Bonus Episode - The Necessity of a Godly Home

Bonus Episode - The Necessity of a Godly Home 

Before diving in (over the next five weeks) to the five-part series called “The Home God Intended,” check out this bonus episode that explains why, according to the Bible, we should have a godly home.

-New episode every Friday

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Good morning. Turn to Psalm 127. Psalm 127. We're going to read the entire Psalm, all five verses. And today we're going to be in our study, The Home God Intended. We're going to talk about the necessity of a godly home. And what I mean by that is really the necessity, I should have titled it the necessity of an intentional godly home. A godly home doesn't just happen, it's built. And so that's kind of what we're going to talk today about today is the necessity of a godly home. Stand with me if you would. We're going to read Psalm 127, verses 1 through 5. Psalm 127, verses 1 through 5. Verse 1 says, Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows, for so he giveth his beloved sleep. Lo, children are in heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them, they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for the day you've given today. God, thank you for the instruction we find in your word for every aspect of life. And God, we're speaking today about the Christian home and how to build a Christian home. And Lord, I thank you for the instructions you give throughout Scripture to help us in that. And Lord, I pray that there's not anybody here that would say, Well, this doesn't apply to me. My children are grown and on their own, or I don't have children yet, or I'm not married yet, or I'm just a young person. But God, every part of a home creates the atmosphere and environment of a home. Every piece has its part to play. And Lord, I pray you'd help us today as we look at this idea of the necessity of a godly home. Help us today. In Jesus' name, amen. Thank you, and you may be seated. So the first thing I want to point out here is in that first verse, except the Lord build the house. Now the word house there is defined as a literal structure, but can also be defined as family. And that seems to be the reasonable assumption that God is speaking of family because he goes on to say, lo children are an heritage of the Lord. So except the Lord build your home, you remember what I said, your house is not your home. You can have a house without a home. You can have a home without a house. And you can have a house without a home. But when you put them together, it's a beautiful thing. And so I believe we're talking about the home here. I believe God is talking about, except the Lord build the house, he's talking about the home, your family, as you put it together. And so the home built without a biblical foundation is destined for destruction. The home built without a biblical foundation is destined for destruction. Now I know when I sent my notes to Tyler, he probably was trying to figure out what this first sub point is. It's a Latin phrase that means without God, frustrated. Boy, I like that. That's a powerful thought. Without God, frustrated. The word frustrate means to make something worthless or of no avail to defeat. Without God, you are creating a home that will have no avail. Trying to build a home without a biblical foundation is frustrating the plan of building a good home. The home was the first institution that God created. All the way back in Genesis chapter 2, God created the home. He created the home. You see, it wasn't just that he made male and female. That wasn't the creation of the home. The creation of the home was the direction given to each person. You see, he was given the direction that he was supposed to keep and dress the garden. What was the garden? The garden was his home. That was where they lived. His job was to keep and dress the garden. Her job was to be a help meet to him. They had a responsibility to each other, and they had a responsibility to their home. God instituted the home. The first institution he ever instituted. He created a structure to follow by giving Adam the command to keep the garden and created Eve to be his helpmeet. Now, God instituted the home before he even founded the church. Now, I love the local church. I love the church. I love this local church, and there's many other local churches that I love. I love the local church that's doing work for God. These, these, these, uh some of the people that we had here at this conference this past week, it was exciting to get to talk to them to find out some of the things that they're doing in their ministries. And that, you know, Central Baptist Church. We're not the only church around still doing something for God. Amen. I love the local church. But you know what? I also know God loves the local church. You see, God instituted the local church and died for it. Jesus says the church is his bride. But can I tell you something that's so powerful? As much love as God has displayed on the local church, he loves the home even more. Because he instituted the home first. The home was more important than the church. You can have a godly home. You, you, you, that's a tough thing to say. Let me think. Let me think. How do I say this? You can have a home, not a godly home. You can have a home without a church. But I don't believe you can have church without godly homes. You see, because it's you that make up the church, correct? And so if we're not intentionally making godly homes, we are a crippled church. Because everything starts at home. We'll talk more about that in a moment, but you can have homes without the church, but without the home, there is no church. Without the godly home, there is no church. Storms will come. Only a foundation built on Christ will last. We find the story in Matthew chapter 7. We're familiar with the story of the wise man and the foolish man. The foolish man, he he he went and built his house on the sand, and the winds came and washed it ashore. The wise man built his house upon the rock. We