This message was given at Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. At the end, we will give information about how to contact us to receive a copy of this or other messages. If you'll take your Bibles or your electronic devices and turn to Psalm 127, In one of the Song of Ascents that Solomon wrote, he says in verse three, behold, children are a gift of the Lord. The fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. They will not be ashamed when they speak of their enemies in the gate. And then Solomon, Once more in Proverbs chapter one, Solomon wrote these words. Verse eight, hear my son, your father's Torah. Do not forsake your mother's teaching. Indeed, they are a graceful wreath to your head and ornaments about your neck. That same Solomon also wrote this in chapter 10 and verse 1. The Proverbs of Solomon, a wise son makes a father glad, but a foolish son is a grief to his mother. Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for an all-sufficient Bible. We thank you that your Word teaches us all things pertaining to life and godliness, faith and practice. We thank you, Father, that your Word is sufficient when it comes to how we raise our children. And we pray that you would help us even this afternoon to think your thoughts after you. In Jesus' name, amen. Now, many, many years ago, in fact, I don't think we were on industrial way yet. I think we were still in the middle school. We had a parenting class that lasted for, I don't know, six weeks, eight weeks, something like that. We actually held it 10 weeks. What, 10 years? 10 weeks. Anyway, we actually had it over at, we borrowed Valley Christian Fellowships meeting place, remember that? Dawn and Jean were there. And of course, my kids were all that small. But I'd listened to all 88 sermons by Al Martin on how not to foul up the raising of your children and thought that I had it. Well, I taught on parenting again, but that would have been about 10 years ago maybe. My kids were like that. And you might imagine that now that I'm going to talk about it again, it's going to be a little different. It's going to be effusing repentance. You know, the fact is, is that parenting is one of the most challenging callings that there is. When you think about it, God, the Almighty Creator, actually entrusts to two people who are maybe one step above idiocy. entrusts to two people this little child, entrusts this living, breathing soul. That child is a stewardship. And the fact is, is that parenting is a huge responsibility. James Dobson said many years ago, the title of one of his books, Parenting is Not for Cowards. Absolutely true. As I think about parenting, I realize that there's fruit, the fruit of parenting, but I'm not talking about the fruit that's born in the lives of our children, but the fruit that parenting produces in our own hearts. In fact, As I've thought about this and thought about it a lot, the fruit that can be produced in our own hearts through parenting is very diverse and sometimes potentially dangerous. There can be the fruit of joy and pride, and not the sinful kind of pride, but a good kind where there is joy and pride in that child as they grow, but there can also be the kind of pride that is most definitely the sinful kind. Some of the fruits of parenting could be a legalistic or even critical spirit, self-righteousness, laziness, negligence, unfaithfulness, despair, depression, and anger. There can also be idolatry. And there can also be God-honoring sacrifice and service. This and so much more can all be the fruit of parenting. So parenting is not only not for cowards, parenting also can be a potentially dangerous endeavor. So we have a new generation of parents, which is great. The kids that were little the first time around are now parents. And I'll tell you, there is no greater privilege for me to pastor that long. It's great. It's great. You can't do that if you're only someplace three or four years. And so it's time to revisit some of the themes, but I will tell you that although the principles and truths remain the same, Perhaps some of the attitudes are different. And I'm actually glad. I was delighted last October when I went up to Tahoe for the men's retreat, and Brother Mark Chansky from Holland, Michigan was there. Mark's a few years older than me, and as he talked about fatherhood, he talked about it in terms of all of the things that he did wrong. And so as we think about parenting, we're going to do some biblical guideposts, if you will, some warning signs to avoid dangerous potholes. And we're going to spend some time on mostly how to make the gospel central in our parenting. So I said biblical parenting, pillars of biblical parenting. So before we get to The first pillar, which is the only thing we'll cover today. I want to talk about the ingredients that make biblical parenting biblical parenting. All right. So when we talk about biblical parenting, we're talking about parenting according to a biblical framework. to have a, if you will, a biblical theology of parenting. Understanding, not what the specialists and experts say, but what the Bible says about the nature of our children and our role as parents and God-given authority and discipline and spiritual nurture and all of those things. Biblical parenting begins with the fundamental presupposition that God has revealed in His Word all that we need to know about the nature of our children and how to raise them in a way that pleases Him. But