I suppose that as Christian parents we can manage just about anything that our
children do except if they abandon the church, if they abandon their faith. I
mean we'll survive as parents we'll survive the crazy music, the funny
hair, the clothes, the mistakes they make, the sins they commit foolish crazy
reckless selfish things they do because they're human beings and they're sinful
human beings as we are. We can manage all of that. We can love them and support
them through all of the ups and downs of growing up but if they lose their faith
we feel somehow that we have failed as parents. Even if they succeed in their
careers and they have good families if they stop serving the Lord Jesus Christ
it seems that all that effort was for nothing. Those late nights that
working of overtime to make enough money to provide this or that or the extra all
of that not worth it if they don't confess Christ anymore if they have no
use for the Lord if they have no faithfulness to the church. Because
Christian parents feel so strongly about the faith of their children and because
there are many children who come from Christian homes but eventually leave the
church and stop practicing their faith I believe it's important to examine some
of the mistakes not that they make some of the mistakes that we make as
Christian parents. Yes, as parents we sincerely want our children to be
faithful I've never met a Christian parent who who didn't think that was
important that was like the top important thing that their children.. we
all want that, but sometimes because of
our misconceptions of what godly parenting ought to be the exact opposite
takes place the opposite of what we wanted takes place. In an article written
by author Barry Gilreath, Jr., Power Magazine interesting he talked about
the five most common misconceptions that Christian parents have about raising
Christian children I'd like to kind of jump off of that and develop his ideas
here tonight. Five misconceptions: misconception number one that godly
parents have because I'm a Christian my children will automatically become
Christians. You know by osmosis my Christianity will bleed into their
Christianity. I mean just because you made this decision years ago as an
individual doesn't mean that your children will also make that decision
it's not a foregone conclusion. In the Bible the Old Testament Samuel prophet
servant of the Lord holy man serving God from an early age but Samuel's sons did
not follow after their father's ways the Bible says they took bribes and they
perverted judgment, I Samuel 8:3. Samuel was a godly prophet but
apparently he did not correct the faults of his children, it didn't come
automatically that they were holy men as their father was a holy man. Children
need to be taught and corrected and trained in the faith specifically if
they are to believe and live according to that faith. Parents we don't use this
word actually we don't use this word in relationship to our children but parents
must evangelize their own children and then they must disciple their own
children if they want them to be converted and then to be faithful and
then to be fruitful, it just doesn't happen automatically.
It's a willful thing, it's a planned thing, it's a thing that requires effort
and work and time. Just because we are Christian, just because we're faithful,
just because we're zealous doesn't mean that our children will be. Misconception
number two is the reverse of misconception number one my actions will
not influence my children's faithfulness. You cannot effectively teach children
with the method that says do what I say but don't do what I do.
Faithful parents who are involved usually produce faithful children who
are involved. Why is that so? Because their body, the parents, their bodies you
know are involved in doing things to service the Lord and they include their
children in that as well. A recent survey showed that when both
parents are faithfully active in the church 90 percent of the time their
children are also active in the church, well no kidding.
When both parents. Only six percent of children remain faithful if parents were
sporadic or not really involved or showed little interest, well how could it
be otherwise. If we choose every time to work every shift offered to us Sunday
nights, Wednesday night, every time there's a ship at extra shift we grab it
and we send along the wife and the kids and then we wonder down the
road how come the kids not interested in go to church on Wednesday night you
ought to be going to church Wednesday night well where were you on Wednesday
night where were you Sunday night? It's an old story but true
children are rarely more faithful than their parents are how could this not be?
Your influence and what you do as parents that's the key right I'm not
telling you something that is new here children do what we do not what we say.
They can filter all that stuff out. Misconception number three: my
children will naturally show respect and give authority to those in positions of
leadership. Respect for authority is taught in the home. If you're waiting
for your children's, you younger parents here, if you're
waiting for your children to go to school so that they can learn how to
obey and how to respond properly to authority it's too late, the teachers
that I talked to one of the most common complaint is well I don't mind teaching
school it's just having to raise everybody else's child that's difficult.
I don't mind teaching math and grammar it's teaching manners that's difficult
and respect because I suppose that all of that supposed to be being taught at
home so that I can you know get busy teaching math and geography and so on
and so forth. A child who doesn't respect the authority of his mother and father
will not respect the authority of Christ.
