Okay, we have looked at last week the origin of the biblical family and we looked at the idea that it was created and that God made man in his image. And of course, and then he made him male and female and God breathed into man the breath of lives and he became a living soul. And then the idea of community in the creation community, it's not good that man should be alone. So the idea of marriage and family is community. And then of course, the command to the family then was that they should feel the earth that they should be fruitful, multiply, and replenish is King James' word, which is not a very good word. Of course, back in 1611, replenish probably had a different meaning than it has with us. But a lot of people have used the word replenish to think, but there was a pre-atomic race, I mean, pre-atom race, and then it was destroyed. And so between Genesis 1.1 and Genesis 1.2 is a gap. And so it's called the gap theory and those kinds of things. But anyway, I think you ought to read the black sections, not the white sections. You shouldn't just fill in the spaces. You ought to read the words. But anyway, the word replenish there means just to fill the earth. And it's been called historically a dominion mandate that God has given. the earth to man and that man should take dominion over it and that man should never be idle. Even Adam in the garden wasn't. Is that ringing a little bit? Even Daniel in the garden was not. you know, that it was not idle. He is supposed to, and I'm in front of these speakers, which is another problem, he is supposed to dress and keep the garden. And so that is the mandate of work. And we are created in the image of God. Now, of course, there's been volumes and volumes and volumes and volumes written on what it means to be created in the image of God. But what would you think being created in the image of God, what would you think some of the characteristics of man that man has flows from the fact that he was created in the image of God? Ever thought about it? Well, surely it doesn't mean body because God doesn't have a body. And when we talk about God or when the scripture, when God talks about himself having hands or a face or feet, You know, that is what we call in English, anthropo, which comes from anthropos, which means man. Anthropomorphic comes from morphe, which means body. Anthropomorphic language. Now you can win a lot of scrabble with that, but basically it just means to attribute to God the body parts of man. But we teach our children in the catechism, does God have a body? No, God does not have a body like me. So it's not body. So what is it if we're created in the image of God? It is the thing that sets us apart from animals. Now, there is some of the image of God in an animal, just like there's some of the image of God in the heavens, the heavens declare the glory of God. But animals were not specifically created in the image of God. They are not specifically image bearers. And so we are an image bearer as human beings, which gives us our sanctity and our dignity, okay? So we are created in the image of God. Now to be created in the image of God, one of the things created in the image of God is that we are creative. We write things and draw things and chisel things and make things and not only creative, I mean in the sense of being, but active. that we have this desire to do things, to take things and to make things. It is to be idle is not really a great characteristic of man. Now, of course, the fall and laziness and all of that has come in, but now also the image of God would be language that we can speak. Also, the image of God would be intellect. Also, the image of God is to consider our own existence. We can contemplate our existence, or as philosophically sometimes called, we are self-conscious. We know that we are ourself, Dogs don't contemplate their existence. They just exist, but we contemplate our existence. And so those are some of the things that anything that sets us apart from an animal is the image of God in us. Now, so in this dominion mandate, this image of God is working out and And Adam was to keep and dress the garden. And then after the fall, the difference was that now you're going to earn money by the sweat of your face. Somebody said by the sweat of your brow. Well, obviously. The scripture does more than brow by the sweat of your face. So thorns and thistles now come up in the ground and things Adam may have, I mean, we don't know, we're not given any idea about how he dressed the garden, but he could have dressed the garden by word, by speaking, he could have dressed the garden. Or he may have used his hands to dress the garden. But the thing is, it became increasingly more difficult after the fall. Well, then the next thing we looked at, and we did this very hurriedly through at the end of the last session, the objective of the biblical family are, if you wanted to use, I'm using alliteration here with O's, but you could, the purpose, what is the purpose of the biblical family? Well, we ran through this kind of quickly, so let me just remind you that the purpose of the biblical family, first of all, is partnership. It's not good that man should be alone, so there's partnership. There has to be at least two elements to be a family, at least two elements. There has to be a husband and a wife, a mother and a father, And then of course, children that come from this. And so the biblical family is partnership. Again, one of the images of God, remember we said last, the one and the many. God is the one, but he's also in Trinity. And that's what we see in creation, the one and the many. Well, God has innate to his being fellowship, communion and partnership between the persons of the Trinity. And so the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, they're not one person. They're three persons, one God. And