.
Well, this session is entitled, The Genesis Family.
And so what I wanted to do was to say, okay, understanding how foundational Genesis is
to our doctrine, understanding that when we take Genesis as a foundation and build our
science that it works and we can explain the evidence and the evidence does fit.
Let's make a wider application now because when I look around today's world, I'm thinking
of the number of churches I've preached in in America as well as over here in Australia,
I see more than ever before whole generations of Christian families whose children are rebelling
against Christianity.
And you see a lot today in our churches where the teenagers don't have much to do with the
church at all or if they do, once they go to university and perhaps get married and
so on, that a lot of them just go right away from the church.
And so I wanted to remind us all today about the whole basis of the family and the importance
of the family because the family is the first and most fundamental of all human institutions
which God ordained in scripture, the first and most fundamental.
And the family is really the backbone of our whole society, our nation, if you think about
it.
If you wanted to destroy a nation like Australia or destroy a nation like America, one of the
best ways is to destroy the Christian family.
And if you think about it very carefully and as we go through this session this afternoon,
I want you to think about the fact that the family is under enormous attack.
In fact, I was just reading somewhere the other day in Queensland, I think it is, that
some of the people there in government are talking about the fact that there needs to
be more of a family emphasis and we need to get back to those stable family relationships.
Well, I'm going to suggest to you there's no way that that's going to work.
I know why they want it because they know that it does work in society and makes a big
difference in society, but there's no way it's going to work if they don't have the
foundation for the family.
They can talk about wanting families all they want, but why?
What foundation do they have for that?
So let's start by looking at Scripture.
I guess as a father, I have five children, one wife, and as a father I've often thought,
how should I bring up my children?
What should I do?
How do I train them?
What sort of priorities are there in education?
How should I look on my children?
And here's a question for you all as we start this afternoon.
If I was to give you all a sheet of paper and say, okay, write down what the Bible says
about children, how you're to train them, what the priorities are, what the family's
all about, how important it is, I wonder how we'd go.
Because lots of us have lots of opinions about bringing up children, lots of opinions about
what the family's all about, but if I said, write down what the Bible says, how would
we go?
That's an interesting one, isn't it?
In fact, I think if you did that in a lot of areas in our churches, I think you'd find
a lot of people couldn't answer it.
What I have attempted to do is to go through Scripture to try and understand the family,
understand my role as a father, as a husband, and therefore to understand the way in which
God wants me to act as the spiritual head of my home to enable my children to grow up
to be obedient servants of His.
And so let's just start with that.
First of all, continuing on from one of the other sessions we've done, the whole basis
of marriage is in Genesis.
In Matthew 19, when Jesus was asked about divorce, a concerned marriage, He said, haven't
you read, He which made them at the beginning, made them male and female, and said, for this
cause shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave under his wife, and they'll be
one flesh.
He quoted from Genesis as a whole foundation of marriage.
And so if we want to understand what marriage is all about, we have to go back there to
the book of Genesis.
Also understanding that God is creator means that God is the one who sets the rules, not
us.
And therefore as a Christian, I recognize I must kneel in obedience to what God says.
And that's the trouble, you know, we all have lots of opinions about all sorts of things,
whether it be in our marriage or other aspects of living.
What we've really got to do is say, what does God say?
Not what do we say, what does God say?
And so I want to ask each one of you as husband and wife, as a father and mother, as a young
person this afternoon, when it comes to understanding our roles in this world, are we prepared to
say what does God say?
Because He's the creator.
When you go back to the book of Genesis, you find because of the events there that God
gave specific roles to a man, specific roles to a woman.
And regardless of whether you want to decide whether those roles are right for you or not,
the point is, what does God say?
When we go back there to Genesis, we find that, for instance, God made a man first,
He made a woman.
Paul tells us later on in the Bible that Adam was created first and Eve was deceived.
And because of that, a woman will be in submission to her husband.
Now that doesn't mean that husbands will lord it despotically over their wives, because
the Bible does talk about the fact that you submit to each other.
But it does talk about the roles of man and woman, that there are different roles.
Yes, men and women are equal, but they do have different roles, and it's the roles God
ordained for them.
Many women today don't want to be in submission to their husbands, but that's not the point.
The point is, what does the Bible say?
Many husbands don't want to love their wives, as the Bible says.
Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it.
I wonder how many husbands love their wives like that.
But it also says a lot of other things.
It says things like Isaiah 38 and 19, the fathers to the children shall make known thy
truth.
Ephesians 6, 4, fathers bring your children up in the nurturing admonition of the Lord.
Psalm 78 is an interesting one.
It talks about fathers teach your children so they'll teach their children so they'll
teach their children and teach their children.
Interesting one, isn't it?
Fathers teach your children.
According to the Bible, who's to be spiritual head of the house?
Fathers are.
He's to be a priest to their family.
But yet in the majority of Christian homes, it's not the fathers who are the spiritual
head.
Who is it?
Mothers.
You see, it tells you there's something wrong there.
And you know, I notice that particularly in... Well, I notice it in America too in a
big way.
You know, I don't mean to... This tape will probably end up in America one day, but I
believe that the feminist movement, which has a big effect in America, has affected
many women in the churches without them even really realizing it.
And maybe it's affected some of us here too.
But at the same time as a feminist movement affecting women, I think what's affected a
lot of men is the sort of teaching that, well, you know, career is more important than their
children.
I'm sure you've seen that too in homes.
And they get more wound up with their career than bothering about their children.
They leave the training of their children to the wives and so on.
I think there's a lot of mixed up things in our families today.
And what we've got to do is judge what we're doing against what scripture says.
And so just as in one of the other sessions I was talking about back to scripture, back
to Genesis, like Martin Luther was saying, we need a reformation.
We need to get back to basics, back to absolute authority.
When it comes to understanding the family, we need to get back to basics, back to Genesis.
Malachi 2.15, if I read it out of the Amplified Version, it says this, did not one make you
and preserve your spirit alive?
And why did God make you two one?
In other words, why marriage?
Why?
Why does he make two people one flesh?
Because he sought a godly offspring from your union.
You know one of the primary importantnesses of marriage?
To produce godly offspring.
Not just offspring, what kind of offspring?
Godly offspring.
You see, if you think about it, as I said, the family is the first and most fundamental
of all human institutions.
You ought to produce godly offspring who will influence the world for Jesus Christ, who
will produce godly offspring, who will influence the world for Jesus Christ, who will produce
godly offspring, generation after generation after generation.
We ought to produce a generation that have the knowledge of the previous generation that
will give that knowledge to the next generation, that will give that knowledge to the next
generation.
And so it goes on and on.
You know, when you read the Bible in Joshua, for instance, and we read there about the
story of when they crossed the Jordan River, remember that?
And they were to take 12 stones and build a monument so that when your children ask
what mean these stones, you'll be able to remind them of what God did so that you won't
forget.
And right through scripture you find this sort of thing.
Right, Peter talks about, I want to put you in remembrance and we have to remember these
things because we're only too apt to forget.
And over and over again the Bible tells us to remember these important things.
Well, I want to put you in remembrance this afternoon of what the Bible says about the
family.
One of the primary importances of marriage is to produce godly offspring.
You see, one of the things that hit me was this.
