TEXT: Genesis 25 & 27
TITLE: The Good, the Bad, the ugly of parenting!
SERIES: Home Health Care
TOPIC: Parenting
OCCASION: Burnside Christian Church, July 20, 2008
PROP.: Parenting isn’t easy, there are good techniques and bad techniques lead to some ugly results!
INTRODUCTION: One of the greatest joys Lindsay and I have experienced has been growing up with your children. Before stepping into the role of Preaching minister, I was the youth minister for 7 years. So think about that just for a second. I was here when your teenager who is now 17, celebrated their 10th birthday! I’ve grown up with your kids. I have greatly enjoyed every aspect of it! And I’ve just witnessed their growth from a distance.
Can I tell you a secret? My favorite show on TV is Jon & Kate plus 8. It’s REAL TV.
What I love about it, is I love watching them parent! They really are good parents! How brave they are! One of the scariest things about parenting is whenever you go into public, your parenting skills are on display. One thing I’ve learned from parenting by watching and through observing is that parenting is messy and tiring! But parenting is also very rewarding!
Our text for the day brings us to Genesis 25. We are continuing in a series called: Home health Care. And this morning’s title is: The Good, The Bad and the Ugly of parenting! What I want you to know today, that in Genesis chapter 25, we have the first reality parenting show. Isaac and Rebekah are whose lives are exposed and laid bare for everyone to see the faults and the successes of parenting. I want to share these with you today!
First, let’s examine
I. The Good (vs. 19-34)
Let’s read: Genesis 25:19-21
19 This is the account of the family line of Abraham’s son Isaac.
Abraham became the father of Isaac, 20 and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah daughter of Bethuel the Aramean from Paddan Aram [c] and sister of Laban the Aramean.
21 Isaac prayed to the LORD on behalf of his wife, because she was childless. The LORD answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.
To be quite honest with you, as you look over the parenting techniques of Isaac and Rebekah, there just aren’t a lot of good qualities to rave about!
But the first one I notice in scripture is found in Genesis 25:21
“. . .21 Isaac prayed to the LORD on behalf of his wife, because she was barren. The LORD answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.”
1. Isaac and Rebekah were joined together in prayer! (verse 21)
A. Praying together as husband and wife is cool!
Praying together as a couple unites you unlike anything else can!
Illustration: Prayer Journals!
Are you and your spouse praying together? For your kids? For your marriage? For your family?
B. They were diligent at praying! (verse 20 & 26)
How long did Isaac and Rebekah pray? I’m so glad the text reveals it! If you’re not careful, you’ll miss it. I did! How old was Isaac when he married Rebekah? (for a hint, see verse 20.) He was 40 years old when he prayed for Rebekah! How old was Isaac when his twin boys were born? Verse 26. Isaac was 60 years old when Rebekah gave birth! That means…ISAAC AND REBEKAH PRAYED FOR 20 YEARS!
Be diligent in praying! I know we have parents who pray for your kids faithfully. You pray for their future spouse.
While you are praying and waiting, God is making YOU spiritually fit to receive what he’s gonna do! God’s working on you! And every time you kneel down in faith, God is working on YOU! He’s working on your faith! Prayer just isn’t changing things and situations…prayer changes us! What was God doing for the 20 years while Isaac prayed? God was working on Isaac!
2. They went to God with their problems (verse 22 & 23)
Notice in verse 22: “The babies Jostled each other within her, and she said, ‘Why is this happening to me?’ So she went to inquire of the Lord.” 23 The LORD said to her,
"Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated;
one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger."
She felt something was not right with this pregnancy! Those who have been pregnant and lost a baby, you can understand the worry, the anxiety that Rebekah was feeling!
--She had been barren her whole life. And finally she was pregnant and she didn’t want to lose these babies! She didn’t have a doctor she could visit. She didn’t have ultra-sounds. She did have God! So she went to God and God told her exactly what’s going on. And it’s just ‘great’ news! God tells her that the kids she is carrying are not going to get along when they are born…and they are all ready going at it before they were born!
God tells them in verse 23 that the OLDER SON, WILL SERVE THE YOUNGER ONE!
When your family is faced with a crisis who do you go to? Doctors are great! God given blessing! Go see the doctor! Counselors are wonderful! Wisdom from another one’s perspective can be enlightening and is certainly Biblical! But the along with those things, the first place you and your family need to go is to your knees in prayer before the Lord!
