Scripture referenced 10 passages
The passage this message was preached from, in full, with every other passage it reached for.
-
Ephesians 5:28 husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies
28 Even so husbands also ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Keep this verse
Colossians 3:21
fathers do not embitter your children or they will become discouraged
21 Fathers, don’t provoke your children, so that they won’t be discouraged.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Psalm 127:3
children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from Him
3 Behold, children are a heritage of Yahweh. The fruit of the womb is his reward.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Proverbs 1:5
let the wise listen and add to their learning
5 that the wise man may hear, and increase in learning; that the man of understanding may attain to sound counsel:
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
1 Timothy 5:8
anyone who does not provide for their relatives and especially their own household
8 But if anyone doesn’t provide for his own, and especially his own household, he has denied the faith, and is worse than an unbeliever.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Ephesians 6:4
fathers do not exasperate your children, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord
4 You fathers, don’t provoke your children to wrath, but nurture them in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
1 Chronicles 16:11
look to the Lord and his strength, seek his face always
11 Seek Yahweh and his strength. Seek his face forever more.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Psalm 55:17
evening morning and noon I cry out in distress and he hears my voice
17 Evening, morning, and at noon, I will cry out in distress. He will hear my voice.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Proverbs 22:6
start children off on the way they should go and when they are old they will not turn from it
6 Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Proverbs 23:24
the father of a righteous child has great joy, a man who fathers a wise son rejoices in him
24 The father of the righteous has great joy. Whoever fathers a wise child delights in him.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Recap
The message in order, in a few minutes of reading.
This message grew out of a week when Pastor couldn't shake two things loose: seeing the film Courageous twice, and sitting through a Wednesday morning men's group lesson on a dad's game plan for raising sons and daughters. He took those two things together and built a list of ten marks of a good parent, walking through each one from Scripture and from his own family life.
What was said
Pastor opened by naming five types of fathers he encountered in the men's study: the absent dad, the distant dad, the demanding dad, the involved but visionless dad, and the involved and strategic dad. That framework set the question for everything that followed: what does it actually look like to be the last kind of father, the one who is both present and intentional?
The first mark he landed on was loving your wife. He pointed to how children watch everything, how a son or daughter forms their picture of marriage from what they see at home. He shared that his own granddaughter told her father she would never want to date anyone who didn't treat a woman the way her dad treats her mom, and he said that kind of fruit takes fifteen years of consistent living to grow.
From there he moved through a cluster of marks about how fathers relate directly to their children: not putting unrealistic expectations on them that leave them embittered and convinced they will never be enough; enjoying them and building memories rather than using the "quality over quantity" idea as an excuse to be absent; and genuinely listening to them. On that last point he brought in the Penn State scandal, which had broken that same week, and said that people heard but did not act, and that silence from a child often speaks as loudly as words.
He then addressed provision, pushing back against the idea that good provision means giving children everything they want. He described the current moment as an age of entitlement, and said that one of the most important things a parent can teach is how to want something, wait for it, and work toward it. Handing children everything, he argued, actually robs them of something they need.
Training and prayer got tied together in the middle section. He said that if a child never learns to respect authority at home, they will not respect it at school, at work, or in marriage. He used the example of little Boone at staff meetings, watching his dad's face and waiting to hear a "no," to show that even very small children are reading their parents and testing limits. Alongside that training, he urged parents to pray for themselves and for their children, morning, evening, and noon, because parents cannot be everywhere their children go, but their prayers and God can.
Pastor closed with what he called the most important mark of all: preparing your children for eternity. He said flatly that if a father does not give his children the opportunity to come to Christ, he has failed at the most important part of the job. He was careful to say that parents cannot make the choice for their children, but they can and must give them the chance to choose. He pushed back on the idea that this belongs to the pastor or the youth pastor, and said it is the parent's responsibility above anyone else's.
