The Blueprint for Spiritual Life

DISCIPLESHIP

Our starting text for today is

Proverbs 22:6 “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”

Deuteronomy 4:9–10 ““Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children’s children— how on the day that you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb, the Lord said to me, ‘Gather the people to me, that I may let them hear my words, so that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children so.’”

Deuteronomy 6:4–9 ““Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

Deuteronomy 11:16–19 “Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you, and he will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain, and the land will yield no fruit, and you will perish quickly off the good land that the Lord is giving you. “You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.”

Deuteronomy 32:46–47 “he said to them, “Take to heart all the words by which I am warning you today, that you may command them to your children, that they may be careful to do all the words of this law. For it is no empty word for you, but your very life, and by this word you shall live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess.””

As you can see the importance God places training and teaching a child in a Jewish home.  So, let’s take a look at some key words from these verses and come up with principles that we can apply to our spiritual life

1. Train up – (to teach a skills or the necessary preparation so that you reach the standard required for a particular job or activities

2. The way – this two words give the idea of a path and direction.  But it's not just simply a set of directions. It's a full-on adventure. A way of living that shapes every step you take.   Here is what Solomon say:

Proverbs 2:20 “So you will walk in the way of the good and keep to the paths of the righteous.”

Proverbs 4:14 “Do not enter the path of the wicked, and do not walk in the way of the evil.”

Proverbs 4:19 “The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.”

So, Solomon states that if we train a child to live the right way, then when they get old, they will not depart from what they were taught.

The command that Solomon gave in Proverbs 22:6 is similar to what Jesus gave in Matthew 28:19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,”

Here is what Jesus said about “the way”

Matthew 7:13–14 ““Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

Matter of fact, the early Christians were called “The Way’. Here is what Paul said in

Acts 22:4 “I persecuted this Way to the death, binding and delivering to prison both men and women,”