know the song. Probably everybody in here singing the song in your head. What was the problem? Both the wise man and the foolish man, both of them were just trying to build a house. They both had the same goal. Perhaps they used the same building materials. What was the problem? The foundation was wrong. But here's even more so, here's the problem. The foolish man did not purposely choose a bad foundation. The problem is the foolish man neglected to see the importance of a foundation. That's the problem. You see, it's not that parents and and and homes and families are going around saying, How can I mess up my family? No. They're just neglecting to see how important the foundation is. Just like the wise man who built his house on the sand. He thought, hey, I'm using the same materials as this guy. Maybe we're using the same plans. I don't know. We're using the same building processes. How come his is still standing and mine fell? Because he neglected to realize how important that foundation is. I mean, imagine today if you went out, if you went out to build a house in Florida without a foundation. Honestly, I don't even think you'd be able to finish it. I believe the ground is so soft in most places and sandy that as soon as you start putting the weight of all those building materials, I think it all collapse. You have to have a foundation. You have to have something for it to rest on. In our homes, it's no different. Our homes have to have a foundation. Now you could make that foundation whatever you want, but a biblical foundation is a foundation that will never fail. It will never fall. The fact of the matter is, in Matthew chapter 7, we read that Jesus, he compared those two. But the interesting thing he said was, when the winds came. Not if. When the winds came. If you've been alive more than about an hour and a half, you know that those winds come, don't they? They come without warning sometimes. Sometimes you don't know where they came from. But one thing you can count on is the winds will blow. So we can't just build a house carelessly on nothing and then be confused when the house falls apart. The winds will come. Storms will come. You know, it's interesting, Jesus used that in Matthew chapter 7. If you think today about the most powerful, most destructive force in existence today, most of us would probably say a nuclear weapon. And I think a nuclear weapon probably is the most destructive force known to man today. But in those days they didn't have nuclear weapons. The most destructive force in that day was a storm. They didn't have storm shelters, they didn't have Doppler radars. They didn't have all these things to tell them when it was coming. The storms just showed up. They had the sky to look at. They give you about a 12-hour notice. Storms were incredibly destructive. It would be like if Jesus said, if you went and built your house on the sand instead of on the rock and a nuclear bomb came. Listen, if a nuclear bomb came, it really doesn't matter whether you're on a rock or sand, your house is getting leveled. But in those days, a storm, if your house was built, and by the way, it doesn't mean it was built on a rock. When Jesus said that he built his house on the rock, doesn't mean he found one giant rock and built his house on it. It's talking about the material that was used for the foundation. It was strong. We need to have some strong foundations in our homes. Couple of thoughts I want to point out about these storms. Number one, I just said Jesus spoke regarding the storms in the affirmative, meaning that they're normal processes and totally expected. It's not a matter of if the storm comes. It's a matter of, am I ready for the storm when it comes? That needs to be our focus. Number two, your environment does not automatically create a firm foundation. Look with me over at Matthew chapter 7, if you would. There's something I want to point out in here. Matthew chapter 27. And verse 24. No, that's not right. Matthew chapter 7. I added too many twos in there. Chapter 7 and verse 24. Therefore, whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them, I will liken him upon uh liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock, and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand. And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell. And great was the fall of it. Jesus said, Every one that heareth these sayings of mine and doeth it, doeth them not. Can I tell you something? It's not enough to just go to church and your home will be a godly home. Jesus said, There are those that will hear my sayings. They will attend to me and my sayings. And then they'll go build their house on the sand anyway. It's not enough to just bring your family to church and say everything's okay. No, home building happens in the home. Church is a supplement to that. Church helps that. Coming to worship is something you do that assists you in building your home. Think about it. Your environment does not automatically give you a firm foundation. Think about Judas Iscariot. Judas Iscariot lived with Jesus. If environment was something that set your foundation, none of the disciples could have betrayed Jesus. But he did, didn't he? But look on the other side, you have Nicodemus. Nicodemus was a Pharisee. Nicodemus was against Jesus. And he got saved, didn't he? He put his faith and trust in Christ. What's the difference? The difference isn't environment. Environment means nothing. You cannot bring your kids or send your kids to church and expect them to just come home and everything's going to be godly. It's not going to work. You have to build a godly home. Now, sending or bringing your kids to church is part of that, by the way. You start to build a godly home and you start to uh put some biblical foundations in place in your home and then tell your kids you're not going to church. Boy, that's just confusing. Why we follow the Bible at home and not go to church? It's equally confusing, really, why we would go to church and not follow the Bible at home. There needs to be some