He ended by addressing the reviews of Courageous that called it out of touch with reality, and turned that criticism around. The reason the film feels distant from everyday life, he said, is not that it is wrong but that families have drifted so far from what God designed. The film doesn't need to be brought down to where the culture is. The culture needs people who will live differently, even if it only reaches one or two families at a time.
Doing a Bible study?
Here is a guide we have prepared for you: the passages in order, questions for the group, and room to write.
- Pastor talked about five types of fathers: absent, distant, demanding, involved but visionless, and involved and strategic. Which of these did you grow up with, and how has that shaped the way you parent or plan to parent?
- Pastor said the quality-of-time idea can become an excuse, and that quantity of time tells children they matter. Where do you feel the tension between those two ideas in your own family life?
and 3 more questions in the guide
Read the full transcript 6,293 words
0:03
Hey. Did you notice that, courageous is still on? Have you noticed that? They put it up to 07:00. Ain't that great?
0:08
How many of you had a chance to see it? How many of you haven't seen it yet? Lord, do you see these hands all over these places? You gotta do that. You really gotta do that.
0:18
It's it's that good. And besides, I'm gonna be given some little secrets this morning in my message about so, you know, if if you haven't already seen it, I'm gonna blow a couple of things for you already. But I mean, it just there's just something about this film. As I went to see it twice, and the first time, you know, you go through it and and you wow. It's great.
0:36
The second time and you cry to the whole thing, of course. And the second time, you said, wow. Wow. That I can relate there. Wow.
0:44
That's close to me. Don't go there three times. Three times, you just you'll probably go up and just, you know, go forward right there in the in the theater. That'd be neat, wouldn't it? But there there's a line in that film, lots of them.
0:57
But one of them that that hit me when the main character Adam is at a table with his friends, and he says and they're talking about being a good dad. And he says this remark, and you heard it on our on our trailer. He said, I don't wanna be just a good dad. And then the other officer next to him says, any fool could be a father. You know, that that stuck with me all week long and and some of people ask, what are you going speak about?
1:27
Did we just finish the forty days of love series? You're to head to China a couple days. You can't start a new series. What are going to talk about? And I was struggling all week on what to say and And the Lord and and I just couldn't get clarity from the Lord what to do.
1:38
Wednesday morning, Wednesday morning, when I'm thinking about what is I'm gonna say? In our our men's authentic manhood on Wednesday morning, this is a great time we have with about 40 guys meet here in the other room. And for the second series, the second class, that's those who already finished the first lessons last year, and so we started the second one. And the lesson was dad's game plan for raising sons and daughters. Here I go I go to this film and see it twice, and I had that in my head.
2:06
Then I get this on Wednesday morning. I said, do you do you want me to to continue in this vein? Because that's where the thought is, what people are thinking about. And then as we go through this class, this this begins to hit me. So there are five types of dads.
2:17
The absent dad. In in our day, in my generation, only about 20 or 30% were absent. Now it's 40 to 50%. Absent means not here, either because of work or no longer, living with a family, gone to the family. Or 50% of our homes.
2:34
Then a distant dad. They're home, but they're not there. Am I making a lot of noise here? What is that? I'm scratching.
2:44
Alright. I'm seeing them go like this. Usually, I'd stop, but I have a whole twenty minutes so I can't stop. Alright. So the distant dad, he's home, but he's not there.
2:56
You can touch him, but you emotionally can't feel him. Then there's a demanding dad. Do this, do that. This is the way I was taught, and this is how you're gonna do it. And and the my father said, son, if I say it, that's enough.
3:13
Didn't matter if he did it. Didn't matter if he lived it. It just mattered if he said it. That's a demanding dad. Then there's the involved but visionless dad.
3:23
Dads who are involved in life, but but they really don't have a plan. To carry their their their sons and daughters, not not just to finish them through puberty, but but make sure they're prepared for life. Then the last one was an involved and a strategic dad. And so as I began to think about that this whole week, I I put down 10 things to make a good father. You're in your they're in your notes, and so we're gonna talk about these 10 things this morning because it's still in my mind to film, and it's really important.