Will not respect the authority of Christ's word, will not respect the
authority and leadership of those in the church.
Respect and submission, the exercise of our own submission to another those
things are not automatic. Some parents want the minister or the elders
to get their children in line. Oh how many calls have I had with that intro.
Yeah well yeah hello yes oh sisters also yeah how you doing good yeah sure
you want to come over to the office it oh you're bringing your daughter yeah oh
you want me to talk to her? Really, so you've been talking to her 17 years she
hasn't listened to you you're going to bring her to me I'm going to talk to her?
She's going to listen to me? If they have the children if they'd been rebellious
with the parents and not corrected they won't know how to submit to anybody's
authority. Submitting to authority is a learned thing, we learn how to take our
own will and submit it to the will of another. Hopefully parents are teaching
that at an early age.
Unfortunately, these type of children are usually taught about respect and
authority after they get into trouble and they learn it the hard way. So much
better to learn those things from our parents than to learn it from teachers
principals you know policemen.
Misconception number four: forcing my children to come to worship service or
youth activities will make them rebel and hate the church. Some people think
that they should just let their children decide on their own about their faith, oh
I cringe when I hear people say this, I mean literally cringe. Well when
they're old enough they'll just make up their own minds about God and things
like that really? What does the Bible say? Bible says that, "The flesh sets its
desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in
opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please."
Galatians 5:17. You see what Paul is saying here? If left alone without guidance or
training the flesh will always always avoid what is difficult, avoid what is
godly, avoid what is spiritual always. Young people need to be trained in the
faith and made to understand that church attendance and involvement they're not
optional things, those are required. Some young people say well that's old-fashioned you
know, but how else how else can we impress on our children the importance
of not only just public worship but the importance of the church as part of our
life, as as part of our lifestyle? If the church is not important to the parents
how can ever be important to their children? I mean it's just it just
doesn't work. Parents need to teach their kids that
being unfaithful is as unacceptable as improper sex or taking drugs or quitting
school you know, what if your 16 year old came home and said you know what I'm not
into math, I don't think I'm going to take any math I'm just not going to go to the
class because you know I want to make up my own mind about things. Yeah how far do
you think you're going to get with that one? It's just a silly to say well I
don't want to hear anything about religion and I you can't force me to do
anything this is a free country, no.
Unfortunately in our society the mirror that we get is that the children are in
charge, the children are the smart ones, the children are going to figure out the
difficult problems in our society. And how will they do that? Well
they're going to take a day off from school in March. That's not how we solve
complex social issues. And children are not the spiritual leaders in the home,
the parents are the leaders the father is the leader spiritually and needs to
exercise his leadership. I think the thing that all parents understand is
that children will always challenge you that's part of growing up and we also
understand have learned through the years that parents who deal with the
challenge of their children and deal with it not harshly or meanly but simply
deal with it using the things that they believe in what is right what
is good, what is our families going to do gain the respect of their children. I
mean if you lose your children's respect you've lost the game. Our children didn't
like some of the arbitrary decisions that we made concerning where
they would go or who they could hang around with you know, Lise and I just
said you know that guy we don't like that guy we don't like that friend
there's just something about that friend we don't like and we don't want you to
hang her and we would get but well that's not fair and you haven't
interviewed them and but that was our job to make that decision and invariably
later on you know they would come back and you know years later and say you
know dad you know you probably forgot that time but you were right that guy
there you you nailed it or mom you nailed it yeah. Another misconception:
without a good youth minister and a dynamic youth group program my children
will not grow spiritually. This idea has crept into the church because in the
last several decades our society has delegated the responsibility for raising
their children to other people. Daycares get them at an early age so mom
can go back to work I have no comment about that in the Bible
doesn't say anything about that that's just the reality of what's taking place,
schools have them after that, extracurricular activities camp sports
organizations keep them busy after school on weekends TV the internet
watches them the rest of the time. So when it comes to faith building it's
easy to think that we can hand this job over like we've done everything else to
someone else that's my point. Personally I became a Christian when I
was 30 years old, I had never attended Bible school, never in my life
didn't even know what it was, I'd never been taught by a 'youth minister,'
I'd never been part of a youth group never been to a camp to a rally nothing
devo didn't even know what that was, but somebody shared the gospel with me and I
obeyed it and 41 years later, here I am.
