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September 24 - September 26, 2014
The biblical family is an instituted government, established by God at the very beginning of human history. The constitution for this government was written by Him, and revealed to us in His Word. The head of each family is the husband, the chief advisor to this head is the wife, and the subjects of this small realm are the children.
husband must teach the Word of God to his family, especially his wife, to cleanse her with its application, encourage her when she is faint-hearted, and oversee the help she is to him.
Fathers must lead in establishing this biblical culture, and mothers must be convinced of the importance of it, for much of the practical implementation will be in her hands.
One of the central problems with bringing up children in our day is the constant temptation to underestimate their capacities. We teach them profane and irreverent little ditties, not psalms and hymns. We give them moralistic little stories, not biblical doctrine and ethics. We expect them to act as though they have no brains or souls until they have graduated from college. We aim at nothing, and we hit it every time.
The fact that the children of Christian parents belong to a covenant home does not alter the reality of sin. Every child, every descendent of Adam, needs the forgiveness of Christ. The third
When all the teaching of the Bible is taken into account, parents who fulfill their covenantal obligations have every reason to expect that their children will be saved.
It is absolutely essential for both parents to recognize that the final responsibility for child-rearing is the father’s—he cannot pass it off to the wife. The husband must lead his wife in child-rearing. He must not react to her, he must not blame her, and he must not be led by her. This is what headship necessarily involves. The husband is the head of his wife (Eph. 5:23), and he is responsible for all the fruit she bears (Eph. 6:4). It is crucial that this responsibility of the husband be embraced by him and understood by her.
Leadership necessarily involves initiative. Many men have blurred the (admittedly fine) distinction between being the head of the home and being a queen bee. A slug on the sofa may be waited on, but he is not exercising godly leadership. In Ephesians 5:25, and 6:4, the verbs love and bring up are active verbs. In the home, the husband is a picture of Christ. But if he shows no initiative in loving, teaching, or admonishing, he is a lying picture of Christ. In other words, each husband,
every day, is talking about Christ through his behavior. What he says is either a truth or a lie, but he cannot be silent. So masculine initiative means watching over the family without prompting, and it means seeking information about the children from the wife at his instigation. Leadership also involves honoring
Whenever children are looking at their mother, they should see the looming shadow of dad behind her—whether he’s home or
Of course this does not teach automatic transfer of saving grace to our children. If we disobey the terms of the covenant—especially with regard to the way we train our children—then we have no right to be dismayed with the result.
The promises of the covenant are given to forgiven sinners.
Christian fathers are commanded to bring up all the children born into their homes in this fashion. And the process is His because the children are His. Trans-generational blessing is assumed throughout the Bible. Peter says that the promise is to “you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call” (Acts 2:39). It is quite true this is governed by the divine will—as many as the Lord our God will call—but given the copious and clear teaching of the Old Testament, and Peter’s reference to it, there is no reason to believe the Lord wants to be miserly in
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order to determine what is true, we are to look to the Word, and not to people. What does God say about those who are covenantally faithful? What does He say about their children? Their grandchildren? Does He promise anything concerning them? The answer is yes.
Faith does not stand alone, nor do works stand alone. Neither do we work in order to attain faith. Faith is given as a gift, and when it is given by God, it appears to the world in the form of fruit. In the case of our children, the fruit is diligent and careful parenting.
How our children do in life is the result of how we taught and disciplined them in our homes. “Chasten your son while there is hope, and do not set your heart on his destruction” (Prov. 19:18).
is the instrument which God uses to raise up a godly seed within the covenant community. But when the members of that covenant community begin to think that the privileges of the covenant are automatically transmitted, the result is always “sons of Abraham” who are really sons of the devil—circumcision, baptism, and choir membership notwithstanding.
Absolutely nothing can be permitted to interfere with this newfangled duty—not even failure in the most important duty that God has ever given to mortal men and women. Sadly, this assumption has crept into the church.
But the reaction of shame by many parents in such a situation is proper and correct. The Scriptures teach a direct connection between how children are brought up and how they turn out.
“The rod and rebuke give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother” (Prov. 29:15).
“Who-ever keeps the law is a discerning son, but a companion of gluttons shames his father” (Prov. 28:7).
who gathers in summer is a wise son; he who sleeps in harvest is a son who causes shame” (Prov. 10:5).