I can't take my car to heaven, not that I'd want to, the way it is anyway, but I can't
take my boat to heaven or my house or my bank account to heaven, but you know there is something
you can take to heaven with you.
You can take your children to heaven with you.
And there's my question to mums and dads this afternoon.
Are you taking your children to heaven with you?
Have a think about that for a moment.
Are you producing godly offspring?
Not just offspring, but godly offspring.
So let's go through and have a look then at what the Bible says about bringing up godly
offspring.
Deuteronomy chapter 6 is a very, very important passage.
In Deuteronomy 6 we read this, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,
with all thy soul, with all thy might.
And these words, whose words, God's words, these words which I command thee this day
shall be in thine heart.
We have to know them.
And thou shalt teach them diligently.
Who's the thou referring to?
Parents and particularly whom?
The father.
And I want to emphasize that.
Thou refers to the parents and particularly the father.
Thou shalt teach them diligently.
You know what diligently means by the way?
With perseverance and carefulness.
Not quickly, give the kids a Bible reading while the ads are on TV.
You haven't heard that before, have you?
And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children and shalt talk of them when they
sit in thine house, when they walk us by the way, when they lie us down and when they rise
us up.
Any other options?
That sort of sounds like 100% of the time, doesn't it?
Now some people say to me, well how can you teach Bible stories 100% of the time?
Well it's not saying teach Bible stories 100% of the time.
You know what it's saying?
Really?
See, 100% of what you do, you are training your children.
Your children look at you and become like you.
That's really what education is all about.
You think of what 2 Corinthians 3.18 says, and we who with unveiled faces all reflect
the Lord's glory are being transformed into His likeness with ever increasing glory which
comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.
We are to look at Jesus Christ and whose image are we conformed to?
Jesus Christ.
Our children are to look at us and who should they see?
Jesus Christ.
In everything you do, in 100% of what you do, yes in training your children, yes you
are to teach them Scripture, you are to teach them how to pray, but in 100% of what you
do, what you are doing is training them to think Christian.
And so when your children look at you, they should see Jesus Christ in everything that
you do.
In 100% of what you do.
Your children will look at you and they will become like whom?
You.
In becoming like you, they should become like whom?
Jesus Christ.
Boy, that's something to live up to isn't it?
Do your children look at you and do they see Jesus Christ?
As your children look at you, are they being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ?
Because I'm sure for most of us when we think about that, it's a rather sobering sort of
thought isn't it?
As you start to think about that.
You ever heard the phrase, ah she's domineering just like a mother?
Heard that sort of stuff?
Bad temper just like his father?
Heard that sort of thing?
You see, if TV is foremost in your household, your children look at you and become like
you, don't they?
If materialism is foremost in your household, your children look at you and become like
you.
You know one of the problems we've got though, I think it's this.
You know how the Scripture says it's easy to see the chip in your brother's eye rather
than the log in your own?
You know, I can see why that is because it's so easy for us to look at somebody else and
see their inconsistencies isn't it?
It's so easy for us.
I mean, and I travel around an awful lot and you meet so many different people and you
meet their children and when you see their children, and I was a teacher, when I was
teaching children in school, I could see the parents sitting there in many, many ways.
I remember going to one particular church and we were staying with the pastor and the
pastor and his wife were sitting down and they were telling us about a problem they
had with their daughter.
She was going to a particular Christian school and the teachers had a dreadful time because
every time they told her to stop doing something, she always just had to finish what she was
doing.
No matter what it was, she had to finish what she was doing and they were telling me about
this terrible problem and as they were talking, no matter what the pastor tried to do, his
wife always just had to finish what she was doing and saying.
You could see the same thing there and they couldn't see it, but I could see it because
I was sort of outside of that.
I know it's happened to me on occasions when I've been home and my wife will look at me
and she'll say, you know, you're just like your father.
What do you mean?
I think what we've got to do is say to ourselves, do you realise there might be many behavioural
patterns and attitudes and so on that we have in our system because of our parents that
maybe they're not some of the right attitudes, maybe some of them are, but maybe some are
not right.
I mean, go generation after generation after generation.
What we really need to do is sort of stand outside of ourselves, if you like, and start
judging our behaviour, our attitudes, our motives against what the Bible says and if
there's things that don't add up then we need to change them, don't we?
We do need to change them and maybe if some people do see things and say things to us
rather than, you know, getting all upset because of a pride issue, which it is for us, isn't
it, when somebody tells us there's something wrong, we get all upset because, you know,
we all have a problem with pride in that way.
Maybe we should think about that very carefully and ask the Lord if there is something there
that we need to change because a lot of us don't think that we do need to change anything
and maybe if we acted more like that and solve some of the problems in churches where everybody
can see everybody else's problems and we get all these little factional fighting and, oh,
it happens all the time, doesn't it?
And that's one of the reasons why churches have so many problems.
One of the reasons why pastors have a lot of problems because they're the ones up on
show in front of everybody and it's very easy for everyone week after week to start to find
their little problems and things and talk about them and before long he's got to go
in three years' time, hasn't he?
It's one reason why there's so many pastors who have to leave churches all the time because
people start to judge them all the time and that's one of these difficult things.
So you see, what you do in 100% of your time, you are training your children.
And so mum and dad, and dad particularly, is head of the house.
My first challenge to you is this.
In what you do in training your children, have you taken on that spiritual headship?
Are you the priest to your family?
Are you looking at the fact that you have to train your sons to be fathers and to be
husbands?
To train your daughters to be mothers, to be wives?
Because you know, a lot of us don't even take the time to think about that.
If they're going to be a father, if they're going to be a husband, then what do you do
to try and train them as they are growing up so that they will think Christian and act
in a Christian way to be a good husband and to be a good father?
Do you actually consciously think about that or do you think it's just going to happen
automatically?
Because it's not just going to happen automatically as we're going to see in a moment.
We are to see our children conform to the image of Christ as it says in 2 Corinthians
3.18.
They are to look at us and to become like Jesus Christ.
We are to be actively training them.
And we are, you know, in Deuteronomy it says, diligently, with perseverance and carefulness.
We have to spend a lot of time doing it.
We can't just let it happen.
And perhaps to sort of explain that to you, let me do it this way.
We're going to consider Proverbs 22.6.
And Proverbs 22.6 says this, train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old
he will not depart from it.
Interesting verse, isn't it?
Of course, we understand the nature of a proverb.
It's not saying that, you know, that's going to happen in every instance or something,
but it's saying here is the general rule.
Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it.
And I want to particularly think of the word train here.
In fact, what I'm going to do is give you a number of different aspects and then bring
it all together for you.
You know the word train, when I looked it up in a dictionary and looked at its meaning
and I had a Hebrew scholar with me to do that with me, I found that the word train is related
to the word for palate, you know, the palate in your mouth.
And it also implies that you have to actively do something.
You know when a mother wants to train its child to eat solid food, like the Hebrew mothers
for instance, what would they do?
Well, you'd mash up the food, put it in your mouth, touch the palate, which gives you no
option but to swallow, all right?
So in that sense this word train is sort of saying giving no option and it's also talking
about something that's active.
You have to actively do something, actively putting in, giving no option.
That sort of sounds like brainwashing, doesn't it?
It is, works well.
It's just a matter of using it for the right reasons and the right motives, right?
