WEBVTT 00:00:08.320 --> 00:00:10.960 Colossians chapter 3 is our text this morning. 00:00:11.039 --> 00:00:14.880 Uh as you're turning there, let me just remind you there's no evening worship service tonight. 00:00:14.960 --> 00:00:17.920 Our evening worship service has gone into summer hibernation. 00:00:18.079 --> 00:00:20.399 We'll be resurrected in a couple months. 00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:27.120 But we are together this morning, and we are looking at the Word of God, finishing Colossians chapter 3 in our study of this book. 00:00:27.280 --> 00:00:33.520 So let me begin by reading from the book of Colossians, beginning in chapter verse, excuse me, chapter 3 and verse 18. 00:00:34.079 --> 00:00:39.280 Colossians chapter 3, verse 18, down to chapter 4 and verse 1 is our text for this morning. 00:00:39.520 --> 00:00:41.679 Follow with me as I read from the Word of God. 00:00:45.119 --> 00:00:48.640 Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. 00:00:48.880 --> 00:00:52.799 Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them. 00:00:53.200 --> 00:00:57.600 Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. 00:00:57.920 --> 00:01:01.840 Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. 00:01:02.159 --> 00:01:10.879 Bond servants, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye service as people pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. 00:01:11.120 --> 00:01:17.599 Whatever you do, work heartily is for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. 00:01:17.760 --> 00:01:19.680 You are serving the Lord Christ. 00:01:19.920 --> 00:01:25.040 For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality. 00:01:25.519 --> 00:01:32.400 Masters, treat your bondservants justly and fairly, knowing that you also have a master in heaven. 00:01:32.719 --> 00:01:34.560 This is the word of the Lord. 00:01:36.239 --> 00:01:52.159 I expect that a number of you have seen the recent Pew Research survey that's been doing the rounds in the media the last couple days, of a poll in which Pew Research Center discovered that fewer than four and ten Americans regard marriage and child rearing as a social good. 00:01:52.480 --> 00:02:02.159 That's not just Gen Z, that's Americans broadly, in all generations, fewer than four and ten regard marriage and child rearing as a positive social good. 00:02:03.439 --> 00:02:24.879 There's all kinds of ways you could read a statistic like that, but I think a charitable reading would be the reality that many people have grown up in broken homes and have experienced such deep pain and suffering because of the sin that was characteristic of their upbringing that it's only natural that people would come in their adult life to have such an opinion of marriage and child rearing. 00:02:25.280 --> 00:02:30.479 But we live in a society that is characterized by some pretty big social problems. 00:02:30.960 --> 00:02:33.280 Drug addiction is higher than it's ever been. 00:02:33.520 --> 00:02:40.560 Children are growing up in a society where they are far more anxious, lonely, depressed than they have ever been in recorded American history. 00:02:40.719 --> 00:02:43.360 And I could just go on and on and on down the list of social ills. 00:02:43.439 --> 00:02:44.319 I don't need to tell you about them. 00:02:44.400 --> 00:02:45.360 You're very aware of them. 00:02:45.439 --> 00:02:46.879 You live in the world that I do. 00:02:47.759 --> 00:02:52.080 In such a world, elimination of the family is not going to be helpful. 00:02:52.639 --> 00:02:59.759 What would be helpful would be the recovery of a biblical, healthy, vibrant, flourishing family. 00:03:00.159 --> 00:03:06.560 A marriage wherein husband and wife discover love, intimacy, stability, and meaning and purpose for their lives. 00:03:06.719 --> 00:03:15.120 That environment where children are reared with stability and love, care, structure, are trained to love righteousness and live for things that matter. 00:03:15.439 --> 00:03:21.439 That kind of family is the vision that we are given in a passage like Colossians chapter 3, verse 18 and following. 00:03:21.599 --> 00:03:29.759 As we have been studying the book of Colossians, we saw at the very beginning that Paul's desire in this letter is to help us understand what it means to be united to Christ. 00:03:29.919 --> 00:03:33.039 He says that that is the fundamental understanding of what it means to be a Christian. 00:03:33.120 --> 00:03:34.159 What does it mean to be a Christian? 00:03:34.240 --> 00:03:36.240 It means you are united to the Son of God. 00:03:36.319 --> 00:03:42.319 You are in an indissolvable, eternal, mystical, real, ontological union with God the Son. 00:03:42.560 --> 00:03:44.560 So that you've died with him. 00:03:44.800 --> 00:03:46.719 In his death, all your sins were forgiven. 00:03:46.800 --> 00:03:49.439 All of the wrath due for you for your sin was satisfied. 00:03:49.599 --> 00:03:53.840 In his resurrection, you were raised with him, so that you share spiritual life. 00:03:53.919 --> 00:04:00.240 You've been wrapped up in the divine triune life of God, and you will be a partaker in the everlasting kingdom of God. 00:04:00.400 --> 00:04:07.919 You're so united to Christ that when the Father looks at you, he sees the Son, so that all the love of the Father is flowing towards you. 00:04:08.080 --> 00:04:11.840 All the inheritance that belongs to the Son of God now belongs to you. 00:04:11.919 --> 00:04:13.360 You are in Christ. 00:04:13.599 --> 00:04:19.360 And that spiritual reality then shapes all of your life in this fleeting life that you're living in the fallen world. 00:04:19.519 --> 00:04:27.519 You're to put off all that is sinful, all attitudes, habits, and characteristic desires, and put on new attitudes and desires in Christ. 