We've been talking about being transformed, becoming godly men, and tuning up fatherhood is what we've called this one. And we've had that acrostic father, F-A-T-H-E-R, and tonight we're going to try to cover the last three of those blanks. just to kind of recap where we've been in the first two sessions. Psalm chapter 127, let's flip over there if we can. Psalm 127, verse number three, that kind of give us our bearing for what we have set out to make this series about, or this set of lessons. In Psalm 127, verse number three, we're told, low children are inherited to the Lord, And the fruit of the womb is his reward, as arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath this quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate. And then in Ephesians chapter six, verse number four, Paul wrote to us that as fathers, we have this command, provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. And so we've been talking about fatherhood in the first, night we were together on this. The F stands for focus on your calling. Let's see if I've got that. Yeah, there it is. Focus on your calling. We talked about the calling that we have, the God-given responsibility as men to raise up our children for His glory. And we went through a lot of different things about the fact that we are called to be stewards. We're managers, the resources God gives to us. And so we're to raise those kids up. We talked about last week we covered admonish in love. That was the A to our acrostic. And we really kind of focused sort of of the admonishment kind of comes with two sides. There's two facets to admonishment. There's positive admonishment. There's negative admonishment. And we kind of focused on the negative part of the admonishment last week. Talking about discipline, and we covered the T as well, which was train them biblically. So the admonishment and the training kind of went hand in hand. We talked about how training is preventative, it's corrective, it's disciplinary. Paul again in Colossians chapter three, he said, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged. And so we talked about how as fathers we're to balance firmness and gentleness together, that we are focused on the heart, not just the behavior, that really everything that we're supposed to be doing as parents is trying to point our kids to Jesus Christ. That's what we want to do is we want to point them to Jesus Christ. And so even through that disciplinary process, which we need to do as parents. The ultimate goal, though, is not just punishment for the sake of punishment, but it's discipline that is to point them back to Jesus. And we talked about how our inconsistency, how hypocrisy in our own lives can be a problem when we come to that. And so we covered all of that. I noticed this morning we got an email. I don't know why, but for some reason, Sermon Audio, they sent us an email about last Sunday night's session together on this. And they said, we've chosen to select this message and to highlight it on our home page. So for some reason, they chose last Sunday night's sermon about fatherhood. We've not seen them do that before, but they chose that message and they're promoting it on their home page. So hopefully we'll have some extra people download some messages from the church. So that'll be good. Then we come to tonight. We talk about how children, they can be fragile. We don't want them to take the wind out of their sails. That's what Paul's talking about when he says, provoke them not to anger, don't provoke them to wrath. Don't take the wind out of their sails. And the way that we admonish, the way that we train is a reflection of what they know about God, his character. They learn it from us first. And so we want to make sure that we're admonishing in love. And then we talked about training up a child in the way he should go. and that it's something that is active, it's something that's ongoing, we're not supposed to be passive in this, we don't just let it happen on its own, but we're supposed to be involved with training them, and we went through those three steps of what training them biblically entails, being preventative, corrective, and disciplinary. So then we come to tonight, with the H, and here it is, have time together, have time together. Some people, we've mentioned this in the past, some people talk about quality time versus quantity time. And sometimes, you know, dads may say, well, you know, I don't spend a lot of time with my kids. It may not be the quantity that I have, but the time I do spend with my kids, I make sure it's quality time. But we want to make sure that we're doing both. We want to spend quality time with them for sure, but we also need to make sure that there's a quantity of time in there as well. And so quantity time with our kids is important. We want to build a strong relationship, build that foundation of trust. Again, if we look back at Ephesians chapter 6 verse number 4, and notice what Paul writes, "...provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." This nurturing that he talks about is not just spiritual. But it includes emotional and relational bonds. Dr. Henry Cloud, he wrote a book on raising great kids, was the name of the book that he wrote. And he talked about how children are living organisms like plants. And he said, you know, they are constantly growing, something that's ongoing. They're not static. They're constantly in motion of growing. It's a continuous process. And he said, so if children, like plants, are constantly growing, then we better be sure that the growth is happening in the right direction. He gave the illustration of, if you plant a vine in your yard and let it start growing, it's living, where it'll grow and which direction it takes, the health of the vine is up to us when we plant that. He said, now if you plant one next to your neighbor's fence and you just let it go, He said, it's gonna grow, whether you put your hands on it or not, it's going to do what vines do, and it's gonna grow, and it's gonna