PREVENTING REBELLION

Raising Children is a challenge

Raising good children is a big challenge

I. Raising godly children is an incredible task

Teaching children to obey

Teaching children to show respect and honor

Protecting them from evil – wrong philosophies

Teaching them to keep their heart’s pure

Romans 16:19 AV

For your obedience is come abroad unto all men. I am glad therefore on your behalf: but yet I would have you wise unto that which is good, and simple concerning evil.

The reason we lose our children is not over protection

But rather there are two ways we commonly lose them:

1. We lose them by not setting up boundaries for them.

2. We lose them by losing their hearts.

Not having boundaries leave children without structure, with out knowing what is right, without knowing what is safe. Then they venture wherever there will and curiosity leads them because there are no boundaries which their parents have set up and they become involved in things not intended for them.

We are very foolish to expect our children to live by the principles of Christian liberty when we as mature adults have a hard time defining it.

But what I hope to do is to talk about the second reason parents often lose their children of the fact that we have lost their hearts - and in some capacity - they either passively or openly rebel.

II. The Goal: Keep the Heart of our Child

That should be the goal of every parent.. You never want to lose the child’s heart.

A. Some worldly and carnal ways of keeping the heart of a child

This world is trying every way it can to keep the child hearts - but the result is losing the child to the world when you use the carnal methods.

1. To much pampering

2. To many gifts

3. To much attention

I’m not saying do not give your child attention, but be balanced. Let them do things on their own - teach them that they can play by themselves.

4. To much praise

We have a funny thing we say with Sophia, when she feels like she does something great and starts clapping like she won super bowl, I say “Yeah, give everyone a trophy.

B. Godly ways of keeping your child’s heart

1. You be the example

You’ve got to be the one that exemplifies godliness in your life.

You are the first and most important line for exemplifying before them

a proper relationship of husbands and wives.

a proper relationship of membership and the church

of good character

of keeping your word

of keeping God in all areas of your life

Proverbs 23:26 AV

My son, give me thine heart, and let thine eyes observe my ways.

2. Love them as God does

God loves us.

But he has given us rules and commands, expectations - right and wrong.

But He is also is ready with mercy and wonderful in grace.

Malachi 4:6 AV

And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.

Luke fulfils this prophecy John the Baptist in Luke 1:17

When children see there parents as just rather than unjust, then they will more likely cease from rebellion and give their hearts to their parents

In 2 Sam 13 and 14

David lost his son, Absalom’s heart.

Abasolom killed Amnon for raping Tamar, but for two more years David never restored his son.

David lost his son, Absalom burnt the fields of Joab to get his attention.

He didn’t care if his father killed him, but he wanted to see his father.

He simply wanted a relationship with his family. I don’t think he ever thought David was perfect. But he wanted a real relationship. But by

2 Sam 15:1, Absalom had become a rebel.

THEE KEY INGREDIENT TO RAISING CHILDREN IS TO GET THEIR HEARTS EARLY, KEEPING THEIR HEARTS, AND IF YOU HAVE LOST THEIR HEARTS, DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO GET IT BACK. – no matter what it takes.

Proverbs 22:6 AV

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

To Train always costs something. A price must be paid to dedicate a child to fully to the lord

Consider

1 Kings 8:63 AV

And Solomon offered a sacrifice of peace offerings, which he offered unto the LORD, two and twenty thousand oxen, and an hundred and twenty thousand sheep. So the king and all the children of Israel dedicated the house of the LORD.

22,000 oxen 120,000 sheep is what it took to dedicate a building, what are you willing to spend, or to give up to train your child.

Whatever it costs to help your children to follow God, must be spent, to get their hearts.

- It may cost you financially

- It may cost you physically

- It may cost you in your own education

- It may cost you in your career

- But it is your calling and your responsibility in this life.

- To help a child recover themselves from rebellion, it might cost your weeks of vacation.

- It might take a radical change

- Fasting and Prayer

Parents who are not willing to pay the price will not win over their children, will not win back the heart of a rebel.