3:53
This may be a good. On Father's Day, we always talk about how to be you know, what it means to be a good father. But I I wanna in fact, you can actually put these things in me. How 10 things to help you become good parents. Because it's not just about dads, it's that of moms.
4:08
So let's look at them together as we go through this this morning and see how God can tie this all in as we work toward being good parents. That's what we all wanna be. Right up in the very beginning, I started with number one, love your wife. Would you read this out loud with me? Ephesians five twenty eight.
4:28
In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. Pretty clear. Pretty clear. And it's very, very important.
4:39
I start out with that because in reality, our children watch how we treat our wives. Sons and daughters watch how we treat their mother. And if we treat them abusively, then that's how they will learn to treat their spouses. If we act abusively toward them, then they will do the same. And so it's very, very important that we start out with a love your wife.
5:02
Love your wife. In fact, my son, the best way to know if you did a good job as a parent is to see how your children turned out and better yet, even the grandchildren. And so now now we're watching this happen in our life. And my second son, our first son, was the easiest one. You know, the first sons are always easy, and he just I mean, he just whatever he said he did, but the second son, he just the second son was born in order to keep us humble.
5:28
And he was born in order to make to show us that the first son wasn't perfect. You know? There's something we he had a purpose in life. I was trying to figure it out the first twenty years of his life, but it it was amazing how you watch how he watched every little thing you did or said, and he brought it back up to you. Now I'm watching him as he is leading his family of two.
5:49
And he he's leading his family in such a powerful way because he loves his wife in such a powerful way. And the children love him because they see how he loves mom. And one of the things that's interesting is our our our granddaughter now is is getting to that age where she's looking at guys, and our grandson is is is 16, and he's looking at gals. And one of the things that Steve said to his his daughter, he said now, you can't date anybody until you're 17, and then you can only date in a group. And then I can hear all, oh, no.
6:26
Don't tell this story. But it's very, very important. So I want you to I love you too much to let you go out among the wolves. Then he said this, no guy will be able to even talk to you unless he comes and talks to us first. Because how they respect us will be how they respect you.
6:49
And my daughter granddaughter said this to her dad. She said, dad, I would never want to date anyone who wasn't like you. And he asked why? He's because you treat mom like she's your lover and your best friend. Now she's 15, almost 16, and she's watched this these fifteen years of her life, and it was important for her to see, does it mean that they always agreed?
7:14
No. Does it mean they didn't have difficulties? No. It means they went through life, but they did it in such a way where they demonstrated to their children that they loved each other. That's so very important.
7:25
So men, love your wives. Women, respect your husbands. It'll be a pattern, a blueprint for marriage for your children. I jotted these down from statistics. If you show you disrespect you disrespect your your wife, then your son will carry that disrespect into his marriage.
7:44
If you verbally or mentally or physically abuse your wife, your daughter will expect that same thing in her marriage. If you treat their mother like she isn't worth very much, you're you're degrading the home, you're degrading the family, and you're giving an image to your children that will scar them the rest of their lives. So it's important. We start out there. Love your wife.
8:09
If you wanna be a a good father, a good parent, love your wife, respect your husband. Secondly, don't expect perfect children. Don't expect perfect children. Here it is. Read it out loud with me.
8:21
Fathers, do not embitter your children or they will become discouraged. Say it again. What's that mean? Well, dad just like this. Since we're not perfect and I know it's hard for you, since we're not the only time you're the only perfect one here.
8:43
So, the rest of us are not. So, since we are not perfect, our children are not perfect. But somehow, we expect them to be. We expect them never to spill their milk, never to to to flunk a test, never to have a difficult moment. We expect them to be the best in school, the best the the most prolific score in the basketball team, the best football player, the we expect them to be what we weren't.