What children need is to hear the gospel and see the gospel being lived and
encouraged to obey the gospel themselves. Paul tells us the gospel is the power of
God unto salvation, not camps, you know these things are tools. Now don't get me
wrong these are important
ways to help young people live out their faith and here in Choctaw we've
benefited by having Mike and Jessica working with our youth a program it's
expanded it's given activities to the young people, it's developed them
spiritually many baptisms have occurred absolutely. But coming to faith happens
when you hear the word of God irregardless of who preaches it to you.
Youth ministers and workers youth programs are meant to reinforce what
parents have instilled in their children not replace the parents.
And I know many youth ministers that's usually their number one not complaint
but observation about their jobs, that they want to be able to reinforce and
support and encourage the things that the parents are teaching their children
they want to be able to reinforce that with various activities, but they
don't want to replace the parents. Now brother Galbreath mentioned five I
had a sixth I've got to contribute something to this sermon. Here's
misconception number six about godly parenting: parents deserve all the credit
or all the blame for the success or failure of their children. I know that
much of this lesson has stressed the importance of the parental involvement
in the spiritual lives of their children however we must remember that each child
has free will and in the end is responsible for their decisions and
their actions regarding their faith. I used to say to our children when they
were still home growing up you and I are connected with a rope, that rope is
called responsibility and right now you're young 12, 13
the length of rope between being used about that long and I hold that
rope tightly but as you grow older I'm going to give you more rope because the
goal for me as a parent is to eventually let go the rope. So the faster you take
the rope, 'responsibility' the more rope I give you the less responsibility
that you take the more rope I take back.
Because in the end I would say to them this is your life not mine
your life you're going to get to decide, you're going to vote and there's only one
vote that will count and that will be your vote.
I'm only here a little while so that you don't spin completely out of control
while you are mature while you were young while you were learning how to
live.
Parents need to avoid the two extremes in raising faithful children: on one side
some parents they think that they take all the credit for faithful sons and
daughters. They are under the impression that through their efforts a discipline
and Christian example their children have no option but to turn out okay.
Of course this attitude is based on pride and it leads to self-righteousness.
These kind of parents use their children and their parenting skills as the
standard that everybody else should use. After all they've succeeded and they've
proven that they're right and their methods have worked.
They usually have become critical and intolerant of other parents weaknesses
and failures thinking if those parents would just do it like I do
it they'd have the same success as me. Now people who think this way are
missing a few important facts, for example all the correct teaching and
example will not influence a child who refuses to respond. Have you ever had a
kid that says no? Do not smoke cigarettes, bad wrong your dad tried it for 20
years no good, you know all the teaching in the world about the evil of
tobacco and what do they do? Just want to try it.
I picked that's an easy one they say no to you. In the Bible David taught Solomon
and gave the example but Solomon became unfaithful anyways. Parents who succeed
owe their success to many people not just themselves. Certainly they owe it to
the Lord, they owe it to their children who decide to respond, they owe it to
family to teachers ministers coaches mentors people who have helped along the
way. Their self-righteousness in thinking that it's all on them that they've
succeeded all by themselves is sinful and they may also be modeling this
attitude for their children to carry on for another generation and this is an
awful burden for children to carry around, my parents work 100% successful
and if I'm not successful well boy you know I'm a failure.
Parents who take all the credit for their children's faith set themselves up
for a terrible disappointment if ever their children do not line up to their
standards. Self-righteous parents tend to either be unforgiving when their
children fail or when others fail or they swing over to the other extreme
they take all the blame. Think about it now, if you're
totally responsible for all the success well then you should be totally
responsible for all the failure too, you can't have one without the other.
As I said, two extremes the other extreme is some parents take all the blame. I've
seen so many parents with extreme feelings of guilt because their children
are unfaithful or unsuccessful in life they think it's their fault. Now
sometimes there's reason for guilt, dad was too busy, mom was an
alcoholic, parents were unfaithful to the church for many years a lot of reasons.
Again we need to remember that regardless of our ability to be ideal
parents the final decision rests with the child.
Jesus says that those who seek will find Matthew 7:7, Ezekiel says that the
children will not be punished for the sins of the fathers and the father's
will not be punished for the sins of the children Ezekiel 18:10-18. What this
means is that God recognizes that both parents and children will sin will fail
in many ways and each will be judged on their own. That parents did a poor job in
bringing their children to the faith will not be a valid excuse for children
to use at their own judgement.
The judgments on us. I have to bear my judgment for my decisions and
our children will have to do the same.
