And this is Eleanor Mann. We are continuing our discussion today of Titus chapter two, verses three through five. And specifically what we are talking about today is verse four, the last half of verse four, which says, so that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands and to love their children. So the last two weeks we have talked about what it means to love our husbands. And so today we're going to talk about what it means to love our children. Sharon, I see that you have joined us. Welcome. We are glad for you to be here with us. I try to welcome everybody. You're welcome. I try to greet everyone as you come on the screen and I think sometimes I'm pretty good and sometimes I'm not all that good at it so I apologize. Sometimes I get so excited about what we're learning. I forget to check and see who has joined us. So that's something I'm working on. So I feel, um, what I was going to say is I feel kind of silly to, uh, initially to address a topic, how to really love your children because you also obviously do love your children. Thelma, you're holding your child right there on your lap. Um, Jodine has a new one that she is learning to take care of in this last week since she's been born. Sarah has her baby growing within her and we pray that she may have had to leave. I don't see her with us anymore right now. Anyhow, you guys know what it means to love your children, but as I was looking at scripture today, I think sometimes there is an aspect of loving our children that we maybe don't focus on to the degree that God would have us do that. Most of the time when we think of loving our children, we think of showing them affection, of caring for them, of feeling a strong emotion for them. And that certainly is a part of it. But scripturally speaking, there is a whole different aspect from God's perspective of showing love. And let's talk about that for a minute. Turn to Hebrews 12. And let's look at verse 6. Thelma, can you read Hebrews 12, verse 6, please? And I see your note, lazy lady, that is just fine. You do not need to unmute. Okay, Thelma, Hebrews 12, verse 6. And I see your note, lazy lady, that is just fine. You do not need to unmute. Okay, Thelma, Hebrews 12, verse 6. And I see your note, lazy lady, that is just fine. You do not need to unmute. Okay, Thelma, Hebrews 12, verse 6. And I see your note, lazy lady, that is just fine. You do not need to unmute. Okay, Thelma, Hebrews 12, verse 6. And I see your note, lazy lady, that is just fine. You do not need to unmute. Okay, Thelma, Hebrews 12, verse 6. And I see your note, lazy lady, that is just fine. You do not need to unmute. Okay, Thelma, Hebrews 12, verse 6. And I see Okay, Thelma. I'm sorry the Sound quality is not not very good. It may be from my end But I it was a little bit hard to understand that so I'm going to reread it. Okay Hebrews 12 6 for those whom the Lord loves he disciplines and he scourges every son whom he receives and The verse before that said, my son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord nor faint when you were reproved by him. And then it goes on to say, for those whom the Lord loves, he disciplines and he scourges every son whom he receives. So this is specifically talking about God's love and comparing it to parental love. But it specifically says that those whom the Lord loves, he disciplines. So God disciplines those whom he loves. So in other words, discipline is a form of showing love to our children, because that is the example that God gives us. When I first read this, it was kind of a surprise to me until I started reading a little further down the chapter. Let's look at same chapter, Hebrews 12, but verses 10 and 11. Lana, can you read that for us, please? Can you tell me the scripture one more time? Yes, that's fine. It's Hebrews 12 verses 10 and 11 and Let me mention too. I'm sorry. I we sent you guys the notes I tried to get them up on the screen and I was having trouble doing that. So I'll see if I can't figure out how to work screen share next week, but you should have these notes in your email and So if you want to look at them, you can. The notes that I sent out are a little bit different than what I'm teaching right now, but they have some good material. I would encourage you to look at that, look up the scriptures. And next week when we continue with this, we can answer questions and talk more about it. Okay. So Lana, Hebrews 12 verses 10 and 11. Our fathers disciplined us for a short time as they thought best, but God disciplines us for our good so that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems enjoyable at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it yields the hardest of righteousness and peace to those who have been trained by it. Okay, good. So, The they that it's talking about in verse 10, as Lana said, specifically is referring to fathers, but it also refers to mothers, that God disciplines us for our good. Therefore, if we are disciplining our children according to God's direction and example, then we are going to be disciplining them for their good. And we are gonna be doing it as an expression of our love for them. so that they can become more holy in their response to God, in their response to