dancing was quite taboo and so most of our church people didn't dance and in that household it was the same. And so when they came to their dad at the age of 17 and 18 or so and said, "Dad, there is a dance at the fair the last night of the fair and we would like to go to it. All of our friends are going." And the dad said, "Well son's, you are old enough now I think you are able to make your own decisions on these things." And so a couple of days later they came back and said, "Dad we have decided that we are going to go to the dance." Dad says, "I have just decided that you are not old enough to make that decision." So a person when they begin to do the things we would do at that age or at our age and they begin to follow our procedures and policies and then we allow them more responsibility. If they fail in that responsibility they step backwards and they have to kind of relearn, be reminded of that responsibility. And so the fundamental of the responsibility is when the kid gets 18, they should know some of the adult responsibilities and be able to assume some of those. And as we grow older yet, there are more responsibilities, we should be able to assume. Household things, like buying a house and cars and all the things that go along with paying our bills and things. And hopefully you are doing it in a responsible way. But there is that widening of responsibility over time, but it takes acceptance of that responsibility to be able to grow in maturity. It's really not much different in our Christian walk, is it? The idea of God for us is that we would be mature in Christ. That we would have a maturity in us that leads us to practice the things of God out of a sense of responsibility, a sense of understanding. Not because somebody tells us to do things. In fact, it tells us in 1 Timothy, Paul tells Timothy, "Some people are teaching the law, but they don't really understand the purpose of the law." The law is for those who don't have any character. For murders, and haters of parents and things like that. It keeps their behavior in order because of fear of punishment. But you see a person who has understanding will do those things properly anyway. So you don't need the law, you need character. So our idea is to use the law to order a child's behavior until the place where they understand the concept. To gain the understanding of it. So then they do it anyway because they have character. Well, that is how we train children. That is how we were trained as a Christian actually. We hear the do's and the don'ts, we hear the rules and regulations, but when we begin to understand, Oh ok I understand that. That is why we don't do this, that is why we do this. Like a child, if a child wants to do something dangerous we say, Don't do that, don't do that. And if you do that I will have to spank you." Because we are protecting them from the danger. When they get a little bit older they probably understand the danger themselves. So they aren't going to do it anyway. Until then, the law teaches them what not to do until they gain understanding. So what happens, however, is many times in our Christian life we get hung up at the do's and don'ts. We get the regulations, the legalism of it and say ok I can't do this, I can to do this, I can't do this, I can do this and think that is what being a Christian is. That is not what being a Christian is. A Christian is somebody who begins to become like Christ. So we begin to do the things that Christ would do, because we are becoming like Him. Children as they grow tend to become more and more like their parents. As time goes along I find myself taking the same opinions and attitudes of my Father, enough though some things we have never even talked to each other about. But I begin to realize that I am much like him anyway. Some of that early training kind of stuck and even some of that stuff that is just in me because of him, is now showing. So we begin to become like the one we follow. If we are following Christ we begin to become like Christ. We begin to do things that are from a sense of understanding not because it is just the rules and regulations to follow. But God's desire for us is we become mature. Now not only mature, but also being able to teach others. 2 Timothy 2:2 Paul says, Now Timothy take the things I have trained in you and teach them to other people who will be able to teach those to other people. So a mature adult actually has the ability to reproduce another person and train them. A mature Christian has the ability because of study and training, and discipline and responsibility to be able not only be able to think for themselves, but also to help other people think through these concepts and teach others so they can teach others also. So the Christian life is not when I become a Christian and I follow Christ. That is not God's desire for us completely. His desire is that we become able to teach others. That you become able to lead a small group, you become able to teach a Sunday School Class, that you become able to teach another person to walk with Christ. They become able to think through the concepts and the philosophies of the world and say, wait a minute here. That is not a good philosophy. This is what God says. I will compare what the world says with what the Lord says and I will stick with the Lord because I understand what He says. Not just as a matter of reading the Bible, but understanding the concepts that He presents there. So God's desire for us is to be mature in Christ. Maturity means able to reproduce another Christian. Able to reproduce our Christian life in other people, because we are following Christ. St. Paul says, "Follow me as I follow Christ." It says as I am following Christ, you can follow Him because I am doing and practicing what I have learned from Christ. So you kind of follow my example and become like Christ also. But there are some steps to take place, I think