00:04:27.759 --> 00:04:36.240 You're to put off the old, to put on the new, and what we're looking at in the passage we're studying this morning is that when you put on Christ, Jesus even comes home with you. 00:04:36.480 --> 00:04:49.920 The new attitudes that belong to you in your union with Christ, the new habits, the new desires, the new way of being that is yours in Christ comes into the most intimate relationships of your life, namely your home life. 00:04:50.240 --> 00:04:53.600 This morning what we're seeing is what happens when Jesus comes home. 00:04:53.759 --> 00:04:56.879 That's what happens to every person who's united to Christ. 00:04:57.120 --> 00:05:06.480 You'll notice that in the passage I just read, there are six simple commands that come into three pairs: husbands and wives, parents and children, slaves and masters. 00:05:06.639 --> 00:05:08.879 This is the household of the ancient world. 00:05:09.120 --> 00:05:12.079 You'll notice that the commands in this text are very straightforward. 00:05:12.240 --> 00:05:16.319 As you study through Colossians, you discover some pretty profound theological truths. 00:05:16.480 --> 00:05:25.040 Sometimes, as I was studying the Greek text, I encounter some difficult grammatical constructions or some very rare words, and you have to look up and understand the nuances of the words. 00:05:25.120 --> 00:05:30.800 But when you read this passage, you discover this is probably the simplest language in the whole book. 00:05:31.120 --> 00:05:32.959 Just six straightforward commands. 00:05:33.040 --> 00:05:34.879 Paul is not hiding the ball here. 00:05:35.120 --> 00:05:41.279 What he requires of us, what God desires for us in our intimate home relationships is very straightforward. 00:05:41.680 --> 00:05:47.279 But though this is probably the simplest grammar in the book, they're probably the hardest commands to obey, aren't they? 00:05:47.759 --> 00:05:51.199 Very simple, straightforward, but very difficult. 00:05:51.360 --> 00:05:56.959 Because much of our natural desires and inclinations goes against what we're commanded to do in these relationships. 00:05:57.199 --> 00:06:02.800 So what is the power that is going to enable you to fulfill God's design for your intimate home relationships? 00:06:03.040 --> 00:06:05.120 Well, you see it again and again in all of these commands. 00:06:05.199 --> 00:06:09.199 There are six commands, and seven times those commands are linked to the Lord. 00:06:09.680 --> 00:06:16.639 All of the commands in this text are linked to your union with the Lord, in the Lord, in the Lord, pleasing to the Lord. 00:06:16.879 --> 00:06:26.399 The Lord, who you are in union with, is now the one who is directing, guiding, and empowering you to live a life that is fully pleasing to him even at home. 00:06:26.800 --> 00:06:40.079 So let's walk through the text this morning, trusting that the Lord is wise and good, and the Lord is gracious and powerful, who is with you at home and will enable you to live out your home life in a way that's pleasing to him. 00:06:40.319 --> 00:06:44.399 The first relationship that you see in this text is the marriage relationship. 00:06:44.720 --> 00:06:45.759 Marriage in Christ. 00:06:46.000 --> 00:06:47.360 Look down at verse 18. 00:06:47.600 --> 00:06:50.480 Wives, submit to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord. 00:06:50.639 --> 00:06:53.759 Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. 00:06:54.000 --> 00:06:58.160 Children obey, excuse me, let's just stop right at the end of verse 19. 00:06:58.639 --> 00:07:06.639 Very simple and straightforward: wives submitting to their husbands, husbands loving their wives in an ordered and structured relationship of unity and harmony. 00:07:06.800 --> 00:07:11.839 And yet, much of our society is characterized by critique of this view of marriage. 00:07:12.079 --> 00:07:14.560 And I think some of you have even felt this in your own life. 00:07:14.720 --> 00:07:27.360 Surely, many of us have felt an implicit understanding that the biblical view of a husband's authority in marriage is inevitably going to create chauvinistic, insensitive men who will silence and abuse their wives. 00:07:27.600 --> 00:07:30.399 Have you felt that in your heart as you came to this text? 00:07:30.560 --> 00:07:32.959 You have at least heard this in society. 00:07:33.519 --> 00:07:40.240 It's interesting to note that sociological data, as it's coming more and more to the surface, just tells a very different story. 00:07:40.480 --> 00:08:04.240 Nancy Pearcy, a friend of many of you, who is a professor at Houston Christian University, has written a recent book titled The Toxic War on Masculinity, in which she surveys modern university sociological research on the relationships of husbands and wives and parents and children, and she discovered that what modern sociological data tells, the story it tells, is very different from the one the world would tell us. 00:08:04.480 --> 00:08:16.480 What she writes is that conservative evangelical men who attend church regularly are the least likely of any group in America to commit domestic violence, unquote. 00:08:18.240 --> 00:08:28.000 Now, if you have grown up in an environment in which you have lived your life in a healthy biblical church, you probably would say, that kind of actually fits my experience. 00:08:28.240 --> 00:08:38.480 The people that I live with, the people that I live my spiritual life with, are generally characterized by healthy, vibrant, loving, forgiving Christian marriages. 00:08:38.960 --> 00:08:46.080 But there is a caricature in the world of a Christian man who says, I'm the head of this house and acts as a tyrannical demon. 00:08:46.320 --> 00:08:49.360 And the data actually says there is a kind of man who does that. 00:08:49.519 --> 00:08:51.519 It is not the man who goes to church. 00:08:51.679 --> 00:08:56.080 It is the man who marks on a survey that he is a Christian but is not part of the church. 