I would add something else on what makes biblical parenting biblical parenting, and that is, for it to be truly biblical, it must be effused with humility. Pride in parenting is a killer, here's something I become completely 100% convinced of. If you have one kid that turns out well, you can't take credit for it. God uses means, no doubt about it. No sense in talking about biblical parenting if God doesn't use means. God does use means, all right? But here's the reality. You could have a hundred kids. If one of them turns out well, you can't take credit for it. It's the grace of God. Now, if you have one that turns out not so well, here's what else I've discovered. You cannot take all. of the blame. You don't take credit, but you don't take all the blame either. And some of you actually need to hear that because you look at the way some of your kids have turned out and you think, because you heard it somewhere, that it's your fault they turned out that way. You may have contributed, but the blame's not all yours. So, no parent does everything right. We agree on that. No parent does everything right. And if you think you do do everything right, there's a word for you, but I won't use it in preaching. If you do think you do everything right, you don't understand your own heart. You really don't understand your own heart. Because biblical parenting is not ultimately about how you birthed the child and how you educated the child and what you allowed them to watch and not watch and listen to and not listen to and what you let them eat and not eat or what you made them eat and not eat. Biblical parenting is ultimately a heart issue. And not just your child's heart, but your heart. And therefore, humility is a major ingredient. The minute you say, look at my kids, they've turned out so great, follow my way. I have absolutely no use for people that wanna claim that their way is God's way. I have no use for people who think that they have discovered the pattern for raising their kids. And if you start out this way and you make sure you follow these steps, raising children is not like baking a cake. So if it's biblical parity and it has to be a biblical framework, but also you need humility, then grace. So what's the most important ingredient for sinners dealing with sinners? Grace. So I tell two people come in and they're all giddy because they're gonna get married and I say, just like, okay, I have living examples that can testify. One of the first things I told you guys was, you know what? What's gonna happen is two sinners are getting married. Is that not one of the first things that I told you? Okay, that's affirmative, thank you. Now, was I right? Yes, okay, so. Two sinners. So what's marriage? Two sinners becoming one. Yikes! Isn't that what I told you guys? Okay, I told them too. And I'm sure I told some others in here too. And it's just true. Well, guess what you have in parenting? You have sinners trying to raise sinners. Only God could come up with something like this. This is not the way that we would do it. And so we know that the gospel, not technique, is central when sinners are raising sinners. And so it's necessary not only for your children, but for yourself. Biblical framework, humility, grace, number four, dependence. If you trust in yourself and your own wisdom, You might, I say might, you might do okay while they're infants. But once they grow, once they grow, you become strangely aware of how dependent you are on God's help because You think, hey, you know what, we had this one, this is so easy, and so we know exactly what we're doing. This is the way it works, God mocks us. For everyone who's had an easy one first, God has mocked us. Okay? This ain't too hard. And then the second one comes along, and you go, what are we doing? What are we doing? This is like some sort of cosmic joke. And then you get a third one. I can't even imagine like those of you who have like 7 and 20 and 30. So there's this dependence where you just realize, I really don't know what I'm doing. I really don't. And I need to depend on God that I do the right thing here. Remember one time Ashley was about 14 years old, and I had made a unilateral decision about something that she could not do, and I thought she would be upset, and she looked at me, and she said, Daddy, she says, what you've said to me is right, and I realize that God has given you to me because you're wise. Bless you, my daughter." And you look at Ariel like... You're utterly dependent on God and His grace and His wisdom every step of the way. Be confronted with so many things that you don't know what to do. And then finally, faith and faithfulness. We follow God's word by faith. God says that we're supposed to do certain things. We don't always see how those things work out, but we just, we commit ourselves to following what God says by faith. And then we entrust our children to the Lord in faith. And then by his help, we try to be as faithful as we can be. So in the end, the only measure of successful parenting is not the product, but the faithfulness. I've come to believe that too. Faithful parents may raise faithful children and faithful parents may raise unfaithful children. If you don't believe me, all you have to do is read Isaiah chapter one and verse two where God actually says that he was a father to his children and he's raised an unfaithful son. Nobody, nobody could be ready to accuse God of not being the best. Father. Faithful parents