Hitler used brainwashing, it works real well, doesn't it?
He just used it for the wrong reasons and the wrong motives and gave the wrong information.
Whereas we need to use it for the right reasons, right motives, giving the right information.
When I'm in America, I like to explain Proverbs 22.6 using a jar of Vegemite.
You know why?
Because I think Vegemite, in fact next time you're thinking of Proverbs 22.6 or training
children, think of Vegemite.
Now you think of it as an Australian.
Why do you like Vegemite?
I presume most of you like Vegemite.
I do, I'm hooked on it.
For those of you that don't when you're not a real Australian.
Presumably most of you like Vegemite.
Now of course it's a black substance, isn't it?
Basically yeast and salt.
When I visit some friends in America who've never seen Vegemite before, I sort of give
them the idea it's sort of like chocolate spread.
So that when they take a big mouthful of the teaspoon, it's interesting to watch them
dive across the room to the sink.
But you know, Vegemite, liking Vegemite is sort of an acquired taste, isn't it?
We've got a daughter that was born in America and she loves Vegemite, but Americans don't
like Vegemite.
You know why she loves Vegemite?
Because when she was just a few months old, my wife would put some Vegemite on a teaspoon
and she would give it to her and she would put it in her mouth and start to get used
to the taste and gradually she gets, what, hooked on Vegemite.
Isn't that why we all buy Vegemite?
Isn't that why, you know, Kraft can make so much money on Vegemite?
Because they have indoctrinated people to think that you've got to give babies Vegemite.
We get hooked on it.
As adults, we love Vegemite, all right?
See, it's sort of a brainwashing technique, isn't it?
All right, we put it in our mouth, touch the palate.
They gave us no, our parents gave us no option, did they?
They put us on Vegemite when we had no option, right?
We got used to the flavour and now we love Vegemite.
You see why I use it in relation to Proverbs 22.6?
Because we start from when they're young, we get them used to the taste, we actively
do something, we make sure that it touches their palate so that they get, you know, get
the taste and swallow it and they grow up addicted to Vegemite.
You realise the word train in Proverbs 22.6 is really implying that sort of thing.
Right from when they're born, we are to train them in truth by actively, by the way, Dad,
actively.
That means you've got to do something.
You can't just sit back and do nothing.
Many fathers just leave it up to the TV or the Sunday school teacher or the church or
the school they go to.
Fathers by and large do not actively get involved in training their children in today's world.
And we need to get actively involved.
Fathers are the head of the house.
They are the spiritual head.
They are to be the priest of their family.
And if they do not get involved actively in training their children, you will suffer the
consequences.
You know, I've seen this over and over again.
Generally speaking, now always, I'm not saying these things in absolutist terms, but generally
speaking when fathers are not the spiritual head of the house and the mothers are left
to do it, you will often find it's the daughters who keep going to church, but they'll often
date non-Christian fellows and marry non-Christian husbands and get in a mess.
And it's the sons who often rebel against Christianity and have nothing to do with Christianity.
That's what you often see.
It's sort of a generalisation.
What I'm saying to you, fathers, if you're not the head of your house and you are not
actively involved in training your children, you justify that position to me from the Scripture.
You can't.
But I can justify from the Scripture that you are to be the head of the house, the spiritual
head.
You are to be training your children, giving them no option.
See, a lot of people say today, oh, you know, I believe children should be allowed to make
up their own minds.
Oh, that sounds like a good scriptural principle, doesn't it?
Show me where it says that in the Bible.
Show me where it says that.
See, truth is not an option.
Truth is not the best policy.
Truth is the only policy.
You know what the Lord does with us?
He tells, He doesn't hide error from us in the Bible, does He?
But He condemns error for what it is, doesn't it?
It condemns error for what it is.
You think about it.
How do you train your children to clean teeth?
I don't know what it's like in your house, but man, with five children, teeth is one
of those things in our family that's just, are teeth a problem in your house?
They're really a problem in our house.
Do you know what we do?
We've told our children, look, here's the toothpaste, here's the toothbrush.
The reason you need to clean your teeth, because if you don't, they'll rot, fall out, you know,
etcetera, and you need to brush them and so on.
And do you know what they do?
Every night they go and get their toothpaste, they put it on their tooth, they run, they
can't wait to clean their teeth before they go to bed, right?
Is your house like that?
Boy, you know what you have to do?
You have to get them and you drag them in there and they're screaming and kicking and
you get that toothbrush and you thrust it in their mouth and you push it backwards and
forwards and you belt them and...
I don't know, teeth are just a big problem in our house.
I don't know why that is, but I found a two-model approach to cleaning teeth doesn't work with
kids.
It doesn't, doesn't.
You give them the option, I know which option they'll take.
You know which option they'll take?
You know why, don't you?
See, you know the nature of children?
Children are not innocent little creatures.
I mean, in sin did my mother conceive me, isn't that what the scripture says?
We all inherit the sin of Adam right from conception.
I remember going into hospital when one of my sisters had had a baby and you know how
they stand around the glass window, gooey and garring, you know, nose like its great
grandmother, ears like its great uncle and all this sort of stuff.
And I looked at it and said, what a wonderful sinful little creature.
I nearly got thrown out of the hospital.
I tell you what, when she got at home she found out I was right.
It didn't take long either.
It was a sinful little creature.
You see when children are born they're sort of like minus five thousand, aren't they?
Right?
They really are.
They're like minus five thousand.
They're sinful creatures.
And that means that you're working against a negative.
By the way, Dad, do you realize what that means in regard to train?
You have to actively put in and you're working against a negative.
Right?
They're sinful creatures.
They're humanist at heart.
That means you've got to work extra hard, haven't you?
Extra hard.
And you know something else I found when I read scripture?
The bad will influence the good more than the good the bad.
Have you found that?
The bad will influence the good more than the good the bad.
I mean what happens?
You send your kids along to a public school and the other kids take home the Bible verses.
Isn't that right?
Or do your kids bring home the swear words and the dirty jokes?
Which way does it go?
I mean you look at the example of Lot.
He pitched his tent towards Sodom.
He was in Sodom at the gates of Sodom.
His sons and Lord didn't even believe him when he told about what was going to happen.
Who influenced who?
Did Lot influence the city or did the city influence Lot?
And you look right through scripture.
What do you see?
The bad will influence the good, if you know what I mean by good in quotes, rather than
the good the bad.
And that's what you see right through the Bible, don't you?
And you know it's the same with our children.
We ought to remember that.
Those bad influences are more likely to influence them than them the bad influences if we just
leave them like that.
But you see we need to understand that children are not miniature adults.
Children are not miniature adults.
What does Paul say?
We read in 1 Corinthians 13 11.
When I was a child I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when
I became a man I put away childish things.
He says in Ephesians 4 14 that we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro and
carried about with every wind of doctrine by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness
whereby they lie in wait to deceive.
Paul's telling us that children are not miniature adults, that children are easily tossed to
and fro by every wind of doctrine.
That when he was a child he thought as a child, but now he's put away childish things.
We need to realize that when we're looking at children we should not treat them as miniature
adults because they're not.
They are little children.
And probably the best way to try to describe what I'm really talking to you about is this.
When we, we read Matthew 5 13.
So I can find it here, here we are, Matthew 5 13.
We read this.
