God's plan for the Family

This is a special Sunday for us here at Grace. Whenever there is a 5th Sunday in a month we have what is called “Family on the 5th.” On these Sunday’s, we shut down our Grace kids classes and invite all the kids to join us in the worship service. This allows for kids to meaningfully engage with us. To watch how we come to worship, to interact about the same passage and teaching, to sing alongside us as we cry out to God in worship. On these Sunday’s, we see family’s come before the Lord, gathering in His name, maturing in the faith alongside each other. Today, we have the opportunity to welcome and embrace all of these young ones as we enter into a meaningful time of worship with the Lord.

Luke 18:16 “16 But Jesus called them to him, saying, “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.”

Children have a special place in God’s heart! And they do in ours as well.

Today, we are going to take a look at God’s plan for the Family. As we study the Bible it is evident that God’s plan is for the family to function in certain ways. Family is not just held in high esteem but understood as critical to the development of community, spreading of the gospel, and maturing of believers from their youth into their old age.

Many times when we talk about the church as a whole we talk about the “family of God.” Recognizing that everyone who has put their faith and trust in God is part of this family. No matter if you are single, married, widowed, or the only remaining person in your biological family. If you are submitted to Jesus, you are part of this family.

Example:

In 1989, a study was released concerning the american family. In the study, parents rate their inability to spend enough time with their children as the greatest threat to the family. 35 percent pointed to time constraints as the most important reason for the decline in family values. Another 22 percent mentioned a lack of parental discipline. While 63 percent listed family as their greatest source of pleasure, only 44 percent described the quality of family life in America as good or excellent. And only 34 percent expected it to be good or excellent by 1999. Despite their expressed desire for more family time, two-thirds of those surveyed say they would probably accept a job that required more time away from home if it offered higher income or greater prestige.

34 years later, it seems that this problem has only been exasperated. We have continued to watch family units morph and change. Many of which better resemble individual people living with roommates than individual families.

It’s at this point in the conversation where sad reality often catches our hopes and dreams off guard. We often start grumbling and complaining about all of the reasons, all of the issues in the world, that have led us to this place. I am not sure that is a good posture to take. This morning, lets recognize that “It’s time,” with fresh eyes and ears, to turn our attention towards God and ask Him how we can better learn to be family members. It is time, that instead of focusing on all the issues we turn to the Father and ask for guidance. Let’s prayerfully, conclude this series on prayer, by recognizing we are all members of a family, we all need to step into our roles, and we all need to seek God together.

Lets open in a word of prayer.

Being that it is Family on the 5th, we are going focus on being a child in a family, as well as being a parent. The timing of this particular Family on the 5th is important because for the past few weeks, our kids have been asked this question in Grace Kids,

“Can God be trusted”

Answer: “Yes, God cannot lie or ever be wrong, so we can trust whatever He has said.”

Trusting God is so important. In fact, trusting God is the most important thing that anyone can do in their life. The more time we spend with Him, the more we learn to trust Him.

But trusting God also means that we learn to trust others, specifically, our parents. We learn through scripture that God has given us parents to help guide us to Himself. Parents are meant to know, trust, and seek God. As they learn about Him, they are to teach, lead, develop their children in the faith. Take a look at

Ephesians 6:1-4 “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” 4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”

Paul gives four meaningful reasons why kids should obey their parents.

Your parents are Christians

How do we know Paul was talking to Christian parents? Verse 1 says “Obey your parents in the Lord.” In other words, they know how to instruct you in the ways of the Lord because they have been instructed and are being instructed. They have experienced God and have understanding of what it means to be a child of God, no longer dead to sins, but alive in Christ. Because they have walked before the Lord, they can teach you what it means to walk before the Lord.

So, when you have questions about God, the Bible, how we can talk to God, ask your parents.

God has designed the family to grow and mature in the faith together. Parents, you are responsible for pointing your kids towards God. You are responsible for actively looking for ways to help cultivate them so that they mature in the truth of the gospel. Students, kids of Grace church - you are responsible to receive your parents training. If they are truly following God, they are likely doing their best to bring you up in the faith.

We were created to be obedient

When God created Adam and Eve, there was an expectation that they would tend to the garden, that they would walk and talk with God. There were instructions that included what to do and what not to do.

The family unit is designed in a similar way. God has given authority to parents in order to help draw us toward Himself. So the role of your parents is to bring you up, understanding how to be obedient to the Lord. If you are going to be obedient to the Lord you will need to practice. The best place for you to practice being obedient, is with your parents. Obedience doesn't come naturally. You have to choose to learn to be receptive, and choose to follow their instruction. So practice it with your parents.

“Honor your father and mother”

To Honor your father and mother is more than just doing what they tell you. It means treating them with respect, listening when they speak, doing what you were asked without rolling your eyes or arguing every point.

Honor includes our actions and our responses to them. Yet, it is still more.

Honor is a deep sense of respect. A kind of respect that knows “I can learn a lot from this person.” A type of respect that chooses to trust their wisdom and insights. That believes, the way they prepared themselves and worked to get where they are is something that I shouldn’t take lightly, but deeply appreciate. I should have gratitude towards their advice and instruction. I should consider and weigh everything they have to say, even if I disagree. Though I may disagree at times, I can still honor them by how I receive and consider their position.

The reality is that God has richly blessed your parents with something that you desperately need. Wisdom and understanding about life, but more valuable yet, if they are following God, they also have understanding about the person of God.

Thomas Carlyle once said “Show me the man you honor and I will know what kind of man you are.”

We are so willing to honor successful people without even knowing them. But are we willing to honor our parents, who God has placed as the people that are responsible for us? I think we could rewrite Thomas Carlyle’s words and accurately discern what people will be like, based on how they honor their parents.

The text is clear, that there is a promise for those who honor there parents. Ephesians 6:3 “3 “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.””

This is a general promise, not a specific one. Meaning, that in general, kids who grow up in obedience to their parents and honoring them, live longer lives and have more opportunity for blessing. The reason is because, parents who are willing to instruct their kids in the Lord are parents who care. Parents who care, will teach discipline, right from wrong, healthy from unhealthy, wise choices from unwise choices. They will use life situations, in the moment, to help their kids understand the bigger picture. In other words, to the best of their ability they ingrain a discipline in you to do what’s right, eat what’s right, believe what is right, and act according to those convictions.

There is blessing in receiving your parents through obedience and honor. But also know there is a flip side. For those who choose not to honor their parents, you are welcoming challenges to enter your life as you get older.

Learn to have a deep respect for your parents. Choose to believe that God has richly blessed them and have much to offer you. Seek to learn from them.

I want to take a minute to address an important point. I know there are many in this room who have had or possibly are having a horrible upbringing. I am speaking about people who have been so hurt by their parents, that even sitting in this room today has been difficult. To those of you who have been significantly wronged, “I am so sorry. I grieve that for you, and pray that God would do a great work in your life. As a reminder, Paul is addressing Christian parents. Parents who love Jesus and are following Jesus. Parents who demonstrate their love and care to their children by their posture and actions.

With that in mind, we now shift our focus to the parents.

Ephesians 6:4 “4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”

Do not antagonize your kids. This goes beyond intentionally frustrating them. This is being aware enough about who you are and who your child is to know how to lead them gently. Too often, we as parents speak with a harsh tone. We are all to ready to pull out the authority card, simply because we can. I believe as parents, we need to be better about looking at the long term picture. We will have momentary struggles over and over again. If we react poorly or just pull out the trump card, we are not going to earn or keep our kids respect, and in time there will be a shift in obedience and honor.

Perhaps, we need to get back to the basic image of what it means to be a parent. God has blessed you with a child. God, has entrusted this child to you, to be trained in biblical teaching, to be led in prayer, to be discipled in the faith, and for us to be a role model in worship. When we remind ourselves that children are a gift that we need to steward well before God, it changes the way we look at the momentary battles. It changes our tone, our thought process, and our willingness to gently lead them. To help them see and understand your reasoning, instead of repeatedly coming back to phrases like “because I said so.”

Can we be honest here, we as parents need to regularly re-evaluate ourselves. We need to consider where we have been to harsh or impatient. We need to actively work on our own ability to parent.

The second half of verse 4 says “bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”

Not only are we to steward each momentary struggle well, our primary focus and purpose before God is to lead this child before the throne. To help them know God in such a way that they stand in awe of Him and seek to live their life for His name’s sake. Your role isn’t to develop people who will do well in life or even to leave them with financial inheritance. Your role is to teach them how to willingly die to this life and this world. To help them see that God is so good and so worthy of all that I am and all that I have. That in my outlook of life, I am always inviting God into everything I do. Every decision I make. I am diligent to seek the Lord through studying His word, spending time in prayer. I am ready to openly pronounce the gospel to the people around me because this life is for Him.