us, and just in their lives. That's our goal with our children. And I want to digress just a minute because Timothy, let me turn to Timothy, Timothy, was one of Paul's disciples who was very instrumental in the development of the early church. And I was reading something the other day about his early life that really surprised me, but it gave such a good example of what we're talking about right here. Acts 16.1 Paul came also to Derbe and to Lystra, and a disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek. And it was at this point that Paul took Timothy under his wing and discipled him, and then ultimately left him to pastor the church at Ephesus and be a great help in Paul's ministry. But the thing that struck me is that Timothy did not come from a believing family. His mother was a believer, but his father was a non-believer. His father was a Greek. So even though his father was not a believer, God's hand was on Timothy's life And he brought him under the discipleship of Paul. And Paul developed the input that Timothy's mother and grandmother already had had in his life as a child. We're going to look at that in just a moment. And used that to help him become the man God wanted him to be. So to me, that was a real encouragement. In my life, my mother was a professed believer in Christ. My father died when I was young, when I was 11. And so she basically raised us herself on her own. I have a brother and a sister, so there were three of us. I'm the oldest. We did not go to church regularly. We went some, but we didn't do any kind of Bible reading or anything like that. And I actually did not become a Christian until my freshman year in college. But it's just an encouragement to me to read that God does not regard our background in terms of our worth in his kingdom. It's what kind of a response we give to him and also the valuable input that a mother can have in the life of her child, okay? Because I had never seen this before. I assumed that both of Timothy's parents were believers, but his father was not. So skip over to 2 Timothy, chapter one. And we'll read a little bit more about Timothy's background. 2 Timothy, whoops, I'm in the wrong book. 2nd Timothy chapter 1 verse 5. Okay. Jodine, can you read that? Are you able to read or do you need to just listen today? Yeah, I can read. Okay, 2nd Timothy chapter 1 verse 5. So Timothy's faith was something which he learned from both his grandmother and his mother. They had a profound impact and influence on his life as a child. And Paul commends him for that and commends his mother and grandmother for the input they had in his life. So when we are reading these things that are talking about disciplining our children, because the word discipline is the same root word is in the word discipline as is in the word disciple. And it means to teach, but it means Not just to teach to a group for instance like I'm doing right now. It means to teach one-on-one Training that person by demonstrating both by your own example and by your specific focused input in their lives What it is you want them to learn so it's a very focused training and that's the kind of input that both Eunice and Lois had in their grandson and son Timothy's life. So it's exciting to me that God's designed it for us to have a real impact, spiritual impact in our children's lives. So let's look at one other verse about Timothy's early years. Still in the second Timothy, but let's go over to chapter three, verses 14 and 15. And who wants to read? Let's see. Anybody want to volunteer to read? Okay. You guys read. Yes, I'll read. Please watch the video. Well, good to go. Thank you. A volunteer, a brave one. So, Second Timothy 3 verses... Second Timothy what? Chapter 3 verses 14 and 15. OK, Second Timothy chapter 3, there is 14 and 15, right? That's right. OK, I read. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, 15, and how from infancy you have known the holy scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Okay, the you in this is Timothy. Paul is speaking directly to Timothy and he's telling you to continue in the things that he learned and then specifically we know from verse 15 he's talking about from childhood or like Chigo read even infancy. Pardon me? Jodine, are you talking to us? I don't want to ignore you. Sorry, my husband came with the baby. Oh, yeah. Yeah, the baby's condition was low. Ah, okay. Okay. Yeah. Well, welcome. Okay. Okay. Well, if you, you, if you need to go take a tear, if you need to go take care of baby, you should feel free to do that. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Um, okay. So anyhow, this is exciting to me because it's scripturally documenting the impact that Timothy's mother and grandmother had on his upbringing. because Paul is commending the input they had, telling him to continue in the things he's learned and become convinced of. So remember last, a couple of weeks ago, when we were talking about teaching what is good, these are convictions that Timothy's mother and grandmother helped develop in his thinking about God, about scriptures, things that Paul is now commending, and which helped him to become the kind of person who is able to pastor a whole church in very difficult times. So we don't know, we know what kind of input we can have in our children's lives. We know that it can have a great effect. We don't know what God's plan is or what he is preparing them for, but we can offer the very best to help them reach whatever goals God has for them. And that's called their success. And that is our goal. in raising our children is we want them to be successful. We want them to be fruitful and personally fulfilled. We want them eventually to be able to live apart from us, but yet still have a strong relationship with us. And that's our goals. That's our goal for them is their success. And that's what Timothy's mother and grandmother were able to set him on the path towards achieving by their input when he was a child, or in the translation that she read from, even in from infancy. From childhood, you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. So they exposed him and taught him the word of God and God used that to bring him to personal faith. Day of excitement. So it's just exciting for me to see the impact that a mother and even a grandmother can have on a child, but it has to be intentional. It has to be a loving discipline, but it has to be intentional teaching that is going to instruct them in specific areas that are going to lead to their success. So that's what we're talking about today. And then going back to Hebrews 12, let's look at that a little further. I'm skipping around in my Bible, but I'm going backwards. So let me go the right direction. Hebrews 12, this is verses 10 and 11. For they disciplined us for a short time. This is talking about parents, as seemed best to them. And that's what we want to do for our children. what we feel is the best for them. But He, and that's talking about God, disciplines us for our good so that we may share His holiness. So is God disciplining us in order to punish us? No, He's not. He's disciplining us for our good. So discipline is very different from punishment. It involves training, not punishment. Punishment deals with the past. and it uses shame in order to achieve an end. Whereas discipline looks to the future and how to help our children succeed. Many times when we are I'm trying to think how to say what I want to say. Discipline involves love, love that is motivated by being able to see what is best for our child, how their actions are going to have a good effect on their development as a person and a good effect on their development spiritually. Punishment has to do with dealing with the past And it can involve shame. For instance, if your child misbehaves and your response is to say, oh, I can't believe you're doing that. Why are you doing that? You do that over and over again. Why can't you learn how to do this the right way? Why are you embarrassing me like this? all those kinds of responses to a child that disobeys. And how do I know those phrases? Because, unfortunately, I've used them before. So it's a learning process. God's very gracious. But when I speak these things, it's from one who learned many things over many years and is still learning. Would you say the phrase, like, how many times have I told you is kind of one of those? That's shame. Yeah. That's dealing with the past. Okay. Yeah. It's even past tense. You know, look at your grammar. It's even past tense in the verb. So, I mean, we do this kind of stuff because we get angry and frustrated. And so, you know, God forgives us. We can ask our children to forgive us and they will. You know, we're in a learning process, so we don't need to berate ourselves, but we do need to recognize what we're doing that's not pleasing to God and then change it. So when we are shaming our children, even if they conform their behavior because we've shamed them into it, we're not doing it out of love. We're doing it almost out of a sense of revenge, of getting back at them for, you know, almost like, How dare you not do what I want you to do? Don't you see what it makes me look like? Or I have to work extra hard to teach you this again because you didn't learn it the first time. All of those things. So we just, we need to recognize that that is not acting out of love, but not decide that The other extreme, however, is to say that we should not give our children any boundaries and just let them figure out for themselves how they should behave. We talked about that again a couple of weeks ago when we were talking about teaching them what is good, that the importance of teaching our children what is right and wrong so that they don't grow up making those decisions based on what the people around them do but they grow up with an inner core, an inner sense of conscience and a confidence that they know what is right and they can choose to follow that. So that's what we're talking about when we talk about discipline. Matthew 10.25 says, the disciple will become like his teacher. If I am an angry parent and if I, refuse to lovingly put boundaries and then enforce those boundaries on my children's behavior, then I will end up disciplining out of anger because they will learn very quickly what kinds of things to do to irritate me. And that's not just a healthy pattern. And they will also follow my example. An angry parent produces angry children. A