00:08:56.320 --> 00:09:08.480 That man is just aware enough of the Bible to know that the Bible says I'm the head of the home, but is not participant in the life of the church, and twists the scriptures in order to abuse and neglect those around him. 00:09:08.720 --> 00:09:10.799 That person is no Christian at all. 00:09:10.960 --> 00:09:16.720 And the Lord is an avenger of those who abuse and twist the scriptures for their own sinful purposes. 00:09:16.960 --> 00:09:32.320 But what the data demonstrate is that men who are engaged in church, those who are actually going to church, members of the church, are the least likely to be unfaithful, the least likely to divorce, the most emotionally engaged with their wives and children. 00:09:32.480 --> 00:09:42.159 Sociologist Brad Wilcox of the University of Virginia writes, quote, the happiest of all wives in America are religious conservatives who hold traditional gender values, unquote. 00:09:42.639 --> 00:09:45.919 This data demonstrates a very simple fact. 00:09:46.159 --> 00:09:51.679 When you live in God's world in God's way, life generally goes better for you. 00:09:52.000 --> 00:09:57.919 The pattern that God has given us for marriage is not one that is one characteristic by neglect and abuse. 00:09:58.000 --> 00:10:02.240 Rather, it's one that's characterized by love, intimacy, and cherishing one another. 00:10:02.480 --> 00:10:04.480 So what is the pattern for marriage in this text? 00:10:04.559 --> 00:10:05.360 Let's look at it together. 00:10:05.519 --> 00:10:06.240 Verse 18. 00:10:06.480 --> 00:10:08.159 First, Paul addresses wives. 00:10:08.240 --> 00:10:12.480 In verse 18, wives, submit to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord. 00:10:12.720 --> 00:10:14.320 Wives, notice, not women. 00:10:14.480 --> 00:10:17.279 This is not a verse about women and men generally in society. 00:10:17.360 --> 00:10:20.080 This is a relationship between a husband and a wife. 00:10:20.240 --> 00:10:24.159 Women are not subservient to men, women are not to submit to men generally in society. 00:10:24.320 --> 00:10:32.080 A wife is to submit to her husband, a unique union between a husband and wife in which she renders her service to him as a joyful gift. 00:10:32.480 --> 00:10:35.759 And notice that the qualification here is as is fitting in the Lord. 00:10:35.840 --> 00:10:36.799 And there's two sides to that. 00:10:37.039 --> 00:10:40.159 Fitting in the Lord, that is, the motivation, why you would do this. 00:10:40.320 --> 00:10:50.240 Why would you render your strength, the creativity, and intelligence as a service to the Lord to your husband in willing submission is motivated by your desire to please the Lord. 00:10:50.399 --> 00:10:58.639 What you see in Scripture is that the Lord commands you to do this, and so out of service to the Lord, you put yourself at the disposal of your husband to love and to serve him. 00:10:59.120 --> 00:11:01.679 But it's also regulated by the commands of the Lord. 00:11:01.759 --> 00:11:05.600 And so the submission that a wife renders to her husband is not unlimited. 00:11:05.759 --> 00:11:11.279 If a husband asks of his wife anything that would be displeasing to the Lord, then she doesn't have an obligation to obey that. 00:11:11.360 --> 00:11:17.679 In fact, she would have an obligation not to obey that because her ultimate allegiance is to the Lord Jesus Christ and to be pleasing to him. 00:11:18.639 --> 00:11:21.120 Now there's a couple other things that I think are helpful to note here. 00:11:21.279 --> 00:11:24.559 One is this word submission, notice, wives, submit to your husband. 00:11:24.639 --> 00:11:25.519 That's an active verb. 00:11:25.600 --> 00:11:27.919 This is not a passive servile laying back. 00:11:28.080 --> 00:11:30.320 This is an active engagement. 00:11:30.559 --> 00:11:35.120 If you'll notice 1 Corinthians chapter 16, if we do the back screens work? 00:11:35.279 --> 00:11:36.799 Are we able to see those? 00:11:37.039 --> 00:11:41.679 In 1 Corinthians and chapter 16, I'm gonna have to turn around here. 00:11:43.600 --> 00:11:44.639 Humor me. 00:11:45.919 --> 00:11:54.240 Paul writes, Now I urge you, brothers, you know that the household of Stephanus were the first converts in Achaea, and that they have devoted themselves to the service of the saints. 00:11:54.399 --> 00:11:58.159 Be subject to such as these and to every fellow worker and laborer. 00:11:58.320 --> 00:12:00.240 Notice that word that I underlined in verse 15. 00:12:00.320 --> 00:12:01.200 They've devoted themselves. 00:12:01.279 --> 00:12:04.080 It's the same root of the word that's translated submission. 00:12:04.399 --> 00:12:11.840 That is, the leaders in the church in Corinth are devoting themselves to leadership, to service and love towards the rest of the body of Christ. 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:17.519 And Paul says in verse 16, what the rest of the body does in response to this leadership is to be subject to them. 00:12:17.679 --> 00:12:20.000 That is, to place themselves at their disposal. 00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:25.679 The same word that's uh rendered here, be subject, is the word in Colossians 3.18, for a wife submitting to her husband. 00:12:25.840 --> 00:12:32.960 There's a parallel kind of idea and dynamic going on here between the leadership and the church and the rest of the body, as between a husband and a wife. 00:12:33.120 --> 00:12:39.519 The leaders in the church are devoting themselves to loving service, and the body is devoting itself to submission to the leadership. 00:12:39.759 --> 00:12:46.240 One translation of this text is not submit yourselves to the leaders, but to place yourselves at their service. 00:12:46.480 --> 00:12:48.960 I think that's an appropriate understanding of the nature of submission. 00:12:49.039 --> 00:13:02.879 It's not a passiveness, but it's an act of taking your intelligence, your strength, and your creativity and placing it at the service of the leader in a un excuse me, in a union of relationship, an ordered, united relationship. 