Better Kids 7 Ways

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Introduction
1. 1 Corinthians 13:11
2. The father draws the lines
3. Principles are taught so children can live

Seven Propositions

1. The father always establishes the atmosphere in the home.
a. Genesis 2:15 – Guide, guard, govern, Prophet, priest, king
b. You’re only qualified to lead to the degree you’re willing to serve.
c. The revelation of God that your family is going to have is what they see as you live in front of them.

2. A father must love his family redemptively.
a. The love of God is unconditional, sacrificial, and redemptive
b. When you give your word to somebody, you are giving them the character behind the word. Trust is extended only to the limit of truth and no more.
c. When you give your word to your children or your wife, you redeem your word when you keep it.
d. Sometimes children don’t know the difference between a broken promise and a lie.

3. It’s not the father’s responsibility to make all his childrens’ decisions, but it is his responsibility to let his children see him make his.
a. Remember, children may not always listen to you, but they will always imitate you.
b. Decisions determine character, conduct, and destiny.
c. Everything in life is under your power of choice, but once you make the choice, you become the servant to the choice.

4. It is the father’s responsibility to give his children four things: intimacy, discipline, love, and value.

5. A father can be either a fabulous father or a deadly dad.
a. You can be both: David with Adonijah and Solomon
b. We don’t need to raise streetwise children, we don’t need to raise churchwise; we need to raise Godwise children.

6. If you go to church and then go home and never read the Bible or pray with your children, you have a problem. Atheism is simply living as if there is no God.

7. Teach truth, but put it in the positive and not in the negative.
Application: Pray together with each other.

Turn with me to 1 Corinthians 13:11. The Word of the Lord says, “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”

When a child is between the ages of newborn and three years old, there are only two things you can give that child—love and security. God anatomically created the woman so that when she holds the baby to feed it, she gives it security. As the baby nourishes in her arms, her eyes and her face lovingly look and nourish the child emotionally.

As a child grows, it can only respond to concrete authority because it cannot be reasoned with. But between the ages of three and thirteen, you begin to teach children the difference between right and wrong. They are taught a reasoning process, and their will is brought under submission. The will should never be broken, but it needs to be brought under submission by the process of reason. Isaiah said, “Come now, let us reason together, saith the Lord.” Up until thirteen years of age, children learn the reasoning process. That’s why in our society when a young person reaches thirteen, they can take their SAT test and pretty well tell how they’re going to do in college. Their life’