mother who is argumentative with her husband will produce children who argue with her. Now they may want to argue with you anyhow, but it's a lot easier to help them learn not to do that if they're not seeing it at home already. Proverbs 22.6, we talked about that several weeks ago, but it says, train up a child in the way they should go. And when they are old, they will not depart from it. And most people want to look at the last part of that verse as a promise. But what we really need to focus on is the whole idea of training, because training and discipline go hand in hand. if you are teaching your children what is right, practically speaking, then not just by telling them or lecturing them or yelling at them, but by actually teaching them what is right and then holding them to that standard, then that is how that child will become trained. They will become molded And they will become, that is the influence that is going to work in their lives to help them become the people we want them to grow up into. Just like the influence that Timothy's mother and grandmother had on him. We need a planned approach with boundaries and consequences. And what we're going to do this week, we're going to talk about some of these principles. And then next week we're going to talk about practical application. So don't be frustrated. Don't think, well, she's telling us all this stuff we should do, but not how to do it. Because that will come next week. And some of these, I know some of you have already heard these things before. So let this just be a refresher course. Maybe something new will tickle your thinking, or you hear something and you go, oh, you know, I've slipped into that without realizing that's what I was doing, because it's so easy to do that. So I hope that as we talk through these things, that it will be an encouragement to you, but also be, oh, maybe a bit of an eye opener. But at the same time, give us hope. Because if you feel like your children are out of control, That does not have to be the way you live. And if your children are able to obey you and are able to be, are being trained by you in a positive way towards their success, then you can enjoy your time with your family so much more. And things like long trips in the car or waiting to see the doctor, or a rainy day where you are all stuck inside the house together. Things like that become fun rather than a trial. If your children have been trained to respond positively to you and to be kind and loving with each other, then not only does it make for a more pleasant time together, but it also provides an atmosphere where you can teach them the things that Timothy's mother and grandmother taught him, the sacred writings which led to his faith in Christ. If you are trying to have a devotional time and your children are wiggling and whispering to each other and getting up out of their chairs and poking their brother, then they're not going to be able to learn as much as if they are able to sit still and look at you and listen. So that's what we were talking about. We were talking about disciplining our children, but doing it as a means of showing our love, not just to make them conform to some random standard we have, but we are wanting to, out of love for them, do what we can to help them become righteous and holy and to help them grow in their relationship with God so that someday, when they are on their own, that is what they will gravitate towards. It's people who like those same things, and they will remember things that they learned in their childhood, and God can use that, even if they've fallen away, to draw him back to himself. Okay, so that's what we're talking about. Let's look at, and I think I mentioned earlier, I sent you some notes on this now everything that I've said so far is none of it virtually is on the notes so but the things that are in the notes are very helpful and they will also include what we're going to cover next week so I would encourage you go on and look at these look at the scripture read through the the comments and you know it will be a real encouragement and a real help So we've talked about primarily the passage in Hebrews 12 and we've talked about Timothy's life in Acts and in 2 Timothy. So let's look at one more verse that is a key verse to this whole concept and then our time is going to be up. We will have time for questions and then next week we will do some practical application. so if you have questions from today trying to find the verse I'm looking for you can ask them today or as you read through the material if you have some questions or some things that aren't clear just jot down or put a question mark or make a note and you can mention them when we come back again and I see in your chat you go Yes, yes, that's really true. Angry parents produce angry children. Argumentative children learn from their parents and will argue with them and with each other. Yes, well good, I'm glad that's helpful. So let's look at one other verse before we close our time together. Ephesians 6 verse 1 and 2. Actually 1 through 3. is what we're gonna look at right now. So, I need a reader. So far, Chigo's been brave, Jodine's been brave, Lana's been brave, Thelma's been brave. Anybody