This is the voice of truth, the voice of God's inebriate, absolute, eternal, unbroken, verbally inspired word. The voice of truth is coming to you from the Metropolitan Tabernacle of the First Baptist Church of Algiers. We're located at 501 Opelousas Avenue here on the West Bank in old New Orleans, Louisiana. This is Pastor Albert Pindarver speaking, inviting you to stay tuned to hear God's message by our late Pastor L.R. Shelton, Sr. on the subject. Children and heritage from the Lord, and this is number 184. That's children and heritage from the Lord, number 184. Now, will your Bibles turn to 127th Psalm? Will you? 127th Psalm. Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows, for so he giveth his beloved sleep. Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth. half is the man that hath his quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gates." Now that's what the psalmist thinks about the home and the children. We notice in the third verse, the psalmist said, children are an inheritance of the Lord. Children are the joy of the home. How often we think otherwise. Everywhere you turn today, you hear the expression, children and dogs not wanted. You cannot build a home without children. Children are a blessing to the home. The fifth verse of the psalm says, Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them. I wish every father and mother listening to me would weigh these words carefully and begin to realize that children are of the Lord. I have never been able to understand how a wife would fight against giving birth to children. and raising children in their home. I have known mothers, not a few, who would even curse the day that they became expectant mothers. This will also hold good with the father or man of the home. Listen again. Children are an inheritance of the Lord. If we realize that great fact, then we as fathers and mothers would feel the keen responsibility of our children more keenly and accept it with a greater weight of responsibility. I want to tell you, My friend, one of the greatest joys and blessings of the home is for Jehovah God to entrust in that home a baby, and make us as fathers and mothers stewards of that child, to raise that child, to train that child, to teach that child, and to plant that child in Jehovah God, the Lord Jesus Christ. as its Savior and Lord. If we did, we would not have the juvenile problem we have today. This great truth, in fact, is brought out throughout the entire Bible, that children are an heritage of the Lord. In Genesis 33, when Jacob came to meet Esau, and when Esau lifted up his eyes and saw the women and children, he said, Who are those with thee? And Jacob said, these are the children which God hath graciously given thy servant. Here Jacob recognized that his children were the gift of Jehovah. When we realize this great fact, our children become a part of us, and we feel the responsibility of them. Our hearts long after them. and we give our lives for them because God gave them to us. God giveth and God taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. I know that it is so in my own case. It was so when I married. I recognize that God gave me Shelton to me as my wife and as the mother of my children. Before each child came into the world, we dedicated unto the Lord. We recognize that God gave it to us. It was His. But it was our responsibility, and God had entrusted that child to us to love, cherish, nurture, and admonish as long as it was under our roof. Also, we recognize that God was holding us responsible for every action of that child, and also for its salvation in Christ Jesus, our Lord. This truth is also brought out in Genesis 48, 4, when Jacob was relating to Joseph how God had blessed him. Jacob said unto Joseph, listen, God Almighty said unto me, Behold, I will make thee fruitful and multiply thee, and I'll make of thee a multitude of people, and I'll give this land unto thy seed after thee for an everlasting possession." You know it is wonderful to recognize the hand of God Almighty, the all-supplying, all-nourishing God in multiplying your family and building your home. I wish every father and mother would bow your heads, humble your hearts, and recognize the Lord Jehovah God as the head of your home, as the one who has given you your family, and would bow your knees unto him as your Lord and Savior. You know that would be a mini home made over today? Yes, it would. Yes, it would. This truth is also brought out in Joshua 24, 3, when the Lord Jehovah spake to the children of Israel and said, I took your father Abraham from the other side of the flood, and led him throughout all the land of Canaan, multiplied his seed, and gave him Isaac. I like that expression, and I gave him Isaac. Mother, Dad, look at that child by your side. Look at him intently. Behold that little face and recognize that God gave you that child. Man, how could you mistreat, misguide, or mislead that child? God gave you that child. I wish you would recognize that fact. In the days of old, the Jewish wife thought it was the curse of God upon her home if her womb was barren. They looked upon children as a gift of Jehovah. Let me give you two illustrations. First, the life of Hannah as found in 1 Samuel. Because her barrenness of womb, the scripture says, she was in bitterness of soul and prayed unto the Lord and wept sore, and she vowed a vow, and said, O Lord of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look upon the affliction of thy handmaid, and remember me, and not forget thine handmaid, but wilt give unto thy handmaid a man-child, then will I give him unto thee all the days of his life." Isn't that not a great contrast to the average home today? The average child is conceived