may raise unfaithful kids, but then again, unfaithful parents may end up raising faithful children. It's just the way that it is. And so the standard of success is not the end product. As much as we desire that, as much as we hope for, A child that grows strong in the Lord and walks in His ways and follows Christ and does great things. The standard of success is not whether that happens. You have no control over whether that happens. You either believe in the sovereignty of God over the outcome of your children or you don't. And if you don't, I feel sorry for you. There are no guarantees. We've been together as a church body for 20 years now, and how many times have we seen many, many, many times there are just no guarantees? And so we trust God and we leave the results to Him. And so once again, I say to the young parents, watch out for the formula makers who try to act as if parenting is like baking a cake. It is not. So those are the ingredients, if we're gonna call it biblical parenting. So we're gonna look at the biblical framework and biblical attitudes for biblical parenting. And so none of these things actually will come automatically, right? So they're gonna take our minds being renewed by scripture. If you parent by instinct and by intuition, you need to remember you're parenting by fallen instinct and by fallen intuition. And so if you parent intuitively, you're actually gonna make enormous mistakes, both in perspective and in practice. And so we parent according to God's word, all right? Now, before we talk about the first pillar, let me just tell you the young parents, there are five books that I like on parenting. Now, somebody said that in the last 10 years, there have been 60,000 books published on parenting. I believe that. Shepherding a Child's Heart, Ted Tripp. Read Ted Tripp. Excellent, doesn't look like this anymore, but excellent, excellent, excellent. Shepherding a Child's Heart. Our dear friend Bruce Ray, Withhold Not Correction. By the way, this book is why we have a training chapel back there. This book taught me better how to discipline my kids than anything else. For older, when you have older kids, nothing is better than this, Age of Opportunity by Paul Tripp, Ted's brother. Excellent work. My good friend and brother, Jim Neuheiser, along with Elise Fitzpatrick, when good kids make bad choices. Jim would be the first to tell you that he did not pick the title for this book. The publisher did. This is not Jim's title. Jim and Caroline are godly people. Jim's been a pastor for many, many, many years. Three sons, none of whom are walking with the Lord today, and yet Jim and Caroline were as faithful as could be. So, struggling with kids that Don't turn out exactly right, great book. Then another one, I try to read books on parenting regularly, Gospel Powered Parenting by William Farley. Excellent, it's at home, but excellent, excellent book, all right? So what's the first pillar? First pillar is privilege and duty, privilege and duty. The idea is that being a parent is a privilege. Now, we don't think of it like that because anybody who's biologically capable actually can become a parent. But parenting really is a privilege. When you stop and consider the fact that that child from the moment of conception, understand, the moment of conception, once that child is formed in the womb, that child is an image bearer of God. That's why it is completely appropriate and necessary for us to adamantly oppose abortion at any stage. Because at the moment of conception, you have a living, breathing soul made in the image and likeness of God. God is the author of that life. So children are a wonderful blessing from the Lord. Psalm 127, 3 to 5, we read it. That child is a gift. As that child develops in the womb and that mother carries that child in spite of all of the implications of the curse, all of the incredible discomfort and then even pain in childbirth, the reality is that that child made in the image and likeness of God is a gift from God. So I saw Calvin last night. We got home from the airport and went straight over to the hospital at 9.30, 10 o'clock at night, right? And I can't hold him yet, which is just killing me. He's almost a month old. And the little stinker won't open his eyes for me to save my life. But I just sat there next to Ashley, because Ashley gets to hold him, obviously. And I just stared at him, just stared at him. And you know babies are special because they smell so good. There is something wonderful, isn't it true? Babies just have a smell about them. You look at that child and you're just looking and it's a human being. That's awesome. It's a privilege. It's a privilege. Children are a wonderful blessing. They're a gift from God. But children are also a stewardship from God. Stewardships are blessings, they're privileges. And what that means when we say that children are a stewardship from the Lord, what we're saying is that that child ultimately belongs to God. That child is not ours. That child is, as it were, on loan from God. That child is a stewardship that God has entrusted this child to our care. And that stewardship reminds us that this child ultimately belongs to God himself. And God has given us the stewardship of their little bodies, their little minds, and their little souls. And here's what we need to remember on the first part of this pillar, and that is, to whom much is given, much is required. It's an awesome thing to be a parent because you've