else want to be brave and read this passage for us? I like to read. Okay, good. I know, I saw that you unmuted. Yay! Good, Timmy Tote. Ephesians 6, verses 1 through 3. Okay. Children, it is a Christian duty to obey your parents, but this is the right thing to do. Respect your father and mother is the first commandment that has a promise added, so that all may go well with you. And you may live a long time in the land. Okay, thank you. Then verse 4 goes on speaking specifically about fathers, but we're talking about mothers. So we're going to focus on these first three verses. And actually, verses 2 and 3 are right out of the Ten Commandments. So those go back way to the beginning. But let's look at verse 1. Children, obey your parents and the Lord, for this is right. So notice this verse is addressed to children, isn't it? So it's telling children that they need to obey their parents. So God has told our children that they need to obey us, for this is right. The word right here doesn't just mean right as in right from wrong. It means it's what leads to the path of righteousness. So we're not just talking about a specific incident. We're talking about a character quality that is going to build into their lives in order to make them godly and to help them be successful spiritually. So in other words, in order for children, to grow righteous in their relationship with God, they need to obey their parents. So it's not just an optional thing. It's not just something that this American is trying to teach you. It is something that God says in the Bible is just true. My version, My version's the New American Standard. I don't have it in front of me. I think it's similar. Which version are you reading from? I think it's the new NAV. Oh, okay. Okay. The ideas are the same, though. The ideas are basically the same, even if the words are different. Yeah. So, that's good. So the morally correct thing is for children to obey their parents. So when we discipline our children out of love for them, we are helping them to do what God wants them to do. Children don't know how to obey unless we teach them. Again, like we were talking several weeks ago, how is a child going to know what is right or wrong unless they are taught? So it's the same way with obedience. That's our responsibility as parents. Verse two, honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise. Verse three, so that it may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth. So the result of honoring, or I think in your translation, it was respect, which is again, the same respect as a form of honor. The result of honoring your father and mother is success, may be well with you, may be well with you, and that you may live long on the earth. It's even talking about success, physical success. It's good for you spiritually, pretty much in every way. It's good for you to be able to honor your father and mother, to show respect to your father and mother because God says so. God says that when we teach our children to honor us, to show respect to us, that we are helping them to be successful, fruitful, fulfilled in their life. So that's what we are talking about. It doesn't mean that we have to make them happy all the time. And that is a burden that many parents live under. That if their children aren't happy all the time, there's something wrong with them, with the parent, or something wrong with the kind of upbringing they are giving them. But in reality, look back at the passage we were reading in Hebrews 12. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful. So this is the Holy Spirit speaking, that joy is not always going to be around, because when we are being disciplined, it is not going to be fun. We are going to be sorrowful, but to those who have been trained by it, afterwards, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. So even if it is momentarily, something we don't enjoy, and something that brings us sorrow, the end result is going to be peace, fruitfulness, and righteousness. So God's desire for discipline in our children's lives, specifically administered by parents, and we've seen the example of Timothy's mother and grandmother in terms of a mother's influence on her children, God's design for that is that it is a means of us showing our love to our children. We are showing our love to our children when we administer godly discipline in their lives. So that's what we are talking about today. And next week, We will talk more specifically about what this means, what are areas in which to discipline, how do we decide what to discipline, even what I can give you a method which we used with our children. What we've been talking about up to this point is principles, but it is helpful sometimes to have a method to start from and then you can talk with your husband and adapt it to whatever you want to do. But at least it gives you an idea where you are not just wondering how to make application. So that's what we will talk about next week. So our time has gone quickly but we are right about at three o'clock so I'm going to stop, pray, And then if anyone has questions up to this point, you can ask them. Or we can talk about other things, too. So let's pray. I'm going to turn off there.