I ask that you return with me in your Bibles, if you have your Bibles with you, to Psalm 78. Psalm 78. I'll be reading through the entire Psalm. but then we'll only be considering this morning verses one through eight, but I want you to see how the Psalm ends by reading through to the end. Let's hear the word of our God from Psalm 78. Listen, O my people, to my instruction. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings of old, which we have heard and known and our fathers have told us. We will not conceal them from their children, but tell to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and His strength and His wondrous works that He has done. For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should teach them to their children, that the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, that they may arise and tell them to their children, that they should put their confidence in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments, and not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not prepare its heart, and whose spirit was not faithful to God. The sons of Ephraim were archers equipped with bows, yet they turned back in the day of battle. They did not keep the covenant of God and refused to walk in his law. And they forgot his deeds and his miracles that he has shown them. He wrought wonders before their fathers in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zion. He divided the sea and caused them to pass through. And he made the water stand up like a heap. Then he led them with a cloud by day and all night with a light of fire. He split the rocks of the wilderness and gave them abundant drink like the ocean depths. He brought forth streams also from the rock and caused waters to run down like rivers. Yet they still continued to sin against him, to rebel against the Most High in the desert. And in their heart, they put God to the test by asking food according to their desire. And then they spoke against God. They said, can God prepare a table in the wilderness? Behold, he struck the rocks so the waters gushed out and the streams were overflowing. Can He give bread also? Will He provide meat for His people? Therefore, the Lord heard and was full of wrath, and a fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger also mounted against Israel, because they did not believe in God and did not trust in His salvation. Yet He commanded the clouds above, and opened the doors of heaven, and He rained down manna upon them to eat, and He gave them food from heaven. Man did eat the bread of angels. He sent them fruit in abundance. He caused the east wind to blow into heavens, and by his power he directed the south wind. When he rained meat upon them like the dust, even winged fowl like the sand of the seas. Then he let them fall in the midst of their camp, round about their dwellings. So they ate and were well filled. and their desire he gave to them. Before they had satisfied their desire, while their food was still in their mouths, the anger of God rose against them. He killed some of their stoutest ones and subdued the choicemen of Israel. In spite of all this, they still sinned and did not believe in his wonderful works. So he brought their days to an end in futility and their years in sudden terror. When he killed them, then they sought him and returned and searched diligently for God. And they remembered that God was the rock and the most high God, the Redeemer. But they deceived him with their mouth and they lied to him with their tongue, for their heart was not steadfast toward him, nor were they faithful in his covenant. But He, being compassionate, forgave their iniquity and did not destroy them. And often He restrained His anger and did not arouse all His wrath. Thus He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes and does not return. How often they rebelled against Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert. And again and again they tempted God and pained the Holy One of Israel. They did not remember His power the day when He redeemed them from their adversary. When He performed His signs in Egypt and His marvels in the field of Zion, turned their rivers to blood and their streams they could not drink. He sent among them swarms of flies which devoured them and frogs which destroyed them. He gave also their crops to the grasshopper and the product of their labors to the locusts. He destroyed their vines with hailstones and their sycamore trees with frost. He gave over their cattle also to the hailstones, and their herds to bolts of lightning. He sent upon them the burning anger, fury and indignation and trouble, a band of destroying angels. He leveled the path for His anger. He did not spare their soul from death, but gave over their life to the plague and smoke, all the firstborn in Egypt, the first issue of their virility in the tents of Ham. But He led forth His own people like a sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock. He led them safely so that they did not fear, but the sea engulfed their enemies. So He brought them to His holy land, to His hill country, and to His right hand which He had gained. He also drove out the nations before them, and He apportioned them for an inheritance by measurement, and made the tribes of Israel dwell in their tents. Yet they tempted and rebelled against the Most High God and did not keep His testimonies, but turned back and acted treacherously like their fathers. They turned aside like a treacherous foe. They provoked Him with their high places and aroused His jealousy with their grieving images. When God heard, He was filled with wrath and greatly abhorred Israel. so that he abandoned the dwelling place at Shiloh, the tent which he had pitched among men, and gave up his strength to captivity, and his glory into the hand of the adversary. He also delivered his people to the sword, and was filled with wrath at his inheritance. Fire devoured his young men, and his virgins had no wedding songs. His priests fell by the sword, and his widows could not weep. Then the Lord awoke as if from sleep, like a warrior overcome by wine, and he drove his adversaries back. He put on them an everlasting reproach. He also rejected the tent of Joseph and did not choose the tribe of Ephraim, but chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion, which he loved. And he built a sanctuary like the heights, like the earth, which has been founded forever. He also chose David, his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds, from the care of the ewes with suckling lambs he brought him, to shepherd Jacob, his people. and Israel his inheritance. So he shepherded them according to the integrity of his heart and guided them with his skillful hands. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the wondrous gift of your word and pray that this morning you would give us ears to hear and minds to understand. Send forth your spirit, Father, with your word and your mercy, drawing us to Christ in repentance and faith, renewing us after his image, equipping us to live and serve in his kingdom in such a way as would bring him glory. We pray that you'd be with your servant. Guard his mind and tongue that he may only declare that which is true according to your word. And as your word is set forth and reflected upon this morning, may your name be praised and may your church be strengthened. In the name of our Lord, we ask this. Amen. Today we celebrate Father's Day, we recognize the value that good fathers give to our society, but we also live in a world in which we see all around us the great destruction that comes by fathers not fulfilling their duties. There have been studies done and so most of the societal ills that we suffer from today are traced to the fact that we don't have fathers in the home. and fathers who are in the home are not engaged in the home. They might be there physically, but they're not really there doing anything. They're just there serving themselves or expecting to be served. Many of the ills of this life could be cured if fathers would just take responsibility and do their job. But what is their job? What are fathers called to do? If they're going to be staying in their families and being involved in their children's lives, what are they to do? What's the primary job? Well, this psalm focuses on at least one of the primary, if not the most important primary job of fathers. And the psalmist puts it out because he shows the destruction When this isn't done well. The first eight verses he says, dads, this is what you're supposed to do. And he spends the rest of the psalm saying, this is what happens when you fail at that job. That it's destruction. And you have generation after generation after generation of rebellion against God that are under the wrath and curse of God. that continue to provoke God again and again and again, despite his mercies, despite all of his love and grace. So he's recording all that to make your mind go back to the first eight verses and say, that's why you do this. That's why you're called to do this job, because as we look back as Israel over our history, we recognize this wasn't done well, and it's led to destruction. So dads, let me go through your job description. What God calls you to do. In this passage we have set before us and what we'll see as we take it apart into first eight verses, we'll see the primary calling of a Christian father to teach his children. We'll see the content of a Christian father's teaching and the aims. What are you aiming at? What are you shooting at in this? In verse one, he calls out, he says, listen, all my people, to my instruction. So he is going to teach them. He's going to be their teacher now. He says, listen to me. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. He says, listen up. Don't just let this go in one ear and out the other. Don't just sit there and say, well, it's Sunday. I just need to make it through my time here. We'll put in our time. Knowing Pastor Jim, it's gonna be a long time, but this too will pass. It'll be done, right? He says, no, listen. He says, this is very important. He says, listen to what I'm saying. He says, I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings of old. And this is, Jesus quotes this in his own ministry. And he's reminding us here, parables are used to those who are the people of God, those who love him. The teaching is very clear. For those who hate the Lord, they can't understand. They hear it, and it's in simple language that someone can understand, but they can't hear it. It's like they're in the darkness all the time. It's like they're seeing it through a veil and can't see. He's like, I'm going to speak to you these words of old. He says, which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us. We will not conceal them from their children, but tell to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and his strength and his wondrous works. For he established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers that they should teach them to their children, that the generation to come might know even the generation, even the children yet to be born, that they may rise and tell them to their children. Here he sets forth that one of the primary callings of a Christian father is to teach his children. That's their job, is to teach. It is not to entertain the children. It is not, obviously, to abandon the children. It is not to lead the children into sin by saying, look at all the stupid things I do, go therefore and do ye likewise. It's not come along with me because this will be fun because I'm your buddy and your pal. Let's go do all these things that lead you into wickedness. It says your job is to teach. If you do not want to be a teacher, Don't be a father. And if you want to know if you're called to be a teacher, go into the bedrooms in your