00:13:03.279 --> 00:13:07.759 Let me go further and offer another parallel passage where the word for submission is used. 00:13:07.919 --> 00:13:12.720 You know, as you read through the New Testament, the first place the verb submit is used is of the life of Jesus. 00:13:13.039 --> 00:13:21.759 Luke chapter 2 and 51, in the story of the childhood of Jesus, we read that Jesus went down with his parents and came to Nazareth, and he was submissive to them. 00:13:21.919 --> 00:13:28.080 Now, does that mean that Jesus was servile and some kind of passive being trampled upon, subservient being? 00:13:28.559 --> 00:13:30.240 Absolutely, of course not. 00:13:30.879 --> 00:13:40.399 This verse, in fact, occurs in the passage in which Jesus ends up in the temple, as his parents have traveled to Jerusalem, he's separated from them, ends up in the temple, and is questioning the religious leaders there. 00:13:40.480 --> 00:13:44.159 And Mary and Joseph can't find him, they go back, find him in the temple, and they ask him, What are you doing? 00:13:44.320 --> 00:13:49.039 And he responds, Don't you remember that I have to be about my father's business? 00:13:49.279 --> 00:13:54.159 And they ask him to come home with them, and he submits himself to his parents and goes home with them. 00:13:54.399 --> 00:13:58.480 Now, in this instance, as Jesus is submitting himself to his parents, what is he doing? 00:13:58.639 --> 00:13:59.600 Is he being servile? 00:13:59.759 --> 00:14:00.639 Is he being trampled upon? 00:14:00.799 --> 00:14:02.159 Is his dignity in question? 00:14:02.399 --> 00:14:06.799 Is he in some way any less glorious than who he is in his essential being? 00:14:07.039 --> 00:14:10.480 No, what he's doing is he's offering a gift of love to his parents. 00:14:10.720 --> 00:14:13.039 He's placing himself at their servants. 00:14:13.200 --> 00:14:23.360 All of his intelligence that he has just demonstrated by bamboozling the religious leaders is at the service of his parents and willing submission that creates an ordered union in their relationship. 00:14:23.600 --> 00:14:35.679 The reason I draw your attention to this model in Jesus is that what the Scripture is calling for wives to do when it calls them to submit to their husbands is not to be subservient, but to offer a gift of love to their husband. 00:14:35.840 --> 00:14:39.679 A gift of love that a wife doesn't offer to any other person in the world. 00:14:39.840 --> 00:14:43.039 They don't submit to any other person the way that they submit to their husband. 00:14:43.200 --> 00:14:51.600 In submitting to their husbands, they are taking all of their strength and intelligence and creativity and putting it at the service of their husband, to be devoted to him. 00:14:52.240 --> 00:14:57.279 And how is the husband to respond to this gift of love that his wife offers to him in her submission? 00:14:57.519 --> 00:15:02.399 Well, Paul says very clearly in verse 19, he is to love his wife and not be harsh with her. 00:15:02.559 --> 00:15:03.840 Look at verse 19 again. 00:15:04.080 --> 00:15:07.919 Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. 00:15:08.240 --> 00:15:09.919 I love how simple Paul is. 00:15:10.399 --> 00:15:15.120 I think husbands, you need that tattooed on the inside of your eyelid so you just can't get away from it. 00:15:15.440 --> 00:15:17.120 And that's the nature of this command. 00:15:17.360 --> 00:15:19.759 Love your wives is an ongoing command. 00:15:19.840 --> 00:15:22.559 It's not start loving them or stop loving them a particular time. 00:15:22.639 --> 00:15:24.320 So let me say it like this. 00:15:24.559 --> 00:15:27.679 In verse 19, Paul says, love your wives. 00:15:28.000 --> 00:15:28.639 When? 00:15:31.600 --> 00:15:37.279 Yes is the answer in all stages of life, in all seasons of life, in all circumstances of life. 00:15:37.519 --> 00:15:39.440 This isn't conditioned on anything in your wife. 00:15:39.519 --> 00:15:47.919 It's not conditioned upon the times in which she just elicits love from you, the times when she's most lovely, the times when she just really gets your emotional fireballs burning. 00:15:48.159 --> 00:15:53.679 Rather, you are to love permanently, unceasingly, in every stage of life. 00:15:54.399 --> 00:15:59.919 Presumably, for most of you who are married in this room, you didn't enter into your marriage as a result of an arranged marriage. 00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:02.720 You probably, husbands, chose your wives. 00:16:02.960 --> 00:16:09.039 You fell in love with them, you chose to love them, at the moment that you got married, you were probably filled with affection for your wife. 00:16:09.200 --> 00:16:12.000 But the nature of life is that you go through life, things change. 00:16:12.080 --> 00:16:18.159 And there'll come a point in your life when you look at your wife and say, You're kind of not the same person that you were when we got married. 00:16:19.840 --> 00:16:20.960 What do you do then? 00:16:21.120 --> 00:16:23.039 Do you say, No, I didn't sign up for this? 00:16:23.200 --> 00:16:24.240 I married her. 00:16:24.399 --> 00:16:25.519 Who are you? 00:16:28.480 --> 00:16:31.840 The command in that instance is love her. 00:16:32.960 --> 00:16:33.919 Love her. 00:16:34.559 --> 00:16:35.600 Love your wife. 00:16:35.759 --> 00:16:37.120 Do not be harsh with her. 00:16:37.360 --> 00:16:43.039 Every season, every instance, all stages of life, and every circumstance, all the time, love your wife. 00:16:43.200 --> 00:16:43.440 How? 00:16:43.519 --> 00:16:44.399 How do you love your wife? 00:16:44.559 --> 00:17:00.399 Ephesians 5, which we're not going to turn there this morning, but Ephesians 5 tells us to love our wives as Christ loves the church, a sacrificial love, to sanctify her and to make her holy and without blemish, a purifying love, and to care for her by understanding her needs, because he who loves his wife loves himself. 