consistency in our homes. Third thought under that is Jesus may have had Proverbs 10.25 in mind when he told this story about the foolish man and the wise man. Proverbs 10.25 says, As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more, but the righteous is an everlasting foundation. If you put your foundation in Christ, listen, the winds will come. Some of you are in a windy situation right now. Some of you are facing a storm right in this very moment. Where's your foundation? You see, if your foundation isn't securely anchored to the rock of Jesus Christ, when the little winds blow, you're gonna be pushed off course. Forget about the big winds. When the big storms come, you're gonna be lost. We've got to set our foundation on the one thing that never changes, and that is God. The wise man and the foolish man both set out to accomplish the same thing. We talked about that. This is a major error in many homes today. We don't stop to consider what the foundation of our home is or if we're even going to build one. Sometimes we get so busy in our homes that we don't even look at the foundation. We get so busy going to each and every sports game that we can imagine. We get so busy taking this kid here and this kid there, and we're so tied up and caught up in all of the cares of this world that we don't stop and think, what is our foundation? If we have our foundation right, then we'll put all of those other priorities in their proper places. But if we don't have the foundation right, then the priorities are never settled to begin with. Which means whatever seems to be the most urgent will become the most important. Did you know that not everything that's urgent is important? Just because it's urgent doesn't mean it's important. Can I encourage you to something? Teach your kids that when they're little. Because when they're little, everything's urgent, right? When they're real little, I want a cookie. No, I want a cookie. No, I want a cookie. We're gonna have dinner soon. I want a cookie. No. Let me make sure you understand me. No. You see, I'm not I'm not telling them it's a terrible thing. What I'm teaching them is you don't get what you want all the time. We need to teach them that when they're this tall. Matter of fact, we need to teach them that before they can walk. No. It's okay. It's okay to not get what you want right now. But you see, what happens is they want it right now, so we give it to them so that they'll just stop asking. I want to play my tablet. No, I want to play, okay, take it, go away. We don't realize the damage we're doing to these kids. And then they grow up and they say, I want to play this sport and this sport, and then the other kid says, Well, I want to play this one. The other kid says, Well, I want to do this instrument, and I'm gonna go to this uh uh club at my school, and I'm gonna do this, and you're going, How am I gonna do all of this? You know what happened? You never set the foundation. And the foundation is, listen, I'm all about clubs, I'm all about instruments, I'm all about sports. I love sports. Like sports are a tremendous thing, very helpful. I was in martial arts for many years, and it taught me that I can do things I didn't think I could do. That's one of sports' greatest values, is it teaches you you can do things you didn't think you could do. You could push yourself beyond what you think you can accomplish. There's great value in that. But can I tell you if any of those things steps in the way of God and His will and serving God and being at church and all of those things, they have to go away. Why? Because my foundation is biblical. And so anything that doesn't fit on that foundation, it doesn't belong there. And we got to make some decisions. And listen, I'm telling you, you've got to make those decisions when your kids are this big. Because man, they're gonna be hard when you're looking them eye to eye. You want to start making changes when they're as tall as you are. Good luck. I mean, listen, you're still the adult in the room. You're still the parent. It's still your responsibility to set the rules, even if you figured it out late in life. It's still your responsibility to say, no, you know what? We're gonna honor God before we honor this. And you're gonna get the eye roll, and you're gonna get the silent treatment, and you're gonna get all of those things. Okay. They'll not die. They'll get over it. I know in the day and age we live in, that's that's not really popular. We we shouldn't preach against, you know, uh, sporting events and preach against those sorts. I'm not preaching against anything. I'm preaching saying we need to build a foundation that's based on the word of God, not worldly desires. Or even worse, no foundation at all. Which then means anything goes. I've had people ask me, I don't know, I don't know what happened. My kids are, they don't want to serve the Lord, they don't they don't want to go to church, they don't read their Bible, they don't talk about the things of God. I I don't understand what happened. Well, how faithful were you when they were kids? Did you teach them what faithfulness looks like by showing them? Hey, man, I loaded my kids on the bus every Sunday and sent them to church. That's great. But what about the other 165 hours a week? What did they see out of you? You see, the church has not been given the responsibility to parent your children. You've been given that responsibility. Now let me be very clear about something. I'm thankful for our bus ministry. And I love that we have a bus and a van that picks kids up and brings them here. I'm thankful for that. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that's a bad thing. I'm saying it's not a replacement for parents who want to build a foundation based on the Word of God. It's not a replacement to just send kids to church. We got to teach it at home. That leads us to my second point. The godly home is the primary place of discipleship. I won't look at all these verses just for sake of time, but in Genesis chapter 18, verses 17 and 19, uh Abraham's approval by God was directly connected to how he would train his children. God was getting ready to judge Sodom and Gomorrah. And he said, Should I hide this from Abraham, who will command his children? What he's saying. Is Abraham's gonna be a leader of many. That was already decided. And if he's gonna be a leader of many and he's gonna lead well, I should tell him what I'm doing. And God opened up and told Abraham what he was gonna do with Sodom and Gomorrah. Why? Because he was gonna command his children. He was gonna train his children well. This principle is applied in many different ways. God will not give you more responsibility until you are fully surrendered in your current responsibility. People say, well, I want to serve God. I want to go do this big thing. Great, do the little things now. There's not a person in this room that can't tell somebody about Jesus. Except these babies. These babies are proof of what the Bible says is true. Miracles of life is what they are. Yeah, right? He was telling me a story about Odin, who just turned three and trying to share truth with a family member. That's great. Praise the Lord. You know, Brother Willette said he learned how to lead people to the Lord before he knew how to read. Praise God for that. Can I tell you there's not a person in this room outside of these little babies that can't tell somebody about Jesus? So why aren't we? So what's the problem? We are all without excuse. You say, well, I want to go do this big thing for God. Well, do the little things. Passing out tracts, telling people about Jesus. Hey, God loves you. Being faithful to your church. Being faithful with your finances. Serving God in those ways. God will not give you more responsibility until you are fully surrendered in your current responsibility. You want to do more? Start doing more. That's pretty simple. You want to be called? Start getting busy. Do something. Serve God. Be faithful. He didn't just give Abraham the information about what he was going to do with Sodom and Gomorrah just because. He gave Abraham this information because God was about to do something in Abraham's life, and this was going to strengthen what he was about to do. Not only Abraham, but Joshua. Joshua determined his family was going to serve the Lord. In Joshua 24, 15. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. The tense used there in that expression is a continuing, it expresses continuous action. Effectively, Joshua is saying, I have and will continue to serve the Lord. Joshua was able to say this because his entire life was categorized as a life of service to God. Joshua chose to fight the Amalekites, though it could have cost him everything. Joshua chose to reject the golden calf, though choosing the flesh would have been greatly satisfying. Joshua chose to serve the Lord by serving Moses, though this was clearly a choice of great humility. Joshua chose to believe God's promise about the promised land, though he was greatly outnumbered. You remember he was one of the twelve spies, only two of them came back and gave a good report. Those two, Joshua became the leader of Israel, and Caleb got his mountain. He said, I want that mountain. And Joshua said, Well, go get it. And Caleb was in his 80s. Caleb said, Alright, climbed up that mountain, killed everybody there, drove them out, said, This is my mountain. How many of you can say you have a mountain? Well, I'd say God blessed him for his faithfulness, wouldn't you? God bless Joshua, put him in a position of leadership. Joshua chose to take the leadership of Israel and lead them into the promised land. Though choosing this meant expressing faith, not unbelief. You remember Joshua chapter 1? He was terrified. The Bible says, My servant Moses is dead. In other words, Joshua, get up. You got work to do. He was terrified. And God said, Be strong and of good courage. Wow. What a scary decision. In that verse, he says, Y'all could choose what you want to choose, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. That connecting word but there is really an interesting word. It communicates very strongly that regardless of what you people choose, we will serve the Lord. What a stand to take. You know, Joshua could have ended up standing there all alone. He could have stood there and said, But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. And everybody could have said, You're on your own, Joshua, forget it. And he would have been standing all alone. How many of you would stand all alone? How many of you would stand all alone in your homes? How many of you would stand all alone and say, I'm going to build my home on a foundation that honors God? How many of you would say today, man, I've not done a great job of that in my life, but today, I want to start today. I want to build my home on the foundation of the Word of God. I encourage you, if you haven't, thus far, I will tell you it's an uphill battle once you've already started. But it's worth it. I mean, imagine, imagine changing the foundation after the house is built. That's pretty difficult to do. But you know how you do that? Peace by peace. You don't go home today and say, all right, I heard a message that we're going to build a foundation based on the word of God and everything's changing. Take all your clothes and throw them in the trash and take all your CDs and throw nobody uses CDs anymore. Take all your DVDs. Nobody even uses that anymore. Take your cell phones, your tablets, throw them in the trash. Get rid of all this stuff. We're changing everything today. Your family might get you committed somewhere. No, no, you change a foundation once it's already been built piece by piece. Now you don't need to take 10 years to do this, but you do it a piece at a time. You say, you know what? How do I do that? Man, how do I choose? You ask God for wisdom. You say, God, what is my priority here? What is the first piece of this foundation I need to change? And God might tell you, but maybe God might tell you it's something that you're doing. Maybe it's not your kids' fault. We like to blame our kids all the time. But maybe God might lay on your heart something that you need to change. Say, all right, God, I'm cutting that piece out. Help me build a new foundation there. Piece by piece. Training a child prepares an adult. Proverbs 22, 6. Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he's old, he will not depart from it. The phrase train up is from a word that means to dedicate or inaugurate. When I read this verse, I see the thought that we're training children not just to be good children, but to be successful adults. I'm not raising boys and girls in my home. I'm raising men and women. I have to look at the end goal, not where they are now. When I'm raising my kids, I have to look at how they're going to turn out someday. The day I have to watch them leave my house, will they be prepared? That is how I train my children. So they'll be prepared for that day. You see, I think too many of our homes, we're just training our children in survival mode. We're just trying to get through today. And listen, there are seasons of life that that's just all you're gonna do is you're gonna get through today. And that's okay. But your foundation can't be built on survival mode. There has to be a goal, there has to be a purpose. The phrase, in the way he should go, is all from one word, which basically means according to his path. And here I find a powerful truth that every child is a little bit different, and they require different approaches. How many of you had more than one kid in your home? Either now or at some point? How many of you would agree that none of them are the same? They're all different. I got five of them, and I'm telling you, there are five different personalities. Now there are likenesses. Sure, there are things that they they uh are kind of the same in, but they have five unique personalities. And if you had two kids, you would say they had two unique personalities. If you had one kid and you said they had multiple personalities, that's a different story altogether. That's a problem. But they do, right? And they they, in a way, they have to be raised a little bit differently. The foundation, however, never changes. The foundation is the same. Methods may change between one child or another. I won't tell you which one. Some of my kids are in the room. I'm not aiming to embarrass them this morning. But some of my kids required a lot more intervention. From me as a parent, Mr. Trish, you know what that means, right? They required a lot more intervention from me and my wife as parents. We had to physically get in the way, okay? Right? Use the the board of education, as they say, right? Yet some of my kids, all I had to do was just look at them. And they just turn into a puddle. Nothing wrong with either one. That's how they were built, and we have to train and teach them. That's that's our job as parents. But we have to recognize that. Do you know there's some kids that if you just talk to them about their problem, imagine this now, you're gonna be shocked. They aren't listening. If that's the extent of your punishment, well, I gave them a good talking to. Well, great job. Give them about 10 minutes, they're gonna do the same thing, because I promise you they weren't listening. Now, there are some kids, and I and I have some in my family that that kind of thing was very effective because they're very sensitive. You gotta understand that. You gotta know that about your kids. I mean, whether your kids are two or twenty, you've got to know how you interact with them. And and this train up a child on the way you should go is talking about the path. It doesn't mean that we have to lessen the standard for anybody. It means our methods and our approaches may change from child to child. There's nothing wrong with that. It's no different than in a leadership position where you have employees. You're not gonna treat every employee the same. You can't. You will frighten somebody, or you will not get through to somebody else. There are some people that are just hard-headed and you have to get in their face about some things. That's the only thing they respond to. So you do. And then there's others, if you do that, they'll quit and call their mom. Been there. Had a mom call me one time and say, You were very mean to my daughter. Okay. That's another story altogether. Wow. The principle taught here in this verse is that if a parent is faithful to train their children, they won't depart from it. Now it's important to recognize this is a principle, not a promise. What that means is we can't do everything that we're supposed to do for the Lord, honor him in our home, and then if a child decides to go wayward when he gets older, then think, God failed his promise. No, this isn't a promise, it's a principle. And what that means is you do your part so that they have the opportunity to do their part. You see, if you don't build that strong foundation of the Word of God, your kid is destined for spiritual failure. But if you build that foundation, they have the opportunity to flourish in the Lord. That's what we're building for them is a foundation that creates an opportunity, not a guarantee. Here's the last thing, and then I'm gonna be done. The godly home is a protection against an evil environment. We won't read all these verses. I have several verses, but let me just tell you what these thoughts are. First of all, companions shape character. Proverbs 13, 20 talks about the person that walks with wise men will be wise, but the person that walks with fools will be destroyed. Let me encourage you on something here that most people in today's day and age don't like, but I believe the Bible teaches it in a couple of verses. Choose your kids' friends. Choose your kids' friends. Don't be ashamed of that. Your kids are gonna say, I can pick whatever friends I want. Well, you can pick them, but that doesn't mean you're gonna hang out with them. You pick whatever you want. Because I know what the Bible says is that he that walks with wise men will be wise. And he that