You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its saltiness how can it be made
salty again?
It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled by men.
I'm sure you've read that before.
We are to be the salt of the earth.
Alright?
Keep in mind the things I've said about children and now let's look at these things and then
we'll bring it all together for you.
We are to be the salt of the earth.
What does that mean?
Well, here's a picture that I think sort of describes what we're talking about.
As an adult we are to be filled with salt.
That means biblical truth.
We are to have a continual input of biblical truth which is why we read the scriptures
daily, why we go to Bible study and we love doing that don't we?
I mean every church, everyone turns up for Bible study.
Why we, you know, go to worship the Lord on the Lord's day and why we have that day set
specially aside for the Lord.
You know that's an interesting one I'm doing a study on at the moment.
You know when God made everything in six days and rested for one there was a reason for
that day of rest.
And in Exodus 20 he said we were to work for six days and rest for one and that one day
is a special day set aside for worship of the Lord and to remember the Lord, a particular
day to remember the Lord.
And I believe that today in our modern world we don't treat one day as any different from
the other in many respects.
We might go to church and then we just treat it as any other day.
But you know there was one day to be set aside specially to remember the Lord and to remember
what he's done for us, a special day of rest as the Lord tells us.
And I think for a lot of us the Lord's day when we worship is just like any other day.
You know let's go to church get it over and done with so we can go and watch the footy
or something like that.
Or you know do other things that please us rather than meditating on the Lord.
We ought to think about that.
I often wonder too whether the whole belief in millions of years is somehow taken away
from the original understanding of the seven day week, six day work one day rest and we
sort of forgotten what God really has done there.
But it's a part of the Ten Commandments isn't it?
You know six day work one day rest, a day set aside for the Lord and of course as you
know the disciples are met on the first day of the week to commemorate the resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And that six day one day pattern is still there.
Well here we have an adult filled with that biblical truth and here we have a continual
input of biblical truth and here we have them dishing out that truth.
Christians are lapping it up and non-Christians are being challenged by it.
That's what I see is a consistent Christian.
A continual input of biblical truth, continual input of biblical truth.
What does Psalm 1 tell us?
Blessed is the man who meditates on his word day and night.
Remember that dad.
By the way dad have you taught your children that?
Have you taught your children to meditate on the Lord's word day and night because the
scripture says so?
Have you taught them that dad?
Have you encouraged them in that?
Because you see if you start from white when they're young and you give them books to read,
you know we take our children along to a Christian book shop every now and then.
We buy them some new books and things like that, some new devotionals.
We have encouraged them from when they can start to read, to read their devotion of a
morning and of an evening and to read their scriptures as well as our own training time
we have with them so that they'll meditate on the Lord's word day and night like the
Bible says.
But you know what dad?
They won't know to do that until you actively put it in.
Train.
Actively put it in.
That's a consistent Christian.
However when I look in today's world I think a lot of Christians are in this position.
You know what it says?
If the salt loses its flavor it's no longer good for anything.
If the salt's contaminated and here we have contaminated salt.
You know how salt can be contaminated?
Well you know the Jewish traders, some of them used to mix gypsum with their salt to
make it go a lot further and when they did that it wasn't worth anything.
Or you know how they had the rock salt used to chip the salt off and you get to a stage
where the impurities were so great that it was no longer good for anything you had to?
Throw it out.
It's interesting to read the description of the Laodicean church in Revelation where God
says I would rather you were cold or hot but if you are lukewarm I will spew out of my
mouth.
If you're hot you're doing great stuff.
If you're cold you're like a dead body and not really doing anything.
If you're lukewarm, if you're compromised, if you're contaminated you destroy.
And God really speaks against contamination.
If the salt's contaminated it's no longer good for anything.
But when I look around today's world and look at Christian families today I see a lot of
contamination, contamination from liberal theology, humanism, evolution and so on.
And here we are as Christians we've got this contaminated salt, we don't know why we believe
what we do, we don't know what we believe, we compromise with evolution, we're compromised
by the TV, things that were considered pornographic once are not considered that anymore because
we've become so used to them.
We're dishing out this contamination, Christians are choking on it, non-Christians, well it's
not affecting them is it because you see compromise doesn't work.
That's where I see a lot of people are at.
Now as regards children, the Bible says that children are not miniature adults and I think
what we need to understand is this, when a child is born they're sort of like an empty
vessel.
In fact I look at it like this, children when they're born are like a computer disk.
You know we all have something to do with computers these days don't we?
And if you have a computer disk you know you have to format it so it will work, you have
to put certain information on there.
When children are born I sort of look at it like this, they're sort of like a computer
disk that's formatted, they've got certain information that God has put on there and
what we've got to do is fill up the rest of the information, we have to put that information
in.
Now one of the problems we've got to recognise is something went wrong with the formatting,
there's a problem there isn't there?
Right, it's called sin.
So there's some glitches on the disk already, you know how hard it is to work with a computer
disk that's got glitches on it?
You have to work real hard sometimes, sometimes you can't use them at all but you know this
is not a perfect analogy but this is the way I look at it.
You've got this disk, it's got formatting on it, it's got some glitches on it and then
we need to fill it up.
And so here we have a child who's born and they're sort of empty except in regards to
this salt if you like, except for the information God's already put there.
God has already put on their hearts that there's a God by the way, the scripture says that,
and they have a knowledge of right and wrong too, they have a conscience, but we are to
put in that biblical truth.
You see children are not miniature adults and dad and mum and dad is head of the house,
I believe one of the things we need to recognise is that we therefore need to very carefully
ensure that we are training our children as Proverbs 22.6 says, by making sure they have
an input of this salt and making sure it's uncontaminated to the best of our ability
so that they will be filled up so that they will become mature adults so that they will
be able to go out and dish out that salt in the community.
And that's how I look at my children.
Unfortunately when I look in today's world I think this is what happens to a lot of children.
The fathers and mothers do not take care, they do not actively train their children,
they just let them have any influence whatever, they don't really set any regulations or rules
or they think that if they do their children will think they're terrible and rebel against
them and all the rest of it.
And so they have this input of evolution if you like and pornography and from the television,
this contaminated salt and that's what's happening to a lot of children.
And so by the time they get to be mature adults they're full of this contamination, this compromise
and compromise destroys.
That should be something we should think very, very carefully about.
How are you training your children dad and what sort of salt are you putting in them?
You see even such things as this, do you realise that peer pressure is one of the greatest
pressures upon children, in fact upon even adults isn't it?
It's an enormous pressure.
You know I don't just let my children go and mix with anybody.
Some people might think well that's terrible isn't it?
If I just let them mix with anybody on the street, for instance some of the people that
live on the street where we live in San Diego, the first time our children were out there
and met some of the local children, what do they immediately start telling them?
Dirty jokes and all sorts of things like that.
See I very carefully select the children that my children go and play with and spend time
with.
If they come home and they have an invitation to go and stay at somebody's place or to go
and play with somebody after school at their house, I don't just automatically say yes,
I'll make sure I go and try and find out as much as I can about those people if I don't
already know.
Who are they?
What's their commitment?
What does the minister say?
What does the school principal say about them at the Christian school they go to?
Find out as much information about the children as I can because I don't want my children
just mixing with anybody because I believe that as the scripture says, children are in
heritage under the Lord, He's given them to me as a gift to train up and I need to make
sure that I carefully train them.