in lust and born into a world not wanted. This accounts for the juvenile problems we face today, the crime among youth. We as fathers and mothers do not feel the keen responsibility of our children as gifts from God. Our orphanages are filled with children not wanted. A few nights ago, yonder on the roadside was a wrecked automobile, all smashed in. There were the cries of bleeding, dying young people in that car. By the sight of their bleeding, crushed bodies, were broken bottles of whiskey. When the father of one of the girls was notified, and he came rushing to the wreck in the spirit of a great excitement, he stood there looking at the sight of blood and broken flask of liquor, and very angrily said, I will prosecute the man who sold my daughter that liquor. Returning home that night from the funeral home, he went to his closet to get his drink of whiskey. And there in the closet he found a note written by his daughter. Listen, here's what it said. Dear Dad, I didn't think you would mind us young people having some of your liquor tonight for our party so we could have a good time. He was the man. That father never had recognized that his beautiful daughter was a gift to the Lord to him. That father thought only of his own lustful appetite, and cared nothing for the responsibility of the life or soul of his child. Man, how do you stand today? Do you treat your child as coming from the Lord? Hannah did, and when the child came, listen, Hannah prayed and said, My heart rejoiceth in the Lord. My horn is exalted in the Lord. My mouth is enlarged over mine enemies, because I rejoice in thy salvation. There is none holy as the Lord, for there is none beside thee, neither is there any rock like God." Then she goes on to say, "'I have lent him to the Lord as long as he liveth.' He shall be lent to the Lord. Isn't that a marvelous thing? Isn't it a blessing to our hearts when we see our fathers and mothers come to realize that our children are gifts of the Lord, and they lend them back to the Lord? And isn't it wonderful to let the Lord lead us and watch the Lord use them as he wills? That is the only way to build a happy home. Now let's notice one other illustration, as found in the first chapter of Luke. Here is a little home up in the hill country in the city of Judea. There lived a man and his wife by the name of Zacharias and Elizabeth. They were not blessed with children, but they prayed earnestly, and God gave them a son. They took it as coming from the Lord, and when he was born, they gave him back to the Lord. Have you ever in your heart, man, down on your knees, dedicated your children to the Lord? My heart aches beyond words of description when I see a child mistreated or abused or neglected or going hungry. How in the world a father can take his money and spend it for liquor, or go off to a gambling hell and lose it, then come back home and see his children suffer for want of food, or run off and leave them? I do not know. Man, I would do one of two things. I would get out on my knees and ask God to break the power of sin over me and make me the man a father ought to be, or I would take a gun and go to a brush heap somewhere and blow my brains out. I would. That would also hold good for a mother. Father, mother, give your child a chance. I'm pleading for our children over this nation this morning. They be given a chance to live a decent life. I know the average home that our children come from. I do. They're not wanted. In so many of our homes, we do much welfare work in checking homes, broken homes, homes of poverty, homes where there's nothing to eat, homes where there's nothing for the necessities of life. And I have sat and cried and wept, O Lord, give us fathers who will be men in this hour." Now, let's notice one other great fact we face, and that is children have to share in our blessings or curse. Father, if you could realize this one fact, that your child would either be blessed or cursed by every act of yours, it would make you sit up and think. Thousands upon thousands of fathers and mothers have never felt the responsibility of their children. You just take them for granted. They're just so much of a problem to you. And you have never realized that you will carry them to heaven or to hell. Which one? Now let's face the fact of our responsibility as parents in training our children. Ephesians 6, 4, And ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Nurture and admonition referred to care and discipline. To discipline a child is to bring him unto the voice of authority and lead him to obey that voice. The word nurture also means feeding or promoting growth in the child. This calls for nourishment, food, clothing. I know in this day and time for the average common family, it's a battle to live, but I firmly believe with all my heart that there isn't a family regardless of how poor, but if you're willing to accept the responsibility for that child, God will lead you in supporting him in some manner, if you have to beg for it. It may not be the best. It may not be what you would like it to be, but if you'll Conserve your money. See if you could manage better than you do. Throw your cigarettes away. Throw your liquor away. Throw your nightlife away. Go home. Live for that home. I was talking to the man one day up along that line. He said, I just, I don't have it. And when we figured up his cigarette bill and his showbill and his coke bill and other unnecessary things in life, it came to around $50 a month that he was literally thrown away, that he could clothe and feed his children much better than he was doing. Nurture also means training, rearing, educating. Here it would mean educating in the Word of the Lord. How many of you fathers take