00:17:00.559 --> 00:17:02.799 So there's no longer a zero-sum game going on. 00:17:02.960 --> 00:17:09.680 Most destructions in the marriage relationship happen when one of the parties, and because it's Father's Day, I'm going to blame all the husbands. 00:17:11.119 --> 00:17:15.279 Think about their relationship as a zero-sum game. 00:17:15.519 --> 00:17:19.279 I have the option to either do what she wants or what I want. 00:17:20.640 --> 00:17:24.799 But the nature of marriage, the way God designed it, is that there is no distinction anymore. 00:17:24.960 --> 00:17:27.039 You come into a one-flesh union. 00:17:27.200 --> 00:17:28.160 You are one. 00:17:28.559 --> 00:17:31.279 Indissolubly forever, you are one with your wife. 00:17:31.440 --> 00:17:34.079 So her needs are your needs. 00:17:34.240 --> 00:17:37.279 Her desires are your desires. 00:17:37.599 --> 00:17:52.640 So as you are serving your wife, understanding her needs, understanding her wants, and helping to sanctify her and grow closer to the Lord and live a joyful, fulfilled life, you are helping yourself live a joyful, fulfilled life because her needs are your needs, because you're one. 00:17:53.200 --> 00:17:56.400 Love your wife, and as you're doing that, look at the end of verse 20. 00:17:56.559 --> 00:17:59.519 You will not, excuse me, verse 19, you will not be harsh with them. 00:17:59.599 --> 00:18:03.200 That word harsh could be translated as harsh or embittered. 00:18:03.519 --> 00:18:07.119 And I think that you could probably say it, in a sense, it means both. 00:18:07.359 --> 00:18:13.519 The idea here is a husband who looks at his wife and thinks, you owe me something. 00:18:14.960 --> 00:18:17.279 That was a good laugh, appropriately times. 00:18:21.039 --> 00:18:24.720 And when she doesn't supply what you think you need, how do you respond? 00:18:24.880 --> 00:18:25.839 You get bitter. 00:18:26.000 --> 00:18:29.839 You get grumpy because she didn't give me what I deserve. 00:18:30.000 --> 00:18:34.160 And inevitably, as you're bitter in your heart, what's going to come out is harshness towards your wife. 00:18:34.319 --> 00:18:37.359 That is categorically condemned in Scripture. 00:18:37.599 --> 00:18:41.680 You are never to be harsh with your wife, and you're never to be bitter towards your wife. 00:18:41.920 --> 00:18:45.519 That's a fundamental misunderstanding of who you are in Christ. 00:18:46.000 --> 00:18:49.920 Your relationship with your wife and your love for your wife flows out of your union with Christ. 00:18:50.079 --> 00:18:50.559 Who are you? 00:18:50.720 --> 00:18:52.079 You're a person who doesn't deserve anything. 00:18:52.240 --> 00:18:54.160 I deserved hell yesterday. 00:18:54.480 --> 00:19:07.599 But God set his affection on me and gave me his only begotten Son, who was crucified for me, resurrected, has forgiven all of my sins, has given me all the love of God, and I'm held secure and a vibrant, everlasting, loving relationship with God. 00:19:07.680 --> 00:19:10.880 And now as I look at my wife, I can love her. 00:19:11.359 --> 00:19:25.519 And if she is in any way unlovely, then I can put on, verse 12, as God's chosen one holy and beloved, a compassionate heart towards her, kindness towards her, humility towards her, meekness towards her, patience, bearing with her. 00:19:25.599 --> 00:19:27.759 And even if they have a complaint, I forgive her. 00:19:27.920 --> 00:19:31.440 Just as the Lord forgave me, so I forgive her. 00:19:32.559 --> 00:19:35.200 This is the relationship God has designed in marriage. 00:19:35.359 --> 00:19:40.559 A loving and ordered relationship characterized by union with one another out of your union with Christ. 00:19:40.880 --> 00:19:43.359 But that marriage relationship doesn't stop there. 00:19:43.519 --> 00:19:45.839 It also extends to your raising of children. 00:19:46.000 --> 00:19:48.000 So look at the next order of relationships. 00:19:48.240 --> 00:19:49.839 We're going to call this parenting in Christ. 00:19:49.920 --> 00:19:50.880 Verse 20. 00:19:51.119 --> 00:19:54.880 Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. 00:19:55.119 --> 00:19:59.039 Fathers do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. 00:19:59.279 --> 00:20:04.319 Now I call this section parenting in Christ, even though it starts with a command to children. 00:20:04.559 --> 00:20:05.599 Here's why. 00:20:05.920 --> 00:20:08.640 Children, do you know what you are doing? 00:20:09.119 --> 00:20:10.960 You are being parented. 00:20:11.519 --> 00:20:15.440 And so God's desire for you is that you would receive it and grow in wisdom. 00:20:15.680 --> 00:20:19.680 The command for you, verse 20, is to obey your parents in everything. 00:20:19.920 --> 00:20:21.680 Now, who is this command directed at? 00:20:21.759 --> 00:20:23.119 Is it directed at every stage of life? 00:20:23.200 --> 00:20:25.519 And I don't think that that is the direction of this command. 00:20:25.759 --> 00:20:27.599 This is directed towards children who are in the home. 00:20:27.680 --> 00:20:28.960 This is a household code. 00:20:29.200 --> 00:20:36.400 Parents living with their children, husbands living with their wives, and in the ancient world, slaves would have been living with their masters under the same roof. 00:20:36.640 --> 00:20:43.359 This is a household code directed towards those children who are being raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, as Ephesians 6.4 says. 00:20:43.519 --> 00:20:48.640 So until a child moves out and establishes their own independent home, they are under the authority of their parents. 00:20:48.720 --> 00:20:56.559 And so if you are listening to my voice, and you are, suppose you are a 19-year-old who lives under your parents' home, you are under your parents' authority. 