start going here and there, and it's just gonna take off and go everywhere. He said, you may get a phone call from your neighbor at some point that, hey, your vines are taking over my side of the yard, you need to do something with them. And so we can be involved in the process of our children growing or not, but they're going to grow. but God wants us to be involved in the direction that they're going. He says, train up a child in the way he should go. So we want to point them in the right direction. We want to point them in the path that they need to be taking. So what are some practical steps that we can take that will kind of help us foster time together? Well, first I would say we ought to create some regular family rituals, things like family game night. Spend some time playing games. We like games. Erica got me one for Christmas. We got it out the other night after Harrison went to bed. She got me a giant Monopoly board. It's like a four foot by four foot big square. It takes up a lot of space, has a big foam die, and the pieces are gigantic. And so, man, that was a lot of fun to play. And some people don't like Monopoly, because it takes forever. This is like a very quick version of Monopoly. So we were playing rounds in like 15 to 30 minutes, and you were done. So it was fast. But game night's good. Game nights are fun. It should be something that you do regularly. Taking walks together as a family. That could be something that, I don't know, Sunday afternoons. You just say, hey, we're going to go out and we're going to walk. Evangelist Scott Polly talks about a lot of times how his walks are some of the most spiritual times that he takes. It gives him a chance. He would take each Sunday, one of his kids, and they would just go for an afternoon walk through the woods. and just kind of talk about whatever comes up. And he said many times it was a great opportunity for spiritual development as we're just out walking through nature. We're just looking at things. We're just chatting. And we had opportunities to talk about the word of God. We had opportunities to talk about what was happening in their lives. And so go on and go on a walk together. Go to the park. Go go on a picnic together. but have predictable, consistent family rituals like that that you do, where you're carving out time together. It's not, man, we haven't done this in months. No, it ought to be normal that your family does things together. What else can you do? If you have more than one child, prioritize individual time. Find time to spend one-on-one. That's one of the things that I really like. I've seen Matt and Lauren, Paul's son and daughter-in-law, they're really good at doing this. They have things that they call... Dino, D-N-O. It's dad's night out or M-N-O is mom's night out. But they will, they've got three kids, a fourth one on the way, and one of the things that they do, they do family things together, but then mom and dad also take time to do something with each individual child. Find time to do things with your children individually, invest into each one of them, so they all know that, man, I'm special to mom and dad. If you've got three or four or five kids, break it up, rotate them in and out. Let them spend time with mom and dad both if you can. That's good. They need to be able to feel uniquely loved, that they're not any less special than anybody else in the family, and that they get that special time with mom and dad, a one-on-one. That's good when we can do that. What else can we do to have time together? Well, incorporate time into daily routines. We're talking about having family nights, family fun, games, stuff like that, but sometimes you can include time into just your daily routine. Car rides, for example. One of the books I've read in this last year, The TechWise Family by Andy Crouch, one of the things he talked about was car rides. And he said that if you drive down the road, one of the things that you'll normally notice, if there's more than one person in the car, he said if you pay a lot of attention, you'll usually see that there's more than one in the car that'll be looking at their phone, and hopefully it's not the driver, right? But he said a lot of times you see earbuds in, You can be sitting inches away from somebody in the car and thousands of miles away from them because you're absorbed into your device. And so his book, The TechWise Family, is all about trying to keep technology in its place. That yes, we have technology, we want to use technology, but we want to use it smartly. And one of the things they do is make car rides a time for family conversation. The research shows that it takes about seven minutes for a conversation to start. In the first seven minutes, people, you know, kind of just exchange a few words here and there. Not much really gets said, but they say about the seven minute mark, somebody finally takes a risk and opens up something, says something where the conversation starts to take off. But it takes that seven minutes of just kind of mundane chit-chat to really get into a conversation. He said many times, you know, on our drive to school or maybe we're going to get groceries or whatever, we would have those car rides and they would be very meaningful conversations that we would have as a family. He said, so I was always looking for an opportunity in the car. to have family conversation like that. And we wanted our kids to know that just because we get in the car doesn't mean it's time for everybody to put their AirPods in and, you know, zone out into their screen. He said now that they're grown up and they're older when we travel, he said, you know, to be very transparent, if we're on a long road trip, eventually you're going to see somebody with their AirPods in and they're going to watch a screen. But still, we really try to carve out time when we're riding in the car together to have conversation. You can do things, you know, he talked about, you know, with younger kids. I remember doing this with my parents when I was