time out to sit down and talk to that boy or that girl? Does that child have a Bible all his own? Have you set the example of reading and studying the Bible in front of that child? Have you bowed joyfully to the Lordship of Christ? And then with the voice of authority you have led your child about his knee to your voice of authority, or is there a divided voice in your home? Man, have you and do you shirk your duty of exercising the voice of authority in your home? I'm driving that home to you now. You better listen. Man, have you And do you shirk the duty of exercise and the voice of authority? Do you take the road of least resistance and leave the responsibility of the children to your wife? Do you, man, in your rebellion against God, take the road of least resistance and let your child have his own way and do as he or she pleases? If that's the case, in your life, God help you, wretched man, it would be better for you if you'd never been born. Let me ask you this question. Do your children obey you when you speak? Or have you thrown up your hands and said, what's the use? I can't make them mind me. I just have to let them go. God pity you, man. God have mercy upon your poor soul. Man, let me plead with you, out of a heart that loves you, to bow your knee to the Lordship of Christ. Then ask God to give you the voice of authority to control that child. Man, God has given some of you good families. God's given you a good wife. He's given you obedient children, but you don't appreciate them. You still want to have your own way and go to hell. If that is your attitude, It would be better for you if you'd never been born. This is training up a child in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I have no sympathy whatsoever with the modern-day teaching of controlling children. The Bible says, spare the rod and spoil the child. I was brought under subjection to my father, not only by his voice, but by his rod. As I've often said, He raised me under the stars and stripes. He praised the stripes and I saw the stars. In other words, He raised me under the rod and the voice of authority. I'll never cease to praise my Lord that my Father's voice and His rod were the authority in our home. And I learned obedience at His feet. My Father was not cruel. I've learned this, if you want your children to love you, make them obey you. Our almshouses are filled with aged people today, largely because their children do not want them. And the reason for that is that they did not make their children obey them in the home. I know it's taught in our schools and all books on child psychology today that we should not whip a child, but should direct It's energy and nature. This is all contrary to the Word of God. You cannot direct all the energy and the nature of a child. Part of it has to be curved, subdued, and brought under subjection. That will must be broken, and the child must be taught obedience. Now you get that. I'll stand there because that's God's Word. We have looked at the responsibility of the parents, which always comes first. Now let's look at the responsibility of the child in the home. Ephesians 6, 1 says, Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor thy father and mother. which is the first commandment with promise, that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest live long on the earth." Listen to Colossians 3.20, "'Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto the Lord.'" Listen to Exodus 20.12, "'Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. We see from these scriptures that God enjoins upon every child a vow in submission and obedience unto his parents. Let me say it again, God's order of government and all, Christ is ahead of man, man is ahead of woman, parents ahead of the children. This is God's order of government and the rule of authority in the home. If the home is built around God's government, then you'll have a home worth living in. Satan has perverted the whole government of the average home. You'll find children in disobedience to their parents. You'll find the wife in disobedience to her husband. You'll find the husband in disobedience to the Lordship of Christ. This is Satan's masterpiece, and you'll find the shoreline of time literally covered with wrecked homes from the stormy blast of Satan. The only hope for restoration is the grace of God, and it's never too late to restore that home. One night some Years ago, I was sitting in a distant city talking to a young man whose home had literally been wrecked by Satan perverting the government of that home. I was pleading with him, as the husband and head of that home, to bow in absolute submission to the Lordship of Christ, that he might bring his wife and children under subjection to his voice of authority. Then he said to me, Well, Pastor, it is too late. It was not the question of being too late. It was the question of him first bowing in submission and being obedient unto the Lordship of Christ as his all-sufficient Savior and Lord, then the God of heaven, according to his word and by his grace through the power of his Holy Spirit. would work a transformation in the home and build it upon the rock Christ and the eternal word of God. I have faced this fact and I know it to be true. No child ever gets saved until he first learns obedience unto his parents. I do not care how religious you are. I don't care what place you hold in the church. If you never learn obedience to your parents, you'll never get saved. If you've never learned to obey your parents, it shows you've never been through the house of Holy Spirit conviction. and been brought low to the place of repentance. As long as a child rebels in his heart against the voice of authority in that