home and see if there are any children there. If they are, if there's children in your household, then God has said, you are called to be a teacher. Whatever else you might be called to do, you might have other things in your vocation where you make your money. But you have been called to be a teacher, and if God calls you to do something, He will equip you to do it. So you don't even have the excuse to say, well, I can't do this. God calls men to teach their children. Look at kind of some of the, look at the pattern for one. He says, our fathers taught us and we won't hide them from our children so that they could teach the generation that's not even born yet. This isn't even just a one generation thing. He says, fathers teach their children to teach their children to teach their children, then it keeps going down generation after generation. Which means grandfathers and great-grandfathers, you're not off the hook. You can't say, well, I went, I looked, and there are no children in the house. I mean, there's children in my kid's house, but not in my house, so I don't have to do any teaching. But he's saying this is a multi-generational process. If you're a dad, you retire at death. Until then, you're working. You're on call. Especially if you find that maybe when you became a Christian, maybe when you had children, you weren't a Christian at that time. Maybe you had no Christian father to teach you. And as you look back and say, I didn't do all that great of a job with my kids. Maybe you didn't know. No one trained you. It is hard when you do it generationally. Now it's easier because every generation teaches the next generation. It is hard. When you're the first generation that's a Christian, that's difficult. Not impossible, but difficult. But now you can help your children to raise your grandchildren. Now you invest your life in your grandchildren and say, now I see some of the mistakes I made with my own children. And listen, all of us, every one of us as fathers, just let's get over ourselves, we all fail. None of us does this perfectly. None of us teaches perfectly, whether it's in our words or by our example. And we learn a lot as our children grow up, and by the time we get to our grandchildren, it's like, okay, if I had to do it all over again, this is what I'd do. Well, God, in a sense, does give you a do-over by giving you grandkids. And if you really didn't learn it well, he gives you another one with great-grandkids if you live long enough, and he says, okay, let's just keep learning how to do this better. So you older guys whose children are out of the house who may have done an incredibly wonderful job, You may have failed miserably, but it doesn't mean you're done. Now you start, how do I invest now in my grandkids? And as long as your children are still alive, they might be adults, but you know this, they're still your kids. It's why you get gifts today. If they weren't your kids, you'd be like, I hit 18, you don't get anything anymore, you're not my dad anymore, I'm an adult, right? No, you're still the dad, and they still need you, and they still need to be taught throughout life. He says, we won't hide these things. Like notice the force of the statements, we will not hide them from their children, which he commanded to our fathers that we should make them known. He said, we won't hide, and God commanded us to do this, that's why we won't. How many men hide all this knowledge of God by never taking time to talk to their kids? They don't have time to invest. They're so busy conquering the world. They're so busy making sure we have enough money that anything my children could ever possibly want, they have. Making sure that I've got stuff so my children have all the fun that they can have. I want to make sure they're doing everything they could ever do. And what they don't find time is to teach your children. And so as far as you're not teaching your children, you are hiding these things from them. You're not revealing them to them. Dad, you're called to teach your children. You can't form this out. You can't say, well, that's what I've got a wife for. My wife takes care of the spiritual education of my children. That's what she does. She's taught Sunday school, or she's done things. That's what she does. I don't need to bother with this. No, it says, dads, this is your job. It doesn't mean your wife doesn't come alongside and help you. And it doesn't mean when she's with the children, she is forbidden from teaching the children, because it's only dad's job. It just means, dads, you're the point person. You're the leader. You can't just form it out to your wife. You can't form it out to the Sunday school and say, I give my children a Christian education. I take them to Sunday school. Well, they didn't work it out for you at Calvary Church for the last four years because we don't have a building, we don't have Sunday school. You don't have the option of formula. But how many people say, I want to just go to a church that has a great kids program? Why? Because I don't want to teach my kids. You've seen my kids, they're brats. I'll give them to somebody else to teach. I don't want to get involved. I don't want to do that. That takes work. Let me find a church that's got a great Sunday school, a great youth group. Let the youth pastor do it. Let anybody do it but me. I don't want to spend the time. I'll give money to pay somebody to do it. I don't want to do it. sending them to Christian school, a wonderful thing, but that doesn't get you off the hook of you teaching your children. I've been doing this pastor thing for a long time, and I was a youth pastor before, and I could tell you how many people have come to me later on when their children grew up and turned away from the Lord, who they spent very little time instructing their children in the things of the Lord. They farmed it out to other people, they did whatever, but they had their hobbies, they