walks with fools will be destroyed. The people who are not going to help your child get closer to God is not going to be their friend. And that is a choice that parents get to make. Now you say, well, what am I supposed to do? They go to school and they're gonna see them. Yeah, they are. You can't control your child, but you have to teach them. And here's what I mean when I say choose your children's friends, I don't just mean tell them, no, you're not hanging out with them. You can't end there. That's not fair. Tell them why. Give them some scripture. Why? Because our goal is not just teaching our children to rely on us for answers, but to teach them how to find the answers in the Word of God. And so, no, I don't want you to be friends with that person. Here's the reason why. I want you to go read these verses. And let's talk about it. Companions shape character. Environment affects etiquette. As I said earlier, environment doesn't create foundation, but it can certainly affect your attitudes toward the things of God. You remember the story of Lot and Abraham? Abraham and Lot parted ways. And Lot said, I want to go to this city over here. It's beautiful, and oh, it's just a little city. There's nothing wrong with it. Well, we know that city was Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham said, I'm not going there. We're gonna split and go different ways here. And so Lot, he didn't go all the way to Sodom and Gomorrah, but what does the Bible say? It says he pitched his tent toward Sodom. He sat right on the gate and watched that city and began to get jealous for it. And before we know it, he was at the gate. Meaning he was somebody in leadership of Sodom. How do we get there? Environment affects etiquette. The environment you create in your home will affect etiquette. This is just normal. Again, in Proverbs 22, 14 and 15, we see the instruction not to make friends with an angry man or else you'll learn his ways. You hang around negative people, you're gonna be negative. You hang around people with attitude problems, you're gonna have an attitude problem. You know, when people try to always be negative, every time I talk to them, there's always something wrong, and there's always something broken, and there's always something that's falling apart, and there's always just like the Eeyore cloud is floating over them everywhere they go. Sometimes I want to interrupt them and say, tell me something good God did in your life this week. Let's not just talk about all the bad things. The bad things are everywhere. Let's talk about how good God is. What did God do in your life this past week? And if you honestly can say nothing, that's a problem. You need to get back in the book. Because God's done a lot for you, I promise you. On the other side, if you hang out with people that love God, you're likely to start developing a love for God. And I like to hang out with people that talk about God. I like to hang out with people that like to point out the goodness of God. I love that. It encourages me to want to do that more. I don't want to hang out with somebody that's always boo-hoo and everything. I don't want to spend time with people that just always talk about how treacherous their life is. Listen, life is treacherous. I get it. And sometimes we go through some bad stuff, and I'm with you on that. But can we balance that out a little bit with, man, I'm so thankful I'm saved. I'm so thankful I'm on my way to heaven. I'm so thankful I have a job. I'm so thankful I've got a family. I'm so thankful that all of these things we could talk about, the goodness of God. Bad stuff's there. I'm not saying don't talk about it. But I'm saying let's balance that with the goodness of God. And I promise, when you start doing that faithfully, you'll find the goodness of God is far greater than whatever bad things are happening in your life. Peter tells us in 2 Peter 2, verses 7 and 8, that even a righteous man can be negatively affected by the wrong environment. If you read that passage, he's talking about Lot. And twice in that passage he called Lot a righteous man. You can be right with God and still be affected by negative attitudes. You can be right with God and still let other people, your environment affect you in a wrong way. Which leads to my last thought here. Guarding the heart requires guarding input. Proverbs 4.23 says, keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life. It's kind of like saying, guard this with your life. Because everything you do comes out of the heart, comes out of the true you. The attention that we must place on the guarding of our hearts is of utmost priority. And as parents, it's our job to help them guard their hearts. I cannot guard my child's heart. I can create an environment of safety for them. When they're young, I guard them, yes, but when they get older, I can't guard their hearts. I have to teach them how to guard their heart. To not let the devil get in and cause problems. We need to protect our kids at all costs. You say, how do I help my kids guard their hearts? First of all, protect them. Protect them from people, protect them from worldly desires, protect them by choosing their friends, protect them by helping shape their environment, protect them by teaching them biblical principles, protect your children. You say, Oh, I'll protect my children. I watched a video the other day of a woman that was walking with a probably three-year-old, hand in hand, walking out of a grocery store, and a man, a man came by and just swooped up that kid. And I'm telling you, that little kid might have had a dislocated shoulder because that mama wasn't letting go. And she started uh fighting him, and then three other people came by. It was really cool to see. Three other people came by, and then it all went off camera. Man, I wanted to see him just get knocked out, you know? It was a bummer. But but you know, when I saw that, I thought, man, that's a woman that's gonna protect her kids at all costs. And I believe every parent in this room would do that. If somebody