How many times have you said, “Honey, we need to pray about this!” in the past year?
ILLUSTRATIONS: One of the things I will always remember about my mom is this: When I was in Jr. High and High School (basically old enough to wake myself up using an alarm clock), I would come down stairs, eat some breakfast and watch TV before getting ready for school. When I would come down stairs, I would walk into the living room and there my mom would be sitting in an old rocking chair…still in her robe…sipping hot tea and reading her Bible. Every morning she would do that! I know this is something that she does to this day! My mom goes to God to see what He has to say to her! What a powerful lesson that was for me to see each and every morning! To see how important God’s word was to my mom helped me understand how important it is for me!
Parents - when you are faced with trouble…GO TO GOD…AS A FAMILY!!!
3. They let their kids learn from their mistakes!
Look at verses 29 - 34
29 Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. 30 He said to Jacob, "Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!" (That is why he was also called Edom. [g] )
31 Jacob replied, "First sell me your birthright."
32 "Look, I am about to die," Esau said. "What good is the birthright to me?"
33 But Jacob said, "Swear to me first." So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
34 Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left.
So Esau despised his birthright.
This was a poor choice of Esau’s. The decision was anything but good! However, the birthright was rightfully his as the oldest son! The birthright was reserved for the firstborn son. With it, he got a double portion of the inheritance and he was responsible for the well being of the family after the dad would die. Twice as much ‘stuff’ (land, animals, money) as the other kids in the family.
Should the oldest son ever get in dire financial straights, it could be sold. There was value to the birthright. And it was certainly worth more than a bowl of soup.
So where was Isaac while this unfair deal was reached? Maybe Isaac didn’t know about this deal at the time. But he certainly became aware of it and why did he do nothing?
I believe it’s because Isaac allowed his son to live with his mistake. His son was grown up and able to make decisions for himself.
I’ve known parents who continually cleaned up the messes of their fully grown kids! There would be a son or a daughter who would be in financial trouble and would call mom or dad to help bail them out. Do you think this helped those kids learn?
Sometimes, the best thing you can do is:
A. ALLOW YOUR KIDS TO MAKE MISTAKES!
--BUT DON’T LET THEM MAKE MISTAKES THAT WILL FOREVER HURT THEM OR FOREVER SCAR THEM:
In other words…
Spiritual decisions
I’m not suggesting that you let your kids make decisions that will hurt them spiritually - THEY DON’T GET TO DECIDE IF OR WHEN THEY WILL GO TO CHURCH. THEY DON’T GET TO DECIDE WHAT RELIGION THEY WILL BE. They are not going to make decisions that will hurt them spiritually.
Physical decisions:
Also, I’m not suggesting that you let your kids make decisions that will hurt them physically! THEY DON’T GET TO DECIDE TO TOUCH A HOT STOVE…THEY DON’T GET TO EXPERIMENT WITH DRUGS…those would be decisions that would hurt them!
But there are certain decisions you can allow your kids to make and when they make those choices, it will help them learn from their mistakes!
Your kids will learn through failing. When they are learning to walk, they will fall. And it’s when they fall that will learn better how to walk. Same is true from bike riding. Are your kids going to learn to ride the bike by always having the training wheels on? There will come a time when you take the training wheels off so they will learn how to ride on their own!!
ILLUSTRATION: MY DAD LET ME TRADE MY CAR FOR A FIERO.
When I went off to college, I still had close contact with my mom and dad. I can remember calling them with big decisions I’ve been faced with. One decision I made was to trade my Buick Skylark for a Pontiac Fiero…straight up. I called Dad about it. Told him the details and asked him what he would do. He said, it’s your decision, but if it were me, I’d stick with the Skylark. So what did I do? I chose the Fiero. POOR CHOICE! But dad let me learn from my mistakes. I’M GLAD MY DAD LET ME LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES!
Isn’t this what God allows us to do? Doesn’t he allow us to make mistakes and then learn from them?
So those are the good things that Isaac and Rebekah did as parents: They prayed together, they went to the Lord with their problems, and they let their kids make mistakes.
But there were some bad things they did as parents. Let’s talk about that:
II. The bad
1. The parents had favorites!
Jacob and Esau may have been twins…but they were different!