might be helpful for us to understand. Get your Bible out, by the way. We have a number of places to go. There are seven steps that I want you to kind of think through with me and just kind of measure where you are as a Christian. First of all, you have to be a Christian. A Christian is not somebody who goes to church, a Christian is not somebody who lives in a Christian nation, supposedly a Christian nation. It is not somebody who thinks Christian thoughts or acts kind of nice around people. A Christian is exclusively somebody who has trusted Jesus Christ for their salvation. They have admitted, and acknowledge their sin, they repent of them and said, " Jesus I need You in my life, I need forgiveness from You, and I will follow you the rest of my life. That is what a Christian is, not somebody who just goes to things called Christian or sends money to charities and things like that. It is somebody who has committed their personal life to Jesus Christ as their Savior. After that, we begin to start out in 1 Peter 2:2 its says this, Like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the word, that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord. If you have tasted the kindness of the Lord and been saved through Jesus Christ, then you will long for, just like a baby longs for the milk from it's mother. By the way it says here for the sincere or pure milk of the word. That means unmixed. The word of God is pure, it is something that brings growth. It is the long thing that brings growth in our Christian life is God's word. So he says as newborn babes, long for the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby. Go back to 2 Timothy 2. The first thing, obviously, is once we have our salvation, once we have trust in Christ, is the desire, the sincere desire, and commitment to get the sincere milk of the word, the milk of God's word so that we may grow. There is a sad fact that many of us as Christians kind of stop at our prayer of salvation. You kind of think there I got my ticket to heaven, that is all I need. Well, that is not all God wants of you. That is not all God desires of you. There is so much more that you could do and you could be used for by God and so much more to the kingdom than we could imagine than just having a ticket to heaven. So you need to desire that, determine to desire that. Number 2, Study. Verse 15 of Chapter 2 of 2 Timothy says, Be diligent to present yourself, and sometimes they say study to show yourself approved. Be diligent here means to take pains with it. That means to discipline yourself to it. You have seen the posters that say, No pain, no gain. They have somebody up there with lots of muscles and have a real wonderful looking body because of all the work they put into it. Well, that is somewhat true. If you don't put up with the pain, you won't gain the thing you need. And this says to be diligent because there are times when you don't want to read the Bible. There are times when you are tired, you are worn out, you can't find the time and so it means to discipline yourself to study God's word. Take time during the day to make time sure that you do, whether you feel like it or not. Because in salvation, in growing, in your walk with Christ it is a disciplined walk. It is not just something that falls upon you and all of a sudden you are wonderfully saved and you're mature Christian. A child learns and grows. We as children in Christ do the same thing. So we can not sit and hope that God matures us. It is a discipline of our life to study, to take pains with it. It says to take pains to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to ashamed, handling accurately the word of truth. So when somebody says, hey what does the Bible say about such and such and they ask you the question, we ought to be able to say, well here is what the Bible says about that. Here is what God's word says about that. Here is the principle that applies to this situation because I know what God says on it because I have studied. It is a sad fact that many times I get the call and they say, hey I have a question here and it is a question they should know. It is one of those simple ones. Ok, it is not a difficult one. I like the difficult ones because it makes me think too. I get some of those every once in awhile. And I go boy, I never thought about it that way, I never saw that or I never heard that one ask like that before. So let me think about it. Let me go and do some checking, because it is not a question I have ever had asked before. But the simple stuff we all ought to know. The difficult stuff most of us ought to know and the really hard stuff I will call somebody else and find out for us, ok. Because there is some stuff that is beyond me also. That is ok. We are all growing in Christ and we are never done with that growth process. So we desire the milk of the word, we study it, take pains with it. Let me ask you a question. When is the time during the day when you sit down to study God's word? When do you do that? Some get up early in the morning to do so, some do it late in the evening, some do it during breaks in the daytime. But have a time. I suggest this. Have a time when you read for distance, maybe 10 or 15 minutes maybe just read three chapters. Start from Genesis and read through so you know what is in the Bible. Take another time when you read only a verse or two verses. And work on them, think about them, ask God to reveal some interesting thing about that or some truth that you hadn't seen before and ask Him to kind of chew on that one a little bit. One of the words for meditation is to chew like a cud. If you ever seen a cow in the pasture chewing away they spend a lot of time chewing on that cud and they get all the good stuff out of it. And that is what meditation means to take a small piece and chew it a lot. Say ok Lord, give me some incite here, give me some instruction, give me some