Taking all the blame is as bad as taking all the credit because it comes from the
very same place it comes from pride. These parents would take all the credit
if they could but because their children failure is evident they take all the
blame instead and of course this type of attitude leads to the cynicism and
negativism and a loss of personal faith. Parents who take all the
blame lose heart because they think what's the
use of trying you do your best and you still fail and already parenting let's
face it is the most guilt producing activity that an individual can be
involved in. Yeah, you don't have to do it on purpose to put guilt on yourself it's
already built into the activity. Taking all the blame also misses several
important points: first of all the child has a role to play and part of the blame
belongs to him or to her; you can bring a horse to water right but you can't make
a drink. Parents who fail have usually fought
against bad influences at school or sickness or problems in the family the
many traps set by Satan to ensnare a child. As much as you want to be
with a child and teach and mentor and so on and so forth if you're a full time
caretaker of your mother who's got cancer yeah that's going to cut into
your parenting time, if your husband's an alcoholic yeah that might be difficult
to kind of maintain family faithfulness and then let's have a devo yeah.
You might have a little trouble
if the child himself has a serious illness. How about a
child who suffers from chronic depression. So let's not be too fast
to take all the blame, it's a sinful world, it's a fallen world, it's not a
cop-out but some parents have less to work with and greater obstacles to
overcome than other people. And of course we need to remember it's not over until
it's over.
Many who take all the blame usually are too quick to throw in the towel. Maybe
they're tired, maybe they're lazy, maybe they're fed up of trying so it's easier to
take all the blame and then just give up on the faith that their children should
have. Parents with unfaithful children should never give up praying never give
up hope never give up trying to influence their children for Christ. How
many parents have I told that particular thing to? I don't know what to do pray
and they go oh yeah pray as if that's like nothing, as a Christian we have
access to the throne of God in prayer.
I think that the majority of our time the majority of our effort on behalf of
our children as life moves on is through prayer. We only have them with us a few
years right just a few years and it goes by very quickly, after that they're on
their own they're doing their thing they're independent of us making all
their own decisions but we can still pray to the very end to the very very
very end we should continue to pray.
There would be a lot less jealousy and strife in the church if each parent used
the Bible as the standard for good parenting and Christ as the point of
comparison for their children instead of comparing their parenting skills and
their children to other parents in the congregation that's a recipe for
disaster right there. When we measure ourselves against God's word, when we
judge ourselves and our children's faith in actions against Jesus the Christ
there'll be no room for boasting there'll be no delusions that we are
responsible for everything because we're not. And so regardless of our
parenting abilities or the relative success of our children in school or in
their Christian walk we all want the same thing don't we? We want all of our
children to go to heaven, that's what we want. Your children my children your
grandchildren and my grandchildren we want them to go to heaven. Each parent
should want that for every child not just your own child. Hell is too terrible
a place to be for us to feel smug and self-confident because we see someone
else's child failing in faith and for some reason or other that makes our kid
look good. My heart breaks for your child if your child is a rebel
is going away from Christ and our own children are only one decision away from
from leaving the faith. We should mourn for every child who struggles every
child trapped in disbelief because it could easily be our child in that
situation. We should support and encourage one another as parents because
we cannot control the outcome of our children's passage through adolescence
and adulthood. We can affect it but we can't control it. In the end every
faithful child is the product of the effort of many people instead of being
self-righteous we should rather be thankful. And every child who fails is
the product of the weakness of many people instead of continually feeling
guilty repent let's ask God to forgive us so that we can have a positive and
hopeful attitude who knows who knows. When our children see us repenting and
making changes it gives them an image of what to do in their own lives with their
own sins. So if you need to repent because you recognize that you've been
at one extreme or the other I would encourage you to do that. If
you're wondering where do I start as a parent recognize and acknowledge the
things that you actually have done and repent of those and ask God to forgive
you and begin an active aggressive prayer life on behalf of your children
whether they're 14 or 44 or 64. God will hear those prayers on their behalf. Now
if you're not a godly parent because you've not given your own life to God
through faith in Christ expressed in repentance and baptism well of course
that each opportunity when anyone is in this pulpit to preach or to teach we
extend the opportune for those to come and confess Christ and
to be immersed if that's something that you may need at this time then we do
encourage you to do that as well as brother Harold will lead us in our song
of encouragement. Shall we stand in sing that song please.