had all these other things, and when their children apostatized later, maybe in high school, maybe after college, they'll come back to me, and it's usually just before they walk out the church and leave to go someplace else, they say, and one more thing, my kids don't love the Lord, and it's your fault. If you only spent the time with my kids that you spend with those people who are outside the church evangelizing, my kids would know the Lord. And I'm like, well, if only you realized that you're your kid's first pastor and evangelist, you failed. You failed. Because you have them in your household 24 hours a day. I get them for an hour, once a week. It is unless your pastor teaches false doctrine. or denies his doctrine by his life, and your children say, boy, this pastor, he said he was a godly man. He turned around, he was just this rotten guy. Then you can blame your pastor. But your pastor isn't in charge of the Christian education of your children. You are, dads. And you need to take ownership of that. Whether it's catechizing your children, reading them Bible stories from the time they're little, watching over the rest of their education, making sure they get a godly education and others. So it's reinforcing what you're teaching and not fighting against what you're teaching. I mean, how many fathers, they destroy themselves and they're trying to teach their kids at home. Then they have them in the state run schools that's denying their faith all the time. So I teach my kids for, you know, if you guys are working. You know, I have a ton of time to do this. So I do my Bible story with my kids for a half hour a day, and then I put them in a public school, which for eight hours every day, their underminer telling them everything I said is wrong. Which is why I don't know if you've been watching the news, if you've been having these things of kids coming out and declaring to their parents, until you support Black Lives Matter, you cannot see me anymore. Until you support some Marxist agenda, until you repent for being white or whatever, I will not have anything to do with it. Don't come into my house. Don't, the grandkids will not visit you, because you are these, where'd they learn that? It's from the people you had teach them. You sent them to colleges who taught that. You sent them the people to teach them to hate you. Dads. What's going on? What kind of thinking is involved in that? I'm gonna send my children to people who hate everything that I believe is important in life. And I'm gonna let them raise my kids and educate my kids. And then I'm gonna be surprised when my kids or apostates hate the faith, hate the Lord, turn away from it, and then to relieve my own guilt, I'll turn around and I'll blame every pastor in every church I've ever been in. It's all their fault. It's on you. It's your job, dads. Nobody else's. There's other people to come alongside and help you. By all means, the church should be helping you. Your pastor should be equipping you for the work of ministry to your children. But you are responsible for teaching your children, which also means, young ladies, when you're looking for a husband, If you want your children to be raised into faith, you need to look for a man who is willing to teach your children. If he is not willing to teach, if he is not interested in the things of the Lord, except insofar as you're interested in it and he's interested in you, so he's hanging around church or whatever because he has an interest in you, you need to look at, Dr. K does this every year when he comes and he talks to the staff, he says, you have to find a man that can teach your children. And if he can't teach the children you're gonna have someday, don't marry him. because it's too important of a job. The Christian father is called to teach. Does your life reflect this fact? As a Christian dad, now some of you guys are really, really new at this. Some of you aren't dads yet, and you're training to be there, and some of you are newer dads, and some of you have done this for a long time, you're on your grandchildren and other things. But does this mark your life? If people were to look at your life from the outside, would say, that dad's a teacher. Look at what he does. He spends time with his children. He's instructing them. It's not just his example and hoping that they'll follow along, but he talks to them. He spends time with them. He's instructing them. He's invested in them. That's what needs to mark your lives, man. But what are you to teach? Well, in the passage, especially verses four and five, it brings us to, it says, we will not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and his strength and his wonderful works which he has done. For he established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers that should make them known to our children. You were a Christian father, you were to teach your children redemptive history. That's why he says, you need to tell them all the wonderful things God's done. And then he goes through a litany. If you read, he starts at Israel in Egypt under slavery. And he brings them, he says, remember all the things God's done. And he brings them to the wanderings through the desert. And he says, look at all the things God did there. And brings them all the way up to the time of David. And he says, remind them of the glory of God, how faithful God has been to his people, even though his people were faithless. It's reminding them that the God of the Bible is the God who is faithful to his covenant. Though we fail him, he never fails us. Though we provoke him, he still shows kindness and grace and mercy. So we're to teach them all of the history of the Bible, because the history of the Bible shows the wonderful works of God. and it finds its center point in the Lord Jesus Christ. So ultimately, we're pointing them to Jesus. Then he says, to teach them that which I commanded to Israel, so to teach them