9:09
We wanna live out our life in them. You wanna be a good dad, good mom? Don't expect perfect children. Don't do it. They're not perfect.
9:21
We're not perfect. Kids mess up. Accept them through that. And that's what it mean. Fathers, don't make your children embittered or resentful.
9:29
Or they're gonna become discouraged. If every little thing that they do wrong, every little thing, we keep bringing it back up to the men, we don't encourage and love them through that, they will live then with this attitude that they can never make it. It's amazing the amount of people that I talk to now, as I walk through counseling with them, goes back to that time in life when dad discouraged them. When dad said they'll never amount to anything. And in their mind, they think they will never amount to anything.
9:56
Or a mom said to the daughter, you're never gonna be beautiful. You're always gonna be this mess. You're always gonna be fat. You're always and that's what they became in their mind because they heard it. And then they lived it out in their life.
10:08
So don't expect perfect children, and don't embitter your children to become resentful because you put unrealistic expectations on them. Does that mean that you don't want the best for them? No. Does that mean that you don't want to encourage them to do the best they can in school? No.
10:23
You want them to do the best they can, not the best they can't. Encourage them. Love them. Be there for them. And second, thirdly, enjoy your children.
10:35
Look at Psalm one twenty seven three. Let's say it again. Children. Look at those two powerful word. Heritage from who?
10:48
The Lord. Offspring, a reward from who? They're our reward. Let's enjoy em. Let's enjoy the children God has so graciously given to us.
10:57
Let's enjoy them. Enjoy them. Children are given to us to enjoy. They're not to be a burden. They're not to be avoided.
11:04
They're not to be ignored. They are to be enjoyed. Now I grew up with this particular saying, and I've learned to realize it is not a true one. The quality of time is more important than the quantity of time. The quality of time is more important than the quantity of time.
11:21
I I grew up that way. That's way it was in our family and that's the way I did it. My family and I say, you know, I've gone a lot. So, the time I have with you is going to be good and that was okay for for some things but sometimes we we use that as an excuse. Children want our time.
11:40
Quantity is important. It says to them that they're important to us. It says to them that that they are not bothering us or they're not a afterthought or they're not something that we do after we finished eating and reading the paper and seeing television. Oh, yeah. Good night, kid.
11:58
Quantity is important. Giving our children time is important. Remember in the in the series of love forty days of love? One of the ways that you spell love is t I m e. The time you give to your family, the time you give to your wife or husband, the time you give to each other.
12:14
Quantity time is important. So how do you be a how do you become a good father? How how are you a good parent? You in you enjoy your children. You enjoy them.
12:24
You build memories with them. One of the things that we're learning in authentic manhood on Wednesdays is building memories with our children. And one of the things you wanna do is build memories, not nightmares. And there are far too many families that have nightmares for memories. You wanna build exciting memories with them.
12:43
It doesn't mean that you have to have exquisite things, expensive things. Children just want time with their dad and mom and and exciting little moments when you go camping, you go hiking, you go you go hunting, you go skiing, all the things you can do in this area immensely. So many things you can do here. They just want time to build memories. Do that.
13:02
Enjoy your children. How do you become a good parent, a good father, a good mother? You enjoy your children. Fourthly, you listen to your children. Let's read it.
13:13
Proverbs one five. Let the wise listen and add to their learning and let the discerning get guidance. Let the wise listen and add to their learning. Their learning. How do we learn?
13:30
By listening. How do we know what's happening? By listening. How do we know what's important? By listening.
13:38
Now to do that, we have to give undivided attention and that's difficult at times. And our children know that. So we want to be able to give them undivided attention and listen to them. Not with one eye on the television, not in during the announcements or during the during the excuse me, during the ads during football, not during free moment. They when they have a issue, they want to be able to tell it to us, and we need to listen to them.