knowledge here that I have never seen before, teach me from this passage so that I can become more like You. So you begin to think God's thoughts. So we study it, we take pains with it and set aside that whether we feel like it or not. Number three. Once you know what is in there, the Bible says we have to practice it. Hebrews 5:11 find that one. This contains both the good and the bad, actually, because this talks about people who have been stunted in their growth. In fact they are not only stunted, they have fallen backwards in their spiritual understanding. The writer of Hebrews explains some very difficult things here comparing the Old Testament concept with the New Testament in Christ and explaining some things in Verse 11, Chapter 5 of Hebrews he says this, Concerning him we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. Which means they used to be able to hear better, now they are dull of hearing. That means they have gone backwards. For though by this time you ought to be teachers Ought is an interesting word, isn't it? Ought means the way things should be. The way things are that are right and so if you are right with God you should become a teacher. I don't mean necessarily a teacher in a classical sense, Sunday School teacher and things, you should be able to explain and expound even upon the word of God because you understand it so well. Teachers are able to teach because they understand the concept. If they don't understand the concept they obviously shouldn't be teaching. But when somebody understands it they can explain it to somebody else. Not from a sense of wrote, but from a sense of the concept, conceptually teach them. So he says
By this time you ought to be teachers, but you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. He says it is too bad. A child needs milk, an adult can chew real food. You are going back to milk. This is bad, this is wrong. You should be out here, you are way back here. You need to start all over again. Verse 13 For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, (means it is not part of his life) for he is a babe. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil. So he says, we study the word of God and we practice it. It is the practice of the word of God that brings maturity. It is the practice of it that brings understanding. I can go into a skateboard shop and I can look at all the skate boards and I can look at all the pads and look at all the things and read the magazines. When we go down to my brother's his boys both like to skateboard and do bicycling where they do the jumps and stuff like that. So they have those magazines, BMX bikes and stuff and I am looking in there and I look through one of them one day and it had a whole bunch of terms that I didn't recognize. Had some kind of forks and all kinds of stuff in there and it is like what in the world are these things? But I could read those and say, Oh good I read it, I am a BMX biker now! Guess what, I am not a BMX biker. Just because I read the stuff. Just because we read the stuff doesn't mean we are it. It is by practice that we learn to discern good from evil. In fact it tells us in the book of James, "You fool yourself if you just read the Bible and don't do it." It says because you are deceiving yourselves, you have to become a doer not just a reader of the word. So we learn what is in their by study, we learn what it is through practice. Be mature through practice. It says we have learned to discern good and evil even through the practice of what God teaches us. Fourth, First desire, study, practice and then grasp. We begin to grasp it in the practice of it. Turn to Psalm 119 that is the longest Book in the Old Testament, right in the middle of the Old Testament, Psalm 119 is the longest of all the Psalms, a very long one. We are going to read verses 97 through 104. TURN THE TAPE. This says some very interesting things in Verse 97 following, O how I love thy Law! It is my meditation all the day. By the way, let me give you a suggestion. Take a verse and memorize it and then quote it to yourself all day. What is the verse we have been memorizing here lately? Psalm 19:14, Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. How are you going to teach it to somebody else? Ok, You have to work on it, memorize it, and then write down the insights. Write down your insights, ok? Take that verse today and say, Ok Lord, show me something in that word today. From that verse just one, two, three lines. I was in a class years ago and they were teaching us how to do Bible study and the Professor said one class he had he gave them one verse. It was longer than this one. He gave them one verse and he said ok tomorrow bring back all the insights that God gives you on that verse. They came back the next day, they added them all together through the whole class and they have like 65. He says, that is a good start. Go do it again. The next day they came back with 214. They came up with over a 1000 insights as they just began to meditate on that one verse saying God, show me something that reveals something about You or about me or about life or something. Teach me from this verse something that I should know. And they began to write those down, they had over a 1000 when they finally got done. You can do that too. There is just interesting, amazing things about God's word because you begin to read that verse and you'll will say well that sounds like this verse over here. And that verse adds something to this verse and pretty soon you are beginning to understand. That is why the Bible says line upon line, precept upon precept, that is how we learn. A little bit and a little more. You learn your addition, then you learn your subtraction and multiplication and division and they begin to work with each other. So this says in Psalm 119 verse 97. O how I love Thy law! It is my meditation all day. Thy commandments make me wiser than