of course, again, many, many books have written on that idea. But why should you think we should understand God to any depth if, I mean, because he's God and we have a finite mind. And not only do I have a finite mind, but we have a mind that's been defective or has become defective because of sin. And so, but there's partnership in God. So there's surely partnership in us. And God says, it's not good that man should be alone. Now that's philosophically, good is a philosophical term. There's two kinds of good in philosophy. There's good in the sense of aesthetics. In other words, beautiful. But then there's good in the sense of morality, what is proper, what is holy, what is the proper, you know. And so when God says it is not good that man should be alone, then he's using that in a philosophical sense that man can never accomplish exactly or could never accomplish what his purpose in life is if he is alone. So it is not good that he should be alone. And then the next idea of the purpose of the family is purity, certain appetites, and surely there's a sexual appetite that must be satiated and can only be satiated by God, by God's rule, and that is that in marriage. And so there's a purity, because without marriage, there would be impurity, there would be There'd be pornography, there would be, you know, there would be putridity, there would be, you know, things that are base and puerile and filthy, disease-ridden, see. But in marriage, there's purity. And then, of course, the purpose of marriage is for propagation, that is to have children. to continue the next generation. God has purposed, when he created, he created trees and they, these trees produced after their kind and the seed was in them, you see. Well again, this propagation with vegetation or with the animal kingdom surely comes to the idea that God has used man and has put in man the ability to generate or regenerate, if you will. And since, so here's propagation and propagation should only be through a marriage relationship. any propagation, any having children apart from marriage and apart from this covenant relationship before God, even if these people are doing it in some kind of remembered morality or they're doing it through some kind of borrowed morality, it is wrong against the commands of God and against the purpose of God to bring children into the world except through marriage. Children should only be brought into the world by a man and a woman who are committed to themselves in a covenant relationship and then propagation, the next generation. So that's one of the reasons that we are in the earth is that the next generation can also be in the earth. And then of course, the purpose of marriage is protection or the family, protecting husband, protecting wife, wife in a sense protecting husband, children being protected by mother and father because children come here helpless. And so they are helpless until they're, you know, they're at least physically helpless until they get around, you know, I don't know, four or five, and then they become more and more, or maybe I should say less and less helpless. And they're mentally helpless until they're about 26. But anyway, but there has to be this protection, physical protection, spiritual protection. There has to be emotional protection, psychological protection, intellectual protection. A child left to himself will become a shame to his mother. I don't know why the Bible said that about mother, but it seems like the mother takes the thing a little harder than the father. And so there's the protection. Then next there is provisions in the family, biblical family. He that doesn't take care of his family is worse than an infidel. And he has denied the faith. And so one of the great responsibilities of family is to make provisions, to make provisions for, you know, for the children, the husband, for the wife to bring in these things, physical provisions, provisions that would, you know, nutritional provisions, provisions of dress, provisions of home, Again, you could extend that provisions of education and on and on, so. So, this comes in the family. It is the family's responsibility. And this can often extend beyond just the immediate husband, wife, children family. It can cross over to a more extended family. So, The apostle Paul writes to Timothy in 1 Timothy 5, but if any provide not for his own and especially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith and is worse than an infidel. And so he's talking about here actually widows being taken care of by the church. and he calls them widows indeed. Well, so verse three of 1 Timothy 5 says, honor widows that are widows, truly widows, widows indeed. Well, who are they? Well, if any widow have children or nephews, the idea of the nephew would be, you know, your brother's or your sister's male children. Let them learn first to show piety at home and to requite or to, you know, or to make provisions for their parents. And this idea of parents even would extend to aunts and uncles. It's actually pro gonos, pro gonos, and it can mean ancestors, can mean parent, grandparent, forefather, and obviously in this context can mean aunt or uncle. So it should not be the church's responsibility to take care of widows. Whose responsibility is to take care of widows? The family's responsibility. So you begin to see the order and then you begin to see self or government, maybe I should say self-government, family government, church government. And every government has its sphere and shouldn't cross over. And for example, the church shouldn't get into the family sphere. Family take care of themselves. Nor should the families get into the church's sphere. You know, I mean, we've all heard about these churches that are run by families. And so, but anyway, so here's the provision. And then of course, the idea of the purpose of the family is power. And so the idea of a covering, that you have power over your head, that husband and wife, that the husband's the head of the wife, and the husband and wife stands at the head of the family. And there is submission, there is submission. And of course, you know, the store or the passive scripture in the Bible, you know, in 1 Corinthians where it says that a woman shouldn't prophesy or pray without her head covered. She should have a covering over her head and that this covering, you know, is indeed her husband and then the children are covered by the parents. And I think, did I say, did I say last week that a woman should have at least two coverings over her head, is that right? Did I tell you all that? That it should be the father, husband, so the father, the wife moves out from under the father, under the head of her husband, and under the head of her husband, or under the head of her father, there should be another spiritual covering, and that would be you know, her pastor or elder or elders, you know, the idea of plurality and so there's spiritual authority. And again, we read this, you know, kind of in another context but the, but the principles are here. So it says, let me just see, this is 1 Corinthians 11. Let me see if I can just get here. Yeah, verse five, but every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoreth her head. For that is even all one as if she were shaven. For if a woman be not covered, let her also be shorn or shaven. But if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered. And then he goes into this discussion, for a man indeed ought not to cover his head. for as much as he is the image and the glory of God, but the woman is the glory of the man. For man is not of woman, of the woman, but the woman is of the man." Now, what's he talking about? He's talking about creation, right? Neither was the man created for the woman, but the woman for the man. It's not good that man should be alone. For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels. Oh, what does that mean? Well, that's controversial. I mean, it's everywhere when you read the commentaries. of the angels, now what are you talking about? You're talking about the messengers of God? Probably not. You're talking about angelic beings? Probably so. And so this woman should have power on her head because of the angels. Well, whatever it means or whatever it doesn't mean, it means that there's a spiritual dimension to this thing, right? There's something otherworldly about this dimension. That could mean because of the angels, because angels are submissive to God and they always live to serve God. It could be because of the angels in the sense that it would be, the angels would be appalled at something like this. That if a woman went out from under the covering of her husband, the angels would be appalled by something like this. Well, and I'm sure that there's probably 10,000 other translations here, but, or interpretations of this, but anyway. The point I'm going to make is out of this text that a woman should have power and the word there is exousia. Now there's two words translated power in the New Testament. One word out of the New Testament is dunamis. We get the word dynamite from that or dynamo and that's explosive or power in the sense of something that's generated. The other word is exousia. which is translated better, I think, or at least more clearly to us in the sense of authority, authority. And so that exousia is authority. So a woman should have authority, power or authority. Nevertheless, neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man in the Lord. And so men and women are indeed codependent upon each other, right? For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman. And you can figure all that out, right? But all things are of God. Judge yourself, judge in yourselves. Is it comely or is it beautiful or is it proper? Prepo is the word here. Is it suitable? Is it proper? You know, does it become a woman? We use that in English, right? That doesn't become a woman. Okay, so it's the same sense, comely. Okay, is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered, does not even nature itself teach you that if a man have long hair, now he's switching back from cover to long hair, so now he's talking about hair and covering and so is the cover a covering or is it hair? Well, of course, Roman Catholicism. What did women, I don't know what they do now, but they used to not even go into church if they didn't have what? A veil over their head, a covering over there. And then there's some Protestants and some reformed people that actually still teach that. So there's some women that don't go into these churches unless they got something on their head, like a little doily or something. Well, again, He goes, if a woman, okay, so if a man have long hair, it's a shame unto him. Well, then you have to say, well, how long is long? Well, didn't Jesus have long hair? I mean, every picture I've ever seen of Jesus, he had long hair. Well, those are not pictures of Jesus, right? Those are artistic renderings of what someone thought Jesus looked like. And Jesus did have a body. So he did have a head and he did have hair. He probably had more like bushy hair, because he was Jewish. He probably, I have some Jewish or some people that I know, some Jewish friends that whose hair is kind of bushy. And when it grows out, it doesn't grow long, it kind of grows bushy. But I don't know, I never saw a picture. I have walked by pictures and I walked by one that was supposed, I guess, supposed to be Jesus, I guess. And I said, look, that's a wonderful rendering of Moses. And the guy looked at me and said, that's not Moses, that's Jesus. I said, how do you know? I mean, I don't know. But I do know this. that every picture that I've ever seen of Julius