tried to steal your kid, or even if somebody tried to steal my kid, I believe everybody in this room would step up and fight for that. I have no doubt in my mind, but why aren't we protecting them about things we can't see? We aren't protecting our kids in the digital world. We aren't protecting our kids when they're at school. You say, well, how am I supposed to protect them there? Teaching them biblical principles. We need to protect them at all costs. You know, it it hurts me when parents say things like, Well, it's up to my child what they're gonna do. Um you've heard me say this many times, but there has to be an adult in the room. And for this season, you're the adult. There'll come a time when your child becomes an adult and they will have to make their own decisions. And you will have to respect that. Unless they're still living in your house, then you don't have to respect it. You can say you follow my rules or you go find another house. But there comes a time when you have to do that. But when they're kids, uh no, sir, no ma'am. Not happening. You say, well, you're just gonna teach your kids to be dependent upon you. No, I'm gonna teach my kids that there's some wicked stuff out there, and I'm protecting them from it. No parent gets to the end of their children's childhood saying, Boy, I wish I had trained them less. I wish I'd spent less time with them. I wish I'd invested less on them. But many a parent gets to the end of their childhood. I wish I'd spent more time. The reality is, the Bible gives a personal responsibility to guard our hearts. We cannot guard our children's hearts for them. However, it is our responsibility as parents and guardians to weigh risks and make decisions for our children simply because we know what's best for them. I had somebody one time, their daughter was getting to graduate college high school, and they were choosing what college to go, and they said, you know, they they want to go into this particular field. I said, Oh wow, okay, that's great. Big, big field, you know, in the medical world, medical research world. And uh, man, where are you gonna send them to college? And they named a secular college. And I said, you know, I mean, she's only been saved for a few years. She really doesn't have a grounded foundation in her faith. I said, I really, I really don't think that's a good idea. I think you need to send her to a Bible college for a year. Just send her there for a year, one year. Let her get grounded a little bit. And you know, Tyler can attest, we went out to West Coast Baptist College and interviewed uh some college students to come here, and uh everyone, except maybe one, or maybe every one of them, said, I only plan to come here for a year. And then God got a hold of my heart. And God's using me, God's called me. Now, you and I can't possibly know how real that calling is, how long that'll last, if it was really a calling, if it was an emotional decision. But what I'm saying is they got into a place that had an environment that allowed them to start thinking about the Word of God and start thinking about God's will for their lives. Why would you take a new Christian, an ungrounded Christian in their faith and send them to a secular institution, especially in that field, that's going to teach you all about evolution. It's gonna teach you all about the details of that. You know what happened to that person? They haven't been in church in years. Got into a same-sex relationship. I don't say these things lightly. I say them because the word of God says it. And I say them because I've seen it happen. If you aren't going to protect your kids' hearts, you're going to lose them. If you aren't going to help teach them to make the right decisions, if you're not going to be the adult in the room and parent your children, don't be surprised when they join the rank of one of the 70% of high school students that graduate and leave church altogether. 70%. You know, we have we have a Christian school here, and I'm so thankful for our Christian school. I'm so thankful for the values that it's teaching our students. Many of our students are not members of this church. They come from elsewhere. And I'm I'm grateful for that. It bothers me when we have students come to our school and then they leave our school to go to a public school, and the parents say, Well, I don't know what I was supposed to do. You're supposed to parent. Their spiritual well-being is far more important than whatever academic education they can get, especially if they are ungrounded in their faith. Now, if they are grounded in their faith, they know what they believe, and they know why they believe it, then I don't see anything wrong with them going to a secular institution. As long as it is a good institution for what they feel God's called them to do in their life, that's fine. But if they're not grounded, if there's questions, if they're challenged in their faith, if they're unbelieving in some things, don't send them to the world. They're not gonna help them believe God more. They're gonna solidify in their hearts that God doesn't exist. That God is irrelevant and their whole childhood has been a lie. And yeah, it can happen in a semester. Don't think it can't. You say, oh, you're being dramatic. Okay. I'm just telling you experiences that I've had. You want to think I'm dramatic, that's fine. You you do with your kids. They were given to you, not me. I'm not responsible for them, you are. But I am telling you what I've seen. I've seen one semester of a secular uh college education undo an entire childhood of faith. Don't think it can't happen to yours. You say, well, how do I know then? You need to find out if they're grounded. Ask them some questions. Talk to them, encourage them. Do they know what they believe? Do they know why they believe it? Maybe a better question is, do you know why you believe what you believe? Have you built a foundation based on the word of God, or are you just building it on something flimsy like, well, I think the Bible teaches this. Get in the book. I