00:20:56.799 --> 00:21:03.039 Now that might spark in some of you a desire to put your big boy and big girl pants on and get a job and move out, that would be okay. 00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:06.559 But so long as you are living under your parents' home, you are under their authority. 00:21:06.720 --> 00:21:08.720 What is God's desire for you in that situation? 00:21:08.880 --> 00:21:13.599 Verse 20, children, obey your parents in everything. 00:21:14.880 --> 00:21:15.680 Everything. 00:21:15.920 --> 00:21:20.960 Now, of course, in everything means everything. 00:21:21.200 --> 00:21:24.720 And of course, the everything is regulated by in the Lord. 00:21:24.880 --> 00:21:30.480 So if a parent asks you to do something that would displease the Lord, then you're under obligation not to obey it. 00:21:30.880 --> 00:21:33.680 But the everything is not up for you to decide. 00:21:34.160 --> 00:21:40.400 That is, it's not obey everything your parents tell you when they tell you to do something that's explicitly spiritual. 00:21:40.480 --> 00:21:41.599 Read your Bible, okay, I'll do that. 00:21:41.680 --> 00:21:42.319 Take out the trash. 00:21:42.400 --> 00:21:44.400 Eh, no, that's not in the Lord. 00:21:45.279 --> 00:21:48.240 No, according to this text, the Lord is in that garbage can. 00:21:49.119 --> 00:21:53.440 And you are to obey your parents, and when you do, that pleases the Lord. 00:21:53.680 --> 00:21:55.359 Obey your parents in everything. 00:21:55.599 --> 00:21:59.759 And notice the difference between verse 18 the wives' relationship to husbands is one of submission. 00:22:00.720 --> 00:22:02.480 Rendering a love gift to their husbands. 00:22:02.640 --> 00:22:07.119 But verse 20, children are to obey their parents in everything. 00:22:07.279 --> 00:22:17.200 That is, this is not a mutual relationship in which you come into an ordered unity where you are offering up all of your talents and gifts to your husband and you are making decisions together. 00:22:17.359 --> 00:22:19.039 That's not the way children relate to their parents. 00:22:19.200 --> 00:22:22.160 The way children relate to their parents is they obey their parents. 00:22:22.799 --> 00:22:33.920 There might be times where a child can offer a question to their parents, but children, your content the contingency for your obeying your parents is God said to, not whether you think it's wise or you understand it. 00:22:34.240 --> 00:22:38.079 I said so is a perfectly sufficient reason for you to obey your parents. 00:22:38.240 --> 00:22:39.039 Do you know why? 00:22:39.279 --> 00:22:39.839 Because of this. 00:22:40.000 --> 00:22:41.200 Look at the end of verse 20. 00:22:41.359 --> 00:22:42.960 Why do you obey your parents? 00:22:43.279 --> 00:22:45.759 Because this pleases the Lord. 00:22:46.160 --> 00:22:53.599 The primary way that you can measure your relationship with the Lord is through your relationship with your parents. 00:22:54.960 --> 00:23:00.480 If you are disrespectful and ungrateful towards your parents, you are disrespectful and ungrateful towards the Lord. 00:23:00.960 --> 00:23:06.000 The primary way that you as a child can measure your relationship with God is through your relationship with your parents. 00:23:06.319 --> 00:23:10.480 So let me just ask you, I'm looking around here and I'm noticing I see children. 00:23:12.079 --> 00:23:13.039 You have Jesus. 00:23:13.359 --> 00:23:15.279 Jesus loved you and gave himself for you. 00:23:15.759 --> 00:23:18.319 Then what Jesus wants for you is to obey your parents. 00:23:18.480 --> 00:23:21.759 And every time you obey your parents, you please Jesus. 00:23:22.079 --> 00:23:29.759 So when you hear a command from your parents, they tell you to do something, and you don't want to do it, then you ask yourself this question Is this what Jesus wants me to do? 00:23:29.839 --> 00:23:30.880 And the answer is yes. 00:23:31.279 --> 00:23:34.799 Then the reason you do it is because you love Jesus. 00:23:35.119 --> 00:23:37.440 Now I have a lot more to say on that. 00:23:37.599 --> 00:23:41.039 I have a very long sermon that I preach to teenagers on a regular basis. 00:23:41.359 --> 00:23:45.039 But this is my one chance to talk to the parents in the room. 00:23:45.599 --> 00:23:49.359 So I'm going to move right along here to the next half of this dynamic in verse 21. 00:23:49.519 --> 00:23:55.519 Look down at the rest of the text, and it says, Fathers, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. 00:23:55.680 --> 00:23:57.599 And that word for fathers is a gendered word. 00:23:57.680 --> 00:24:03.839 It's talking to fathers, and yet in the Greek-speaking world, it was common that sometimes you could say father's plural to refer to the mother and the father. 00:24:04.079 --> 00:24:08.079 Hebrews chapter 11, for example, Moses' fathers hid him from Pharaoh. 00:24:08.160 --> 00:24:09.759 That's not saying that he had two daddies. 00:24:09.920 --> 00:24:12.799 That's a normal Greek-speaking way of saying that father and a mother. 00:24:13.039 --> 00:24:16.160 Speaking of the father first in the sense of having leadership and responsibility. 00:24:16.319 --> 00:24:20.640 And you notice verse 21, this is speaking to both parents, both to the father and the mother. 00:24:20.799 --> 00:24:30.640 But I think one of the reasons that Paul says fathers, rather than just the generic word for parents, and there is a generic word for parents in Greek, is to emphasize that fathers are to step up and take responsibility. 00:24:30.880 --> 00:24:38.000 And I think that's very important, particularly in the modern day, where for most families, most of the time, mothers will end up spending a larger quantity of time with their children. 00:24:38.160 --> 00:24:40.400 I think that's the experience of most families. 00:24:40.559 --> 00:24:46.720 And in that situation, it's natural and normal for a fallen dad to think, well, I'm out here, I have these other responsibilities. 