the law of God. We don't teach them, well, you need to discover your own morals, come up with your own ethical code. He says, this is the law of God, this is the law of our king, this is how we live. I don't care what other people do, it doesn't matter. Our King says we will do this. Our King says we won't do this. And that's the only King we serve. So we live by His law, regardless of what the government says. If the government tells us we have to disobey the law of God, then we say we're sorry, we can't obey you. If the government says you can't obey God, you can't do this, we won't obey you. Now we'll make every effort to do things within, because the civil magistrate is answerable to God and he's over us a minister of God. But the minute he says, you have to break the law of God to obey me, that's when we say, I'm sorry, we can't do that. We're not arrogantly just fighting because we're Americans and we have our rights and how dare you. We've got a greater king that we serve. And if you ask us to rebel against him, if you ask us to violate his law, we can't do it at that point. And we'll suffer whatever consequences you have, trusting that our father could take us through it. So we're gonna be teaching people the word of God, teaching our children that. Now guys, you can't do that if you don't know the word of God. How could you teach your children the wonderful works of God throughout history if you're not a student of the wonderful works of God throughout history? How can you teach your children the law of God if you don't know the law of God? And how are you gonna teach your children to obey the law of God if you recite the law of God, you recite the Ten Commandments, and you get your children to recite it, but you live a life that's constantly violating the law of God? I mean, how many Christians have this attitude? We should have the Ten Commandments in school, the Ten Commandments should be in the courthouse, but the Ten Commandments shouldn't be in my life, because Jesus said we're just under the law of love now, and I just, as long as what I'm doing is loving, as long as I feel a loving feeling in my heart, I can do whatever I want, because that's the Old Testament. Now that's an old heresy, okay, that the Old Testament isn't for today. The law of God reflects God's character. We're told God doesn't change. If God's character doesn't change, his law cannot change. Not the civil and ceremonial laws that are fulfilled in Christ, but his moral law. And when Christian dads preach the law to their children, but then they live lawless lives, they live as if they're a law to themselves. Again, now you're undermining it. You don't even have to send your kids to public school now. You're undermining yourself well enough. By saying, you read the 10 Commandments, God says this, I ain't doing that. God says this, I ain't doing that. God says don't this, I'm doing it, I'm doing this. But then we catch our kids. Now children, don't be like me. You need to obey, because I said so. We need to teach our children the word of God. And there are tons of resources out there. That's what little children's catechisms read. Question and answer books, so they could do it. Children's Bible story books. Dad, your kids won't know that you didn't know the story until you read it into the children's Bible. They will be amazed at how brilliant you are by just reading it out of the book. And you will start learning the wonderful deeds of God. It is wonderful that you could teach your kids how to fix a car, or how to build a building, or how to cook. or how to fish, or how to hunt, or how to place. Those are all wonderful things, and I'm sure your kids are very thankful for the time you spend with them. But the content of your teaching has to focus on the word of God, not these other things. For what good is it if your child gains the whole world and loses the soul? What good is it if they become a world-class mechanic or a computer technician or anything else, but they don't know the word of God? That's what you must teach them. That's why every dad, to a certain degree, has to be a theologian. He's got to understand the Word of God so he can teach his children the Word of God. And dads, there's no shame if you're just starting and just explain it to your kids. Sometimes your kids will ask a question, a story, and I say, Dad, what is it? And they say, I don't know. But we could talk to the pastor, we could ask pastor when we see him next time, and maybe he could help us. Because you're just being honest. It's like, I don't know, I got a late start in this. That's why I'm helping you, my children now, so you're a better dad than me later. You're a better adult than me, so you knew more. So I'm gonna help you as much as we can. And that's why God gives us pastors and teachers to help us as adults. We teach our children the history of God and His people. We teach them the law of God because they find their focus in the person of Jesus Christ. The law drives us to Christ. The stories of the Bible all point towards Christ in the Old Testament, and in the New Testament, point back towards Him on the cross. So in the end, what are you teaching your children? You're teaching them about Jesus. You're teaching them to find Jesus in all the Bible. You're teaching them that Jesus is this great God that is spoken of, that is merciful and compassionate and cares for his people, who dies for them and gives them life. We can't just teach it as history, like, well, this is what happened, you know, 1492, you know, Columbus sailed the ocean blue kind of thing. It's, I'm teaching you this history so you could know this person. So you teach them the that, that you could get them to the who. Jesus, and in all things you want to point them to Jesus. Dads, are you doing that? As a Christian father, are you faithfully teaching your child the word of God to the best of your ability? If you don't have much