The Christian Family (Part 1 of 2)

You may have heard the expression takes a whole village to raise a child. That doesn't mean that as parents we can relinquish our responsibility today on Truth for Life Alastair Begg looks at God's design for the family and will find out why parental authority affects more than just the immediate household. In fact, parental authority is essential for a stable society. Exodus 20 and verse one and God spoke all these words say I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

You shall not bow down to them or serve them. For I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work you or your son or your daughter, your manservant or your female servant, or your livestock or the sojourner who is within your gates.

For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth to see and all that is in and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal.

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's now and all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain spoke smoking the people were afraid and trembled and they stood far often said to Moses you speak to ours and we will listen, but do not let God speak to us, lest we die. Moses said to the people do not fear for God has come to test you that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin. The people stood far off while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God wants all we thank God for his word and that we may get the basis of our study and I invite you to turn now to Colossians into chapter 3 canards are for study. The Christian family. Once again our text is brief is clear.

Verse 20 children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Pray gracious God, we ask now that you will seminars by the truth of your word that you will teach us by the power of your spirit that you will bring us to faith and trust in yourself, that we might be enabled to live in obedience to your truth for Jesus sake.

Amen RA there. We had a children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. We really have reversed into this little series and have I think fastened on something that a marriage from our first Sunday and it is simply this, that we are recognizing that in a very realistic sense. It takes the church family to make it possible for each of us to be enabled to raise a Christian family. The challenges are immense. The privileges are terrific. The responsibilities are vast and the help that exists amongst others around us who tried it before who's done it before, who are living at now, and so on is a massive resource and so we are trying to help us to recognize the fact that it is not that our physical family life exists is aware as assisted and if there's other things that we want to add into it than including George life all well and good to know an actual fight in Christ, the real family is the church family and the question is not how do we fold our church life into our physical family life by how do we fold our physical family life into all that God has for us in the church and the Bible is really clear. Not just in the epistles here in the New Testament, but throughout the Bible that parental authority is absolutely vital. It is actually indispensable for a stable society and that is why when we read the Bible, we discover that from the very beginning God established mankind within the structure of family life structure in which the roles between husbands and wives were delineated and a structure in which children where to submit to the authority of their parents.

And this is if you like a natural law. It is in the instinctive die mentions of human existence, and it is also part of the law of God as we read in the Decalogue earlier. It is therefore no exaggeration to say that the well-being of a person or of a nation begins then in the home and whenever a culture turns its back on God. Whenever a culture turns its back on the moral framework that God has established for the well-being of society. When the destruction and disintegration of family life begins to take place, then it is clear that God's design has simply been satisfying and it's not that God's design is hard to understand and find it is because it is so clear that it is rejected so forcibly one man and one woman in a monogamous heterosexual lifelong commitment that provides the opportunity to fulfill the privileges of parenthood and it is surely noteworthy that on two occasions when Paul in writing to various places wisely writing to the church in Rome and writing to Timothy and to Titus when he addresses a collapsing culture and he describes their constituent elements that would be represented when the culture begins to fall in upon itself included in both of the two key lists that we have is one simple phrase disobedience to parents, disobedient to parents, in the midst of all the various things that are described horrendous things in the moral collapse and so on. There you find disobedient to parents know what this then means as a number of things. First of all, it provides the Christian church and Christian parents in particular with an opportunity for the gospel a chance to adorn the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ as Titus foods a chance for the Christian family to become a living testimonial to the truth of the Bible to the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ himself and I've labored in these brief studies to set this in this context every time and I want to do so again this morning is relatively easy to simply say no. Here's what wives are supposed to do.

Here's what husbands are supposed to do.

Here's what children are supposed to do.

We were familiar with all of that. Our problem is not that we are untaught in relationship to the state.

Our problem is a far deeper problem.

Our problem is a gospel problem. Our problem is a biblical problem. Our problem is in obedience problem and it starts with an understanding of who Jesus is. So our first point will be to consider the identity of Jesus. Secondly, to consider the responsibility of parents and thirdly and only then to consider the duty of children always able why would you begin with the identity of Jesus. Well, simply because that is how it is handled here by Paul.

Paul was aware and we become aware of the fact through our study that there were all kinds of ethical codes that were present in Judaism and in the Greek and Roman world.

Those people realized by way of natural law bad for society to function. There had to be order. There had to be structure and it had to be there in the family life. So what was it end up always introducing or what if you like.

Does the Bible introduce that takes it forward from there.

While specifically the fact of who Jesus is the fact of the Lordship of Jesus Christ and so what he's saying is the specific responsibilities within the Christian home for the various roles assigned have to do with Jesus as Lord and that's why here in verses 18 through to the end of the chapter are you find the phraseology recurring in verse 18, the wives are submitting to their husbands in the Lord. In verse 20 children are to do this because it is pleasing to the Lord and 22 we obey our earthly masters, fearing the Lord and in verse 24, and in part a knowing that from the Lord, you will receive the inheritances.

Your reward you are surveying the Lord Christ. So the summary of the responsibilities of various family members is actually the application of their theology, Lord, we have to understand the Bible, we have to understand who Jesus is. We have to board believe it and we have to live in the light of it, every going to actually make any sense of practical instruction such as this and that is why, for example, in chapter 2, and in the middle of chapter 2 verse six they are of chapter 2, he says to them. Therefore, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord. This is the distinguishing feature of these people you have received Jesus as Lord i.e. is your King. He is the sovereign one.