If you want to parent well, according to the design that God has intended, you better be all in when it comes to seeking God. You also, better understand the significance of the role that God has given you. I believe a biblically successful parent sees the world as a mission and their child as a disciple who they can train to be sent out into the world. And when the time comes for that child to leave the home, they cant help but think about how they will bring Jesus with them into the next phase of their life. A young man or woman whose desire is to seek the Lord and be led by His Spirit! Wherever He may call them.

Parents, if we are going to be remotely successful in bringing up our kids, we better be in prayer. We better be in prayer with them and for them. They better see us in prayer and know what it means to pray because of how they have witnessed us praying.

It is time for us to understand our role in the family unit. It is also time, for us to understand our role within our spiritual family, our church family. If prayer isn’t an active part of it, then we have it wrong.

Matthew 21:12-13 “And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. 13 He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.”

Students when we don’t honor our parents, when we don't respect them and live in obedience to them we are making God’s house a den of robbers.

Parents, when we fail to earn the respect and trust of our kids by how we speak to them, teach them, and lead them towards Jesus, we make God’s house a den of robbers.

The issue with the sales people in the temple is that they were distorting the temples purpose. The temple was the place where God’s presence dwells, it was designed to be a place for the people to draw near to God, seek forgiveness, praise and worship Him, a place to stand in awe of God. A place where you could go, to seek correction in your life in order to realign your values. Removing the worldly values that you have given into and finding yourself in alignment with God.

Everything about the temple was designed to reveal the full character of a loving God to a wicked and sinful people. As a result of coming near and being forgiven, they were compelled to worship and as they worshiped God, He continued to open their eyes and their perspective of God grew and their posture became lower and more humble. There is something about being in the presence of God that changes every part of our posture, our attitude, and the way we view the world.

Kids, students, when we don’t lean into the instruction of our parents the way God designed we are distorting the purpose of the family unit.

Parents, grandparents, spiritual leaders, when you fail to bring up your kids in the faith, instruct them in the Lord, spend meaningful time with them because you love them - you are distorting the way God designed the family unit.

And you might say, “Well at least I am not distorting the temple where God dwells!” But in that assertion you are incredibly wrong. Because when Jesus died on the cross for our sins, the curtain in the temple was torn. Now we live in the new covenant, and we are the temple. We have the presence of the Holy Spirit living inside of us, which means when we distort God’s design, we are becoming a den of robbers - because we are robbing God’s temple of it’s purity and its purpose.

Jesus said that the purpose of the temple was to be a house of prayer. What we need to understand is that we are the temple which means we are not only designed to operate correctly within the family unit but also, we are all as individuals called to be a house of prayer. Think of every believer as a active vessel. Moving around, interacting with the world, bringing everything it see’s into prayer. This is a person who is constantly praying for their family, community, and broader mission. A person who knows how to draw near to God, confess sin openly, praise and worship God as the one who is worthy to be praised. A person who stands in awe of God because they have readily received all that He has for them.

Now, if we as individual Christians understand ourselves as a person who is the temple, a place where God’s holy presence is living. And if we understand this temple to be known as a house of prayer.... How then should we understand a family unit?

Shouldn't the family unit also have times of prayer together? Shouldn’t there be a regular habit? Shouldn’t there be an openness, a comfortableness to sit together in prayer?

Parents, when is the last time that you had everyone sit together and pray?

Students, when is the last time you asked your parents for prayer?

Is there a willingness in your home to share prayer requests, to pray fro each other, to be in prayer together?

For the larger church family, how should we understand your role, concerning a house of prayer? Just because you are single, or you don’t have kids running around the house, doesn't mean you are excluded. In fact, I believe that we are to act as a larger scale, house of prayer, a larger scale family unit.

Are you making time to meet with other believers?

Are you regularly praying for others?

Are you entrusting your prayer requests to faithful brothers and sisters?

When we looked at the survey results from 1989, it was alarming, to see that so many parents recognized the need for more quality time with family but would readily give it up. Its even more alarming as we consider that, in many respects, family values have continued to decline.

It’s time for us to recognize the vitality of prayer within the family unit. It’s time for us to consider, that maybe if we functioned as vessels of prayer, surrendered to God, that we wouldn’t get so distracted by worldly desires.

It’s time, to reclaim prayer in the home. It’s time, for the church body to be known as a house of prayer.

Prayer cards out on the table.