young. We would try to find license plates. You know, we wanted to identify however many license plates we could find. We would play all sorts of games together in the car. I remember one trip from Denver back here, apparently I made my mom read David Copperfield and Treasure Island multiple times, but read together when you're in the vehicle, sing together when you're in the car, make things like that that may just kind of be mundane tasks, turn it into family time where you're spending time doing something. You can talk about what you heard at church or you may see something at the store that opens up an opportunity to have conversation, but incorporate time into daily routines, cooking meals together. That's one of our favorite things to do at home. Eric and I, we love to get in the kitchen, we like to cook. That's a good thing for a family to do. There's all sorts of ways to get the entire family involved in doing something like that. You can find simple ways in just your daily routines to have family time. So look for those ways to incorporate that in. And then plan special events. Maybe have an annual camping trip, something that everybody in the family's looking forward to every year. Or maybe you're going to a theme park or You're going to a national park somewhere, but plan special events. Celebrate milestones, accomplishments. Make a big deal out of those things. We ought to celebrate things together like that. So make a big deal out of it on special occasions. That'll create lasting memories. You want something that your kids are going to remember for a lifetime. Do things like that. And this one, regardless of what we're doing, be present. and engaged, this can be one of the tough things to do, especially in the tech age that we live in, but sometimes we have to put away the distractions like the phones. Andy Crouch, again, in his book, he talks about, yeah, he talks about mealtime as a time that everybody in his house, all the phones are put away from the table, they sit down together, And they have time where they eat, and they talk about what their day was like, and they find out what's going on in their lives. And they spend that one hour at the table together every night, distraction-free. And so he promotes something that he calls one hour a day, one day a week, one week a year, where everybody puts just those distractions away. So everybody in the family can be fully present, be fully engaged, and especially as parents and dads, we need to be present. It's hard. I shared the story a few weeks ago, you know, trying to watch a football game while Erica was trying to tell me something that I still don't remember what that was, because she was interrupting my football game. We've got to be present, we've got to be engaged, we've got to be actively listening, especially when our kids are talking to us, if they're asking us a question, don't just brush them off. What they're asking is probably more important than what we're watching on TV or the video that we have on our phones. So be present, be engaged, plan times that everybody puts their electronic devices away, an hour a day, one day a week for Andy's family, it's every Sunday. Devices get shut down, this is the Lord's day, and so we're gonna focus on the Lord, we're gonna focus on spending time together. social media and everything else, it'll still be there on Monday morning when we wake up. We can absorb all of that stuff again come Monday. And then one week a year, you know, when they take a big trip, they go somewhere and they shut down from the outside world. He talked about how his email, he sent an email that would go out. Somebody sent him an email and say, hey, I'm on vacation this week. Unfortunately, I will never read this email that you sent me. And he said, I don't want to spend time going back through those emails when I get back home. But he wants to be fully present and engaged with his family, giving them their undivided attention, maybe playing in a tea party. building model airplanes or a Lego set, but you're engaged and you're active and you're present because that's what your kids want. They want to know that you're there and that they're not having to compete for your attention with Monday night football, with TikTok, with any of those things. So set a time, regular time on your calendar exclusively for family activities. Do everything you can to protect that, to protect that time. Maybe once a week, maybe once every two weeks. We're gonna make pizza together tonight and watch a movie. We're gonna play games tonight and have popcorn. Whatever it is, but put it on the calendar and do everything you can to protect that time and make sure that the whole family can be together. I know as kids get older, it can become more challenging to do that, but it's important that the family have time together, have intentional conversations. You know, sometimes we tell our teachers this here at church, you know, when you're working with kids, it's best not to ask yes or no questions when we're, you know, trying to share the gospel with them. For example, you know, do you want to go to heaven? Well, yes. You know, do you want to be saved? Yes. Ask them questions, you know, open-ended questions with like, why and what? Like, why did you come forward today? Ask your kids questions like, what was the best part of your day-to-day? Ask them questions that are going to force them to do something besides say yes or no. Especially as they get toward their teen years, their answers tend to get shorter, right? They really don't want to engage in conversation. So you've got to kind of draw it out of them, right? And periodically just kind of assess how much time you're spending with your kids. Do I need to focus on this a little more? Am I spending more time with the boys than I am with my family? And maybe I need to adjust that. So have time together. Anybody got anything to throw in here before we move on? Yes, sir. FaceTime. That's good. Who else? I know one thing that I've read from several