He's in charge of your finances in charge of your future. He's in charge of your family is in charge you received is the Lord now, he says, in light of that, the imperative is that you now must walk in here indicative you received him imperative walk in him you see how the indicative always precedes the imperative to use it if somebody listens to me talk this morning and thinks that what I'm simply doing is seeking to reinforce a Christianized version of an ethical code that I've done a dreadful job. That's why am laboring to make the point at the beginning of what is being entrusted to these believers in Colossae is being entrusted to believers. They have understood God's grace and knowledge truth. They realize that they could not arms God salvation. They realize that Jesus is the Savior that they require they have received him as Lord. Now that is indicative of what is true of. Now he says it is the imperative that continues from there. I want you. Then he says to live your life's in this way and I won't continue to read it, but you can read it on their in chapter 2, and what the point is, is straightforward because you see in verse nine of chapter 2 in Jesus the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily. In other words, he is God. He is God he is the one that who establishes our volumes. He is the one who guides our thinking he is the one who directs our conduct and in a very realistic way. Poor parenting can be traced actually not to an absence of information but a failure in application failure. First of all to believe what the Bible says and then to behave in light of who and what Jesus is. Paul is concerned in writing to the Colossians here that they will not be swept away by the thinking of the surrounding culture and actually he says in it were still in chapter 2, actually. And in verse 40 says I'm seeing these things to I'm seeing these things to to to you in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments down in verse eight he says see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and by empty deceit.

The dissident concerns human traditions that works according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ.

No, Paul has in mind their specific challenges as it relates to the identity, the person of Jesus.

False teachers were pressing upon the church they were teaching doctrine and they were demanding practices of people that did not depend on Christ and all I am saying and referencing these two exhortations is that while that was an express issue a peculiar issue that was there in the Colossae Valley commentators debate the nature of the issue and so on, but the principle remains.

It is for the Christian person living under the Lordship of Christ to see to it that we are not diluted to see to it that we do not succumb to specious arguments and two philosophies which have no basis at all. In reality, and goodness gracious, if there is not an area in which that is a challenge, other than family life of the moment. I don't know what is because he said earlier in Jesus all these things hold together. Now all that said, to reinforce this foundational premise that obedience all children is the only proper response to the instruction of parents who acknowledge Christ as their Lord. Obedience of children is the only proper response to the instruction of parents who submit to Jesus as Lord will not say a word or two about the responsibility of the parents is a will is supposed to be about children as it is about children, but the children don't live in a bedroom by themselves.

They live in a house I'll be in well with parents. Parents are to bring their children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. But how can children be expected to know their boundaries if their parents are clueless. How can they be expected to know what they're supposed to do what they're not supposed to do if their parents are neglectful of their responsibilities. Clear responsibilities as delineated in the Bible and whatever decision Christian parents may about the ongoing education of their children, and there are many within our congregation that adopt all kinds of approaches and we understand and recognize that whatever that decision. One thing is true of every mom and dad in the congregation and that is that they are responsible for the registrant for the instruction of their children in the word of God.

It is their responsibility.

The task is to be exercised by the parents in the face of all of the challenges of a world that doesn't agree the insinuations of the evil one that come to us and say you know you shouldn't listen to all this stuff is old-fashioned. It said it's irritated the Bible. If somebody had written the Bible at this point they would never have included this as a kind of thing you hear all those say, but you need to be a pragmatic person that leaders need to be is as realistic as you can. And frankly, this doesn't work, or you have and say you know what you really need is self-help and they should only Bible help. You don't need the spirit self psychology will be of far more help to you then theology and at the heart of all of those kind of insinuations which come ultimately from the evil one. At the heart of it all is the undermining of the word of God the design of the evil one is to get God's people to live their lives paying scant attention to the truth of the Bible being prepared to affirm its authority as was said of the enlarged line. Be prepared to say we believe it entirely and then to do absolutely nothing with it when it comes to the issues that we are dealing with now instruction begins at home where it's formal or informal. It has to do with creating a climate in which our children recognize that we are depending on the Bible and depending on the help of the Holy Spirit to try and do our level best to raise them according to their structures and definitions of the Bible that we are on our best days sinful as well, and we do so in the awareness of the fact that, for example, let's take the demythologized Asian of evolutionary theory and your children come home from school and I remember as it is gather around the table of one of the children said, you know, I learned something funny in school today are civil.

What was that he said the teacher told me that I came from and 8% is and how funny everything that it is really funny to America. Talk about whether you came from and eight were not where God's word is true, where what it says actually describes what happened or whether were living with a mythology, whether were involved in the greatest religious contract of the world has ever seen over the revealing in the realm of reality. I guarantee you that the child nurtured by a biblical view of the origin of life will enjoy in life, security that can never be experienced by the youngster schooled.

For example, in evolutionary theory how happy the son who can say when I was a boy in my father's house still tender and an only child of my mother. He taught me and said lay hold of my words with all your heart keep my commands and you will live. Effective parenting begins with believing the Bible and behaving in light of who Jesus is and what is done listing to Alister Beck on Truth for Life.

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