been entrusted with a human being. Because of the magnitude of the privilege. There are clear duties that parents have. And those duties need to be taken seriously. If you are a Christian and you're a parent, then you need to understand that the duty of parents is to glorify God in our parenting by raising our children according to God's revealed will. That should be our heartbeat. That little child has been entrusted to us, and in that stewardship, we need to see my first responsibility in the exercise of this stewardship is that God wants me to glorify Him in the way that we raise this child according to God's revealed will. And so as Christian parents, We need to have a conscientious goal in our parenting. Parenting without goals, parenting without a sense of purpose will actually lead to parenting by default or parenting by trends. Somebody says, oh yeah, I watched Oprah today, and I should be doing this. Or, you know, I watched Dr. Phil today, and I should be doing this. Or I read a blog today, and I should be doing that. Or I picked up the latest parenting magazine, and hey, here's a great idea. My day without no. That was actually an article that I found years and years ago. My day without no. Where this mother had this great idea. She noticed that every time she said no, to her son that the son actually defied her and so she came up with this great idea of having a day in which she never said no. Well guess how many times he disobeyed? As parents we need to have a goal and that goal will keep us from gravitating towards these trends and parenting by default. I mean, how many parents just simply do what they do because that's how they were raised? You know what? I may say that from time to time to my sons, you know, hey, listen, this is the way that my dad did it, and this is the way I'm going to do it. And he usually had to do, well, forget that. So I don't want to I don't want to go there. That's just parenting by default. As Christian parents, we need to have this conscientious determination. You know what, I'm going to actually not parent by instinct or not parent by trend, but I'm rather going to parent according to the Word of God. And my goal and my purpose in raising this child is actually to glorify God in the way that I raise this child. And so the goal for Christian parents is the glory of God. So 1 Corinthians 10.31, whatever we do, whether we eat or drink, let it all be done for the glory of God. and I would remind us that we actually can honor God in the manner that we raise our children. You ever notice this in 1 Samuel? You might remember that Eli was a godly man, right? He's a godly man. Being a godly person doesn't guarantee godly children, does it? In fact, Eli raises two sons that are awful. How would you like to be known in scripture as the one that God killed your sons? Eli would not rebuke his sons. And this is what we see in 1 Samuel. Let's see, 1 Samuel 2. God's actually speaking to Eli. Actually, he's... He's speaking to Eli and he is giving Eli a prophecy as it were. And in verse 29 he says, why do you kick against my sacrifice and at my offering which I've commanded in my dwelling and honor your sons above me? by making yourselves fat with the choices of every offering of my people Israel. Therefore the Lord God of Israel declares, I did indeed say that your house and the house of your father should walk before me forever. But now the Lord declares, far be it from me. For those who honor me, I'll honor and those who despise me will be lightly esteemed. Although Eli was a godly man, he failed in his fathering and he failed to rebuke his sons. And God actually says to Eli, do you know what you've done? You've honored your own sons over me. If you would have done right, you would have honored me. But you didn't. You honored, you put your sons, because you failed to raise them according to my will, you honored them above me. And so as we think about raising our kids, we need to remember that there's a lot at stake. In hope, in hope, God is glorified through the lives of our children as they come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Our hope, as we have this goal to honor the Lord in the way that we raise Him, our hope is that our children would honor and love the Lord Jesus and would faithfully serve Him and obey Him. And in fact, more so than we ever have, Greater desire could we ever possibly have for our children. The greatest desire of all, that my child would come to know the Lord Jesus Christ, love the Lord Jesus Christ, serve the Lord Jesus Christ. Absolutely nothing better than that. Nothing better, but I will tell you that that is our hope. It does not fall within the domain of our control. So our ultimate desire is to see them grow up to love the Lord Jesus. But here's the thing is that we are going to be determined to raise them according to the revealed will of God and leave the results to God. And we're going to honor God by doing things his way to the best of our ability. So to glorify God in our parenting means that the Word of God is our supreme standard. And Paul says in 2 Timothy 3, all Scripture is God-breathed, profitable for doctrine, correction, reproof, and instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be equipped, thoroughly furnished for every good work, right? That applies to parenting. The word of God is the inspired word that actually is profitable for everything we need on parenting. Proverbs 3, 5, and 6, trust in