different biographies and things like that, as people recount the lives of their parents, a lot of times, especially wealthy ones, kids aren't as concerned about what you leave behind with them, as far as monetary resources, than they are the fact that mom or dad, they spent time with me. And they remember those things. And so it's important that we keep that at the forefront of our mind, that time is one of the ways that our kids, you know, you can try to go buy them gifts and that works for a little while, but eventually, it's not really stuff that kids want, is it? It's time that they wanna spend with us. And so we wanna make sure that we're modeling that kind of relationship again. We're a reflection of God to them, so we ought to be spending time with our Heavenly Father, and the same way we spend time with Him, we ought to spend time with our kids, and they see that reflection. I've done my best to drag them around the national parks. It's getting harder. Pinnacle? It's no joke at the end, is it? Did you do that in troop school? Did you have to wear a full pack or anything? We were, two kids. Erica was asking me a week or so ago about different Christmases that I can remember. Told her, I said, honestly, I don't remember a lot of Christmas gifts that I got over the years when I was young, but I can remember trips and places that we went, time that we spent together, you know, so things aren't as important as spending time together, so have time together. All right, here's the next one. This is the E, e-courage, encourage, and equip. Encourage and equip. Words have incredible power to shape a child's character, their faith. What does the book of Proverbs tell us? In Proverbs chapter 18, Verse number 21, let's read these words together, ready? Death and life are in the power of the tongue. It's a really big reminder that the words that we have, the words that we use, we can build people up or we can tear people down with the things that we say. We wanna speak words of life and encouragement. Paul admonished us in Ephesians chapter four, verse 29. We're not to let any corrupt communication proceed out of our mouths, but that which is good to the use of edifying. What is edifying? That's building somebody up. And fathers are uniquely positioned to speak life in their children. in several different ways. How can we encourage our kids? We'll kind of do this in two different blocks. We'll give you some things on how you can encourage your kids and some ways that you can equip your kids for the challenges of life. First of all, ways to encourage your kids. First, praise efforts, not just achievements. Praise efforts, not just achievements. Kids need to know that they're valued for their diligence, for their perseverance, not just for their results. The truth is, in life, not everybody's going to be a winner. You're not always going to win. Sometimes you're going to lose. But hopefully the character that we instill into them teaches them to show perseverance, and we can be proud of the effort that they give from the character that's been instilled into them, even if they aren't in first place, even if they didn't take the top medal, even if they weren't the best at it. They need to be praised when they put forth effort and do everything that they can with their whole heart. You know, if they're doing everything to the best of their ability, even if it's not as good as the kid that they were competing with, if they gave it their all, we ought to recognize that and praise them for their effort. Telling them things, the fact, you know, I'm proud that you didn't give up, that you continued on. We teach them to have that kind of an attitude. Sometimes, you know, especially working with kids, sometimes, you know, the kids, if they don't win in children's church, especially with the younger ones, you'll see, you know, they'll start to break down and cry, because, you know, they wanted to win, and try to teach them that, hey, it's okay that you didn't win today. You just, you keep working, you keep doing your best, you know, to sit still, to be quiet, all this kind of, you do your best. And that's all that we can ask from you. You may not have won today, but that's okay. If you gave it your best effort, then that's a good thing. What else can we do besides praise their efforts? Well, we need to affirm their identity in Christ. Affirm their identity in Christ. They need to know that their worth comes from being created in God's image. Their self-worth doesn't come through how many likes they get on a photo on social media, by how many reactions their videos on Instagram might get. Their self-worth doesn't come from what their peers say that they look like, whether they're beautiful, whether they're ugly. Their self-worth doesn't come from that. Their self-worth is based in their identity in Christ. They were created in God's image. Ephesians chapter 2 verse number 10 tells us, for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus. When Jesus created your children, when he created all of us, he didn't make a mistake, did he? Every single person has worth and value because they are created in the image of God. And that's what sets us apart from a lot of the rest of the culture that promotes things maybe like abortion, that says that that life doesn't have value to it. Well, no, all life has value. God makes no mistakes. And so every single person is uniquely created and designed the way that God intended for you to be created and designed. And so you are special to God. And so therefore, you have worth. And our kids need to know that, they need to hear that, especially in the social media age that we live in and the media culture that we live in. They need to know that their worth is not based on what they do to their bodies. they were created in the image of God. Sometimes we sing that song here at church, I am not my own. I'm bought with a price. I'm created in the image of God. And so if God made me a male, then I'm created in the image that God created me in. If I'm