Now some people see that as isolationist and perhaps I should explain that to you right
now.
See I send my children to a Christian school and I know there's some people who say look,
that's being isolationist.
We've got to send our children out into the real world.
That's the only way they're going to be able to cope.
Well before I mention anything here let me say this.
I am not being judgmental on where you send your children.
People have lots of different reasons as to why they send their children to particular
schools.
I happen to be able to send them to a particular good Christian school and I praise the Lord
for that.
You might send your children to a public school, there might be lots of reasons.
There could be finances, there could be all sorts of reasons as to why that's so.
So don't get the idea I'm judging you as to what you do with your children.
But what I will say is we have to make sure obviously that what we are doing with our
children is in accord with what the Bible says and that if there are problems because
of the situations we're in we might have to work extra hard in some areas to overcome
those problems to make sure we try and train our children the way the Bible says.
So I hope you understand what I'm saying there.
But you know I've had a lot of people say oh we wouldn't send our children to a Christian
school because you see our children are to be the salt of the earth and so therefore
they should be out there in the public schools being the salt of the earth.
You know what I disagree with that.
Justify from scripture that that's a reason, that that's a valid reason.
You know what Mark 9.50 says?
Mark 9.50 says have salt in yourselves.
Do you realise you can't be the salt of the earth until you've got salt in yourselves?
Think about that.
When children are born they're not filled with that salt.
When children are born they're like empty vessels.
You can't be the salt of the earth until you've got salt in yourselves.
And what I see is this, that while they're still children and they're easily tossed to
and fro by every wind of doctrine my responsibility as a parent is to make sure that I minimise
some of these bad influences that there are out there.
I'm not going to stop them but I must minimise to as greater extent as I can the wrong influences
and I must continually have this input of salt training my children so they can be the
salt of the earth.
And you see as I train my children I know some people say but look sending to a Christian
school is isolationist or doing what you're doing is an isolationist philosophy.
Guess what?
It is.
But you know what?
If I send my children to a public school it's an isolationist philosophy.
You know why?
Because I'm isolating them from a Christian philosophy.
I'm isolating them from creation.
I'm isolating them from Christian influences.
You see whatever you do you're being isolationist.
It's a matter of what you isolate from if you think about it.
And that's what you've got to look at.
So whatever system you adopt is an isolationist system.
And if you're in the situation of sending your children to a public school and you know
some of the influences that are there and the secular philosophy they're getting you're
going to have to work extra hard at home.
By the way the same goes for many Christian schools unfortunately.
I wouldn't just send my children to any Christian school either.
There's a lot of Christian schools that are nothing more than just a Christianized secular
philosophy.
And to me that's almost worse.
So you see you've got to be you know each of you has to really decide before the Lord
what's best in your circumstances.
I understand that.
But the overall thing is education obviously begins in the home and we must be prepared
to say what does the Bible say and therefore let me apply that to make sure that I try
and train my children the way that the scripture says.
And so therefore to be the salt of the earth you know from some of the other things that
we've said before I want to train my children.
I want to teach them about evolution.
I want them to know more about evolution than the evolutionists but I want them to know
why it's wrong.
I want them to know why they believe in marriage.
I want them to know the basis of marriage from Genesis.
I want them to know why it's wrong to date a non-Christian.
I want them to have that foundation right from when I'm able to explain it to them.
I want them to know why they wear clothes.
Why there's a standard.
Why it's not just a matter of the fashions of the day.
You see training my children to be the salt of the earth is training them from the foundation
up.
You follow what I mean?
Giving them that foundation from scripture back to Genesis so they have a foundation
as to why they believe what they do and what they believe so that I believe when they get
out into the big bad world there if you want to call it that they're going to be better
able to cope.
See some people think if you just isolate your children in that sense with a Christian
school and within a Christian home and so on that they won't cope in society.
I believe if you train them the right way they will cope better.
I think the reason some people don't cope is because they can be isolated but not given
the foundation.
And you see I'm going to make sure my children know that no words like pornography and what
that's all about but know why it's wrong.
Now I don't have to show them all those things to tell them why it's wrong.
They don't have to have those influences but I can give them the foundation about the
rightful place for sex and all those sorts of things.
See I think in many instances unfortunately what some parents have reacted against is
the legalism they were brought up in their Christian home and they don't want their children
to have that legalism because they rebelled against it.
But you see that legalism is an imposed set of rules.
I think that's very different to training your children from the foundation up giving
them reasons for what they believe.
You see the difference?
And I think some of the older generation were trained in these very strict Christian homes.
You will do this why? because you will.
You're not going to wear that why?
Because it's not right.
Rather than giving a foundation from scripture.
And if we get back to that foundation from scripture and train our children from the
foundation up so that they understand God is the creator, He sets the rules, I'm not
just imposing these things on you, it's because there's a God and He has His absolute authority,
His absolute word, then we can build our Christian philosophy.
And so I want my children to have a Christian philosophy, a Christian way of thinking so
when they're in the world out there they will be able to judge what's right and what's wrong,
they'll know what's right and what's wrong, what's good and what's bad.
They'll know why they think from the foundation up.
And when they're talking to humanists who are opposing them and pagans who are opposing
them, rather than just looking at that and saying it's wrong they'll think I know why
it's wrong.
They've got the wrong starting point.
They have the wrong basis, the wrong presupposition.
They'll know why they think the way they do.
And if they know why the others think the way they do and if they know why they think
the way they do, they'll be better able to cope.
That's what Christian education's all about.
Let me tell you something that's sad.
Most Christian schools do not train children like that.
Now some do, but most Christian schools don't.
Tell you something else.
Most churches do not train their people like that either.
Do you know the majority of people today do not know why they think about things?
They're not taught how to think.
They're just taught what to think.
They're not taught how to think.
That's one of the big problems we've got.
And because dads in our churches haven't been taught how to think, they don't know how to
teach their sons and daughters how to think.
That's a massive problem that we've got, if you think about it.
And that's another area that we can get onto altogether.
You see, what I think is missing from a lot of Christian families today and from the church
is what I call presuppositional apologetics.
You know what that is?
Teaching us, we start from our presupposition of God's word and we build our thinking on
that to come to right conclusions.
Back to scripture.
A lot of preachers today preach about interesting examples and analogies and things like that,
but how many start from scripture and say God is the one who knows everything, our thinking
starts there and build it upon that.
There's a big difference.
A big difference.
It's not just a matter of reading a Bible verse at breakfast time and having an interesting
story.
Teaching your children to think Christian.
And we need to think Christian.
And it's in every area.
In every area.
So that's one of the reasons why I think we have problems with art and music and things
like that is because we think what's good is what sounds good.
Not necessarily, is it?
Particularly when we're sinful creatures.
Do you know there's a Christian philosophy of music?
A Christian philosophy of art.
A Christian philosophy of science.
And if we want to know what any of those things are, we have to start from what God's word
says and build from there rather than just have lots of opinions.
And sadly because many people have not been trained like that, what happens?
We get contaminated.
And do you realize that many Christians today don't even know they're contaminated to the
extent they are?
You know why?
Do you realize a lot of what you see on advertisements on television today are probably pornographic?
And we sit there and let our children watch it?