14:07
When they're children, when we listen to them when they're children for little small things, my mommy, John Johnny, you read my book. Okay, honey. Let's go. You listen in for little small things, as they get older and those things are larger and bigger, because we listened when they were small, they now will come back to us when they're older. And they know already that we are listening to them, that they are important to us, and we become important to them.
14:38
This last week, football world was rocked by a scandal in Penn State University, and Joe Papp happens to be one of my most favorite people in all the earth in terms of football. And, grew up with him. Forty six years he was there. I've been a Penn State football fan fan for forty six years. Actually, started when Rip Ingle was there when I was a little kid.
15:03
So I I watched every game, followed all way through. So then I get shocked this week as I I see that, well, he wasn't a part of it in terms of he did his legal right, morally, he did a very wrong thing. When he heard that, when he heard from one of his assistants that a young boy was being, molested in a shower in his locker room, When he heard that news that he went to the officials above him, and they in turn went to the officials above them, and none of them went to the police. For fifteen years, this went on. And now they're saying maybe as many as 20 boys were victimized because somebody didn't listen enough to stop and do something about it.
15:57
They listened, but they didn't apply what it is they what they heard to change the course of actions that may have or could have saved 18 to 20 other boys. And for me, that's the worst of all wrongs. So, it's very important that we listen to our children. Even if at times we think they don't wanna say anything. Because I have discovered in my own life in ministry, even in my own family, silence often speaks volumes.
16:29
Things that aren't said often speaks volumes. And so we have to work through that and walk through that until we actually hear what the issue is. You wanna be a good dad? You wanna be a good parent? You wanna be a good mom?
16:43
Listen to your children. Listen to your children. Fifthly, provide for your children. It's a no brainer. I know I'm speaking to the choir, but this is something very important in our day.
16:54
Anyone who does not provide for their relatives and especially for their own household has what? Say it with me. Will you read that again? Has what? What a thing to say.
17:09
Come on. That's that's pretty powerful line here. That means provision for our family is ranks pretty high. It's like denying their faith and they're worse than a non believer because unbelievers provide for their children maybe. Often they do and and so do believers.
17:24
I'm not saying that we don't. I'm just saying, it's so important that we provide. Now, it's not just giving our children everything they want. One of the difficult things in the valley is that we live in a culture where many of our children get what they want. When they want it, how they want it.
17:41
We have a very difficult age today. It's called an age of entitlement. This is what I deserve because Johnny has it. This is what I deserve because Sally has it. This is what I deserve because all the kids around me have it.
17:52
This is what I deserve. And so we give often because we think, okay, I want to be I want you to be like Johnny. I want you be like Susie. I don't want you to be a weirdo. So, I'm gonna get whatever it is you want.
18:04
We don't teach our kids often the importance of wanting something and then waiting for it, and then working towards getting that. We actually rob them of understanding what it means to work through issues and having to work through and getting something by just constantly always giving them what they want. Does it mean that we don't give them what they need? We do. But there's a vast difference often between what we want, what we need, and what we want.
18:33
And so in that idea providing for children, there's also to be a good dad and a good mom is not just giving your children everything they want, but it's providing for them everything they need. And teaching them what it means to want something, work for something, wait for it, and then receive it, and the joy you all get in the satisfaction of having it happen. Too many fathers today buy off their children with things. They think that if I buy them, I can relieve them of the guilt, relieve myself of the guilt of not being there for them. And that's what we have raised a generation.
19:12
That's what it is in this generation today. I don't know what it's gonna be like for my grandchildren. But this generation is a generation of entitlement. This generation, the generation of I want it at all cost. This generation and it's amazing.
19:25
And not to get in politics here, but what a difference between a tea party and a Wall Street Occupy Party. One celebrated and proclaimed the importance of being able to to have free enterprise and work together as as Americans, and the other destroys and builds. It destroys buildings and burns things because they want it for nothing. And the reason why they want it for nothing is because we're in the age of entitlement. If you have it, you have too much.