ability, are you making use of the resources that are out there to help to increase your ability? I mean, if you were bad at it, everybody, you know, today's the joke. Anybody ever say, where'd you learn how to do this? Where'd you go to school? University of Google. I just looked it up. We will look up anything that we are interested in. But then we say, I can't teach my kids. Look it up. It's the same thing. There are many great sites, there's some terrible sites out there as well, but there's some great sites, Ligonier Ministries, Refinet, other things, with preachers that you can find, with Bible stories on there, with catechisms that can help you do this. We could do anything else, we'll post it on Facebook. Look what I did, I built this all by myself and all I did was put on a YouTube video and I figured out how to do this. But when it comes to teaching our children the word of God, we say, well, I just don't know the Bible, what can I do? You could go online and get taught. You could go to your pastor, you could ask him for resources. Men, are you doing that? And young men, you who hope to be married someday, you need to become a student of God's word now So if the Lord blesses you with a wife and blesses you with children, you will then be ready to fulfill your duty. Don't wait till you have children, because then you're playing catch up the rest of your life. Start studying now. Then lastly, what's the aim of a Christian father's teaching? Well, as we get towards the end, when you get to verses seven and eight, he says, that they should put their confidence in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments and not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not prepare its heart and whose spirit was not faithful to God. Saying the aim of your teaching is that your children learn to hope and trust in the Lord and obey him. That's the goal, that's the final product you're looking at. You're teaching not just to fill up their heads with knowledge, so if the family ever gets together to play Bible Trivial Pursuit, you could wow all the relatives or the other people in church who come by to play with how much stuff your kids know. You're teaching them to trust and obey. And the only way they're gonna learn to do that is if you model that. Otherwise, if all you do is model, know all the data, and then just spit it out, so you know how to fight with people on Facebook, you know how to get into arguments with people about theology, because you've mastered that, but you don't trust and obey. You just live like any other secular humanist. You just live for yourself and do your own thing. But you know a lot about religion, and you know enough to argue with people and win arguments. That's not good enough. We've got far too many of those people already. What we need is dads who model trusting and obeying for their children. And they don't just say, well, here's some stuff, go and do it. They say, come walk with me, children, I'll show you how to do this. This is why in the Old Testament it says, teach your children when you rise up, when you lay down, when you're out in the field, when you're coming, when you're going, teaching them all the time. There's a saying, your talk talks and your walk talks, but your walk talks louder than your talk talks. In other words, your kids pick up more of what you do than just what you say. And if you want them to hold on to the things you say, then you need to model it and be doing it in front of them. Otherwise, you're just gonna look and say, that's great. Dad is a great Bible scholar. It's useless, it doesn't affect his life at all, but what a scholar he is. If I have a trivia answer, a question, I can go to dad and he'll give me the answer. You want your children to say, I know what it looks like to follow Jesus, because I just look at my dad. And when I see my dad, I see someone who not perfectly, but every day follows Jesus. If he falls down seven times, he gets up the eighth time. He doesn't give up. He models not just obedience, but he models repentance when he makes mistakes. He models grace by forgiving us when we fail. The goal of your teaching is to have your children following Jesus. When we look at the Christian church today, that's not what we're finding. That's why we're in a mess we're in as a country, for one. We're training our children to be successful in the world, to make lots of money, to conquer things. So we set up their education for that. So we have children who hate the Lord, but they make lots of money, or they're very influential, or they're trendsetters, or they're Instagram influencers. They've done all these things, because that's what we've trained them to do. That's all their education was set to do something out there. And again, Jesus says, what does it prosper? What does it prosper if your child gains the whole world? It's the next Bill Gates or someone like that, or the next Donald Trump, they don't have money but power. What good is it if they do that and lose their soul? If my sons are illiterate, but they're faithful workers at the only job they could get with their illiteracy, but they love God with all their heart, I'll consider it a success. But if they conquer the world in whatever job they have and don't follow the Lord, it's a failure. What good is it? And dads, you need to take that approach. This is why I'm doing this. I'm called to teach. Teach what? The word of God pointed to Jesus. Why? So they might trust and obey. Because if they don't, what's the rest of the psalm about? Here is the train wreck that comes in life and in society. It's not just households. It's the society. And sadly, what society is he talking about? It's the Christian society. It's the church that is destroyed when fathers will not teach their children. And then the wrath of God comes down upon the church first because judgment begins in the household of God. If fathers had been doing their job