female, that's what God created me as. And so I don't get to choose what my identity is. God decided what my identity is, and that's where my worth and my value is found, is in what he placed on it. The book of Psalms, I will praise thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Every single person was created with a purpose when God designed them. And our job, every single human, our job is to find out what that purpose is. Why did God create me? Find that purpose and live it out for his glory. And that's one of those things that we're trying to teach our kids as they're growing up, is that you were created for a purpose. You were born for a reason. You're here because God wanted you to. That's why we don't take our own life. You see things like suicide rates, especially among teenagers, seem to have kind of crept up in the last few years. They need to know that their life has worth and it has value and that they're here for a purpose. And so because of that, we don't determine when our life ends. That's God's choice. And so I don't have the right to take my life. And so we need to remind our kids of that. Talk about how unique they are, how God created them special. Talk about how we can see the fingerprints of God in their life. Tie it all back to that, that it goes back to God. Again, we're trying to point everything in their life back to the Lord. What else can we do? We can be specific and genuine. Sometimes just kind of general compliments can feel empty. Specific praise. feels more authentic and meaningful. Instead of saying, you know, good job, you know, it's just kind of generic and bland. You know, maybe be a little more specific. You know, I loved your attitude when you were playing with your friend, how you were kind, how you shared. Maybe talk some specifics about characteristics that they are exhibiting that reflect God's character. And so find specific ways to encourage them, you know, instead of telling them, you know, you're really smart. Maybe talk about how they were good at problem solving, at critical thinking, things like that. What else do we do? We model God's encouragement. He is the ultimate encourager. Jesus Christ is the ultimate encourager. And so as fathers, we reflect his character when we speak words of life to our kids. Psalm 103, verse 13 tells us, it says, a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. God shows pity, he shows empathy, he's near to the brokenhearted. God is the ultimate encourager that we have. He's the friend that sticks closer than a brother. And so we need to model God's encouragement to our kids. It's one of the things that we need to do. Teach gratitude and contentment. This is one of those things that we are not just born thankful. We have to be taught to be thankful. We read a book a couple of years ago called Raising Grateful Kids in an Ungrateful World, or Raising Thankful Kids in an Unthankful World, something to that effect. And it's getting more difficult to do that. And you have to be intentional about it. You have to teach gratitude. You have to teach thankfulness. You have to teach. contentment. In fact, it's one of the things that I've done the last few weeks with our kids here at Children's Church on Sunday mornings, try to teach contentment. As we come into this Christmas season, we talked about, you know, you're going to be getting some gifts. Maybe the things that you get aren't exactly what you wanted, or it may not be the favorite thing that you got from somebody, but you need to be content. You need to show gratitude. If somebody spent time and money to go buy you a gift, even if it's not what you wanted, You need to show gratitude and thankfulness that somebody cared enough about you just to spend their time and their money to get it for you. So we have to teach gratitude and contentment. We gotta teach them to thank God for their blessings, to find joy in what they have. The culture that we live in is a very ungrateful culture, very unthankful culture. We live in a very entitled society. And we ought to try to break that entitlement mentality. Bible tells us that what I deserve is hell. I don't deserve any good thing. And so everything that I have, it came from God. I'm not entitled to any of it, but through God's grace and God's mercy and God's love, I have what I have. And the Bible tells me that he owns everything. So I need to be content for the things that he's bestowed to me. We teach our kids to be thankful in all circumstances, in the good times and the bad times, when they win and when they lose. Teach them to have gratitude and thankfulness. In everything, give thanks, Paul said. In everything, give thanks, even the bad times. It doesn't mean that we're thankful for the bad things that are happening, but we can find ways to be thankful in those bad times. Again, we have that ultimate encourager. We have God who never leaves our side. And so we need to be teaching gratitude and contentment over and over again, because your kids aren't gonna get it just one time. They gotta hear that week after week after week after week as they grow up. And hopefully, as we continue to model that in front of them, because we're gonna have to model gratitude and contentment in our own lives, Hopefully if they see that model and they hear that repeated over and over again, when they get to be teenagers, when they get to be young adults, you'll have raised some kids that aren't entitled. Think that everything is owed to them. Next, encourage them to trust God. Teach your children to rely on God in every single circumstance. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart. Lean not to thine own understanding. Trust God in every single circumstance. Share stories from the Bible. Share stories from your own life, if you can, where trusting God led to blessing. Pray with your kids during uncertain times. The things that they deal with are gonna be really minor things, but to kids, they're big deals. Pray with them in their uncertain times. It may be a test that they have. It may be a friend that they're struggling with. When they lose a pet, pray with your kids. Ask God to help them trust him in every situation. Celebrate, recognize their talent and abilities. The Bible tells us, especially if we're saved, that we have some spiritual gifts. And so recognize those. They may even have the talent. Maybe they're a musician. Maybe they've got the ability to play instruments like Sean. Maybe they can sing like Connor. Just kidding. Remind them that those are ways that they can use their talent and their ability and their gifts to honor God. They can play music that honors and glorifies the Lord. They can use their ability to sing, to lift up praise, to worship Him. They could go to the nursing home with our church on Sunday afternoons and sing for the people who can't get out. They could go during the Christmas season and sing Christmas carols for those people. Whatever their talents and their gifts, we ought to recognize those. and encourage them to use their gifts and their talent for God's glory. Maybe they're gifted in the arts. Maybe they're a great painter. I mean, they could draw stuff. They could design pictures and maybe that would lead them into doing artwork for churches. Maybe they become a graphic designer that builds things for churches. Maybe they gifted in the area of technology and they could use those gifts to do things for God's glory. Recognize those and always point things back to how they can use them to honor and glorify God. Here's a big one, pray over them and pray with them. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. Pray with your kids regularly. Thank God for them. Ask for his guidance in their lives. But pray with them. Don't just pray about them when they're not around, but pray with your kids. Teach them God's promises. Teach them God's promises. Encourage them to hold on to God's word during challenging times. Say, well, I don't really know the promises of God to be able to teach them. Well, this is one of the great things, I guess, about being a parent is that doing some of these things is going to drive you to where you have to actually study the Word of God for yourself because you need to be able to tell your kids what the promises of God are. We sing that song, Standing on the Promises. Well, we ought to know what some of those promises are and pass them on to our kids. The Bible tells us thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. And so remind them of God's promises. They can trust God in difficult times. Memorize verses, things like Joshua 1, 9. Be strong and have a good courage. Over and over again, we see that through scripture. And then here's the last one on encouraging your children. Share stories of faith. Pass on examples of God's faithfulness. Psalm 78 verse number 4 says, We will not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord. One of the things that the people of Israel had failed to do was to pass down to their kids what God had done for them. They began to forget God. And a lot of the dark times in Israel's history was because one generation didn't pass it down to the next generation. We ought to be passing on stories of faith from the word of God. There's all sorts of great examples of faith that you can use in scripture. People of history that you can read from and share with in your family. People that have exhibited great faith in God. Use those stories. It ought to be something that you use regularly. You can do things like that maybe in a devotion time. Maybe you can find a book about heroes of the Christian faith and just kind of read snippets to people that will encourage your kids. Because again, they need to have this foundation laid day after day, week after week. Because someday they're going to be on their own and they're going to need to be grounded in that faith for themselves. And then we want to equip them for life's challenges. We want to teach life skills for sure. They need to know some life skills, problem solving, decision making. but we also need to be teaching them the word of God. We're the primary ones, as parents, we're the primary ones that should be teaching our family the word of God. It's good when we come to church. It's good when you can have the Sunday school teacher, when you can have the youth pastor to do all of that, but they're only there to back up what you're doing at home. It's our responsibility to teach our family the word of God. And God's word is the foundation for wisdom and guidance in life. All scripture, all scripture is given by inspiration. It's profitable. And he goes through and lists all the things that the word of God is profitable for. So how do you equip them? How do you teach the word of God? Have regular devotions. It doesn't mean that you have to stand up behind a podium and preach a 45 minute sermon to them, but open the word of God, read something and give them something from the word of God. It can be very simple. And the younger they are, the more simple it needs to be. Act out some of the stories of scripture. Do scripture charades with them, but constantly have the word of God present in your home. It should be regular that your family's hearing the word of God. What else do we do? We equip them with prayer. They need to learn, just like we've prayed for them, we need to teach them to pray. Pray without ceasing. Teach them how to pray. I said, man, I'm not sure if I know how to pray. It's a good thing that we're gonna learn it then, right? We're gonna learn it so we can pass it on and teach them. pray for others, to pray for needs, to pray for salvation in people's lives. The next thing that we need to equip them with is godly character. Promote godly character. The fruit of the spirit, love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, all of these things, godly character, we need to be promoting that at home. Teaching them the importance of virtues like honesty and kindness and patience. Again, these are opportunities to use the word of God. People like Joseph, you talk about