19:53
Therefore, I want it. Does it matter if I work for it? Does it matter if I earned it? You've got it, and I want it. And when we have that kind of mentality, we destroy the basis of family.
20:06
You wanna be a good father? Good mom? Provide for your children. And in providing, teach them to work, to want something, and to wait for it to happen. Six, train your child.
20:21
Here we go. We all know this one. Let's read it out together. Fathers, do not exasperate your children. Instead, bring them up in.
20:31
How are they to be brought up in what training? Again? Instruction the Lord. Again? Instruction of the Lord.
20:40
Is that important? Church, is it important? Yes. Yes. In the instruction of the Lord.
20:49
I don't know everything. In fact, I know very little. God knows everything. It's important then that I bring up my children in his instruction. He has the answers.
20:58
We must teach and train our children to respect authority in a home. If we don't teach them to respect authority in the home, they won't respect authority in the school, and they won't respect authority in their jobs. It's amazing. It was like my daughter's a teacher in the public school system, and the number one issue that she has is disrespect. She got you know, when I went to school and when some of you guys went to school, you went in there and, you know, if you said anything without raising your hand, then you're in trouble.
21:26
And going to the principal met something. When you went to the principal, you know no one wanted to go to the principal. Nobody in my day wanted to go to the principal. Now everybody wants to go to the principal because they can get out of school. I mean anything to get out of class, I'll do that man.
21:40
You know what your punishment is? You're gonna go to the library and spend the day there. Oh, terrible. I'm gonna go to the library. I'm gonna get to read books all day.
21:49
If you don't learn to respect your parents, you won't respect authority. If you can't respect your father and you can't respect your mother, you won't respect your teacher and you won't respect your spouse, you won't respect your girlfriend, you won't respect anyone. So we are to train our children, Bring them up in the instruction of the Lord. Your children are gonna test you. Believe me.
22:17
My wife and I had four of them and all four of them tested us in different ways, but they all did. You have your children, and your children will test you in different way. They'll see how far they can go. Kids are the most intelligent beings in the face of the earth. They know what they are doing.
22:37
Don't believe that they don't. Even when they're small, a baby knows, oh, if I cry, oh, I'll get this. So they keep on crying. Children know. They know.
22:46
Little Boone knows. Little Boone comes to comes to staff meeting. We we have a staff meeting on Thursday, and Renzi comes, and he plays with toys, and and Boone sits on his desk, and we talk to him about worship. That's how it goes. But you knew that.
23:02
So so so we're there and stabbing, but little Boone knows. He knows how far he can go. And and I'm watching little Boone, and he'll he'll look up to his dad, almost waiting for his dad to say, no, Boone. Don't do that. No, boom.
23:15
Don't do that. And if he doesn't hear that, he'll do it. He'll do it. He's just waiting for the no, boom. Don't do it.
23:21
He's so small. How could he no. He knows already. He knows. He's looking at dad's eyes.
23:27
He's looking at no. No, boom. Don't do that. He stops. Just for a little bit, and he'll keep on going.
23:32
Nope. Children, no. Children, no. And they'll test you, and they'll test you, and they'll constantly do that all the way up until they're married and even beyond. They still love the test.
23:47
That's another sermon. Alright. Seven, pray for yourself. Let's look at chronicles sixteen eleven. Look to the Lord.
23:55
Let's read out loud. Look to the Lord. How long? How often? How often?
24:04
Always. How often is always? Always. It's not part time. It's not, you know, maybe when I'm sinking in the ship and I don't know where to go.
24:14
Okay. God, I'm in this mess. Get me out. Let's start from the premise that we're gonna be in the mess because we're messes. We don't do well often, and we're constant learning.
24:25
We're in process. So pray for ourselves. We ask the Lord, lord, give us wisdom. I can't do this. Help me.
24:32
And God does. God knows our kids. He loves our kids even more than we do. He gave them to us. So let's go to him.