00:24:46.799 --> 00:24:48.000 That's her job. 00:24:48.240 --> 00:24:50.880 But according to God, no, that's your job too. 00:24:51.119 --> 00:25:00.480 Your responsibility is to provide your wife with all of the support, emotionally, spiritually, and parental support to enable her to do her duty before the Lord well. 00:25:00.559 --> 00:25:06.799 And your responsibility is to engage with your children directly and raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. 00:25:07.039 --> 00:25:11.759 Look at the rest of the text, what it says, Fathers, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. 00:25:11.839 --> 00:25:13.920 You notice it's just a negative command here. 00:25:14.079 --> 00:25:20.799 But in order to understand the negative command, I think we need to remind ourselves what is the positive command that fathers have towards their children. 00:25:21.039 --> 00:25:28.799 Fathers, Ephesians 6.4 says, do not provoke your children to anger, but here's the positive side: bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. 00:25:28.960 --> 00:25:31.200 This is core and fundamental. 00:25:31.920 --> 00:25:41.440 Your duty as a parent is to create an environment and a relationship with your children where you help them to glorify God and enjoy him forever. 00:25:41.680 --> 00:25:43.279 That's your duty as a parent. 00:25:43.440 --> 00:25:52.240 It's to create an environment in your home and cultivate a relationship with your children where you are helping them to glorify God and enjoy him forever. 00:25:53.680 --> 00:25:54.720 That's it. 00:25:54.960 --> 00:25:56.400 That's the bullseye. 00:25:56.559 --> 00:26:04.960 Everything else, a good college and good grades and sports and everything else, those are just manifestations of glorifying God and enjoying him forever. 00:26:05.200 --> 00:26:06.960 But they are not the bullseye. 00:26:07.039 --> 00:26:11.119 And if you make anything else the bullseye, you're not fulfilling your God-ordained duty. 00:26:11.359 --> 00:26:20.480 Your God-ordained duty is one task to create an environment and cultivate a relationship where you help your children to glorify God and enjoy him forever. 00:26:20.640 --> 00:26:24.160 You raise them in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. 00:26:24.480 --> 00:26:29.119 Now, once you understand that, you will be able to understand the negative command in Colossians chapter 3. 00:26:29.279 --> 00:26:31.039 Look at the text again, verse 21. 00:26:31.200 --> 00:26:34.559 Fathers, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. 00:26:34.720 --> 00:26:37.119 What kind of provoking is Paul referring to here? 00:26:37.279 --> 00:26:44.559 I have heard some fathers say, I don't want to spank my young child or I don't want to discipline my teenage child because they'll get provoked. 00:26:45.200 --> 00:26:47.119 Is that the kind of provoking that we're talking about? 00:26:47.279 --> 00:26:51.519 So, and if that's the kind of provoking that Paul we're talking about, then what kind of a squishy parent would you be? 00:26:51.599 --> 00:26:55.519 You'd have to be bending over backwards all the time to say, Teenage punk, what do you want from me? 00:26:55.759 --> 00:26:57.359 That's not parenting. 00:26:58.880 --> 00:27:05.440 The way the word understand provoking our children is, I think, pretty clearly demonstrated in the way this word gets used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament. 00:27:05.599 --> 00:27:07.279 Let me give you a couple examples here. 00:27:07.519 --> 00:27:16.960 In Deuteronomy and chapter 21, verse 20, parents who have a rebellious son bring him before the community and say, Our son, he is disobedient and provoked. 00:27:17.359 --> 00:27:19.839 He does not listen to our voice. 00:27:20.079 --> 00:27:24.160 Provoking here is the idea of a child who is provoked to rebel against God. 00:27:24.559 --> 00:27:33.440 You are not to lead your parents to parent your children to have a relationship with your children in such a way that you are cultivating in them rebellion against God. 00:27:33.680 --> 00:27:40.480 Here's another verse where the word is used in Proverbs 25, verse 23 A shameless face provokes the tongue. 00:27:40.640 --> 00:27:43.599 So how is it that you would provoke your kids by having a shameless face? 00:27:43.680 --> 00:27:44.559 What's a shameless face? 00:27:44.640 --> 00:27:51.039 That's an idiom in the Old Testament for a person who claims that they believe in God, but then acts in a way contrary to God. 00:27:51.440 --> 00:28:02.079 You will provoke your children and make them discouraged if you bring them to church, tell them that we're Christians, but then you live the rest of your life in a way that's contrary to the word of God. 00:28:02.240 --> 00:28:05.440 That will fundamentally provoke your children, and they'll become discouraged. 00:28:05.599 --> 00:28:06.400 Discouraged from what? 00:28:06.559 --> 00:28:11.279 Discouraged from the primary goal that you have for them, which is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. 00:28:11.440 --> 00:28:17.119 You'll discourage your children from knowing and enjoying the Lord if you act in a way that blasphemes him at home. 00:28:17.440 --> 00:28:31.519 What the Lord is commanding us to do as parents is to act in a way that enables our children to know the love of God in Christ, to know the goodness and the joy of righteousness, to see the beauty of God's truth. 00:28:31.680 --> 00:28:40.559 You're acting in such a way so as to cultivate in your children attitudes, habits, and disciplines that help them to know God and enjoy Him. 00:28:41.039 --> 00:28:42.559 This is your goal as a parent. 00:28:42.640 --> 00:29:00.880 So you ought to be able to ask yourself: everything that I'm doing as a parent, whether it's the bedtime that I set, the food that I give them, the sports that I place them in, how am I able to trace that back to developing in them attitudes that help them to know God and enjoy Him forever? 00:29:01.440 --> 00:29:03.279 This is the goal of all parenting. 