my enemies, For they are ever mine. (So it makes us wiser than our enemies) I have more insight than all my teachers, For Thy testimonies are my meditation. (Wow we get smarter than teachers) I understand more than the aged, Because I have observed Thy precepts. (Notice he says because I have observed, I have practiced them. Not just because I have read them, but because I practiced them.) I have restrained my feet from every evil way, That I may keep Thy word. I have not turned aside from Thine ordinances, For Thou Thyself hast taught me. How sweet are Thy words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth? From Thy precepts I get understanding; Therefore I hate every false way. We begin to grasp the concept. We begin to grasp understanding of God's word as we desire it, as we study it, as we practice it, we begin to grasp and we begin to say, I understand. We begin to get it. Number five, Once we begin to get it, we need to start teaching it. Tell somebody else what you have learned. Tell your children. 2 Timothy, this is back in the New Testament again. 2 Timothy 2:2, Back on the grasping part. In Hebrews it says, the word of God is sharper, is living and sharper, than any two edged sword. It gets right down to the very center of your being between the joints and marrow and between the thoughts of your mind and the intents of your heart. You begin to grasp and understand life as you begin to practice God's word. As you begin to understand it. Number 5, we are to teach it. 2 Timothy 2:2 says, The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, these entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. That is called discipleship. It is called reproduction. Means what you have learned from other Christians from the word of God, you should be able to move to somebody else and impart to them so that they can eventually be able to do that for somebody else. It is a reproductive process, from generation to generation of Christians. The problem is Paul states that in 1 Corinthians 3 he was writing to the church of Corinth and he says, I have some really good things to tell you, but I can't treat you like adults, I have to treat you like babies. Because you are selfish, because there in infighting, because there is favoritism. So he says, sometimes you might have the size of maturity, but you don't have the heart of maturity. So we need to be able to teach it, because as we teach it we begin to learn even more. Number six, use it. Minister. Turn to Ephesians Chapter 4. We teach it to teach it. Ok, we teach it so somebody else can teach it after us. We use it, we minister so that we mature and the church grows as a result. Verse 12 of Ephesians 4 says, For the equipping of the saints ( this is what he gave my work and apostles, pastors and teachers and things like that) for the work of service, (service means ministry) to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fulness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer be children, tossed here and there by waves, and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him, who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by that which every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love. So he says, my work and other work of us who are mature in the Christ, is to help others mature so that they can minister, serve God in some capacity. So the questions is, in what part of the body of Christ are you serving? What are you doing in order to grow the body of Christ, the Church? What is the part that you are playing? If you are just coming to church on Sunday morning that is not a part. That is just coming to worship. You need to be involved in some aspect of ministry. And that could be small or large. But you need to accept the responsibility of becoming a part of the growth of the body of Christ. We become mature as we minister. So we teach to teach, we minister to mature. We practice to become more like Christ, but we minister to grow the body of Christ. So if you are not involved in a particular aspect of the ministry of Christ, I think you are not a mature Christian. Those are not my words, those are His. It says we become mature and that begins to grow the body of Christ. Says we are no longer tossed about by doctrines, you are not pushed around by somebody else saying well I think the Bible says this, or I think the Bible says this. You have already studied it for yourself, you have practiced it, you know what the concepts are. You know what the Bible says. In Romans 14 in the context of what day should we worship and shall we eat meat or not and things like that. In Paul's day he says, No, we stand or fall on our own in Christ. We have to become responsible for our own individual growth in Christ. It is not somebody else who makes us grow, it is not somebody else who is responsible for our growth, we can help, but I have to assume responsibility. Once a person gets to maturity in life, they take responsibility for their own life, they have their own debts, they have their own responsibilities to go work and get up and set their own alarm clock and make sure their own gas tank is fulled and things like that. They begin to realize that there is some responsibility here for them. Maturity means I am responsible. Maturity in Christ means you are responsible for your Christian growth. Doesn't mean we can't help, but we can't read the Bible for you. I can't read the scriptures for you, I can't practice it for you, I can't obey it for you. That is an individuals responsibility. We help each other through the ministry and once we become mature we begin to give ourselves to God and say God, where can I be used? Show me where I can be used. Equip me, gift me, help me and I will do it. And that brings the whole body growth and strength. Finally pass it along. Deuteronomy, back in
the Old Testament again. These are the last words of Moses to his people.
