Sermon Tone Analysis

How do we raise our children to love and to rest in the reconciliation of the Lord.

If we have the ministry of reconciliation, how do we reconcile our kids to the Lord?

Teach Them

"We are reconciled to God by the death of his son."

"Let no Christian parents fall into the delusion that Sunday School is intended to ease them of their personal duties.

The first and most natural condition of things is for Christian parents to train up their own children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." - Charles H. Spurgeon

Paul’s assistant Timothy was a man called by God to pastor in some terrible situations.

He pastored Corinth, that disfunctional church.

And Paul reminds Timothy, as he instructs the young man in ministry, that it was the teaching given to him by his faithful mother and grandmother that kept him in Christ.

Timothy did not become a believer in a vacuum.

He became a believer because of the faithful teaching of his mother and grandmother.

We live in a culture that discourages the teaching of the truths of God to our children.

I’ve been told that the only reason our children believe in God is because they have been brainwashed.

To that I say, “AMEN!” God has revealed himself through His word, and the enemy would love for believers to not teach their children the truth of him.

God from the beginning of his dealing with men has encourage them to teach the truth of who he is to future generations.

The reason this is important is because God reveals himself in two ways.

One is general revelation.

General revelation refers to the general truths that can be known about God through nature.

We see things about God through the sun, moon, and stars.

Through the seasons and through all of creation, but this knowledge is imperfect.

A experts of fine wine called Master Sommeliers can tell you much about where and when the wine was made, the type of container it was stored in and other information just by the smell and taste of a wine.

And in the same way we can know certain things about God through creation, but like a sommelier that knowledge is limited.

In a recent study, your average sommeliers were given tests and that when compared to average wine drinkers they were unable to tell that three wines they tasted were all the same wine from the same bottle given at different temperatures.

Like wine tasting, general revelation is incredibly subjective in imperfect.

Special revelation refers to the more specific truths that can be known about God through the supernatural.

The primary way that God reveals himself to us is through His Word, the Bible.

The Bible is, according to Voddie Baucham, 66 books in 3 languages written by 40 authors, spanning 3 continents and over 1,500 years, and has been corroborated by 23,000 archaeological digs.

It contained specific prophecies, and miracles written when eye witnesses to those miracles were still alive and it reveals to us everything that God decided humanity needs to know about Him, what He expects, and what He has done for us.

Our kids need that special revelation.

They need the word of God.

So how do we give it to them?

Read it To Them

I admit that I’m not perfect at this.

We are terribly busy and we do not sit down every night with our kids like we should.

But we read the Bible with our kids.

Our children have gone through the Bible time and time again throughout their lives.

We use books like Star Meade’s Training Heart and Teaching Minds, or Bruce Ware’s Big Truths for Young Hearts.

We’ve used the Jesus Storybook BIble with our kids, and we encourage them as they get older by buying them devotionals and checking in on them.

Take Them To Church

Another way that we keep our kids in the word is by not making church optional.

My kids are in church every Sunday, no questions asked.

Church is a non-negotiable.

I had one of my children one time tell me, “Dad, we go to church all the time, why can’t we miss one Sunday?”

After laughing, I said, “God gives us his son, and died for our sins, and Jesus intercedes for us every day.

He deserves our time.”

Dads, it is your responsibility to bring your family to church.

If church is optional in your home it’s your fault.

Repent of that and make a commitment from this point to change that.

My 19 year old son knows that as long as he sleeps under my roof he will be in church on Sunday morning.

He goes to church with his girlfriend sometime, but he is in church.

Take your kids to AWANA.

Bring them to grow group.

Take them to worship.

They may say, “I don’t want to go tonight, I want to play fortnite.”

But they should know that church is not an option.

It’s amazing to me how many parents would never let their child miss a sports practice or skip work, but they let their kids skip church because they are tired.

And when you live like this you should not be surprised when your kids do not believe you when you say “Church is important” and “God is important”.

If church is optional in one generation it become extinct in the next.

Show Them

Every father should remember that one day his son will follow his example instead of his advice.

– Charles F Kettering.

But more than that, we should SHOW it to our kids.

The best way for your kids to love Christ is for them to see you loving Christ.

Let your kids see you putting the things of God first.

Let them see you stepping out of your comfort zone, taking risks for the kingdom, serving others.

We have a growing generation of young people who do not share their faith becuase theyve never seen anyone share their faith.

Christians we must let our kids see the Christ in us.

One way we can do this is by GOING WITH THEM TO CHURCH.

Don’t drop your kids off, go!

But how else can we model Christ?

Be Submissive In the Home

One way we model Christ to our kids is by submitting ourselves to our spouses.

Notice the picture of submission.

Wives submitting herself willingly, and husbands lovingly submitting himself to Christ.

This is a picture of submission to Christ.

Husbands and wives, if you cannot be submissive in your life to your spouse then do not be surprised when your children do not submit themselves to Christ!

Be Submissive in the Community

Serve.

The way we submit in our world is to serve those around us.

Being good neighbors, loving others, serving in the community.

These are all ways to show the love that Christ has for the world to our children.

We think missions is going around the world, but true missions starts with helping an elderly neighbor in their yard, or helping a grandparent fix something in their home.

Submission means loving others the way Christ loved us.

Be Submissive in the Church

Finally, we model it by serving the church.

As our children see us loving Christ in the church it models to them the need to be in church, to love the church and to serve the church.

Pray for Them

On e of the most powerful things that we can do to lead our children in reconciliation ministry is to pray for them.

Our children are born sinners.

Their eyes, like ours once were, are blinded by sin.

They are in darkness.

It’s hard to look at a baby’s little toes and hear its cooing laugh and think of it as sinful.

We can call ourselves sinners, we readily admit that.

We can proclaim the reality of the sin of strangers near us, but when cannot imagine any evil lurking in the heart of our innocent child.

But Scripture clearly states that we are born sinners.

Before Christ regenerates them they are lovers off darkness (John 3:19) & they do not understand the things of God (1 Cor.

2:14).

Because of Adam’s fall into sin, mankind is corrupted by sin in every area of his life: mind, emotions, and will have all been tainted.

This does not mean we are as evil as we possibly can be and that we do not sometimes do good things, but it’s the reality that everything we do is tainted by sin.

Several years ago when Kristy and I first go married I left a pen in my shirt.

The next day, when she pulled the clothes out of the dryer, everything in the dryer was covered in little blotches of ink.