“He who mistreats his father and chases away his mother is a son who causes shame and brings reproach” (Prov. 19:26).
Our tragedy of disobedience is that many godly Christian parents are turned away from following the example of their elders. They do this, not because they are rebellious, but because the elders have not set a biblical example.
The book of Ephesians was written to Gentile Christians. In this book, not only does Paul apply a promise contained in the Sinai covenant to Gentile Christians, he applies it to Gentile children.
Modern Christians often assume that the Levitical administration of Israel under Moses was a deal God made with ethnic Jews, and that the terms of that covenant were entirely ethnic—genetic. The Pharisees believed this and thought the right DNA imprint was sufficient for a right standing with God; modern Christians believe this about those under the Levitical administration and think that it was insufficient. But they both believe that this was the way God expected the people in the Old Testament to think. This is false.
The Bible is clear. Ethnicity does not save. Ritual does not save. Being born into a family which professes faith in God does not save. Misunderstood, it commonly condemns. When someone trusts in their “tribal position” for salvation, this is a sure indication that they are lost. Personal individual covenantal faithfulness is necessary before we may know that God has regenerated and saved any individual. And while it is important to remember this truth, we must also remember that this is not a new truth. The truth did not originate in the New Testament at all. God has taught this to parents
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A central point in this chapter is that the Christians are not to be faithless to the terms of their baptism into Christ in the same way the Jews were to their baptism into Moses. The Jews had a baptism, and the Jews had a covenantal meal in the wilderness, and yet many of them still fell through unbelief.
The New Covenant was not brought in to destroy faithful covenantal families. One of its features was to be the restoration of the covenantal father/child relationship, not the dissolution of the covenantal father/child relationship.
The word used is akathartos and means foul or unclean. The word is used most frequently to describe unclean demonic spirits. The children of believers are called holy. The word used is hagia and is commonly rendered as saint.
We have already established that our children are by nature indistinguishable from all other human children. Paul is not teaching us here that our newborn infants are all regenerate and personally holy. He is teaching us their covenantal status. They are holy by virtue of their placement in a covenanted family. If they were outside the covenant, they would be unclean. Because they are not, they are set apart as holy.
The assurance of parents, and then later, the assurance of the child, should not be based upon a distinct conversion event in the life of the child.
Assurance comes from believing Christ, and gratefully noting the promised results of believing Christ.
They say, “Our child is at college, and I just hope and pray that God brings some Christian into his life. . . .” They are hoping for some remarkable divine intervention after eighteen years of negligence on their part.
“Now it happened in Iconium that they went together to the synagogue of the Jews, and so spoke that a great multitude both of the Jews and of the Greeks believed” (Acts 14:1). The way they preached, under the sovereignty of God, was important.
Although they live in immaturity, this simply means there will be an immature rebellion against the light, or an immature believing response to it. Children
Now many children of believing parents do not become believers themselves. At the same time, children of obedient believers will become believers.
The sovereign God uses means to accomplish His purposes in election, and His appointed and revealed means for the conversion of covenant children is obedient parents—not elect parents who are disobedient in how they bring up children.
Discipline is corrective; it seeks to accomplish a change in the one being disciplined. Punishment is meted out in the simple interests of justice.
The standard for a godly home is simply this—prompt and cheerful obedience.
If a parent is angry with his child, he is not spiritual and is therefore disqualified from administering the discipline.
parents—“a child left to himself brings shame to his mother” (Prov. 29:15).
When the parent is qualified to discipline, he probably does not feel like it, and when he feels like it, he is probably not qualified.
As stated earlier, small children should live in a “totalitarian police state” at home. “Foolishness
“Where there is no wood, the fire goes out; and where there is no talebearer, strife ceases” (Prov. 26:20).
fall. Big oaks come from little acorns. No overwhelming problem in child-rearing started out overwhelming.
Rules in a godly house should therefore be basic and easy to understand. “You must always tell the truth. You must always obey us immediately. You must always respect your mother.” This does not cover every situation, but it actually does come close.
Disciplined children are children who are enjoyed.
If child discipline is approached with all the appropriate seriousness, then there is going to be much room for joy, laughter, and fun because everyone knows the boundaries and respects them.
The world’s practices include such obvious things as discipline through time-outs and grounding, education through government schools, sexual seduction through recreational dating, and more.