Deuteronomy means deutero nomous which means second law. So he is restating
the laws that he has already given them. He is saying it over again,
reminding them of what he already said. Deuteronomy Chapter 6. There is a
problem with most of us. We assume somebody else will teach our kids things
that they should know. Many people say I came to this church or I went to
that church, I went to another church because they have such a good Sunday
School class for my children and I want my children to learn these things.
It is not the Sunday School's responsibility to teach your kids these
things. It is the Sunday School's responsibility to reinforce what you have
taught them. You teach them the Bible, you teach them the stories, you teach
them to memorize scripture. The first verse that I memorized I can remember
was 1 John 5:11 and 12. I knew that when I was this big. Because my Dad taught us to memorize scripture. I didn't do as well as my Dad did. I am not sure my kids know as many as I do or did when I was a kid, but it is not my responsibility to teach your kids, it is not your Sunday School teacher's responsibility to teach your kids. It is not, O good, we will wait until Sunday and then they will get the religious training. No, you are teaching them all week anyway, so teach them the Bible stories, teach them the importance of the scripture, teach them to memorize the word of God. That is what it says right here. Deuteronomy 6, verses 4 through nine says, "Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart and you shall teach them diligently (which means take pains again, work at it) to your sons (and daughters) and shall talk of them when you sit in your house." (not in Sunday School class not in small group, not in junior church, not in pioneer club). It is wonderful to bring them here for those and you should because it helps them understand the corporate nature of our Christian life. We are parts of each other, but the responsibility of training your children is upon you So he says teach them to your sons and shall teach them when you are in your house, when you walk by the way, when you are walking down the road, the teachable moment is hey, look at this, isn't this wonderful what God did here, this is wonderful. Did you realize that God created this? Did you realize that God said this about this? Did you realize this? And the child begins to gain a concept of God because you give it to him as you walk by the way. Kind of like the Dad walking along the beach with the son, the son says Dad what kind of dead fish is that? He says, I don't know son. Walk along further and the son says, Dad what kind of bird is that over there? I really don't know, son. He says will Dad what kind of bird is that flying over there and he says I don't know, son. He says Dad am I bothering you with these questions? He says oh no son otherwise you will never learn. Ok, well you are responsible to teach your children the concept of God as you sit in your house, as you walk by the way and when else? When you lie down and when you rise up. Bedtime stories, good morning son, isn't it wonderful that God created this day for us? And so we need to take that. My wife and I were remembering that we have to do that again. Because now we have grandchildren in our home all the time. He says in Verse 8, You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. And you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. Pictures, stories, sayings, a verse of importance like Psalm 19:14. Make a plaque, help your children do that. They do that in Sunday School, you can do it at home. My wife had the two little girls making valentine's for Mommy and Daddy and Russell. We don't even know who Russell is, but we are making one for him too. And so they are making Valentines, they can also make a plaque and say, Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so. You know that song don't you Lewis, you sang it for us a few minutes ago. So we are going back and saying we have little children in the house, we have to do little children things again. But they will grow as we do those little children things and grow them. We, as a Christian, need to realize that our ticket to heaven is not it. God says you teach these things to others who can teach others. Your responsibility and my responsibility is to grow so that when we get done, we are not ever done actually cause there is always more to learn and more to do, it is a continual practice of life. That we minister the body of Christ for the strength of the body because we serving God. We are maturing because of practice, we understand, we grasp it, we get it because of our practice. And we put time into it, we put energy into it, diligently we discipline ourselves to do it and we take responsibility for it. So, where are you? Are you desiring the sincere milk of the word, thereby we grow? Are you taking pains with it? Are you practicing it? Are you using it, are you grasping it finally? Are the lights going on in your head, saying oh, I didn't realize that. Now I know. Are you teaching it? Are you responsible for it? Let's pray, Father You want us to be teachers. Not necessarily in a Sunday School class or a formal setting, but You want us to be able to teach others the word of God. You said we should have it on our hearts so that we can put it in the hearts of our children. When we walk by the way, when we rise up, when we sit down, we lie down and get up again. You want us to have such a intimate relationship with You that our children see it in us. Father help us take responsibility first for our own life, second for the life of our children and our grandchildren, and our family, and then beyond our family. To others to reinforce the things that others have taught there children about God. So that we as a body grow and mature and become stronger in our faith. Father, tell us where we are today. Tell us what we need to do about it so we can become more and more and more like you. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen |