If you will, turn with me to Ephesians chapter six again. Ephesians chapter 6, we'll pick up the reading in verse 4. And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord. So over the last few weeks, we've been dealing with the issue of how do we deal with the sin of anger that might exist within your child's heart, or better yet, for some of you that have the younger children, how do we start working to ensure that we deal with this, not when you see the full-blown outburst of wrath taking place, but that you actually start dealing with the warning signs. Let me remind you what are the warning signs that there's really problems within the heart of your child. You would especially think of outbursts, temper tantrums, and sometimes we justify that in younger children. Once again, you need to start disciplining them at a very young age to make sure that that doesn't become how they try to push back against your authority. Things such as argumentation, quarrelsome. debate you know those that just like to debate for debate sake those who just want to argue with you There's no real sense of wanting to grow. There's a place for discussing the Scriptures and trying to sharpen one another with the Scriptures, but to just sit down and argue for argues sake, to sit down and build a church around people who just want to argue all the time, that's not growing together. You know, we looked at this Sunday about the purpose and the nature of the church. One of the things that Christ talks to us about is He describes us as a body that He is fitting together. And so, I challenge you to think through, as we have gotten to know one another over the last several years, would you say we're growing close together in our understanding of what God's Word has to say? And it's not a one-way street, right? You're challenging me, I'm challenging you. We're encouraging one another to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Are you seeing that? If we see that, then what that tells us is that we're actually performing the purpose of what the church is to be about. The body of Christ growing together in oneness and understanding. Okay? To sit down and have a disagreement over things is not what we're talking about. It's just having a spirit of wanting to argue, strife, right? And wherever you go, you find yourself wanting to argue with others rather than say, how do we grow together? But if we see that, particularly in children, think about your home. This is why the home is a good place to start instructing your children. Is there always something quarrelsome about one or all of your children? Then that tells you there are some real warning signs there. Disrespect. Animosity, cruelty. Does the bigger child use force to get their way? Once again, invoking unbiblical principles when there's disagreement within a house would be signs that, hey, there's anger within that, malice, bitterness. Here's one, discouragement. Do you have a child that just seems to always be discouraged? That's a warning sign that there's anger going on within that child. And maybe you've been there before. You know what it's like. You've been discouraged before because everything it seems like you do is wrong. Nobody wants to live in that kind of environment. You don't like it. You wouldn't want me to treat you that way. And why would we ever want to treat our children that way? And so apathy. Are your kids apathetic? Are they indifferent? So that would be some warning signs. And the common denominator of all that is that there's anger residing in the heart of that child. We took our study as we dealt with, and the Bible equates the foolishness, the characteristics of a fool, with anger. And so we looked at the different characteristics of a fool. We looked at all those passages in Proverbs to try to build that together. And then we talked about one of the things that we see, or at least when I talk to other parents, or at least the things I'm reading as we try to look at all this and try to pull together what the scriptures say, is that when you have a child that is dealing with anger, one of the common denominators that you find is typically what you've created in your home is a child-centered home. And so, remember, we contrast a child-centered home with a Christ-centered home. And they look different. They feel different. The structure of the home is completely different. So let me remind you of the characteristics of a child-centered home, lest you've forgotten, because my concern is that you heard the teaching, you thought, boy, that sounds a lot like my home, but you're not cleaning it up. You're not dealing with it. So I want to keep reminding you of this, because I don't want to let you off the hook. So, number one, does your children interrupt adults when they're talking? That's a characteristic of a child. Can they not be patient? Do they not understand their place? Next, they use manipulation and rebellion to get their way. Do you find that your child is manipulative? And you'll see this even at a young age, right? Are they manipulative to get their way? Number three, they dictate the family schedule. So, once again, if you're doing outside activities, that's okay if your child is where you want them to be at any given time, but if that begins to dictate your schedule where you can't perform your duties before God, you're creating this kind of environment where Christ's desire becomes second to what you or your child may be wanting. Does that make sense? So we're not saying that there's anything wrong in and of itself of activities, but they have to be brought under and make sure this is where you're trying to lead your family and that that's not dictating your schedule. Alright, next, a child-centered home looks like where the child takes precedent over the needs of the spouse. That should never happen. Remember, we argued that the relationship between the husband and wife, according to Genesis 1, is a permanent relationship. It's the primary relationship within the home. The relationship between you and your child is a temporary one. Remember, what happens when they leave? They cleave to someone else. Then that becomes the permanent relationship. So make sure that they don't take precedent over the needs of your spouse. Next, another characteristic of a child-centered home is that they have an equal or overriding vote in all decision-making matters. Your home is not a democracy where the children get to weigh in and vote. You are responsible under God as the parents. to have authority over that home. We have the head, we have the women, and keep this in mind, even the young men in the home, they're not over the wife. Right? And so you need to make sure you have that proper authority structure within your home. Your children are to honor your wives. But once again, they're not to have an equal or overriding vote in the decision-making matters within your home. And I think I used the example before where, you know, I hear about parents who say, well, yeah, we'd love to come. I mean, I don't know what it was. I was at a homeschool conference and I gave a lecture on using homeschooling as a tool for discipling your children. And I had several parents, particularly, you know, his moms, right? The moms came up, said, this is great. We ought to be sitting over there where you guys are. But, you know, my children just really love their youth group. Since when do the children get to dictate what church they go to that you go and worship? So once again, don't allow your children to make those types of decisions because that's what you're going to be held accountable for as you stand before God. The other thing too is that, now that doesn't mean there will be a time and a place where your children, because you're training them to make decisions. So when do you allow them to start discussing and having these talking points around decisions that can be made? as soon as you see that they can make decisions that are not self-serving, but that they serve God, that they serve someone else other than themselves. That's a different way of thinking. So you are trying to not prepare them never to make a decision. You're trying to prepare them and train them to that point, to that day. Now what age does that happen at? I don't know. It depends on the child. You know, we got some 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds, still haven't reached that, right? And Marie might even argue there's a 40-year-old in here that hadn't reached it. But, you know, the point is is that, you know, we should be training our children up to this point where they can make decisions, okay? Another one is they demand excessive time and attention from the parents to the detriment of the parents' other biblical responsibilities. They speak to parents as though they were peers. Children, you're not your parents' peer. They're your authority, you're to honor them. And you need to make sure that you're training your children to have that type of respect. Another characteristic of a child-centered home is that the child has to be entertained or coddled rather than disciplined out of a bad mood. You have a child that is prone to being in a bad mood, well then how do you get them out of a bad mood? Don't let them dictate the culture and the environment within your home. Now let's contrast that with a Christ-centered home. A Christ-centered home is described by children who joyfully serve others. Now some of you may think that's impossible, but that's because you've been living in the other category. Your children can learn to joyfully serve others, but you've got to train them. You've got to train them to do this. Part of it is, do you like to joyfully serve others, or do you joyfully like to be served? If you like to surround yourself with people that serve you, then guess what? That's what you're training your children to do. They need to cheerfully obey parents the first time. What do we say, children? Slow obedience is what? So you heard that. You've repeated it. Now, tomorrow morning when your parents wake you up and say, get out of the bed, how long are you going to lay there and think about it? Do you know what's going to happen when you wake up? We've been through this. Do you know what your mom expects of you when you get out of bed? Are you going to immediately do it with a cheerful attitude? Are you going to pout or are you just going to ignore it all together? But the point here is that in a Christ-centered home, the child is taught to obey the parent the first time they hear the instructions. What usually happens is you don't teach them this. And maybe you're okay with it and you're that patient mom who gets through 8 to 9, from 9 to 10, from 10 to 11, but somewhere midday, you've had it. And then you're no longer training them, you're unleashing on them. And so what we want to do is make sure that if they don't obey you the first time, immediate discipline, a zero tolerance policy on disobedience, And it prevents all the wrath of any parents going out of control, right? Because now your children are obeying. Now I can't get a read on some of you if you think that's even possible, but it is. But you've got to have this idea that I will not allow disobedience to continue within the home. In a Christ-centered home, the child is taught not to interrupt parents and adults when they're speaking. And this is something you need to do. There are times when your kids need to talk to you. Have you taught them? Have you taught them what to do when they come up on you and they're talking to an adult, and they really need your attention? I mean, just teach them to put their hand on your arm. Hey, you know, I'm not just standing here, listen, I really need your attention, but I'm not going to interrupt you because I respect you, right? You didn't know, and then that would be a cue for, oh, hang on one second, let me, right? But teach them. There's times when they really need to talk to you. So you've got to train them. What is acceptable? What's unacceptable? That's your job to train them in this. Next, they need to understand that God has given parents other responsibility other than just meeting their needs. And they need to know that. Next, they need to suffer the natural consequences of any sinful and irresponsible behavior. They need to learn not to speak to parents as though they were peers, but honor them as a God-ordained authority. So, kids, how are you treating your parents? How are you talking to them? How do you approach them? You can go back and listen to the other teaching, but those are some of the high points I wanted to hit you with. The thing I want to talk about is, before we get into dealing with the anger within the heart, we've been dealing over the last two weeks about ways parents might be provoking their children to wrath, provoking them to anger. And so this is what Ephesians 6 is actually talking with. First it says, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath. So that command is given because, fathers, we do have the ability to provoke our children to wrath, and we need to understand that. He says, don't do this, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord. So, what are some ways that we provoke our children to wrath? Well, we looked at some of these, and I'm going to continue this tonight, but just by way of review, the first way we do it is lack of marital harmony. If there's discourse and strife within your home between the husband and the wife, that's going to set a tone and a culture within your home that will provoke and promote anger within the child. You know, if you, as a husband and wife, don't know how to resolve conflicts without outbursts, then guess what happens to your children? Do you find yourself, you have to intervene quite a bit to resolve conflicts between your children? Where do you think they learn that from? Where do they pick up that habit? Okay, so think about how you fathers or husbands communicate to your wife. Wives, think about how you communicate. I mean, let's face it, we're all sinners and we recognize there's going to be disagreements. The issue has to be how do you address them. And so if you find that you don't think that your children are biblically playing this out correctly when they have disagreements amongst their siblings, you need to make sure you're not training them to do this. This will provoke them to wrath. So that's the first one. The second one was establishing and maintaining a child-centered home. We've covered this, so I'm not going to spend too much time on it again. But if you are allowing the child to be the center of the attention within the home, then what happens when they don't get their way? They get angry. They have outbursts. Okay, so there's going to become a point where you will set limits, right? Even in the most permissive homes, there's always some limit being set, and when that child reaches that limit, he's going to react and he's going to explode against the parent. What you want to do is bring the child under, help him understand in a Christ-centered home, we're all, even myself, I'm a man under authority. You are men and women under authority. Your children need to learn that they are under authority. Teach them this at a young age. Next, modeling sinful behavior is another way of provoking them. How do you deal with them when it comes to discipline? You respond to them in an angry type of way. You model sinful anger in front of them. Number four, we covered this one. Habitually disciplining while angry. When we discipline when we're angry, it allows us to over-discipline at times. The other thing too is, remember, I think James 119 ought to be a scripture that we all ought to put to memory because he teaches us it's not the anger of man that leads us to the righteousness of God. Our anger will never drive a child to the righteousness of God. So we want to make sure that when we do discipline, even when we have to rebuke, there can be firmness in your voice. There can be a sense of urgency around it. I'm not talking about being emotionalist without emotions. What I am trying to get you to see is don't just be reacting and just let anything fly out of your mouth. You need to learn to govern. Be purposeful with your words. Bring the Word of God to bear on them. And then when you discipline them with the rod, then the idea there is that you're not doing this out of being vindictive. You're actually with this idea of correction. Alright, next, verbal outbursts are unacceptable. We talked about this one last week, right? We need to learn how to speak. We need to learn how to speak for what the situation calls for. Here's another way that we provoke our children to wrath. When we're inconsistent with discipline. Remember, the ways we are inconsistent is one, by having two different parental standards of discipline. So if the father is the stern one and the mother is permissive, or if the mother is the stern one and the father is permissive, then understand you're sending this mixed signal to them, and what actually happens is they learn how to manipulate the system. But that inconsistency will provoke a child to wrath. You need to be on the same page. What is worthy of getting the rod out? You need to help them understand this so that it's clear walking into this in your home what the culture is going to be. The other inconsistency is vacillating from day to day about what is punishable. Children should know that our yes means yes and our no means no, right? And that it doesn't really matter whether I'm in a good mood or a bad mood. That's really irrelevant. These are the standards here. I mean, what if there was a judge out there who just judged based on how he felt each day? Well, this is kind of, you know, that'd be frustrating, particularly if you're the one on trial. And so, think about a child who has to come in and not know from one day to the next how bad it's going to be with father, because father from day to day just, he can't control himself, he can't control his emotions, and so there's no real training going on there. It's just, I'm trying to feel him out on how far I can push the boundaries today, because maybe today he's in a good mood, he'll be permissive, but if I find he's in a bad mood, I'll just avoid him. Well, that's not a culture, that's not a home of what we're talking about, how you train up. A place where the children avoid you because you're in a bad mood is not a home of training and discipline, okay? Alright, so the other one is having double standards. And you know how frustrating this is. I mean, parents who use the Bible to teach, reprove and correct children of righteousness, but is not willing to practice the same biblical righteousness in his own life, we call those people hypocrites. And that will provoke the child to wrath. Okay? So, just understand that you need to be consistent. If you're going to teach something in your home, be consistent with it. Now, if you find that something you're teaching is wrong, and you have to back off of it, how do we handle things when we're wrong? We acknowledge it. We confess it. We say, look, you know, we're going to ask for forgiveness if forgiveness needs to be asked for in that situation. But this is what God's Word says. As I've studied God's Word more out on this issue, we may change a policy within our home or rules within our home and bring it more in alignment with God's Word. That's acceptable. But don't be about the business of teaching one thing and holding your children to a level or standard. Remember, disciplining your children It first has to start with you. Because they're going to follow your pattern. They're going to watch you. So if the standard is you want them to read their scriptures, then you ought to be reading your scriptures. You're going to tell them to pray, well then you ought to be praying. We're going to go and sit and hear the teaching of the Word on a consistent basis. Right? They ought to see you. Right? There shouldn't be anyone in my home that doesn't see me all the time listening. I'm constantly listening to the Word. I'm reading it. I'm studying it. I'm thinking and then you say, well yeah, but you're the pastor. But I hadn't always been the pastor. Right? They need to see this in your life. If you want them to be able to minister with the Word, then you need to learn how to minister with the Word, which means you know it. Okay? Next, being legalistic. And when we talk about legalism, I'm talking about taking your man-made rules and putting them over God's law. Now, we talked about this last week. In any home, there is definitely going to be biblically directed rules. I mean, there's God's law that we have to bring into our home. Love your neighbor. Love your God. Don't lie. Don't steal. Don't covet. Children, obey your parents, right? But then there's other rules that you bring into your home. Go to bed at 8.30, make your bed up each day. There's certain foods you might eat or not eat, right? That's y'all's choice. Maybe you like your kids to put on clean clothes. Those would be the rules of your house. Some of people's houses, they don't care what they wear, right? And so brush your teeth, brush your hair, put on deodorant, right? There are just certain rules in your home that you've structured. And so those are okay. What I'm talking about is taking those and say, I'm going to enforce all of these to the detriment of the biblically-based rules. In other words, I will allow you to disobey God's rule, but you better not not make your bed up. Do you see the problem with that? Don't elevate your rules above God's law. That make sense? That will provoke a child to wrath if you're going to train them in God's law. But then, remember, what was the problem with the Pharisees? They made the word of God of no effect. They made the law of God of no effect. Why? Because they'd taken their traditions, their rules, and put them over God's law. And if you go back and you read some of their traditions, I don't think some of their traditions were bad. Right? John, do you have a problem with what the Pharisees said about washing their hands? It's actually a good one, isn't it? Right? So that's a good... But what was happening? What had they done? They were saying, well, this is what defiles a man. There wasn't a problem with washing their hands. I hope you guys wash your hands. But the point here is that's not what defiles somebody, what Christ is talking about. So the idea there is make sure you don't provoke your child to wrath by putting your rules above God's law. Does that make sense? And I may need to stop and allow for some questions there because I'm not saying don't have rules in your home. Your homes have to have rules to function. But are we clear on this? Don't allow your rules to make God's law second place within your home. That will provoke a child to wrath. Next, in a home where you don't admit you're wrong and you never ask for forgiveness. I think this is where we ended up last week. Turn to Matthew 5. And as you're turning through there, continue to take notes about, think about your home. How does your home look in light of what we're talking about here? And there may be some areas I think we all probably have to give some consideration to. Alright, so Matthew 5, 23, it says, Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar, remember that your brother has something against you. What does he say? You leave your gift there before the altar and go your way. First be reconciled with your brother and then come and offer your gift. Turn over to James 5. Hold that thought and turn over to James 5. Let's ask your parents this. Did any of you ever grow up in a home where you just never heard your parents, your father or your mother, say, hey I'm wrong and ask for forgiveness? If you grew up in a home like that, that's tough. That's a tough place to be. Make sure you, in front of your children, play out how we handle sin. If I have sinned against my children, if I lose my temper and say something to them I shouldn't, I need to ask for forgiveness. Right? Or if I do something, if I unjustly accuse them of something and I come to find out, I mean, you need to admit that to them. They need to see what you do and how you handle when you make a mistake or when you sin. They need to see that, particularly when it's against them, right? So in James 5, look at verse 16. It says, "...confess your trespasses one to another and pray for one another that you may be healed. The effective and fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much." And so as parents, or a parent who fails to acknowledge any kind of offense committed against the child, right, it will discourage the child from ever practicing any kind of biblical communication with you. I mean, if you don't show them how to deal with your own sin, then how will they ever learn? I mean, it kind of goes back to, I'm going to tell you what to do, do as I say, not as I do kind of mentality, right? That's going to provoke them and frustrate them. I mean, when your child sees in your own life an insensitivity towards sin and a refusal to humble yourself and turn from pride, you will provoke them to wrath. It's not a matter of if, it's when. I mean, it will happen, right? And your child will never, ever talk to you because the idea is what's the use? I mean, you'll never admit you're wrong, right? And so you're teaching your child to never own up to his sin, and he will always be dismissive, he will always blame others, he will always justify his sin if you never show them how to deal with your sin. Make sense? Did you see how... I mean, what kind of church would this be if that's all I ever did to you guys? I mean, that's not... I mean, you wouldn't stand for it too long, but yet, if you're doing this, Your child kind of has no right because he's got nowhere to go. He doesn't have any other choice, right? But just understand when he can get out, he's going to get out and he's going to run. All right, don't provoke them to wrath in this area. Don't provoke your children to wrath. And I mean, think about this. I mean, how do you deal with this? Well, I would just say this. Number one, acknowledge that you've sinned. I mean, to me, these are so basic, but maybe the basic things need to be repeated, right? How do we deal with somebody when we sin against them? Acknowledge you've sinned, number one. You ought to write this down. Acknowledge you've sinned. You say, practice it, I was wrong. God has convinced me that I was wrong, right? It'll come out of your mouth, right? But you gotta start doing it, right? So I was wrong. It's hard, but you know, you gotta say it. So acknowledge your sin. Then next, identify the specific name, the sin by its name. In other words, what I did was selfish or what I did was dishonest, whatever it is. What I did was out of line. I shouldn't have talked to you like that. It was unacceptable. So specify the sin. And then next, identify the biblical behavior to demonstrate your resolve to repent. So let's say you've lied to your child for some reason. I don't know why you do it, but maybe you have. So if you lie to your child, when you go in there and you identify the biblical behavior to demonstrate your resolve or repentance, say, I will tell you the truth no matter what the consequences are. So identify the biblical behavior that you're trying to demonstrate to them. And then finally, ask for forgiveness. Will you forgive me? Will you forgive me? So you have to learn how to ask that when you sin against somebody. So what does it mean to forgive? Let's look at some verses. Go to Ephesians 4. Look at verse 32, and be kind one to another, tend to hearted, forgiving one another. Now, how? How should we forgive one another? Even as God in Christ forgave you. So Ephesians 4, 32. Be kind to one another, tend to hearted, forgiving one another. Are you quick to forgive? Alright. Go to Isaiah 43. Isaiah 43, look at the reading, I think it's in, let's see, verse 25. Yeah, here it is. I, even I, am he who blots out your transgression for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins. So what happens when God forgives your sins? He says, I'll blot them out, I won't remember them. Turn over to Jeremiah 31. Jeremiah 31. In Jeremiah 31, this is the section on the promise of the new covenant. But look what he says in verse 34. So we are called to forgive one another according to Paul in Ephesians. as Christ forgave us, and then when God says He forgives us, He blots out our transgressions, and He says, I remember it no more. Now, when He says, I remember it no more, does that mean that God forgets these things in the sense that He can't know them? Remember, he's omniscient. It's not that. What he's saying, he knew about our sins even before we committed them. When the Bible speaks of our sins and that he does not remember them no more, what he's actually saying is, I won't hold them against your charge anymore. I won't remember them in that sense. I will not bring them against you. Does that make sense? And so, He doesn't charge them to our account. Rather, God will charge them to the account of the Lord Jesus Christ who died and paid on the cross. He paid the debt for our sin. But what we do is we receive the imputed righteousness of Christ. That is the beauty of the gospel. That's the good news. The good news is that sinners can have their sins forgiven and receive eternal life. Alright, so we have to think about what does it mean to forgive. Well, forgiveness, from God's perspective, is first and foremost a promise. In other words, God has promised not to hold the sins of repentant sinners against them. And so when we forgive, we're not to hold the sins of those who have transgressed against us, right? We're not to hold it against them. Why? Because we've forgiven them. So what does this look like? Well, first, And let's put this, let's bring it close to home, husband and wife, right? What does forgiveness look like between the husband and wife? Well, it means that we don't bring up a forgiving offense, right? In the sense of using it against him. And as husband and wife, we're good at not doing what God does. What are we good at? We're good at bringing what someone did to us 15 years ago in the marriage and bringing it back to remembrance, don't we? Now, we don't do it in our house, but I bet y'all do in yours. So, this is not what true forgiveness is. Second, we don't discuss the forgiven sin with others. Now, that's a problem here in the South because, you know, I forgave Chad, but you know what, Andy? Let me tell you what he did. No, we don't discuss that. All right, next, finally, you may not dwell on the forgiven offense yourself, but rather remind yourself that you have forgiven the offender. They've been forgiven. And so the idea here, I think, when we think about forgiveness is that as sinners who have been forgiven much, I mean, all of you who profess to know the Lord Jesus Christ would say you've been forgiven much, right? And so the one who has been forgiven much should be willing to forgive others. In other words, we don't hold grudges, we don't allow unforgiveness to eat us up with bitterness. That's the idea of it. So that's just some kind of simple basics about forgiveness. But let's go back to what provokes our children to wrath. What provokes our children to wrath is the fact when we sin against them we refuse to acknowledge that we're wrong and we don't ask for forgiveness. Alright, children, do you know what provokes the wrath of your parents? when you won't admit when you're wrong, and you won't seek forgiveness, right? So it's a two-way street. Now, some of you kids been sitting back here probably thinking, yeah, yeah, yeah, my parents, they need to hear this, but so do you, right? We're quick. I mean, it's just the disposition that we all have. We're a little bit too arrogant, too prideful in this area, and we're not quick to bring up the fact, yes, I did wrong, Mom, will you forgive me? You know one of the quickest ways to get your mom and dad off your back, and I don't mean just do this in a manipulative way, but is to truly, with a brokenness over what you've done, ask for forgiveness. I mean, think about any dispute that you have with somebody where you think you've, you know, someone thinks you've wronged them. Do you know how to resolve that quickly? You know, hey, I didn't know. Will you forgive me? I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do this to you that provoked you. Maybe you were completely clueless and you didn't even know you had offended somebody. The easiest way to diffuse it is to say, you know what, I'm going to take ownership of this. I'm truly sorry. Will you forgive me? What can they say? That would diffuse all the emotions and then allow true communication to happen where you can actually talk and figure out, well, what in the world just happened here? Learn the habit of forgiving. Not justifying sin and not trying to make excuses for it or blaming someone else, but take ownership for it. Next, number 10. I think this is the 10th one. Another way we provoke our children to wrath is constantly finding fault in them. And what we're addressing here is not the parent's responsibility to address sinful behavior, right? If your child is sinning, you need to be bringing this up and bringing this to their attention. What I'm talking about here is this constantly finding fault under this category is a critical, condemning, accusing, judgmental attitude that tears a child down rather than instructing him and building him up, okay? It is an attitude that leads a child to believe that he can never please you. Is that the tone of your home where the child feels, I do nothing right ever because all you do is tear them down? Okay, now don't confuse this. If they're sinning, this needs to be brought to their attention. Please keep in mind when we go through these categories, these categories are not to forget everything else we've talked about. There's real times when you need to be pointing these things out. What I'm talking about is just that you've been around people like that, just overly critical, judgmental, you never can make them happy. We want to make sure that's not the tone of our home. This is a horrible, horrible place for a child to be. Husbands, think about this. How would you feel if everything you ever did was never right in the eyes of your wives? Wives, what if you lived in a home where everything you did, your husband criticized you and tore you down for it? I mean, you realize there's real homes like that out there. I hope that doesn't describe any of our homes, but the point here is that, how does that make you feel? That's a bad place to be. Now think about a child. Don't let that kind of culture take place within your home. Think about a child who lives in an overly critical home. It's hard to imagine what this would be like, but that would be a miserable, miserable existence, and this will provoke the wrath of a child. Turn to Revelation 2. When we went through Revelation in this second chapter, you had some churches that needed some real attention, right? But just take this one here in Revelation 2. to the church of Ephesus. The angel of the church of Ephesus writes, these things that says he who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks in the midst of the golden lampstands. Notice where he says, I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil and you have tested those who say they're apostles and they are not and have found them liars and you have persevered and have patience and have labored for my name's sake and have not become weary. Now, what did Christ just do? He commended them. He encouraged them in the areas that they were doing well in, right? Then we come to verse 4. Nevertheless, I have this against you that you've left your first love. Now, Christ brings a rebuke against them. Christ brings something to their attention that they're negligent in. But what did He also do? He encouraged them. He commended them in areas that they were doing well in. Well, this ought to be the kind of way we approach our children as well, right? Notice here Christ chastises the Ephesian church for leaving their first love, but before he does it, he starts off with a list of behaviors that actually, you know, pleases him. Now, how do we prevent this from happening within our homes? Well, it's not that hard. We need to learn to create an environment where the parents' purpose, where they actually purpose to bring praise and commend and acknowledge the child when he or she has done well. It's not sinful to bring to them their attention when they please you. That's not unbiblical. So make sure you understand what I'm saying here. I'm not necessarily saying that you should rebuke less in your home. Your child may need the rebukes. That's not what I'm saying. What I am saying is you should increase the number of commendations. It is okay for you to tell your child, once again, if they please you. Communicating to them that they've accomplished a task well will not unnecessarily create arrogance or pride, but it actually trains them and disciplines them, oh, that's your expectation. That's okay. It's okay to tell folks they're doing a good job. Learn to implement positive communication in the life of your child so that they can better hear your rebukes when it is required. If everything's always negative, at some point they'll just tune you out. Next, number 11. Another way that we provoke our children to wrath is when we reverse the God-given roles. Turn over to Ephesians 5. In Ephesians 5, look at verse 22, "...Wives, submit to your own husband as to the Lord, for the husband is the head of the wife, as also Christ is the head of the church, and He is the Savior of the body." He says in verse 24, "...therefore just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything." So when God's order in the home is violated, various consequences are set in motion. But these consequences create a home environment that will promote frustration. Wives will become embittered over husbands who will not manage their homes as the scriptures direct, and husbands will become embittered and lose respect for the wives who are not fulfilling their God-given roles. But here's the problem when the roles are reversed. When we teach the scriptures to our children and hold them accountable to the authority of the Word of God, but we refuse to submit to the standard in this area of roles, then what we do is we frustrate the child because they see a double standard again being played out in front of them. Mothers, how can you teach your daughters the biblical teaching concerning submission if you refuse to submit? Your daughter will see the hypocrisy, right? Fathers, how can you teach your sons to lead and hold them accountable if you're neglecting your responsibility as the head in the home? When parents refuse to live out their God-ordained role within the home, the child becomes uncertain, they become confused about their role. Because they're looking to you to play out the example. They can hear your teaching. You can come and teach them their responsibility before God. but it makes it a whole lot easier when you play it out. I mean, how many of you fathers struggle when you first understood you were the head because you didn't have it played out in front of you? Mothers, how long did it take you to get this whole idea of submission if your mom did not train you and did not teach you? If your mother usurped the authority of the father in the home, think about the role and the impact it had in your life, and then think about how you're teaching your children. So do you see your failure in this area, it's gonna tempt your child to sin as well. And so if this area is not brought under the Lordship of Christ before your child, then you're teaching them to rebel. And all of these consequences can frustrate the child and provoke them to anger, right? Next, number 12, not listening to your child's opinion or listening to his side of a story, okay? Turn over to Proverbs 18. Yeah, Proverbs 18. Turn over there real quick and a couple of passages we'll look at. Proverbs 18, Luke verse 3. When the wicked comes, contempt comes also, and with dishonor comes reproach. And then you jump down to verse 17. The first one to plead his cause seems right until his neighbor comes and examines him. And so you may not always agree with your child's reasoning, your child's conclusion, your child's opinions, but if you're going to lead him to the truth, you need to first seek to understand his perspective, especially if their perspective is wrong. I want to know what my child is thinking. Not that it's going to necessarily get them off the hook, but I've got to know what I'm trying to correct here. I want to know what reasoning, what thought process led them down to the pathway where now all of a sudden they're being disciplined. This is going to allow you to instruct, correct any kind of false thinking or reasoning that may have led your child to disobey. Moreover, by attempting to understand his perspective, you may Well, let's say it this way. Let me flip it around and say it another way. By not attempting to understand their perspective, you may communicate sinful attitudes such as arrogance, impatience, apathy, or lack of love. So never forget, when you're dealing with your child, you're dealing with a sinner. And so, if you won't listen to them, then what you don't do is you don't come across as a sinner helping another sinner out, but what you're really doing is you're coming across as a self-righteous, and in some of your instances, maybe even hypocritical, but you come across as a self-righteous person who comes down on a sinner without attempting to point them back to the pathway of righteousness. So once again, don't take what I'm saying here in isolation and put it against the other things I've taught. This is not me telling you not to rebuke them. That's not me doing that. It's first understand what led them to this. Especially if one of your kids has this annoying habit of trying to always bring to your attention every little thing another child does in your home. And every time you turn around, they're bringing these things up to you, but yet you won't listen to what the other child's side of the story. You're going to start making judgments without all the facts. And once again, you're going to frustrate the child. You need to hear what went on and get both sides of the story, and then based on the evidence, then you determine how you want to discipline. And it may require you to rebuke them and go through all these other things that we've talked about, but don't create this area in your home where you just don't ever listen to them at all. Okay? So, when there's a constant barrage of rebukes without any communication that attempts to understand what is motivating the child, then the child basically will conclude that the parent is like the proverbial fool who is never interested in anyone's opinion but their own. Is that how your house is conducted? Okay? So, learn the discipline of listening. and then responding and reacting based on what you've heard. Okay? Alright, next. 13. Another way I think we frustrate our children is when we compare them to other kids. We need to understand that God has given each of your kids special, unique gifts and talents. Therefore, you need to be careful you don't compare your child to some other child, especially in the areas where gifts and talents are concerned. So what you want to compare them to, if you do want to compare them to something, then compare them to the biblical standards and use that to push them towards righteousness. But comparing your child to another child is never going to promote righteousness in the child, especially if you want to compare to other kids within your home or maybe there's another kid in the neighborhood or even in your church or your other family or whatever. You don't want to be in this business of always comparing them to others, especially to a standard. If they're not gifted in an area, Just don't do it. I mean, that's a drag, that's a bummer. If all the time you're being held to a standard you're not even gifted towards. So try not to provoke your children in that one. I think that was pretty obvious, right? To me, this is one that provokes the child and really doesn't add any value at the end of the day. Next, not making time just to talk. Turn over to Ecclesiastes 3. Ecclesiastes 3 verse 7, we read this, there is a time to... That's the wrong verse. Oh yeah, there's a time to tear, a time to sew, and a time to keep silence, and a time to speak. Alright, so we need to understand that all relationships are built upon communication. So, you need to learn to spend time just talking and getting to know someone, right? If you want to strengthen a relationship with somebody, you've got to spend time with them. You've got to communicate with them. Relationships are strengthened when we communicate and we reveal certain things about ourselves. Now what tends to happen with a lot of us is we allow pressures and the pleasures of this world to pull us away from our children and so we don't spend any time communicating to them. So by not making time for the child, what we're doing is we're communicating to our child that they're really not that important to us. And so we're not making them a priority. So understand that this will provoke the child to anger. Not only do we provoke them to wrath, but we weaken the relationship with the child. And this may very well be why your child would rather be with kids, other kids, than spend time with you. Because you don't spend any time talking with them. You don't spend any time with them. So at least the kids, their buddies will listen to them and talk to them. So if your child is looking for ways to get away from you, it could be that they're up to something wicked, but it's definitely a sign that you're not spending time with them just to get to know them and listen to them. Next, not praising or encouraging your child. I mean, I think this is similar to the one we've already talked about, but this will provoke your child. I mean, it is okay to praise your child, acknowledge when they met your expectation. And so it's good for you to encourage them. Our tendency is only to give them attention, but only give them negative attention. And we wanna make sure that's not the only time we're dealing with them. We may be spending a disproportionate amount of time pointing out the things they're doing wrong. And so what this does is that it gives them this perception of themselves that I think is wrong and perverted. Your child needs to soberly be able to evaluate himself. And so he needs to evaluate himself in areas he does well, and then he needs to be able to evaluate himself in areas he needs to work on. So when we talk about, you know, with our children, I constantly remind them, here's some areas of strengths I see that God's blessed you in. These are areas that you need to continue to foster and continue to build, but there's also areas of character issues that I see you need to work on as well. Okay, so it doesn't always have to be negative attention. I mean, there's always things that they need to be working on, but it's okay to let them know, hey, here's some areas where I really see God working in your life. I see an area that you were struggling with eight months ago. I've seen you make, you know, God's doing something with you because I'm seeing a difference. Encourage them to that end. All right? All right. Let's do one more. Here's one more. Failing to keep your promises. The Bible is very, very clear that we should let our yes be yes, our no be no. Promises and commitments are usually made, typically they're made with every intention of keeping them, with no intent to deceive. But when promises and commitments are consistently not kept, regardless of whatever reason you provide, they will begin to provoke your child to wrath. Because there's a true sting to the child as you continue to break promises, and as that broken promise is getting longer and longer, the child increasingly views the parents as undependable, unreliable, and deceitful. And his anger is going to intensify proportionally. Because basically what you're doing is, you're probably teaching them the principles of being truthful and keeping your word, but yet, if you're habitually breaking your word, that's that double standard we were talking about earlier. And so, think about how you feel as adults when someone breaks their word to you. Now maybe you're a little bit patient and you're okay with it once, twice, but at what point does it really get to be, you know what, this is enough, enough's enough, I gotta confront it. Think about how we do it as adults. But what's the problem with the child? Typically in those types of homes, they don't have comfortable where they can come and bring this to your attention. And so make sure, if you're constantly having to back out of your word, that actually is starting to tell you about where your real priorities are. So when you break your word with your child, you're basically telling your child that your word means nothing, and basically that they're not a priority. So if you don't deal with this, then it's going to lead to several things. It's going to lead to disappointment and discouragement. It will lead to suspicion and cynicism. In other words, there's not going to be any willingness to trust. It will lead to feelings of rejection. It will also lead to bitterness and resentment. It will also lead to a loss of respect and contempt for parents. And whether you realize it or not, it's going to get them to start thinking that you don't love them. They're going to start having these ideas that they're being unloved. As you can imagine, any of these that they're not dealt with, they're going to lead the child to anger, and you're provoking them in this area. Alright, let me do another one. Mocking your child. I think we would all agree that mocking the child is never appropriate, but maybe you do it. First, we should never make fun of a child because of inadequacies that they can't do anything about. This would include their intelligence, their athletic ability, their physical features, their motor coordination. I mean, these are characteristics that are not sinful. And so I would never mock a child in these areas. And I mean, if you do this, then quit. In Exodus 4.11 and Psalm 139, both those passages very clearly teaches that God has created everyone the way they are. God takes responsibility for creating the individual. Secondly, we should never make fun or make light of behavior that is sinful. And we need to think of it this way. We should never make fun over things that Christ came to die for. We shouldn't make light of that. Sin is not a laughing matter. Sin should be dealt with in a biblical manner, such as we've been discussing in these series of teachings. Let's stop here and we'll try to finish this up Lord willing next week and try to get more towards the child and start dealing with them next week. But I just want to give you some things that you need to be thinking about in your home. If you're dealing with, if you have a child or children that are prone to anger, prone to those things we talked about earlier, or if you have children that are not showing signs of anger, but you're seeing these areas we've brought up in your home, then get ready for them to become angry. The idea here is they are responsible for controlling themselves, but we don't want to be found guilty of provoking or promoting them to sin. It's no different than any other sin. Every person is responsible for their own sin, but we don't want to go provoke or tempt someone to sin. That's the way you need to be looking at it. So how is your home ordered? Is your home Christ-centered? Do you have the characteristics of a Christ-centered home? It's been brought under His dominion? Or is your home child-centered? Are they ruling and dictating what goes on within your home? So we'll stop here and we'll pick up Lord Willa next week and talk a little bit more about now moving from the parent's responsibility and we'll start dealing a little bit more next week with the child.