Verse 27 & 28
27 The boys grew up, and Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the open country, while Jacob was a quiet man, staying among the tents. 28 Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.
Esau - was more like his dad - an outdoors kind of guy. A man of the open country. A hunter who loved wild game. Esau was loud. Boisterous. And got things done. He was hairy and very masculine. Aggressive.
Jacob - was more like his mom. Soft spoken. Quiet. Passive.
And the problem wasn’t that they were different, the problem was that the parents preferred one over the other. And how did they show which one they loved more? Who knows?
But parents…go out of your way to make sure your kids love them all the same! And the best way to show you love them the same is through consistency!
Consistent in your discipline!
Consistent in your gifts!
Consistent in your rules!
Consistent in your love!
When you don’t treat your kids with the same kind of love, it breeds jealousy! Nothing good comes from playing favorites!
ILLUSTRATION: What did Jacob learn as a result of his mom and dad’s unhealthy love? Jacob had favorites!
You remember Jacob’s kids, right? He had a favorite! Joseph. And Isaac loved Joseph more than any of his other sons! And he made for Joseph a robe that was richly ornamented! It was decorated really nice!
2. They weren’t parenting as a team
In chapter 27, we see an elaborate hoax unfold.
Isaac is old and is wants to pass along the blessing to the oldest son. This was the blessing God had first established with Abraham: Your nations will be great…I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you.
But Rebekah convinces her son Jacob to impersonate Esau by wearing a goat suit and tricking Isaac into blessing him!
Why would Rebekah undermine the authority of her husband? It goes back to the consequence of Eve’s decision in the garden! “Your desire will be for your husband…” She desired her husband’s authority!
One had one set of goals. The other parent had a completely different set of goals!
These two parents weren’t only not PARENTING together, they were headed in opposite directions! They weren’t communicating, they weren’t supporting each other’s decisions and it was having adverse effects on how their kids behaved!
There is nothing you can do to ensure that your kids grow up to follow the Lord. But there are things you can do to ensure they won’t! Learn from the mistakes of parents who have gone on before you! Resolve to be different! Put aside the BAD techniques of parenting! Repent of bad parenting techniques.
Well, let’s look at the ugly side of parenting…
III. The ugly
So this part of the message is for all of the kids out there. Raise your hand if you were born to parents. See, not everyone here is going to be married. Not everyone here is going to have kids. But we are all children to the parents that raised us. Listen to me today: HONOR YOUR FATHER AND MOTHER IN THE LORD! Ephesians 6:2
How do you do that? Make decisions that will make your parents proud!
The UGLY side of parenting is when your kids make poor decisions that just break your heart! That don’t honor how you’ve trained them to be!
When your kids grow up and go out on their own, they are going to be responsible for their own decisions.
You see, Jacob and Esau made some decisions in their life that didn’t honor their Mom and Dad.
And when that doesn’t happen, it’s more than sad…it’s ugly!
Look at three decisions that didn’t bring honor to their parents:
1. Jacob deceived his dad!
--Lying to your parents doesn’t bring them honor! It doesn’t make them proud! It doesn’t make them say: “that’s my boy!”
2. They married ungodly women!
Notice what it says: Genesis 26:34,35
34 When Esau was forty years old, he married Judith daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and also Basemath daughter of Elon the Hittite. 35 They were a source of grief to Isaac and Rebekah.
Is your daughter or son dating a non-Christian? WHY? “Because there are no Christian kids they are interested in…” So let me get this straight - you are saying that it’s better to date an unbeliever than to not date at all? What’s wrong with this picture?!?!
You say, “well, it’s harmless. They are only in high school…” So you are planning on saying something to them when they get SERIOUS about a relationship? LISTEN…if you don’t set up the healthy practice now, you are going to experience pain!
If you don’t step in now and raise your kids right…do you think they are going to marry a Christian woman?
Kids, pursue relationships that honor your parents! That your parents will be proud of!
CONCLUSION: Parents, I want to leave you with this question: what is the goal of parenting? Successful parenting is doing all you can you to raise Christian kids that honor you and bring glory to God.
And so I want to leave you with the model for successful parenting as found in the Bible. There are four things that a healthy family has:
1. They have a God who rules! --God’s word is read and enforced
2. They have a dad who leads! --
3. A Mom who loves! -- a loving, supportive mom…
4. Kids who obey!