integrity, you see people like Joseph, he was a man who lived with integrity. People like Ruth, you could talk about loyalty in her life. People like Esther, who trusted God even when there was difficulty around her and may have been uncertain. Next, we need to prepare them to resist temptation. Submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Teach them about the armor of God. Help them to establish some boundaries and some accountability. But they need to know that there's gonna be some things that they'll be tempted with, and the older they get, the more that they need to know about that. Proverbs chapter one, verse number 10, my son of sinners entice thee, consent thou not. You can see there's a little Bible song that goes with that. You can sing things like that, but teach them from a young age that drugs are bad, that alcohol is bad, that they don't want to smoke. Engrain all that into them when they're young. And maybe when they're older, maybe somebody, some peer that they're around tries to pressure them into it. Hopefully that foundation will come back. The words of God will ring back in their mind. But they need to be prepared to resist temptation. Here's another one. Instill a biblical work ethic. Instill a biblical work ethic. A work is ordained by God. and it reflects his character. Whatsoever you do, do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men. Assign age-appropriate chores. Teaching kids from an early age to be helping around the house to do things. We had boxes that were sitting out on the back porch today. Harrison was out riding around in his little tractor and had his little trailer hooked up to the back of it, and he was going picking up boxes, putting them in his little trailer, and taking them out to the burn pile. He loves to drag the trash across the kitchen floor over to the door. You teach them. Start teaching them at a young age to help. Teach them the value of stewardship by managing their money, by managing their time, their talents for God's glory. Because we want to raise up kids that, again, they're not entitled. They have a real biblical work ethic. Equip them next with discernment. Teach children to evaluate choices through a biblical lens. The way that we interpret the world comes through the word of God. We look at things through a biblical worldview, not a humanistic worldview. And so they need to be able to discern right from wrong. They need to be able to discern things like when they hear that you can choose what your own identity is, you can choose what your gender is. If they've been taught at home, that's automatically going to trigger something in the mind that says, wait a second, that's not right. That's not what the Bible teaches. And so we're teaching them discernment. Paul wrote in 1 Thessalonians 5.21, prove all things, hold fast that which is good. What is he saying? Test everything. And cleave, cling to the good things. Hold fast to that. Teach them to ask questions. Does this honor God? Before they're going to do something, use discernment. Is this something that I can do and glorify God by doing this? And you can talk about media. You can talk about friendships. You can talk about all of these different aspects of their life. and they need to use discernment. Help them to recognize false teachings by grounding them in biblical truths. That's part of our job. Train them to serve others. Train them to serve others. You have been called unto liberty. Only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another, Paul said. We're to serve others. That's part of what Jesus, when he came to earth, he came not to be ministered to, but to minister. Jesus came as a servant. Part of the Christian life is servanthood, servant leadership. And so we are to serve other people. And if we're not serving, if we're not doing stuff for other people, then we're not fully living out what we have been called to do. So encourage your kids to get involved in church ministry, community outreach, acts of kindness, ways that they can be a light, be an example. Again, we talked about things like the nursing home ministry, maybe going to some of the shut-ins. But doing things for other people, that ought to be common nature. And then that helps them when you're serving others. We talked earlier about teaching gratitude and contentment. When you're serving others, that kind of negates, it kind of helps push down selfishness. They go hand in hand, don't they? And so if we teach them to do stuff for other people, the easier it is to have gratitude and contentment. When you go on something like a missions trip, when we went to inner city Philadelphia, or we went to the Indian reservations, or you go to India, somewhere like that, you begin to see why you should be thankful for what you have in your life compared to what other people have. And as you serve others, it just fulfills you. Train them to serve others. Equip them for relationships. Be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another. Teach conflict resolution through forgiveness and grace. Relationships should reflect godly love, respect, and forgiveness. Equip them for leadership as well, I would say in that. Help them prepare to be able to work for somebody else. You want to be an example in your family, church, and community. And then instill eternal perspective. We want to help our kids be able to prioritize what matters most in life, eternal things over temporal things. Everything that's here on earth, this is all fleeting. This is only here for a moment. We're going to have this for a little while. And Jesus said the rust, the moths are going to corrupt it. The thieves are going to break through and steal it. But when we lay up treasures in heaven, when we invest in eternal things, that's why we're trying to win other people to Christ. That's why when you give to missions, things like that, that's lasting forever. Teach them toys are fun. But man, that toy is only going to last for so long. And it's going to break and it's going to fall apart. things are never gonna satisfy. Solomon tried to find that in life. He tried to find those things and temporal things didn't satisfy Solomon. He said, it's all vanity, vanity of vanities. And then he encouraged people, he said, seek now thy creator in the days of thy youth. Build that relationship with the Lord when you're young. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." We want to teach our kids it's more important to live for God's glory than it is for personal success. Man, if I can be successful in life, that's good, that's wonderful. But if I have to be successful in life and choose between that or honoring God, then I need to honor God. Leave the success up to Him. If I become successful in whatever it is that I'm doing, then praise the Lord for it. But my first and foremost priority in life, again, it goes back to our purpose. Why am I created? Well, I'm created to give and bring glory and honor to God. So I need to seek that with life. And all these other things, it'll take care of themselves. It'll take care of themselves. Share the hope of heaven. What we have here on earth, this is only going to last for so long. But heaven's going to be forever. We can have that. Encourage them to set spiritual goals, maybe reading through their Bible, maybe leading someone else to the Lord, but set spiritual goals and then provide accountability. Because accountability helps us to stay faithful. Iron sharpeneth iron, the book of Proverbs tells us. Iron sharpens iron. And so it ought to be commonplace in our home that we're kind of checking in on how their spiritual health is. Encourage them to find godly mentors and accountability partners. And then very quickly reflect God's character. This is the R on your sheet. finish out the word father, reflect God's character. We are a model of life of faith. Again, we said this a few weeks ago when we started this, the first impressions that kids really form of God come from what they see in us. And so we want to reflect God's character. You remember what Paul wrote in the book of 1 Corinthians 11? Be ye followers of me. even as I also am of Christ. As I'm following Christ, I want you to follow me. It doesn't mean perfection, we're never gonna be perfect, are we? Until we get to heaven, we'll be perfect then, but here on earth, we're gonna make some mistakes, we're gonna have some flaws, we're gonna do some dumb things from time to time. But if we're following Christ, we can feel confident telling our kids, hey, follow me. That's why it's important that we're modeling that character. There's some people that, you know, you don't want them to follow that person. But follow me as I follow Christ. Show consistency between your faith and your actions. Demonstrate dependence on God when times get tough, when there's problems, when there's difficulties. Model to your kids that you're depending on God. Don't just tell them that they ought to depend on God. You depend on God. Show it to them. Be a reflection to the Heavenly Father. leading your children to trust and follow Him. They'll be much more likely to be trusting of God if they see that in our lives, won't they? And so we don't really have an excuse for failing to do our job. If God's given you a child, or someday you're hoping to have kids, we need to be prepared for it, we need to take it seriously. and see that as our primary calling and occupation is raising up kids for God's glory. Be more present there than we are at the office, than we are at the job, than we are at the football game or wherever it is. We want to be engaged in raising our kids for God's glory. Somebody got something to add in on the second part there? Whether it was on the encouragement, the equipping, collecting God's character? The third thing that I'm trying to do right now is kind of not necessarily create, but That's right. That's good. I saw somebody else's. Amen. It's good. Yeah. Any other thoughts? That's some good stuff. That's one of the things that we talked about last week is that that discipline is an expression of love. The book of Hebrews tells us that God chastens those that he loves. And so if you want to be a loving parent, part of that is that you have to do that. And that if you don't, you're actually not loving your kids by not doing that. Remember that, like I said a minute ago, parenting, it's not about perfection, it's about faithfulness. You're planting seeds. God promises his word won't return void. Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he'll not depart from it. At some point, the kids are gonna grow up and they're gonna walk out of the house, and you're no longer gonna be responsible for what their actions are. Hopefully, you've laid that foundation that they know what's right, they know what's wrong. Sometimes they don't always do what we hope that they will do. But you continue, even if they stray, you continue to model God's love, God's grace, and hopefully it'll be one of those prodigal son stories. or you're standing out there at the end of the driveway and one day you'll see them come back. But don't give up. And don't beat yourself up over the head if they don't do everything that you hope that they would do. If you've demonstrated all these things, you put this into practice, then you've planted the seeds. And they'll remember those words whether they tell you they do or not. They'll remember what they were taught. And that's when you're going to really have to trust God in your own life and pray for them and hope that God will wake them up and bring them back to what that spiritual foundation is. But that's why it's important that we lay that foundation. The odds are better that they'll never stray from that path if we build that foundation day after day after day. And so it's a lot better. Again, vines are going to grow, kids are going to grow, whether we get involved or not. But it's better if we have some training of where that vine is growing than just to let it go wherever it wants to, right? All right. Well, appreciate you guys.