III. Rebellion originates in the heart

Whoever has your child’s heart has control of your child.

Most children are more enamored with a cartoon character, a sports player or team, and teen star, a rock star, even CCM star than their own parents.

Look on your child’s wall and you will see who or what has his or her heart.

Do you have your child’s heart

1. Would your child rather spend time with you than almost anyone else?

2. Does your child listen respectfully when you speak?

3. Does your child have a genuine desire to please you?

4. Does it hurt him to displease you?

5. Is he loyal in your presence as well as behind your back?

6. Do you know what is going on inside your child?

Some adolescent rebellion is normal in every teenager and should be expected.

Rebellion is a sign that the child’s heart is wandering and looking for a place to put itself.

Hearts are in danger of being: Lost, Hardened, Stolen

IV. Three big dangers of their heart

We are in danger of:

A. Losing their heart

Ephesians 6:4 AV

And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

This is the only negative command for parents to not do to the children, do not provoke them to wrath.

We need to, by God’s grace, ask for his help not to do those things that provoke our children to rebel.

Did you know that we as parents do things that provoke our children to wrath. We need to prayerfully consider this in our lives that God would help us to not do this.

This especially applies as children grow from Junior to the teen years. When they are young we have to work hard on setting up authority, and correction when infractions of the boundaries occur. But now as they are older, we need to guide them and deal with them as they develop. We need to be ready to address the needs of our children individually.

Anger crushes a child’s heart. We often remember how we grew up, we knew about how we were yelled at, how our spirit were crushed. We do not have the right to scream and yell, nor should we use it, because it will cause rebellion over a prolonged period of time.

One of the quickest ways to lose the child’s heart, is to yell. Their hearts are to delicate, and they hide their heart and retreat within.

1. By criticizing him unjustly.

2. By speaking to him harshly

3. By teasing him excessively

4. By correcting them publicly

5. A standard to high for them to reach

Raising the standard to get approval so high, that they can not reach it, higher that what God expects of the child.

An immature child or teenager should not be expected to do the job like mature, diligent, or perfectionist parent.

As mature adults we know our talents and our weaknesses, we know our strong points and weak ones, we cannot expect our children to have the same ones.

o We must be wise to make sure that we develop their talents and expect out them unreasonable expectations.

o I am a Pastor, I cannot expect that my children will study like I do, can expect them to enjoy the challenge of the ministry like I do, I cannot expect them to read their Bibles and pray like I do, now I need to teach them these things, they need to achieve a reasonable degree of success in these areas, but these may not be their talents.

We cannot expect our children to have our zeal for all of our likes, hobbys and interests.

- When a child has done his or her best, they should be praised whether it as good as someone else’s performance or not.

6. They should not be compared to others so as to make them feel inferior

7. By forcing them do something they are afraid to do

8. By not communicating with them clearly your expectations

9. By spending to much time outside the home

10. By allowing their attention to be glued to any screen

B. Hardening of their heart

These things harden the child’s heart.

Then it is available to be stolen.

C. Stealing of their heart

Absolom stole away the hearts of the people, but it is the same thing to win the heart of the child.

1. Listen to the child

2. Respond to them calmly

and even touching them and not being silly. Tell them you want to understand.

3. Be genuinely interested

do not go through the motions

Don’t say it is no big deal, tell them you understand and then listen more.

- Some say their children don’t want to talk.

- If something is important to your children, then it is important.

- What my children perceive as their needs and what I perceive as their needs may be two

completely different things.

- I have to meet their needs the way they perceive them also.

This means we have to take time to kiss the dolly’s little toe now, because it is important to them, it is as important as to what the C.O. has to say about your promotion or your orders. 20 years from now, you will look back and realize how important this is.

You’d better care about their perceived needs now.

Why do your hearts give their hearts to their friends, because they listen to them.

Why does any child give their heart to the drudge group, and the dark/punk groups, because those outcast groups listen to them.