Caesar or rendering Julius Caesar didn't have long hair. And so you have to be critical when you're thinking about these things, right? Like Christmas couldn't have been in December because the sheep wouldn't have been out. Come on, it rarely snows in Jerusalem. In fact, Jerusalem is about on the same Longitude, and that'd be latitude, right? Saying latitude as Laurel, Mississippi. And how much snow did we get this Christmas? I mean, our sheep couldn't have been out this Christmas because they would have drowned. But other than that, they surely could have been out. So you have to be critical when you're thinking of this. And so they said, well, Jesus had long hair. But when you look, and Julius Caesar died about 30 something years before Jesus was born. Did he have long hair? Well, and they said, well, they couldn't cut hair back then. They sheared sheep. What do you mean? Here's the Bible talking about a woman being shorn. Just think, okay, just think. Well, if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her, for her hair is given her for her covering. Now, whatever we make of this, obviously the scripture is saying that a woman's hair is her cover. And so why should a woman have long hair? Again, how long is long? Well, a woman has long hair because it's her glory. And if you've ever been around a woman when it comes to her hair, you know that's true. Men don't really care too much about their hair. I mean, there's a few of them that do. I used to have a cousin that would get a woman's permanent way, but he was weird. Anyway, but I never cared. Just make sure it looks all right, doesn't look bedhead before you leave. And then, but women are just, I mean, their hair has to be pristine. Because we're not talking, I mean, there are some Slav, and maybe I shouldn't have said that, but anyway, there are some women that don't care too much about their hair, but most women, it's their glory. and they treat it. But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such customs, neither the churches of God. So he's saying this thing about covering and how this, he says, but you know, if you're gonna be contentious about this thing, well then, you know, just do whatever you think's best. But we see here in the word of God that there is this power, this covering. which says, so the covering, the long hair or the covering on a woman says that she is under authority and under whose authority? The authority of her husband. And then, so, well, I guess that's about all I need to say about that, unless you have some questions, which is probably dangerous for me to start asking questions. I mean, by and large, women like long hair, right? By and large, what'd you think, by and large? I mean, it's a problem, right? I mean, I'll never forget my grandmother. My grandmother was a godly Methodist. She was a Methodist when Methodists were Methodists. She liked a little holiness too, a little Pentecostal. She was a little bit Pentecostal. My daddy would take her around to these Pentecostal meetings and she kind of leaned more a little bit to holiness in Pentecostal. But I remember my grandmother always had her hair on her head and I remember being there one day when my grandmother decided that she was gonna wash her hair and she took her hair down and it was to her ankles. I was stunned. So she took this literally. But then she wore it up here, you know, like you couldn't tell that, but anyway. So there's a lot of, you know, the Pentecostals were real big about that, but then they piled it up. So, I mean, if it's gonna be a long hair, it should be. All right, enough of that. No questions? All right, good. All right, now let's go to the next major level, the order of the family. So we've talked about the origin and we've talked about the objective of the purpose and now we're gonna talk about the order. And of course, this will probably be the meat of the rest of our time together in talking about this order. of the biblical family. Now, first of all, let me talk to you about the concept of order. There is the biblical concept of order that when Christ comes into your life, what does he do for you? Well, I mean, we could talk about it, you know, we could talk about it in a number of different ways. You know, he redeemed you, he forgives you of sin, but he also changes, right? If any man be in Christ, he's what? a new creature or creation, I guess. And probably the better translation would be creation because a creature is a creation, but he's a new creation. So if anyone be in Christ, there's a new creation. So he changes you. What does he do for you? Well, one of the things he does is that he orders your life, right? You become a disciple. What word do we get out of the root word disciple? Discipline. Discipline. What is a disciple? Well, the root meaning of that word is a pupil or a student. One who learns from a master. That's why we are called the disciples of Christ. We are his disciples. He is our master. He is our teacher. And they called him rabbi, which meant what? Teacher. We know that thou art a teacher come from God. No man can do what you do lest he be from God. And they called him rabbi, rabboni, my teacher, our teacher. So he's master, he's Lord, he's teacher. And so the idea of disciple is discipline. And we used to talk that way in English. We used to say, what are you studying? I'm studying the discipline of law. I'm studying the discipline of mathematics. I'm studying the discipline of astronomy, the discipline of theology. Okay, so the idea here is that there can be no education without discipline. You cannot be a disciple of Christ without discipline. And part of that discipline is an ordering of your life. You used to be chaotic and now you are ordered. You used to be contrary. Things used to be horrible in your life. You had no form to your life. It was just wrecked by sin. But when Christ comes into your life, he is Lord of your life and he brings order to your life. Now the very, we know that because in the beginning God created What? Fill that verse out in your mind. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. You know, that's interesting. He says the heavens, but then he doesn't say, you know, the planets and the stars, but the heavens. So there's two divisions. There's the earth, and then there's the heavens. The earth is different than the heavens. In humanistic thinking, they just want to put the earth among all the other planets. But not in God's thinking. When God gave us his word, he divided this earth from the rest. The rest of it's called the heavens. Haishamayim is the Hebrew word. Haritz is the Hebrew word for earth. So there's the heavens and there's the earth. Now, there's a Greek word for earth. Do y'all know what that means? Y'all have heard that word. You've heard it a hundred times. The word for world or for earth, mostly world, earth could be gay, Not gay in the sense of happy, but gay in the sense of, in the sense of geo. Geography is the study of what? The earth. Geothermal, heat that comes out of the earth. But the word for world and for universe is what word? Do you remember that word? Social with a K. What? Cosmos, cosmos, okay? Y'all heard that. Cosmic, we get the word cosmic. We also get another word from that, cosmetics. And we also get a word from cosmetics, cosmetology. So the idea of cosmic, so what is cosmetology? The study of what? Well, the study of hair is part of it, but cosmetology goes beyond hair to the face, right? In other words, cosmetology is the study of orderliness. When you put cosmetics on, you are ordering. Men don't do this. Some men do, but they're funny. But women mostly do this. Before, I mean, Paula's grandmother would never leave the house until she was made up, as they used to say. Until she was what? Ordered. She didn't want to look disorderly. So she ordered her face, her hair. Well, so that's the concept of order. It comes from God. The world, literally means what? An ordered thing. When God created, he created order. Now, what was, you know, again, you go back to Genesis 1, the first 10 chapters of Genesis are absolutely vital that you understand them or you won't understand anything else. And humanists say the first 10 chapters of Genesis are what? Myth. but we know that they're not myth. I mean, they're the message. It's the heart of everything else. Well, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Verse two says, and the earth was without form and void and darkness covered the face of the deep. So the earth had no form. It was void. It was vain. It was empty. And God ordered it. And you see that, read through the account of creation. He put a greater light in the skies to do what? to rule the day. He put a lesser light in the sky to do what? Rule the night. He put, I mean, the Psalmist says he put all these stars, all these stars in their orbits, in their circuits. Actually, the Bible talked about orbits and circuits long before science came up with it. Well, again, there's an orderliness That's what God does. Now, what are the works of God? The works of God are these. Decree, God decreed everything that would come to pass. The second work of God is the work of creation. The third work of God is the work of providence. And what providence is, is decree applied to creation, see? And that's why these great confessions do them in that order. Here is decree, creation, providence. Decree is God purposing all things that will come to pass. Creation is God's ordering of this void and empty thing. And providence is God governing doing the actual governing of his decrees in creation. And then what's the other work of God? That's why we're all in Christ. Those of us who are believers, the work of redemption or the work of salvation. Now in all of those works, was there any order to decree? Well, sure there was. In fact, that's where we get this highbrow theological discussion of, was man's fall supralapsarian or infralapsarian? That might be a lot more than you want to deal with, but anyway. But the order of the decrees, what were the orders of the decree? Did God order the decree? Was it decreed that man should fall first or that man would be saved first? And so, theologians get after it. The rest of us go, what does it matter? Anyway, is there order in creation? Well, there's absolute order in creation. Is there order in providence? Well, the whole idea of providence is the idea of order. So should there be order in redemption? Obvious. To be redeemed is to be ordered. And so the concept of order is not only basic to the family, but the concept of order is basic to all existence. I'll tell you a little story. I've got a friend of mine, George Martin, George Martin went to seminary. He was a little ahead of me. I think he's a year ahead of me. Brilliant Hebrew student. He'd come back from class and he would do his Hebrew. He would do like day one and then he'd come back from day two and do day one and two, then three day one, two and three and four day. I mean, he would do it all. He just kept doing it over and he became a brilliant Hebrew student. In fact, he's actually teaching at Southern Seminary now in the Hebrew department. He was a missionary to Indonesia and told me that you could tell those who were still Hindu and those who were still Muslim, as opposed to those who had become Christian. He said, you could tell, you didn't have to talk to them. You didn't have to have a discussion with them. You could just walk by their houses. And the houses of the Christians were orderly and the Muslims and the Hindus were junky. I'll never forget that. He said, so when God saved these people, he ordered their life. Well, so that's what we'll talk about after the break.