the Lord with all your heart. Don't lean on your own understanding and all your ways. Acknowledge him. He'll make your path straight. So to parent according to God's word means that we resist, first of all, worldly philosophy and worldly psychologies, even which have the stamp of the church on them. It means that we actually resist the kind of worldly wisdom that sets itself, opposes itself to God, as Paul notes in 1 Corinthians 3. And that doesn't mean that we don't pay attention to the things that people maybe outside of the church or even outside of the faith may say. There may be situations where a parent has a special needs child, and that special needs child actually There's been research that's done that may help that child through nutrition or various things. That is common sense and common grace. But what we need to remember is that we test everything according to the word and we hold fast to what is good. Parenting according to God's word also means that we seek wisdom outside of ourselves. We recognize that God has put people in our lives that are older than us, wiser than us, more experienced in God's ways, maybe more experienced in parenting. I mean, how many times, Dave, seriously, have Ariel and I come to you over the years and asked you to adopt our children? No. Ask you to help us. I mean, how many times? Can you even keep track? just realizing that we don't have the answers. We don't know what to do. We're at a loss. We need somebody else to help us. Going and talking to other people, asking them, what do you do? That, by the way, is what the Bible calls wisdom, is seeking counsel, right? Seeking counsel from people who know better. And so to parent according to God's word means that we let the word of God mold every aspect of our parenting. Think about this. In the Bible, we have the perfect example in our heavenly Father, right? Perfect example in our heavenly Father. We have both positive and negative examples in the Bible. Can you learn anything? Understand, I know that there'll be some of you that will jump on this and say, well, you're not thinking about the Bible in a Christ-centered way, but I'll talk about that later. Can you read the patriarch stories in Genesis and learn negative and positive examples in parenting? Absolutely. Can you go to a man after God's own heart and learn anything about parenting? Is it possible to actually go to the Bible and have discernment to look at what David did with his son Absalom and to actually see where David made incredibly huge missteps along the way that led to his demise, his son's demise. Stop and think about the very one who wrote that a fool is a grief to his mother was the one who raised Rehoboam. You ever think about that? Read the book of Proverbs and what it says about parenting in light of the fact that Solomon raises Rehoboam. So when we come to the scriptures, not only do we have this perfect example in our Heavenly Father, but we also have positive and negative examples in the scriptures from which we can learn. We also have very clear directives towards parents and towards children. In both the Old and the New Testaments, we have very, very clear directives towards parents and children. Everything from children, obey your parents and the Lord for this is right. To fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath. But raise them in the fear and admonition of the Lord. Fathers, do not exasperate your children so that they do not become disheartened. There are directives, there are prescriptions for parents and children. And then also, and we'll look more at this, we have in the Bible these broad strokes of law and gospel and wisdom. And so there is, and we'll talk about this, there is a sense in which, as a parent, you have God-given authority and you have every right to expect your children to submit to your authority and to obey you. And you can do that without turning them into Pharisees. Now, you can do it in a way that teaches them to be Pharisees, but it is never right for a parent, in a sense, in terms of law, it's never right for a parent to say, well, you know what, what I want them to do is I want them to obey me from the heart, and if they're not willing to obey me from the heart, then it's okay if they disobey me. Bull! I expect them to obey. And if they don't, there are consequences. And so there are the broad strokes of law. You teach that child to obey. There's foolishness in that child's heart. It's your responsibility to drive it far from them. There's also gospel. Every failure, every act of disobedience, every failure on your part, can be turned into a redemptive moment through the power of the gospel. What do you tell that child when you need to bring correction upon them? They're acting like the Tasmanian devil. You're trying to get their attention. And then you have to bring the rod of correction. And there's already a rule that says if you resist, you get another. So when you're up to 35, and you're just flat out tired, and you're like, man, I need to do more cardio if I'm gonna discipline this kid, right? You take that moment And you ask them, what is it that causes so much resistance in your heart to daddy? You know what they're gonna say? I don't know. Is that not true? I don't know. Or if they're theologically astute, this is what I got. Because my heart is black with sin. Yeah, okay, you're absolutely right, but I don't think that you really understand what you've just said, because I'm