INTRODUCTION
• If you love something, set it free. If it comes back, it will always be yours. If it doesn’t come back, it was never yours to begin with. But... If it just sits in your living room, watches your TV, messes up your stuff, eats your food, uses your telephone, takes your money, and doesn’t appear to realize that you actually set it free in the first place, you either married it or gave birth to it!
• In the beginning God created male and female and God said it was good. Then they got married got in trouble and had children. It can be quite a challenge to raise a family today.
• I believe that the family structure has been weakened because the family is getting away from God and His principles.
• We can blame the schools or society, but really the downfall of the nation and of the family comes from the fact that the family has no idea what its purpose is.
• Today I want to start out a series called “Focus on the Family”. Today we will focus on the purpose of the parents.
• Dr. Laura says in today’s American society, the role of the family, and of the parents, has been stripped down to its bare minimum. Emphasis, it seems, is placed on everything else--school, friends, oneself, TV, media--as the "shaping factors" in a young person’s personal and intellectual growth and development. Children are expected, even encouraged, to seek influence, teachers, and mentors outside the home. The radical groups are trying to say that there is no such thing as a traditional family. (DR. LAURA)
• As adults one of the most important jobs that we will do is to raise our families.
• Today I want to look at 4 tasks that will define our purpose as parents. These tasks will help enable the family to fulfill its’ purpose.
SERMON
One of the purposes of a parent is:
I. PARENTS MUST START WITH THE TASK OF LEARNING! 1-6
• READ DEUTERONOMY 6:1-6
• This seems like a given. Before we can do anything the way God wants us to, we have to learn for ourselves what God wants us to do. We have to know what we are to obey.
• Notice in verse 1, Moses is saying that he is teaching the people what God commanded him to teach. Moses knew what he was teaching.
• Notice what Moses says in verse 6. READ AGAIN SHALL BE ON YOUR HEART!
• Ignorance of God’s word is one of the things that are killing the church as well as the family.
• We are raising a generation of biblically literate people. We can blame the church, but this has to start in the home. It has to be taught by parents who themselves know the word of God.
• Notice that verse two tells us that Moses is teaching the people so that the parents can pass it to their children who will pass it to their children.
• We are not to just learn, but we are to do also! Verse 2 says that if we fear (respect) the Lord God the days of our lives will be prolonged. God’s Word is good for us!
• If we do not know God’s commandments, statutes and judgments, what are we passing on to the next generation?
• The next generation cannot do what they do not know. This starts at home.
• I believe that if you ask people in education they will tell you one of the problems with education today is that many parents have totally turned it over to the school, they do not participate in the education process. We turn our children completely over to the schools, and then wonder why they are not performing.
• Ask some of our people who work in the schools, they will tell you the ones who have been worked with and the ones who have not. In general, a child will not do well at school if they are not worked with at home. If we use terrible English, our kids will pick up and do the same thing. If our children are seeing a bad example of what it means to follow Jesus at home, chances are they will follow the same way.
• Our churches struggle because a lot of our children are not seeing true love and obedience to Jesus from us. When they see we do not take Jesus seriously, they will not either.
• Verse 5 gives us the key to the whole chapter, a key to our mission as individuals. READ IT.
• We are to follow verse 5, and then we are to model and teach that to our children.
Another one of the purposes of a parent is:
II. PARENTS ARE TO TEACH THE FAMILY WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED. 7-9
• Verse 7 tells us how as parents we are to impart what we know to our children.
• Men I want you to look long and hard at this passage. In many families it is the wife who is acting as the spiritual head of the house; WE have a responsibility as head of the house to take an active role in the education of our children.
• This is what happened with Timothy in the New Testament, his mother and grandmother taught him from God’s word. His grandmother taught his mother who taught it to him.
• Notice the method of teaching. We are to drop the kids off at the church door and then let the church do it all. WRONG!
• The church is here to help, but as parents it is your responsibility to teach your children about Jesus.
• For too many years men have made faith something for women and children, that thinking will kill the family and the church.
• Verses 7-9 basically tell us that the teaching is to happen all of the time while we are spending TIME with our children.
• When you WALK with them, SIT with them, when you lie down, when you rise up.