00:29:04.319 --> 00:29:08.640 And to do anything less would be to provoke them lest they become discouraged. 00:29:08.720 --> 00:29:20.880 Now, there's obviously a number of ways in which we would do this, and I think it would be helpful because I, as I said, I'm the youth pastor, I don't always get to talk to the parents, but I have a thing or two to say to y'all. 00:29:21.839 --> 00:29:26.160 There are a number of very practical examples of ways in which you can provoke your children. 00:29:26.319 --> 00:29:28.960 Here are a few lack of affection. 00:29:29.680 --> 00:29:36.640 A parent who has unrealistic expectations that can never be attained, and so the kid just is never living up to his parents' expectations. 00:29:37.359 --> 00:29:41.599 That kind of relationship doesn't demonstrate what Colossians chapter 3, verse 12 says. 00:29:41.759 --> 00:29:48.079 Put it on, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. 00:29:48.640 --> 00:29:53.599 Parental instruction ought to entail affection, kindness, tenderness towards your children. 00:29:53.680 --> 00:29:54.880 That's a baseline starting point. 00:29:55.039 --> 00:29:56.640 Do you express kindness and tenderness? 00:29:56.799 --> 00:30:00.240 Are your children confident in the affection that you have for them? 00:30:00.799 --> 00:30:04.960 Here's another way that very commonly we could provoke our children: anger. 00:30:05.599 --> 00:30:11.279 Outbursts of anger towards your children accompany that with a lack of repentance. 00:30:11.440 --> 00:30:16.799 That's a surefire way to undermine any instruction that you're trying to give them in righteousness. 00:30:16.960 --> 00:30:21.519 Is when you live in such a way that you you act like you don't believe it. 00:30:21.759 --> 00:30:28.400 Because you're you're acting in ways that demonstrate what matters really ultimately, no matter what comes out of my mouth, what matters is me. 00:30:28.559 --> 00:30:32.319 And if you assault my little kingdom, I'm gonna get at you. 00:30:32.799 --> 00:30:40.160 That kind of tyrannical behavior is a surefire, simple way to undermine your child's ability to understand the love of God. 00:30:40.400 --> 00:30:51.359 Here's another simple way: a combination of lack of good standards and overprotective neutral standards. 00:30:51.519 --> 00:30:52.960 Here's what I mean by this. 00:30:53.279 --> 00:31:06.000 We live in a fairly affluent part of the world where it is a very common reality that parents have very, very, very, you could even say overprotective standards for their children's success in this world. 00:31:06.240 --> 00:31:19.119 Parents regulate their children's grades, they regulate their parents' activities, they regulate everything in their par in their children's lives in such a way as they are aiming, calculating, how do I help my kids succeed in this world? 00:31:19.359 --> 00:31:21.279 Now that's a neutral kind of standard. 00:31:21.359 --> 00:31:22.880 That's in a sense that's good. 00:31:23.119 --> 00:31:29.599 As you children grow up, you need to measure how much freedom you give them, and they ought to be able to develop responsibility and freedom. 00:31:29.839 --> 00:31:35.359 But you ought to be providing them structure so that they do develop good habits that will enable them to succeed in this world. 00:31:35.599 --> 00:31:51.119 But a surefire way to provoke them, to provoke in them rebellion and to discourage them from following the Lord is to have highly protective standards for enabling them to succeed in this world, but lacking any provision of standards to help them cultivate explicitly godly attitudes. 00:31:51.440 --> 00:32:00.480 And what I mean is, if you are constantly asking your children about their grades, but you never speak to them about their Bible reading, what are you communicating to them? 00:32:00.880 --> 00:32:04.559 W what kind of priorities are you cultivating in their hearts? 00:32:05.440 --> 00:32:17.359 When you tell your student your kid that they need to be on time to their practices, but then you send them to bed at night with an unlocked smartphone, what do you think you're communicating to them? 00:32:17.680 --> 00:32:28.960 In fact, on this point, if I can be provocative here for a moment, fathers, would you drop your son off at a brothel at night and tell him, exercise good judgment, and I'll pick you up in the morning. 00:32:29.920 --> 00:32:32.799 Then why do you send your son to bed with an unlocked smartphone? 00:32:33.200 --> 00:32:39.119 Your son has all kinds of sinful desires in his heart, and all the filth of the world is actively trying to assault him. 00:32:39.440 --> 00:32:44.160 Your duty as a father is to provide some spiritual protection and guidance. 00:32:44.400 --> 00:32:56.079 As much as we provide protection and guidance for success in this world, our chief priority ought to be protection and guidance to help our children flourish spiritually. 00:32:56.319 --> 00:33:04.559 We ought to be creating an environment and culting of a relationship wherein we enable our children to know God, to glorify him and enjoy him forever. 00:33:04.720 --> 00:33:07.200 That's the bullseye of parenting. 00:33:07.839 --> 00:33:16.880 Now, we've walked through two of these relationships here: our marriage in Christ and parenting in Christ, but there's one more relationship, and so we ought to hasten on to that. 00:33:17.119 --> 00:33:19.519 Work in Christ is what I'm going to call this relationship. 00:33:19.680 --> 00:33:21.519 Look at verse 22 and following. 00:33:21.839 --> 00:33:29.680 Bondservants in everything, obey those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye service as people pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. 00:33:29.759 --> 00:33:36.079 Whatever you do, work heartily is for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. 00:33:36.160 --> 00:33:37.759 You are serving the Lord Christ. 00:33:37.920 --> 00:33:38.880