totally depraved. And you can explain to them, you know what, you lied or you stole, you did whatever, and here's the thing, God sent his son into the world so that you could be forgiven and you could have a new heart And so there's the broad strokes of the gospel, so that even in the midst of them violating law, they get the balm of the gospel. And we parent redemptively, and we're continually pointing these kids, not just to behave, behave, behave, but look to Christ. And then there's wisdom. You know, there's gonna be a lot of stuff that, I mean, there's some pretty big gaps in terms of law, right? Law's kind of black and white, and there's a lot of gray area when you're parenting, and that's where wisdom comes in. Of course, does God give us wisdom to raise our kids? You better believe it. And so we parent according to the word. We let the word mold every aspect with the broad strokes of law, gospel, and wisdom. So it's a serious privilege to be a parent. And it demands that we take our responsibilities, our duties seriously. If you're not a praying person, you become a parent. Oh, you'll pray. Depend upon God. As a parent, make sure that in taking your duties seriously, that you're the kind of person that's diligently trying to learn. Never stop learning. At each stage, you want to be learning more so that you can actually better apply God's Word to each stage of their life. But it's even more than that, because having the first one doesn't mean that you learned how to parent the second one. It's just true. Just because you learn to do this one doesn't, so all of a sudden now you're realizing, wow, I need to think about this, and this kind of discipline doesn't work for this one, and so, you know, time to go to Home Depot. Get a bigger two by four. but diligently learning, just thinking through, Lord, I realize that I need to learn about. Then you have, then they go into, you know, pre-adulthood. And all of a sudden that 12 or 13 year old is so just radically different than when they were 11. And you're thinking to yourself, I had no idea hormones could make such a difference. And so we're learning and growing, and we never stop. We never stop. Consistency. If we're going to take our responsibilities and our duties seriously, we need to be consistent. And I'll tell you that this is the most common failure, isn't it? Anybody that's raised kids, you know this is the most common struggle, isn't it? To be consistent. We're frail. We ourselves are sinners. We struggle with inconsistency. We struggle with the things that require faithful practice. My kids didn't like when we listened to Al Martin tapes when they were little. We'd be listening to one on the way to Dairy Queen and I'd say, Kids, while we're eating our blizzards, we need to have a talk. Mom and dad have kind of become sloppy about things. We've kind of slipped on some things. We think God requires us to be more consistent. And so we want to apologize to you and ask for your forgiveness for not being consistent with you. Which you understand what that means, right? Father, your inconsistencies were perfectly fine with us. We were praying for you and we were praying that you'd be more inconsistent. You know, Romans 7 applies to parenting. The things I want to do, I don't do. The things I hate, I end up doing. Hated losing my temper with my kids. Hated being inconsistent. Consistency. And then reliance upon God and His Word and ultimately the gospel. You know, sinners raising sinners is the perfect place to put the gospel to work. Sinners raising sinners is the perfect place to display the grace of the gospel and to show how wonderful Christ really is. A savior, not only to fallen children, but a savior to fallen parents. So in the next few weeks, while Jason's preaching on the church in the morning, we'll be doing pillars of biblical parenting in the afternoon. And, you know, this is, much more difficult the third time around. But may God help us all to encourage one another, help one another. Just because you don't have any kids at home doesn't mean you're off the hook. Right? That young mom that's about ready to throttle those boys, not that I speak from experience, she may come to you and you've raised your kids, and the worst thing in the world you could do is say, you know what? I'm done with that. You're now called upon to bring aid and assistance and comfort to somebody that's really struggling. In other words, parenting in the body of Christ really is a community effort. So may God give us grace and help. And most of all, may God raise up a generation of our children who know and love the Lord. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word and the way that you reveal to us the glories of parenting and even, Lord, the grit and at times the pain of parenting. And we pray, Lord, for the young parents. We ask that you'd give them humble and receptive hearts. Lord, we do pray that those that think they know everything would realize that they really don't. Father, we pray that you would encourage all of us in this great calling, no matter how old or how young our children are. We thank you that you are our perfect Heavenly Father. No defect in you. The defects are in us. We pray for your mercy and help in Jesus' name. Amen. We hope you've enjoyed this message from Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. To receive a copy of this or other messages, call us at area code 775-782-6516 or visit our website gracenevada.com.