Before we look at the section of scripture in Colossians tonight, which is chapter 3, verses 18 through 21, and this has to do with household relationships, this is December and in table talk every month this year, they've been talking about key themes of the Reformation. They've covered all the solas. And December is about the middle sola right behind me. Sola de Gloria. I want to read three things from December 1st, and that's the introduction to that. The verse that is used in connection with this is found in Isaiah, Isaiah 42.8. I am the Lord. That is my name. My glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols. And then in table talk, there's a part called Coram Deo, which means living before the face of God. And by the way, that happens to us every day and minute of our life. As believers, we are living before the face of God. That's a huge comfort, but I think also rather scary, isn't it? Because God knows our hearts. He knows exactly what we're thinking right now. Right now, He knows what is going through your mind. The writer of Table Talk says this, Jesus tells us that God bestows a certain kind of glory on us in salvation, John 17, 22. But this is not the kind of inherent divine glory that Isaiah is talking about. There is a glory that belongs to God alone, that existed before all things, and that is the reason for all things. We are called to point our friends and our family to that glory by what we say and by what we do. So what this tells us is, what he's written right there is, our words count. Our words matter. And not only do our words matter, but what we do matters. And tonight we're going to be looking at household relationships, but I wanted you to think of it in the context of what sola gloria is all about. Let me read the last paragraph. If God's highest aim is the furtherance of his own inherent glory, and ultimately everything he does is for his own glory, then that must be our aim as well. Our entire lives must be spent working to make much of his name and not ours. No other goal of ours should be greater than to see the Lord's glory magnified and proclaimed everywhere. To be a true servant of God is to seek his glory. and we will seek his glory in our household relationships if we're following what scripture says for us to do tonight. We've been looking at what the Christian lifestyle is in Colossians and we've looked at putting off and putting on and it involves how we relate to others. And last week we looked at chapter 3 verses 12 through 17, which focus on relationships in a local church. Paul shifts the focus to how we are to relate to those in a family setting. In a typical family setting, there's a husband and a wife. And if they have children, they're called parents. And then there's the children themselves. That's what we're going to be looking at tonight. I want to read to you Colossians 3, 18 through 21. Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. Let's pray. Our Father God, I want to thank you for the truth that we're going to look at tonight. It's searching truth because it affects us with the people we spend the most time with, our family. So as we look at these verses, they are very pointed. They're not wordy at all. They just kind of zero in. Help us, Father, that we would be obedient. Help me to speak clearly and accurately and in the unction and the power of the Holy Spirit. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Before we begin looking at the duties of wives and husbands, children and fathers, I want to cover the topic of submission. Paul is going to start out talking about submission when he talks to wives. But we need to look at submission in a broader scope because it is broader than just addressed to wives. There's a scope to submission and I want to suggest to you four. First of all is our submission to God. This is absolutely critical in our lives. If you're to live biblically, if you're to live to glorify God, you must be in submission to Him. And this is the most important relationship that we have, bar none. We relate to God as inferiors. It's not a relationship of equals. And as created being, we worship our creator. He is Lord over all. He is sovereign. He's our master. We are his servants. And we're to be obedient to his commands. All of those things are wrapped up in our submission to God. And then scripture speaks of submission to govern authorities. And we see that in Romans 13, one through seven. Let me read to you the opening verse. Let every person be subject to governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God. And those that exist have been instituted by God. When this was written, fear God and honor the emperor that Peter talks about in 1 Peter 2.17. Do you know who the leader was? Nero. If you know anything about Nero, he was unbelievably wicked. But who put him there? God did. And some of this we may have a hard time putting together, but God is sovereign. God is working for his glory all the time and for our good. And these are truths, overarching truths, big truths that need to govern our life. And then another place in scripture we're told that we are to submit to the elders in the church. 1 Peter 5, 1 through 5 just zeroes in on submitting to elders. Do elders sin? Absolutely. Do they always make wise judgments? No. but we are to submit to them because we sin too and we don't make wise judgments all the time. And then in Ephesians chapter 5 verses 15 to 21, it talks about submitting to one another, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. Who is our example when it comes to submission? It's the Lord Jesus Christ. Mark 1.1 says this, in the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. He's the Son of God. He's God, very God. And Jesus is no less divine than the Father or the Holy Spirit. However, the Son is subject to the Father. Listen to His words in John 8, 29. For I always do the things that are pleasing to Him. And the Him there is God the Father. That's what Jesus was all about. And if we're a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, that's what we need to be all about in submission to the Father. And Jesus sets an example for not only being submissive, but being humble. When in that upper room, he did something that that shocked the disciples. I'm going to read chapter 13 verses 12 through 15. And when he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, do you understand what I have done to you? You call me teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If then your Lord and teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash another's feet. For I have given you an example that you should do just as I have done to you. We start out now looking at what Paul talks about. What is striking is that he doesn't use a lot of words and he zeroes in Ephesians expands that, but we're going to stick with what he says here. He starts out by talking to wives, and he says this, Wives, submit to your husbands at his fitting in the Lord. So wives are to be submissive to their husbands. to place themselves under his authority. This is a voluntary act on the part of the wife. There's no coercion involved. There's nobody standing with a hammer over the wife's head. That's not the idea here. A Christian woman who is getting married is to do this willingly. Now, there's a lot of girls right here that are single. And maybe over here too. You really need to understand what I'm gonna say to you. And if you don't, you're gonna experience heartache in your marriage. I will guarantee you that. Because what the Word of God says for women to do is to be submissive to your husband. Listen, a lady should not consider a man for her husband that she could not submit to. Don't, if you're a Christian, don't marry a non-Christian. Don't do that. And even if you're interested in a Christian, you better know that young man very, very clearly, very clearly. Because scripture tells you to submit to him. Now submission is not a popular concept at all. You're not going to hear it in a typical wedding of a non-believer at all. It goes against the grain of the world's thinking. But really for the young woman, it's the safest place to be. And I want to point out something about submission. Proverbs 31, have you read that ever? The woman described here is unbelievable. She's in business. She's caring for her household. She's not this lady who's just not doing anything at all. So there's the balance there. And now I wanna speak to these young men who are not married. By the way, women are never called to submit to anything a husband may want them to do that would cause them to sin. Let me give you an example. you're in a family and there's a phone call. And the phone, the person on the phone says, may I speak to Mr. Smith, your father? And Mr. Smith, the father, gets your eye and goes like this. I'm not here. Listen, if you say that, what are you doing? You're lying. Now, what you could do is, you know, he's not able to talk to you right now. Could I have your name and number and I'll tell him about that you called. So young man, what a young man need to consider. Most men realize how much they are asking a woman, and I hope they do, when they propose marriage. Men give a lot of thought to the woman that they want to marry. They're looking at her, they're looking at the quality she has, and that is rightly so. But how many men consider their own qualities? How many young men are willing to look at themselves and the qualities they have Are they the kind of a man that a good and godly woman would be willing to submit to? I really urge you young guys out here to keep that in mind. Are you the kind of a guy that the girl you want to marry would be willing to submit to? So it's a two-way street here. Paul goes on, what's the duties of a husband? Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Now, to really understand all of this, you need to understand what love is all about. The world has conditioned us with regard to love to think of it as a feeling. as a feeling. Thus, I don't have love anymore means I no longer have feelings for that wife or young woman. That's not love at all in a biblical sense. Love is not a feeling but an action. That's what love is. It's an action. You know what happens? Feelings come after that. Not, say, after that. When we deliberately act well towards someone, feelings often follow. So few godly woman would mind submitting to a man who loves them as Ephesians tells us, as Christ loves the church. That's the positive. Love your wife. But he just doesn't say the positive. He talks about a negative being harsh. When I was a little boy, my dad was a cowboy, and there was this one particular home that we went to, and the husband at that home, I never heard him speak a kind word to his wife. The words that he spoke were harsh words. I don't know what his wife was thinking and maybe she was just numb to it by now. But that doesn't belong in a wife's words or a husband's words to his wife. At times, being married is a war, okay? Believe me. because two sinners are living with one another. But one of the things that husbands need to be very careful of is the way they speak to their wife. Here's what Corinthians says regarding that. Corinthians defines love the positive for us. So men, we don't have to wonder. We just have to be obedient. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. There was a time in my married life when I spoke sarcastically to Bonnie, and it was done in the form of kind of a joke or jesting. No. That doesn't belong. Doesn't belong. You don't find that in the words I just read to you. Man, it tells us how we're to treat our wives. And now we come to children. What's the duty of children? It's extremely simple and pointed. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. You see, children are under the authority of their parents. God's created order is parents have children to raise them. And you have the exact parents that God wanted you to have. Exactly. God never makes a mistake. And some of your parents may not be Christians. That is not a mistake that you were born into that family. And sometimes Christian kids, if they live in a home where their parents are non-Christians, have this idea that they don't have to obey them. Now, again, you don't obey them if they're asking you to sin. And it's a huge responsibility to be a parent. And those of you that are out there and are parents, you know the weightiness of that. Proverbs has certain kinds of things to say concerning kids. Proverbs 10.1, a wise son makes a glad father, but a foolish son is sorrow to his mother. Proverbs 17.5, a foolish son is a grief to his father and a bitterness to her who bore him. And girls, you're not let off the hook because it talks about son here. Children, you need to honor your parents. Now I'm talking to every child whose parents are alive. We have things called Father's Day and Mother's Day. Now that's not a part of the church instituting that, but it's a day set aside to honor them. Did you do that this year? Did you do something, communicate with them in such a way that you honored them? Because if you're a Christian, you