24:40
He can do it. You know, where we can always go where our kids go. We're not in the car with them when they go to the games. We're not in car with them when they're out of date. We're not in car with them when they go, on trips.
24:52
We're not with them. But our prayers are. God is. So we can ask God to give us wisdom in rearing and training our children, and we can ask God to protect our children. I'll give you some of that at the end.
25:07
Number eight, pray for your children. Let's read it together. Evening, morning, and noon. Do you get the picture here? Evening, morning, and noon that is a kind of regular thing?
25:22
What happens? Cries out in distress. And and who hears his voice? God hears his voice. So what does it say?
25:28
So that I I'm praying for my children. God help them. Protect them. Guard them. Keep them.
25:34
Lord you know what temptation they're going through now. Open up doors for them. Help them to see. Give them a heart after you. We pray for our children.
25:43
You pray for your children. God's there to intervene and be there with them. Look at number nine. Gonna be a good father, good mom, be a good role model. Read it with me.
25:54
Start children off on the way they should go. And even when they are old, they will not turn from it. Let's read it again loud. That was a verse that my wife and I adopted with our children. It goes like this.
26:17
Train up a child when he's young, and when he's old, he won't depart. What does that mean? That means if you start when you're little babies, you start with little Boone, and you love Boone, and you encourage Boone, you're with Boone. And then when Boone goes, and he gets two years old, and three years old, and four years old, as you walk through him, all the little steps of his life, and he goes off to to elementary school, and then he goes off to junior high school, middle school, junior high school, and high school. Every step of the way, You're praying for him.
26:45
You're loving him. You're caring for him. You're with him. As you're training him, you're starting the children off the way they should go. And what are they seeing?
26:52
They're seeing you. They're seeing how you act a mom. How you acted how you drive. How you respect others. They copy what you do.
27:00
Children are great copycats. They have indelible memories. They don't forget. We wish that they would. We wish that they would forget the words that we said.
27:13
We wish sometimes they would forget the actions that we did. We wish sometimes they would they would forget the abuses that we have done into others and to our family. We wish they would forget. Children don't forget. So be a good model.
27:30
Start when they're young, the way they should go. And when they're old, they'll look back and say, that's what my mom did. That's what my dad did. That's what they said. That's what they wow.
27:43
Do we make mistakes as parents? Yes. Yes. But if you do the very best you can to be a positive role model to your children, it will bring great, great benefits. Lastly, prepare your children.
27:56
Read it with me. The father of a righteous child has great joy. A man who fathers a wise son rejoices at him. A wise son or daughter. Here it is.
28:08
The father and the mother of a righteous child has great joy. A man or a woman who fathers a wise son or daughter rejoices at him. What is it? Just as I said earlier, the worst thing that Joe Paternal could have done was nothing, and that's what he did. He went just far enough to say to the next person, this is what happened.
28:39
He didn't follow-up. He didn't make sure it wouldn't happen again. He didn't prepare the people around him. He just walked away and did his job. And fifteen years later, the pain is enormous, and the hurt is beyond explanation.
29:01
Prepare your children for eternity. Fathers, if we do not prepare our children to find Christ as savior, we are failures as fathers. Can I say it again? All four of our children came to Christ in our home. All of my grandchildren have come to Christ in the home.
29:29
Our responsibility as a father, as a mother, before anything else, is to make sure our children are prepared for eternity. Make sure that they know Jesus as their savior. To know that beyond a shadow of a doubt. And when we know that, we have great joy. Great joy.
29:53
We can't choose what path they go. We can't choose what choice they make, but we can choose to give them opportunity to choose right. We can choose to give them opportunity to accept Jesus. We can choose that. We can't make the choice, but we can give them the choice.
30:11
So often we don't even do that. We think it's the youth pastor's job. Now the youth pastor may have that privilege and he may do that because he's there and at that stage of the life, the kid finally accepts Christ. That's great. That does not rob us.