Do you know what's happened?
It's like the story of the toad, a poikilothermic animal.
Do you know you can get such an animal, put it in cold water, slowly heat it up and boil
it to death and it doesn't realize what's happening until it's too late because it keeps
accommodating to its surroundings?
Do you know what's happened to us?
We keep accommodating to our surroundings.
And we just, ah yes, well, you know, I don't agree with it but then we get used to it.
I don't agree with that but then we get used to it.
I don't agree with that and then we get used to it.
Our children say something and think, oh I feel so sorry for them.
Oh well, I'll let them change their mode of dress or I'll let them do this or I'll let
them go there and the next time, oh well, they can go that place down.
Before long what happens?
You've lost your standards.
And you know in many churches, many youth groups, do you know what they do today?
They've lowered their standards to meet the world for the sake of numbers rather than
maintaining a high standard and training up high quality people who are going to affect
the world for good.
And I've seen that so often.
I've seen some of these youth groups that, ah, that, you know, with their heavy rock
bands and everything else that they have and I was at one recently where the guys were
coming in going out during songs and having, you know, swigs on their whiskey bottles and
things like that and I mean this youth group in there and I think it's great, look at all
the numbers we've got.
Numbers?
But what's the quality?
They had lowered their standards to get the numbers.
And that happens in so many churches.
Because we've accommodated to the world and it happens in many families too.
Do you have standards in regard to television?
Do you let your children just watch anything?
Standards in regard to the children they mix with?
Dad, do you realize how important it is to train your children?
It's extremely important to train your children.
Because what your children become, do you realize very much reflects what you did to
them and how you trained them.
Now think about that for a moment.
You are held responsible as parents.
You know as I was talking about this in the church there was a lady once, she got real
upset with me.
She came up to the front and she was shaking a fist at me and she said, are you telling
me that because my children have nothing to do with Christianity it's my fault?
I said no, I didn't say that.
But I said what I did say is how you train them will very much affect their philosophy
and what they are and become very much reflects the way you train them.
Now keep in mind I've seen the Lord put his hand on a person in a totally atheistic home
and he become a Christian.
I've seen a person, a family where they had tremendous Christian parents and the children
were all Christians except one who really rebelled.
But you see generally speaking, generally speaking what the children become very much
reflects the way the parents trained them and what they did with them.
You know this lady came up to me and she was mad with me and she said look, she said I've
got four sons, one's a doctor, one's a lawyer, one's this, one's that.
They've made a great way for themselves in life.
They've got good salaries and everything else but I did the best I could.
It's interesting it was a woman saying it to me by the way and not the father.
I did the best I could.
We trained them all we could and they came to that particular point when they made their
decision she said it's not my fault, you can't blame me.
I take no responsibility because I did the best I could.
She said now they have to answer for their own sins and I said well that's true, the
Bible says they have to answer for their own sins.
Nonetheless I said how you train them in the home very much has an effect on their whole
philosophy.
You can't say that, you're blaming me.
I take no responsibility.
And I said tell me if your four sons were all on fire Christians, one was a Christian
doctor, one was a Christian lawyer, one was a missionary and one was a Christian teacher
and they're all great on fire Christians, maybe one was a great evangelist, would you
stand there and say I take no responsibility, it had nothing to do with me.
Speak because you can't have it both ways.
You know I know the reason that I can stand here and speak to you is because of the way
my parents trained me right from when I was a youngster, right from when I was born and
they trained me that the Bible was the absolute authority, that it was God's Word.
We got transferred around Queensland a lot and I know a lot of the churches we ended
up in because there are only a few churches in those towns, some of the towns are only
a couple of churches.
I know that often they're very liberal churches and I've heard the minister get up and say
things like you know a little boy took out his loaves and fishes and so everybody else
did the same.
You know the Egyptians drowned in a few inches of water when they tried to cross the Red
Sea and you know the light of the Lord illuminated red berries in a bush and Moses thought it
was burning and you know my father would get us and he would go to the pastor and he would
open up the Bible and show him where he was wrong from the Bible.
I mean I was trained like that.
By the way do you think that's affected me?
I can see those influences are the reason that I can be here speaking to you today because
of those influences that my father had on me and my mother had on me as they trained
us from the Scriptures over and over again.
I know when it came to the problem of evolution in school, you know what my parents said?
They didn't say well we must reinterpret the Bible.
They said the Bible has to be right or Christianity is wrong therefore there has to be an answer.
Let's wait for the answer and try and find it out and I'm pleased I did because the Lord
showed me the answer.
As eventually as I became older and was able to get books like the Genesis Flood and the
Genesis Record and realize what those answers were.
Boy do I praise the Lord for the way he trained, allowed me to be trained in the Christian
home and you know part of that training too involved this using the rod with love.
My father was a school teacher and he used to like using the rod and you know it's biblical
isn't it?
You read through Proverbs, many, many verses in Proverbs.
Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child but the rod of correction shall drive it far
from him.
Withhold not correction from the child if you beat him with the rod he shall not die
if you beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell.
The rod and reproof give wisdom.
A child left to himself brings his mother to shame.
Blows it and wounds, cleans away evil.
Strokes make clean the innermost part.
Do you think the Bible talks about corporal punishment?
You know I was at a church once and I was talking about this and a man came out afterwards
and he said, that was fantastic I've always believed in capital punishment for kids.
Well I had to explain to him that I wasn't talking about capital punishment at that stage.
Certainly solve your problems I guess but might create a few more too.
But you know what happens in a lot of Christian homes?
You're at the tea table, supper table in America.
You're at the tea table and you know the kids are throwing food across the table and you
know there's things spilled all over the place and there's a glass of milk all over here
and the kids are yelling at each other and somebody throws this and the wife's there
and her hair standing up on end and she suddenly screams at the husband, why don't you do something?
It's about time you did something to these kids.
Gets up, he gets a belt, he belts the daylights out of him.
That'll do for another three months.
That's not what the scripture's talking about.
It talks about the rod with love consistently.
The punishment must fit the crime.
You know if our children do something wrong we do spank them.
Now today you've got to be careful doing that.
You're probably put in jail for child abuse or something like that and boy that's a very
real problem today because if you're seen spanking your children out in public there
are people who will actually complain to the police about you and I've seen that sort of
thing happen in America.
But you know, they talk about, I read a report recently over in California that talking about
public education and the superintendent had released a report to the newspapers.
Public education is improving in California.
Rapes were down by a certain percent.
Right?
Murders were down by a certain percent.
This is an improvement.
Improvement?
You know we talk about the discipline in our public schools and the problems that there
are and more and more they're removing what? corporal punishment because oh that's terrible.
That's just abuse.
If you use it properly in accord with scripture you know your children will love you all the
more because they need discipline and they crave discipline.
I know when I was a teacher some of the children who used to act up the most were those that
didn't get any love from home and they wanted the discipline because they really wanted
to be, for someone to care for them and that's why they acted in that particular way.
You know I found this too.
I know there were some teachers who used to let their children hang from the rafters and
I used to see them crawling out the windows after jet aeroplanes and things like this
and I used to be very strict with my students and oh some of them with a name like Ham they
used to say all sorts of things.
I know there was another teacher myself who were probably the two strictest teachers at
this school.