know that God gave you those parents, as I mentioned. So what do you do? You honor them. You honor them. And you keep honoring them till the day they die. And then you need to keep honoring them by what you say about them. And for you children, you need to learn to stand alone for what is right in every kind of context that you find yourself. All of our kids went to public school from day one till the end of high school. They had to stand alone at times. They had to stand alone at times. You know what happens in a high school setting? If you put a hundred high schoolers in a room, those who are alike seem to gravitate to one another, all the druggies. It's just the way it is. So what are you going to do when somebody offers you something or other that you know you shouldn't do, yet you have to learn to stand alone? Parents, what do you need to do with your kids? Train them, teach them how to stand alone. And now I want to talk to fathers because the last thing that Paul says is addressed to fathers, the head of a family. Fathers, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged. Children in a home can become very discouraged. They say it in these words, he, meaning their father, is always finding fault with me. Nothing I ever do seems to satisfy him. Now let me tell you how I am. I love neatness. I love things in their place. I'm symmetrical. I like it when things are balanced. You're a little more over here, but I like balance. Listen, I need to get over that when it comes to certain things. Now, I'm married to a woman who doesn't let me get off easy. Okay? And so, we have these little things in a home like elephants and little things, and I have my way that I like to put them symmetrical. I don't do that anymore. Because Bonnie told me, hands off. Okay? And it really, in the long, big scheme of things, doesn't matter a hoot. It doesn't. But you can get locked in And I had a phrase that I tried to use with my kids. I want to major in the minor, excuse me, I don't want to major in the minors. I don't want to major in the minors, the things that really don't matter. I'm going to read to you what J. Philip Arthur says about this thing concerning fathers. Paul's warning here is that fathers can overbalance and err on the other side of child-rearing by breaking a young person's spirit. This can be done by becoming overprotective. Did you get that? Becoming overprotective. and stifling opportunities to learn independence. When you're learning something, you make mistakes. And if somebody is hovering over you, it's not pleasant. My dad taught me how to drive when I was nine years old. He taught me how to drive to help him in his work. Now, I didn't, at nine years of old, get in that Jeep pickup and start driving smoothly or whatever. My father never scolded me. I can never remember my father doing that for anything. If he asked me to do something, he showed me how to do it, and in the initial stages, he accepted what I did. without getting on my case. I can't say that as a father regarding my own kids. Okay, let me, let me, I got detoured here. This can be done by being overprotective and stifling opportunities to learn independence, by unrelenting criticism and stinted praise, by letting the child know that he or she has fallen short of expectations that were never realistic in the first place. and by making pointed comparisons, either with siblings or with children from another family who are presented as if they're perfect. The only thing that this will achieve is to make your children develop a cordial dislike for the ones they are compared with. Very few fathers who read Paul's words will not feel rueful And that word means shameful at some point and be grateful that both God and their children are forgiving. I've had to go to my kids and ask for forgiveness when they were your age and younger because of my stupidity as a father. And that's all I can call it, my stupidity. So let me read you another summary in closing. There's a slippery slope about the human heart. In particular, faced with a table of family duties like this one, we can find it all too easy to impose conditions. A wife says to herself, Okay, I'll submit to him, but only when he starts to show me some sacrificial love. It is possible that her husband is taking the same line when he says, I would love her in the way that I ought, but not until she shows me a bit of respect. Children can play the same game. Obey them, dream on. not unless they show me a little bit of affection. And in the meantime, resentful parents are thinking, why should I be affectionate when the only return I get is a surly non-cooperation? The problem here is that each person is looking at the other party rather than looking at himself or herself. We would do well at such moments to remember Jesus's words to Peter. What is that to you? You follow me. We've looked tonight at the closest relationship that there is as a human being, and that's in a family setting. You, as a husband, a wife, a parent, as children, are going to be working on this the rest of your life. And if you're older, you know what I mean, because you haven't made it yet. And we never will till we're with our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So I have just one question tonight. Are you fulfilling your duty as a member of your family? It's pointed, not many words, but it's something all of us need to work on. I'm still a parent even though all my kids have left home and have kids. I'm a husband. I'll be that till God takes one of us. Bonnie and I are in the last chapters of our life. My mother lived to be 95. I don't know how long I will. I'm 76 now. God is clear. What do we need to do? We need to pray that we would be all that God wants us to be in our family relationships. You know, one of the things that happens, did you pray a lot this week after you found out that Rae Lynn, of what is happening to her? Did you find yourself praying? I hope you did. Listen. praying for each other. That's what church is all about. So I'm gonna give us time to just think about what Paul said in these verses, and then I'll pray and then we'll have a closing here. Our Father God, We are here tonight and your Word has spoken. And I want to ask, Father, that you would cause us in the week that lies before us to think about what these verses say. They're weighty verses. It's about a context with the people that we're with the most. So help us, Father, not to bring forth excuses why we're not doing this. Help us, Father, to do what your Word says. For we ask it in Jesus' name, amen.