could go on and on about that. I we have to guard our children's heart. We have to help them teach them. Not only do we need to guard their heart, we need to guard their eyes. We need to be careful of what we let them watch. Careful of the phones and the tablets. I would venture to say that probably no greater harm has been done in the modern youth today than what's been done by phones and tablets. Now, we'll all shout amen to that because we know it's true, but what are we doing about it? What are we doing? What safeguards are we putting in place? Listen, and it's not enough to just teach your kids, hey, don't do this, because they got friends. I was talking with somebody the other day and they said, well, it's my policy that no teenager is to have a smartphone. Man, I'm for it. I got nothing against that. I mean, my my my kid has a phone, but it's pretty well locked down, and I'm I can do whatever I want with his phone, and and he knows that. And I it's okay. It's okay. But some people say, well, you know, what am I supposed to do? You know, I'm just gonna take his phone away, and my kids can't have a phone until they're 18. That sounds good in practice, but unless they live in a bubble, that's not gonna work. Because their friends all have phones and they're gonna look at theirs. You don't know how many times I've seen in our environment here, when one kid opens a laptop or brings a tablet up, it's like a bat signal goes out. And kids start flocking. And I'm telling you, it's like you blink and all the kids are there. How did you even know? Like the Windows thing isn't even up yet. The laptop hasn't even fired up yet. And they're already anticipating something, and they just flock around and they're like glued. Can I tell you, does that look not tell you something's wrong? Nobody should be that immediately locked into something like that. Oh, there's great dangers there. We need to be careful of those. And we need to put in front of their eyes good things on a regular basis. Church, Bible, good, helpful books. Give them books. Look up the look up the series. Um, somebody can maybe remind me what it is, but it's we have a bunch of them here in our school that we've used for uh classes for book reports. They're missionary stories. I mean, you can read all kinds of stories about missionaries. And can I tell you something? I don't really like to read. I think you know that, but I could pick up one of those books and I could read it from start to finish. They're fascinating. The things that men and women have gone through so that we can still worship today the way we worship. Oh, it's amazing. Give them good stuff to read. You say, Well, I don't really know what my kid's reading. Can I tell you something? And please don't throw anything at me. But that's a failure as a parent. If your kid has something and you don't even know what they have, that is a failure. But here's the great thing about failure there's always a way back. Sin never has to be permanent. There's always a way back. And there's a way to say, you know what? I'm I'm uh we're not gonna live in our home like this anymore. So we're gonna talk about different things in our home. And I'm praying throughout this series, I'm praying that somebody, at least one family, will go home and have a little family meeting and say, listen, I don't really know what this looks like yet, but I'm just giving you a heads up. Some things are gonna change. I'm gonna pray to God, and God's gonna give me some guidance on what we're gonna do. And your kids are gonna sit there and they're gonna roll their eyes and they're gonna say, okay, whatever, mom, whatever, dad, whatever you say. And maybe you ought to just say, and we're gonna start with that right there. That's gonna end right there. Hey, listen, can I can I just encourage you on something? If if if you've got older kids and if you if you've decided today, hey, there's some things in my in my home that's not going well, and I'm gonna make some changes. Can I just encourage you something? Get your shield and your face shield ready because you're in for a fight. And and by the way, don't get mad at your kids for it because you created that. Okay. But be prepared. There's gonna be a fight. Those are the books, thank you. You can what does it say? Christian heroes then and now. There's like 27 of them. They're great books. But if you go home and you start to you start to fight with your kids about it, don't get mad at them. You created the environment. You're the one trying to change it. Just encourage them. Hey, I promise you. Just stick with me. We're gonna get there. Don't give me attitude. Not gonna put up with attitude. We're not gonna do that. You say, man, that sounds hard. Well, who lied and told you parenting was easy? Whoever it was, y'all stay away from them. They're liars. Parenting's hard. So prepare for the fight. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for the day you've given. God, thank you for this message this morning. Thank you for your goodness and your love to us. Thank you for the great honor that you give us by sending us children as gifts. Father, that we have the opportunity and the privilege to raise them, and I pray that we would raise them to honor you. Father, will you work in our hearts this morning as we come to the end of this time? We come to our invitation time, Lord, and maybe there's somebody here that's been battling in their homes with some things, and there's some decisions that need to be made. There's some changes that need to be made. And maybe, Lord, there's some people here that they're so far into their family, and there's changes that need to be made that they're terrified. God, will you help them to not freeze, but to just start making those changes piece by piece? Not by power nor by might, but by the Spirit of the Lord. God, we can trust in you, and you can give us the power and the ability to accomplish all things. Father, will you help us to make these decisions, Lord, in our homes? We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.