We came along to school one day and some of the students had built a mock grave in the
middle with his name on it.
It sort of makes you feel real good doesn't it?
But you know what I found?
I found later on, a year or two years later, maybe even many years later some of those
students would come back to me and say sir, you know I was one of the students that really
hated you and said all sorts of things about you and all the rest of it but I want to thank
you for what you did for me because your class is the only one I really learnt anything in.
And I've had them say that sort of thing to me so often.
You know Ms So and So we used to have great fun in her class but you know we never learnt
anything.
We don't really have any respect for her even though at the time she thought that she was
doing great stuff for them.
You know what I mean?
You know I found with my own children, yes we smack them if they need it and then we'll
go and sit down with them and we'll pray through it with them and tell them why it was wrong
and next time if they do it again they'll get a heart attack.
But you see, the rod with love.
And we need to apply those things.
Why?
They're biblical.
If you don't apply that discipline, if you don't apply it in the early ages, you know
right from when children are born, they're sinful creatures as I said, you have to start
working with them real hard.
We have a daughter that's 18 months old and she's one of those strong willed little girls.
Really strong willed.
Very independent.
We're starting to work hard with her and spanking her for certain things she does.
She knows.
She knows when she does things wrong and she's learning.
And you know we have another little girl that was very strong willed.
She's now 11 years old.
But if we had not have worked with her from a young age, she's one of those that could
be very, very rebellious.
But she's turned out to be a very lovely young girl.
And she's not without a problem.
I mean all children have their problems as you know.
We all have our problems.
But boy, we had to work hard with them.
You know mum and dad and dad is head of the house.
If you're prepared to work hard with your children actively, putting the time in.
You know what?
Isn't it tremendous to be able to look on them and realize that they can be in heaven
with you?
And you know what we should be reminded of?
You know what Matthew 5 19 says?
Matthew 5 19 says, whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments and
tell shall teach men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven.
But whosoever shall do and teach them the same shall be called great in the kingdom
of heaven.
You see the Bible talks about blessings and talks about warnings in regard to training
our children.
But you know one that really hit me?
Matthew 18 6, whosoever shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it
were better for him that a millstone were hanged around his neck and that he were drowned
in the depth of the sea.
Boy that hit me.
And you know what I realized?
When I look at one of my sons, I've got two sons and three daughters.
Say you just look at one of my sons or one of my daughters.
I realized something.
Do you know I might not be looking at just one person?
Do you realize I could be looking at millions?
Because you think back in history.
Do you realize the Australian Aborigines could have started from just two people coming to
Australia, having children who had children who had children who had children.
And it could have happened that that one father did not tell the next generation about the
true God.
He did not actively put the right information in.
He rebelled against the true God.
And what happened?
How many thousands upon thousands in that culture have not heard the message of Christianity?
Not heard the message of God, the creator, the true God.
Because do you realize their ancestor no one knew about the true God?
Do you realize their ancestor Noah knew who that true God was?
Do you realize when you look at one child, you could be looking at millions?
And you know what, Dad?
Do you realize if you haven't trained your children as to what Christianity is all about
and your child, for instance, dates a non-Christian and you see nothing wrong with that, they get
married and have children that have nothing to do with the church, the consequences of
that.
And I read the scripture, whosoever shall offend one of these little ones which believe
in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck and he would drown
in the depth of the sea.
You know, when I get into primary schools to teach or elementary schools, you know,
I often find children want to believe.
They know there's a God.
God's put that on their heart.
And they listen with interest.
Isn't it sad by about the time they get to grade eight, nine and ten, a lot of them,
ah, they just mock and carry on because of all the teaching they've had in the meantime
in many instances.
Boy, that's sad, isn't it?
They get to that age and they've lost it.
And you know, there's a lot of indication.
Professor Wildersmith did a lecture over here once and his man environmentally or genetically
controlled, and he was saying that up until the age of puberty, the amount you extend
their minds and what you put into them, at puberty there's something that happens and
a lot of those behaviour patterns and attitudes are then very set.
You know how hard it is to talk to a teenager?
You know why?
Because you think what you've trained, what you've done in training, the attitudes you've
put in, what you've done from when they're born up until puberty, that's what's really
going to be with them for the rest of their lives.
It's very hard to change someone after that time.
That's why, you know, a lot of parents talk about these terrible rebellious teenage years.
Well, you know, I'm just coming up to teenage years with my children.
I have a son that turns 13 this year.
And I know I have to answer to the Lord for the way I've trained my children.
I know that I'm not perfect in what I do.
Far from it.
But you know, I believe from reading scripture and talking to other parents too, you don't
have to have those teenage rebellious years that people talk about.
I know that things happen and things are different and, you know, at the age of puberty and biochemical
things that occur and all the rest of it, certainly, certainly, you know, we all have
our little traumas.
But, you know, there's a lot of parents out there who say, oh, you wait until they're
a teenager and then they just really rebel.
You know what I think a lot of it is?
I think a lot of it is a lack of training from when they're born.
That's what I think a lot of it really is.
Because a lot of fathers have not taken on their God-given responsibility.
And you know, fathers want to warn you about something.
And I say this even in an American audience and, you know, a lot of Americans realize
this they bow their heads in shame sometimes when they hear it.
Because I think the same things are going to happen here.
You know what's happening in America?
The whole society is becoming anti-family.
Even the church is becoming anti-family.
Do you know what happens in a lot of churches?
You don't worship together as a family anymore.
I've seen churches that have got signs on the sanctuary.
Children not allowed in the sanctuary.
You know, if you take your children to church with you, they make one little noise.
These women turn around and glare at you.
What are you doing with that little thing in here?
There's a nursery.
Didn't you know about that?
I see that in a lot of churches in America.
You know what's starting to happen here?
And you go along to churches and what do you do?
You split up the family.
These go here, these go here, these go here, these go here.
You don't worship together.
And you know what else is happening?
You know in America it's starting to happen here too.
24 hour restaurants everywhere.
People eat out for breakfast.
A lot of people eat out a lot of times.
They don't eat at home anymore.
They don't eat as a family.
We make sure we have our meals together as a family.
I saw a report once in a Los Angeles newspaper that equated high college marks with students
who ate with their families at home.
And I think that has to do with stability and things like that.
But you see you're going to find more and more in this society with the fast food chains
and things that are coming in that we get to that stage.
We don't eat together as a family.
We don't have devotion times together as a family.
The family is split up and even the churches are splitting up families in some instances.
And we need to stand back for a minute and think, listen, the family is the backbone
of society really, isn't it?
You see you want to produce godly offspring who produce godly offspring.
We should have the older women teaching the younger women how to be good mothers and wives.
Do we have that?
And you know a lot of churches have programs for women and an emphasis on women's Bible
study and all the rest of it.
But how many have emphasis on men?
You know what I've had people say to me?
I know a pastor said to me once, you know he said, we found that when we won women to
the Lord we certainly won a lot of trouble, particularly in those homes.
Now that's not to say you shouldn't try to win women to the Lord, not at all.
But he said, you know what we found?
When we emphasized winning the men to the Lord, when we won a man we often won the whole
family.
You see we need to think about the family and its whole effect on this nation.
And I believe Satan is out to destroy the family and he's been very successful.
He's destroying it in many ways.
Dads, are you holding your family together?