30:27
That does not take away from us. That does not say that we cannot do it. I have had parents say to me, I I don't know how to do that. I believe it's a job of the pastor. It is not the job of a pastor to lead your son or your daughter to Jesus.
30:46
It is not the job of a pastor to be the role model for your son or your daughter to be a man or a woman of God. It's your job. And what a great job it is. What a wonderful opportunity it is. What a great joy and privilege it is to do that.
31:12
If this morning you say, well, I haven't done that. Don't bemoan what you haven't done. Make the step today to say, this is my responsibility. And one of the great things of the film is the end of the film. The end of the film, when the fathers take responsibility for their actions.
31:31
I read the reviews of that film afterwards. By the way, the first week, it broke all records, even Hollywood. I read the reviews, and here was one of them. For a Christian film, it was that warm fuzzy wuzzies, and it was great for the choir, but it certainly wasn't relative to the day. Another review.
31:58
Great for right ring believers out of touch with reality. Another one. Kind of a soapy soapy sicky kind of film, not in touch with reality. Do you know why the film was not in touch with reality? Because in reality, because fathers haven't been fathers, and moms haven't been moms, and families haven't been families, and because families are divided, and because that which God built and expected and planned for, we as men and women decided to go our own way.
32:40
And the reality is that film is so far away from where our culture is. That does not make it right. What it does, it blatantly shows us how far away we are. How far away we are. For our culture, our media to say, it's warm, fuzzy, wuzzy, but just isn't for today means they missed the whole boat because it should be fuzzy wuzzy for everybody, but it isn't.
33:10
In reality, when more than 50% of the homes don't have dad, and in reality when homes when our families are divided, and in reality when we live in an entitlement age, and in reality when things are so far away from what God really wants done in our life and home, in reality, because that's the culture and the world we live in. The only bright light, the only salvation, the only hope is for you and I to get it right. So that we can then impact even so little. Even if it's just one or two or three, whatever or whoever we could help, we can snatch away from the jaws of the enemy by being good dads and good moms. Let's pray.
33:58
Father God, would you help us in these days? We wanna love you. We wanna love our kids. We wanna be examples and role models. We wanna be able to impact our culture, and we do that by standing up for what we believe.
34:08
Yes. But we also live out what we believe. So would you help us as dads? Help us as moms? Help us as kids to accept what you have for us?
34:20
What a perfect plan you have. That dad come to know you as lord and savior and and lead his family in a godly way. That mom come to know you as lord and savior and respect her husband in a godly way and love her children. And that the kids grow up to understand what love is and what a home is. How important it is to be together and love each other and love the community they're in.
34:41
Lord, that's been screwed. It's been stagnant. It's been destroyed in so many people's lives. Would you help us in this community of faith to live out and be men and women of courage, be young people of courage to stand up for what's right and live for you in Jesus' name. Amen.
35:04
Let's stand together and say. Somebody may say, you know what? I didn't I didn't get reared that way. My dad wasn't there. My mom wasn't there.
38:48
I come from a broken home. Whatever happened in the past to the past, what happens now? What counts. So, you can say, I'm going to be the best dad possible. I'm going to be the best mom possible.
38:57
I got the best family possible. I'm going to do it right now. On the back of your information pack of the message this morning, I I went to the Bible and found prayers. I love praying scripture. So, we just took those scripture verses and put them into prayers.
39:11
You have your own prayers but great thing to just put your kids names in there and pray for your children every day. Ask God to protect them, guard them, keep them. Let's see what God can do in an extraordinary way in these days. Only he can. Father God, would you take our fathers and moms and kids today?
39:27
Our families here. Would you bless them, encourage them, and empower them, and help them to live out, to take what they learn from their head, move it to their heart, embrace your truth, and live it out. As they live it out, what a difference they'll make. In Jesus holy name. Amen.
39:42
God bless you. Have a great great day. Enjoy Coffee Connection.
Share this message
Every word on these came out of the message. Download one and post it anywhere.