in the last many generations, then the church would be doing their job of being salt and light, and maybe we'd have a different society right now. But there's a very real sense in which the church has led the world away from God because we handed our children over to let other people train them, other people raise them. We've sat back and thrown money at it, just as long as the kids are, as long as they're not whining in my ear, as long as they're not complaining, let them be happy wherever they're going, whatever they want to go do. And then we're reaping the fruit of that. And at this point, all we can do is repent of it and find forgiveness in Christ. And then say, well, I don't have to keep failing. As long as the Lord gives me breath, there's somebody I could be teaching. So you don't have kids around here, you don't have grandkids around here, find one of our fatherless children within our congregation. Come alongside a young father and help him out and say, let me help you with this. Let me show, learn from my mistakes. Let me help you. Fathers, we all like the acclaim on Father's Day, right? We like people saying, oh, happy Father's Day. Put up the little thing, world's greatest father. That's great. But with the honor and the dignity of being called father comes a responsibility to actually do the job. It's not a figurehead position. It's not an honorary title. You gotta be in it every day to earn it. God calls you fathers to be teaching your children the word of God that your children might trust and obey. Not just one generation, you teach them to teach the next generation, to teach the next generation, to teach the next generation. This is one of the ways that the church fulfills the great commission. How are we gonna make disciples of all the nations if we're not making disciples of our very own children within our own household? You're a pastor evangelist in your household. It starts with making disciples in your household. Once you got that good, now you can start moving out to others. But as the scripture says, a man can't rule his own house. How in the world can he think he can do it outside of that? So today, amidst all the hoopla, walk through your house again, peek in rooms. If there's a child there, you're a teacher. Say, okay, I gotta teach them then. I need to learn God's word so I can teach them. I need to model God's word. If I don't trust and obey the Lord, they won't. So let me set an example. Ladies, encourage the men in your life to do this. Don't let them just hand it off to you and be like, okay, you got this. Encourage them, help them. If they're struggling, don't mind, don't belittle them if they don't know things. Then they're just gonna claim up and not say anything. Encourage them, little bit by little bit by little bit. Children, encourage your dads. Make family time when they're trying to teach you from the word of God. Don't make this a time when you scream and yell and you hate it because I want to get back on my computer games or I want to do this. Appreciate the time your dad is spending investing in your life. Don't despise the instruction of your father. He's doing it for your good. He loves you. So be willing to listen. Otherwise, you end up being the back part of the psalm, the people who were destroyed under God's wrath because they wouldn't listen. It doesn't take long in Bible reading to realize what happens when children will not listen to godly fathers, when we as the children of God will not listen to our heavenly father. We see the destruction that comes. On Father's Day, let's re-evaluate, guys, what we're supposed to be doing. And instead of resting on our laurels, let's get back to work. Young men, you've got the opportunity to start well. Start mastering the word of God now so that when you do get married, you're ready to teach, you're equipped, you're ready to do this. Let's repent of our failures. If you need to go back to your kids and say, look, I'm sorry, I never taught you. I set a terrible example. I left you exposed to all kinds of dangerous things I should have never done. Please forgive me. But now going forward, I'm gonna do the best I can. I want to honor the Lord. Older guys, invest in your adult kids, invest in your grandkids, your great grandkids, whatever you have. If we're going to see a change in the church and in the society to go from rebelling against God to honoring God, it will start with fathers. And it will only go so far as fathers lead it. Because that's God's plan. God changes the world through fathers. It's an amazing thing. It's an incredible responsibility, but with it comes great honor as well. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, forgive us for where we have failed as fathers. When we have become so busy with the things of this world, or so distracted by our own hobbies and other things that we like that we have not invested in the one thing that you have called us to do, which is to teach our children. Forgive us for we have put our children at risk, Father, whether it's with what we allow them to watch on TV or listen to on the radio or in books, whether it's the educational decisions we have made for them that put them at great risk. Forgive us, Father, and grant us grace and wisdom to try to repair the damage that was done or help to repair that. Give us a heart for our children, our grandchildren, our great-grandchildren. that we would not grow weary in the work, Father, but out of love for you and for them, we will stay diligent, studying your word and how to live it, sharing your word with our children and modeling how to live it. May we not undercut the words of our mouth with the way we live our lives. And Father, we pray for the generations to come, that each succeeding generation would be more godly than us. would walk with you more faithfully, Father. And thus may you be glorified in your people. In the wondrous name of our Lord we ask this. Amen.