You know the old adage, the family that prays together stays together.
The family that eats together and the family that has devotions together and does think
together as a family.
Do you go away together as a family?
Do you enjoy each other as a family?
Do you take your son, dad and mum, do you take your daughter and do you help them to
understand things to do with fathers and mothers and there's so much that we could talk about.
See our children are not learning the ways of the heathen.
You know what Jeremiah said?
Hey listen, you're there to influence them, not them you.
Big problem for the Israelites, wasn't it?
We've got to be able to distinguish good from evil.
Hebrews 14 talks about that, distinguishing good from evil.
Tell me something, how can you distinguish good from evil if you don't know what good
is and you don't know what bad is?
It's only when you've been trained in truth that you can distinguish good from evil, otherwise
how would you know?
We ought to have salt in us and so influence the world for Christ.
I want to suggest to you that your children will not become the salt of the earth if you
don't actively put that salt in them.
They won't necessarily become the salt of the earth, I should say, if you don't actively
put that salt in them.
And as we finish this session, let me therefore challenge you as fathers and mothers.
Number one, are you obedient to the roles God ordained in Scripture for the family?
Number two, fathers, as head of the house, are you a priest to your family, a priest
to your wife?
Do you know a lot of husbands and wives don't even pray together?
Father, do you take on that active role?
As Christ is our high priest, are you the priest to your family?
Do you organize devotions?
Do you organize how to train your children?
Do you go and get materials for them to do that?
Do you determine what's seen on television and what's not?
Do you actively do these things?
Do you discipline your children?
Are you concerned as to who they're mixing with?
Boy, I tell you, when you start to think about those things, you need to remember that Scripture.
If you offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it would be better if a millstone
were hanged around your neck and you were drowned in the depths of the sea.
You know a good thing about talking to a group like you?
I don't know many of you, hardly any of you, which is a good thing, isn't it?
That's why it's good for itinerary preachers in churches.
I can say all this sort of stuff and then leave all the problems to the pastor, can't
I?
Have a look at your children, mum and dad.
Are they godly offspring?
Dad, did you really spend the time?
You know, we need to remember the Lord is the Lord who forgives and we can come in repentance
to Him and maybe there's some here that need to do that for what they haven't done.
And now you need to work hard at trying to undo it.
But I tell you what, one of the hard things to cope with in this world as a Christian
is that even though God forgives sin, which is something that gives us that real peace
and nonetheless the consequences are with us, aren't they?
While this world is here.
It's like, you know, I know a young lady who had a couple of children out of wedlock and
even though the Lord's forgiven her and she's a lovely Christian, you know what?
She suffers the consequences for the rest of her life.
She's got real problems in regard to those two children and they're going to have some
problems too because they don't have a father now to train them up and what a mess.
She cries when she sees them and looks at them and thinks of what she did.
But she knows the Lord's forgiven her.
But the consequences are there, aren't they?
You know, mum and dad, unfortunately, grandma, grandfather, sometimes when you look at those
children and those grandchildren, you know what you're really seeing?
The consequences of a lack of training.
That's sad, isn't it?
But boy, we need to get down before the Lord and repent and know that He forgives us.
But we need to warn others, don't we?
We need to make sure that our churches are doing something about it.
Tell me, in your church, are the older women training the younger women to be good mothers?
That's what the scripture says they're to do.
Are the fathers being trained?
You know, a lot of fathers don't even know how to sit down with their children.
I know fathers who aren't game to sit down with their children because their fathers
never did it with them.
Father, you can try it.
Sit down with your children.
Talk to them.
Get to know them.
Do you really know your sons and your daughters?
Do you know their personalities?
Talk with them.
Go out with them.
Teach them things.
Read them.
Get books and things, get them reading.
Train them.
You know, with my children, what I do is from a young age we start to teach them Bible stories
with pictures.
And then I start to read it to them as they get a bit older and then they read it themselves
and they become so familiar with those stories because we use those same basic books.
And of course we give them lots of other things as well and we have tapes that they listen
to and you know, there's so many things that you can do.
And what a great pleasure it is to be able to sit down with your children and talk to
them and get to know them.
I don't think, I think a lot of fathers don't even know their children, really.
They don't really understand their personality.
I was surprised, I took one of my sons on, sometimes they come on certain tours and things
with me.
And it's one of the problems for me is being away from home teaching people like this.
I just have such a very, very special wife and the Lord gives our children some very,
very special blessings.
But I know I went on a tour, a Grand Canyon tour with ICR that I go on each year and I
took my son with me and you know, just getting to know him even more in that 10 days, I realized
aspects of his personality that I didn't even know as we had sort of a close relationship
for that 10 days.
And you know, Dad, something we need to do an awful lot more of, an awful lot more of.
Well I'm going to finish there and what I think we should do is just close this session
in prayer.
Our gracious loving Heavenly Father, we do praise you and thank you that your word is
truth.
And Lord, we recognize that each one of us, Lord, we are in rebellion against you.
We are sinful creatures.
We know Lord that you have forgiven our sin.
For those of us who love and trust you and serve you, we, oh Lord, we're just so grateful
for what you did on that cross so that we can spend eternity with you.
And that Lord, we are a recreation because of what you've done.
But Lord, so often we do fail you and particularly when it comes to our families and our children,
Lord, we have so much to answer for in regard to that because there's so many ways in which
we fail to train our children.
When we look at our children, the children of Christian families around this nation,
we realize the enormous problem.
Lord, for those of us who haven't been head of the house like we should, we ask your forgiveness.
And for those of us who haven't obeyed the roles that you've told us to obey, then Lord,
we ask your forgiveness.
For those of us who are children, who haven't been obedient to our parents or obedient to
you, Lord, we ask forgiveness.
We ask that you would help us to be more consistent as a Christian in everything that we do.
Lord, we ask now that you would keep us safe as we go our various ways and bring us back
this evening for the final session.
In Jesus' name, amen.
If you come back tonight, what we're going to look at is that there are different groups
in society that need to be approached differently to convince them about creation.
And maybe I've had people come up to me after that talk and say, you know, my grandfather
is in that group or my friend is in that group and things like that.
So we'll talk about that tonight.
I'm going to take this opportunity to introduce you to the work of the Creation Science Foundation
of Australia, a nonprofit, non-denominational Christian ministry.
Creation Science Foundation consists of qualified people from many different backgrounds and
church affiliations.
They are dedicated to helping people understand that true science supports the word of God.
They do this firstly by explaining the limits of science.
Real science cannot repeat or observe the past.
So much of the framework within which evolutionary research operates is based on faith.
Here we see geologist Dr. Andrew Snelly explaining evidence from under the microscope consistent
with the rapid formation of Ayers Rock during conditions of a great flood.
Research such as this is another activity of the foundation, which along with ministry
is financed for the most part by donations from committed Christians.
Another activity is the writing, publishing and distribution of God-honouring science
and nature books, videos and films.
It also publishes Creation Magazine, the world's leading creator-honouring nature and science
magazine for the layman.
It's packed full of interesting and informative articles and illustrations, including a children's
section and is a ministry in its own right.
Right to the foundation now at Post Office Box 302, Sunnybank, Queensland, 4109, Australia,
and asked to be put on the mailing list for their free prayer newsletter and catalogue.
Thank you.