• Verses 8-9 says that God’s words are to be on your forehead, that is the Word is to be your guide. You are to bind them on your hand, or God’s word should lead the work of your hands, your house is to be built on a foundation with God as the center. The Jews did these things literally.
• Jesus used everyday occurrences to teach the people about the kingdom of heaven.
• Teaching has to come from BOTH MOTHER AND FATHER, if it does not it is confusing to the children. This is why I am not a fan of even so called inter-faith marriages. What ends up happening is that neither faith gets passed on, or just a form of religion is passed instead of a relationship with Jesus.
• We are to use the time with our children as a time to teach them about the kingdom of God. Start with them at birth. Instead of reading all fairy tales, read God’s word to them, let them watch Christian cartoons and videos.
• In the book of Joshua 24:15, Joshua just before his death challenged the people to follow God, "If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord."
• The people agreed to follow God, but when we get into the 2nd chapter of Judges, the people had already forgotten God. JUDGES 2:10 All that generation also were gathered to their fathers; and there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord, nor yet the work which He had done for Israel.
• Why didn’t the next generation know the Lord? Because they had forgotten what the purpose of the family was.
• Here is the dilemma, if you do not teach your children, the TV, their classmates or the video games will. Who gets your kids more, you, the TV the computer or the video games?
Another one of the purposes of a parent is:
III. PARENTS ARE TO SET AND PRIORITIES FOR THE FAMILY. 10-19
• As we learn about the kingdom of God, and as we teach our families about those things, we must take what we know and make sure that we as parents are setting the priorities for the family.
• Television has all but made fathers out to be stupid useless people and mothers out to be insignificant.
• Television teaches us that the kids have all of the answers, and that they set the agenda for the family.
• As a parent it is you job to make sure you child goes to school. Why? Because they need an education. Parents, it is your job to get you children to church, it is you job to get them to youth group even when they do not feel like it. Why? Because they need it! EXPAND
• It is the parents’ job to run the zoo.
• As we look in verses 10-19, Moses is warning the people about keeping their priorities straight.
• The people were going from poverty to prosperity and Moses was warning them not to forget what is important.
• When times are good, it is hard to keep focus on what is important, God knows that. VERSE 12.
• Verse 14 deals with idolatry, in the context it is dealing with the Israelites following false Gods, but the principle fits with idolatry. We are not to put anything ahead of God.
• Whatever is first in your life is your God. Matthew 6:21.
• We are told in verse17 that we are to diligently keep Gods command.
• Verse 18 tells us to do what is right before GOD! We worry too many times about doing what other people think is right. Part of setting our priorities is saying that we are going to do what God says is right. Some things are legal, but they do not please God.
Another one of the purposes of a parent is:
IV. PARENTS ARE TO BE A WITNESS TO THE FAMILY FOR JESUS. 20-25.
• READ VERSES 20-25
• We will be different than the world. As your children get out into the world they will see that. When they see that, they will ask you why you believe what you believe, why you live the way that you do.
• We need to have an answer to that.
• In the context these verses are dealing with the Israelites and the Promised Land, but it will work for us.
• What will you tell your children when they ask you why you are a Christian? What will you tell them when they ask you how to become one?
• One thing that will help you in your parenting is being able to explain why CERTAIN THINGS ARE RIGHT AND WRONG FROM A BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE. (Clothing Example). You will have the authority of God’s word behind you instead of some circular argument.
• Our children cannot be fooled; they will know what is important to us. We called to witness to and be a witness to our family.
CONCLUSION
• Joshua received a promise from the people before he died that they would follow God, a generation later Judges tell us that that did not happen. Not only did the family pay but also society paid the price.
• Tell me what you can give your children that is more important than a good Christian home where they look up to and respect you and what you believe.
• Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train up a child in the way he should go, Even when he is old he will not depart from it.” This is a general principle that will increase the chance that our children will follow Jesus.
• The purpose of the family is to pass on the faith to the next generation. We are to do all that we can to make sure our family is one that will pass on a solid faith in Jesus. This does not mean that all of our children will follow suit, but what it does mean is that when we stand before God, we should be able to say that we provided the most Christian home and atmosphere that we could at the time.
• Over the next few weeks we will look at some of the families in the Bible and their problems and triumphs to see what lessons we can learn from them.
