Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction: In one of the Mission Impossible movies, Tom’s Cruise’s character, Ethan Hunt, gets married, yet his wife has no idea that he works for the IMF, the agency that he works for that is super secretive.

That changes very quickly, as she is kidnapped because an enemy wants to use her against Ethan.

The issue at hand was that Ethan thought he could separate what he did away from his home life.

And we today in our Christian culture, can do the same as well.

What do I mean by that?

That we treat our homes and workplaces as separated form our lives as Christians.

Does that mean you act completely different than you do at church?

Not necessarily, but often we think too often tend to separate the “secular” from the “spiritual.”

And that even is seen, even unintentionally, by how we lead our homes and our lives as a whole.

Today, we will see how Ephesians continues the “household” implications of the Gospel and how the sacrificial death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus affects all of life.

CTS: The home and the workplace should be strongholds of discipleship toward Jesus.

I. Make Disciples in the Home (1-4)

Children

A. Value of children (1a)

I begin with this because of the importance of our understanding as biblical Christians why children are so valuable and part of God’s plan.

We live in a current culture today that minimizes the value of children.

Those that have many children nowadays are seen as weird, or even to the point now, that children are seen as more of a burden than a joy.

We see in the current uptick of arguments for abortion are based not on the factual biological truth that a human being at conception, and instead, the argument is over whether it’s a woman’s body that trumps the body of a child in the womb, removing that there is a distinct human being involved with its own body.

Personal autonomy is king in our culture.

Children are often seen as a burden rather than the gift that God has shown them to be.

The Scriptures show the value of children (though this is not to speak against those that deal with infertility, as though you are less of a person because you can’t have children.)

Married couples are commanded to have children (if possible)

The inherent value and life of children from conception is clear

Jeremiah was set aside before his birth:

John the Baptist was filled with Spirit from the womb and leapt in the presence of Mary, Elizabeth considered that her baby was a full person, the Lord himself.

They are a heritage from God

Taken all together, we should view children not as burdens but as God created creatures, just like you and me were at one point, and that the admonitions we are about to see point to the goodness of the family structure that God set aside from the beginning.

A spiritual heritage of the home is clear and commanding from Scripture.

This is why abortion is unequivocally wrong in every circumstance.

But it is also why we must offer a better way, and also the church protect and nurture children not only in voting at the polls, but offering hope and grace to parents in situations that have brought about children.

The church also needs to be a bastion of grace for those that have chosen abortions and are facing the guilt and shame of their actions, that we point them to the cross and the grace of Christ.

Yes, vote, but even more importantly, we must put our money where our mouth is, and support struggling women and men, help with adoptions, buy diapers and formula, and be a family for many that don’t have anywhere else to go.

Why?

Because children are God’s incredible gift and heritage, image-bearers of God.

B. The position of children in the family (1b)

Paul writes to the church, and no doubt, is assuming the gathering of the church as he writes.

That includes children here.

One implication of this is that there was an expectation of children to be in the life of the church, in the midst of gathered worship.

Even in their messiness, their fidgety selves, and their whines and cries, children are seen as integral and part of the church gathered.

So, he addresses them here, fully expecting that they will hear these words, and reiterated in their own homes.

Obedience: Obedience here is different than submission, actually showing a hierarchy of authority.

Wives weren’t commanded to obey, they were commanded to submit, which we talked about is integral in a loving and nurturing relationship between man and wife, submitting to the servant leadership of the husband.

Children on the other hand are to obey their parents rules of the household, as this is integral to their growing as a human being and as an image-bearer of God.

This is natural to our world, written on the hearts of mankind.

But that obedience is rooted in the Lord.

As they obey their parents, children are obeying Christ.

Does that mean that no matter what, children should obey everything that their parents tell them to do?

The exception to that command would be anything that is sinful or would go against God’s commands.

If a child believes and trusts in Jesus, but the parents are unbelievers, and were to bar the child from worshiping with a church, that would be an instance where I believe disobedience would be necessary.

Or anything sinful or oppressive.

But overall, the child should obey in all things that their parents command.

Children do not rule the home, but parents do.

But even in that in the Lord is important.

The gospel implications are full at work for all generations.

As Jesus was a child, he obeyed perfectly his parents.

He obeyed His Father all the way to the cross, to pay for the penalty of our disobedience.

For children, for all people, we realize that our righteousness is found in the obedience of Jesus Himself, and that we now live our lives, children or adults, to obey Christ in all that He desires and asks us to do.

C. The Scriptural basis of the command (2)

The command is rooted in Scripture, rooted in the Decalogue (10 Commandments).

The fifth command there, and reminds us that this obedience is nothing new, but always an assumption in God’s kingdom and His people.

Children, you obey because God commands us to do.

Jesus did so.

We do so.

The Bible is our supreme authority in all things.

When we read our Bibles and we read about God’s plan for us, and when we obey it, we obey our Lord Jesus, the one who died to save us from our sin and disobedience.

D. The promise of obedience (3)

Rooted in that command is a promise.

Paul calls it the first commandment with a promise.

Some have tried to discredit Paul by saying that the second commandment has a promise, but that’s not the case.

That phrase is related to the character of God.

Here, this is the first commandment with a promise.

Here in the ESV, the translation retains “the land,” but other major translations say “on the earth.”

I think the latter is better, because Paul is communicating to the new kingdom, not the theocracy of the nation of Israel in a physical land, that they would live long on the earth.

Also, this promise is not necessarily individual, but rather, corporate.

When the family operates as it should, when the children obey the authority of the Lord put over them in their parents, the fabric of that community is strong.

This biblical view of marriage and the family will stand up to the wiles of Satan and to degradation.

This setup that God has is for the good of children and for the good of the family.

His ways are better than our ways.

Parents:

The command now shifts to the fathers, which doesn’t mean mothers are off the hook here.

Knowing that Fathers are seen as the spiritual head of the home, he begins to command them.

A. Don’t provoke them

Paul is relaying to the parents that their authority over their children is not to constantly berate and suppress their individuality.

That every little annoyance that they do or imperfect thing that they try to do is a means to insult, berate, or scold them.

Here, the parents are meant to point them to the general admonitions of the Lord, instead of nitpicking and holding a heavy hand on them.

There are those that have had to had the tightest of grips on their children and have watched them slip through their fingers because of the animosity and hatred that was built up over the years of the overbearing and overly critical parent.

As our Father is patient with us, we are to be patient with our children as well.

We show grace because we have been shown grace.

We apologize when we’ve done wrong because we are imperfect parents.

B. Disciple them

Instead of provoking them to anger, the call of the fathers, parents, is that they would disciple their children.

Two fold aspect here is a discipline for showing what the wrong way is and to stop them from those destructive behaviors (good discipline is for their good, not because we are angry) and to instruct them in the Lord.

Overall, this means that the home must be the primary place of discipleship.

Your children need you as parents to disciple them in the ways of the Lord.

They need fathers that open the Word and teach them about Jesus.

They need parents that pray over them, for them, and with them.

They need a constant diet and place where God’s instructions and God’s grace is seen.

You cannot put off discipleship to the church.

The church is an important part of their discipleship, but it is only part.

Me and Chris Lindsey cannot disciple your kids as they should be discipled.