home, he rebels against the Lordship of Christ. Now, my friend, that's true. That's true. I don't care if it's before they get married or after they get married. If that child rebels against his or her father, they're gone. They never will be saved. Never will. And you can find some old lopsided preacher somewhere that's got itchy ears that'll sit down and tell you, oh, you know, it's a great thing that you're out from under the domination of your father. I've had them to tell that over and over again are trying to win my children away from Christ, to win other children away from their fathers and mothers. Listen, to talk to an individual in rebellion against his parents about trusting Jesus for salvation is blasphemy to the nth degree. That's right. To say that that child is saved who's never learned obedience is to talk nonsense. You're not saved. If you've never learned obedience to your father, I don't care whether you're married or single. You're not saved and never will be until you learn obedience. You get that. 2 Timothy 3.1, This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents. We notice that one of the prevalent sins in the closing days found in religious life is disobedience to parents. Paul is not talking here about the world. Paul is talking about the children of church families. We are living in those days right now. I have never seen as much rebellion in the hearts of children of our church families in all my life. And these children belong to our churches. They have been brought into the church on the high-pressure decision days in Sunday school, training unions, daily vacation Bible schools, and such like. They have padded the church roads and were told that they were saved. They have been brought into our trading unions to train them for church membership when they have never been known Christ as Lord and Savior. They have never known Holy Spirit conviction. They are foreigners to repentance. Therefore, they have missed Christ. They are disobedient unto their parents. Their wills have never been broken. They cannot be taught the Bible. As a whole, they do not love the Bible, cannot understand the Bible. Why? Because they have never been born again. Why have they not been born again? Why are they not saved? They have never been awakened to the fact that they are lost sinners and been brought to the place of repentance. Our present-day so-called child evangelism is a farce. It's an abomination in the sight of God. It makes the child of twofold more the child of hell than it was before. So many churches today are sending their children on Wednesday nights and Sunday nights off to the movie and picture show in an adjoining room of that church building for entertainment, and while the parents are supposed to be hearing the gospel. I want to tell you, my friend, we're facing the darkest hours we've ever faced with our children. God help us in these hours. Will you pray with me? Oh, I know I've been criticized because my children are this and that and one and the other, one by one. May we pray that God will awaken them and bring them to Christ. If the grace of God I preach to you can save children, it can save yours. Man, mother, don't let go. God can save your children for Christ's sake. Let's pray, will you? Let's not let our children go. Let's stay with them. This brings to the close another broadcast. We want to thank you for your letters and gifts that keep these messages coming out or going out over the Voice of Truth program each week. Again, the title of the message was, Children and Heritage from the Lord, and this is number 184. You can order it by that number or by the title. You may have a free printed copy simply by requesting it. All of the messages preached here by Pastor L. R. Shelton Senior on this broadcast are also available on cassette tape for $3 postpaid. This includes the complete hour, the singing by the radio choir, the story, the letter reading by Ms. Wylene, and then the 30-minute message. And I'd like to mention, in closing, our book of the month. We've been offering it now for two or three weeks. It's The Marriage Ring by John Angel James. What a gracious little book. I've read it. I recommend it highly. I often say, if you're not satisfied, I'll give you money back. Yes, take the money out of my pocket and give it back to you. It's a gracious little book for a gift for someone who's getting married, someone who recently got married, or if you're just having problems in the home. It answers many questions here. It sells for $2.60. postpaid through December 31, 2000. That's the marriage ring by John and Jill James. And we appreciate the opportunity to bring you this old-time, old-fashioned gospel message. Yes, folks ask me, Pastor, why do you call yourself old-fashioned? And I say it's because we preach God's Word. Not much of that being done today. No, we have so much easy-believing-ism in the land today. Folks making a decision for Jesus, giving Jesus a heart. None of that means anything, my friend. No, that's not a thing in the world, but just the trick of Satan to keep our folks blinded. But we preach here the awakening ministry of the Holy Spirit. Coming up on a poor old lost sinner, blinded to his lost condition, awakening to his lost condition, and then showing him his heart and allowing him to repent. Come to the Lord, begging for forgiveness. Yes, you know what repentance is? Taking the blame. Have you ever taken the blame? blame, my friend. This is Pastor Albert Pandora saying it's been good to have been with you. Let me give you my mailing address. It's Radio Missions, Post Office Box 6250, New Orleans, Louisiana, 70174. May the Lord's richest blessings rest upon you. This is the Voice of Truth broadcast.