Imparting God's Word to the Next Generation

Well, with all of that having been said, let me have you turn in your Bibles to Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy chapter 6, and with the time that we have, I'd like for us to look at verses 4 through 9. And if you want to give a title to the message this morning, it would be Imparting God's Word to the Next Generation, imparting God's word to the next generation. all of us as parents desire to impart good things to our children, right?

We, we want that. Yet sometimes we as parents find ourselves in situations where we're wanting to impart something that we know is good to our children, but they are not quite so interested in what it is that we're trying to impart to them, nor do they view it as good. They don't even agree with us maybe that it is as good as we think it is, and so their hearts are not open. To what that is that we are seeking to impart to them.

Every parent experiences this frustration on a variety of levels, even something as simple as food. When our son Brendan, who's now 22 I think, who's living in Illinois, when he was younger, there was a particular meal that My wife made that he just could hardly abide. taco pasta shells. Do you guys know what that is?

How many of what that is? See, I should have, there's pictures of it on, online. I should have, showed a picture of it. Just imagine big pasta shells and inside is like taco meat and cheese and onions and peppers and stuff.

But I love the meal. Everyone in the family loved this meal. it was one of my favorites, but it was Brendan's least favorite. He could never bring himself to eat this particular dish.

But of course, being the phenomenal parents that my wife and I are, whenever we had this particular dish, we would seize the opportunity to disciple and to train our son. And we would insist that he eat this particular dish. We tried several strategies. We would tell him how delicious the meal was.

I don't know what we were thinking to accomplish. I would tell him this is one of my favorite meals, as if just hearing that would make it delicious. For him, sometimes we would tell him about the starving children in Africa. which normally only succeeded in making him want to ship the food over to Africa to help those in need.

we would tell him sometimes about the trouble that his mom went through to fix the meal and to consider her feelings. We would tell him that we can't just cater to him and he needs to go with the flow and eat what the rest of the family is eating. So like suck it up, get with the program and eat like everyone else is, was the vibe that we gave off to him. And often we would tell them you have to eat at least one of these taco pasta shells, and we told them if you don't eat at least one of these in total, then you cannot eat anything else for the rest of the night.

Wonderful parents we were. And he never would eat it, never. His pattern of non-eating was the same almost every time he would move the food around on his plate. He would divide it up.

He would smash it into his plate as if hoping it would just disappear into the plate, but honestly, when you smash it around and move it around, it can look like you've eaten a lot when you really haven't eaten any of it. sometimes he would take a bite and he would try to chew it and swallow it, but then he would start to gag and heave and choke, which obviously was just wonderful for everyone else's dining experience. sometimes he would put food. In his mouth and then he would grab his napkin and go to wipe his mouth and And deliver the contents that were in his mouth into the napkin and then say I've got to use the restroom.

He'd disappear into the restroom and come back without the napkin, having gotten rid of it. We also had a dog named Roxy at the time, a 65 pound boxer who loved taco pasta shells. She would sit at Brendan's feet under the dining room table, ready to help however would be needful, and whatever Brendan would give to Roxy on those occasions was not visible to any of us in the room, but an hour or so later, pungent odors emanating from our dog gave ample testimony to the fact that her digestive system had been compromised.

By the spicy human food that somebody had given to her.

But try as we might, try as we might, It was always a chore, and I don't recall ever succeeding in getting our son to eat what in our opinion was good and delicious food. I think most of us as parents can identify with this struggle in ways that are far more serious. Oftentimes as parents, we want to give our children God's wisdom, right? God's wisdom is good.

It is delicious. It sustains and saves lives, but our children sometimes don't have a taste for that wisdom. That we are wanting to impart to them. We love God's wisdom.

Our taste buds have been chastened and developed over many years, but our children don't quite have the taste for God's wisdom that we ourselves might have. And so God's wisdom doesn't, doesn't go down into our children the way that it goes down in To us, God's word, which is so palatable to us, isn't so palatable, palatable to them on many occasions. It leaves us as parents with a question that we ask, and that is how, how do we impart God's wisdom to our children. What can we do to at least increase the chances of God's wisdom, God's words being successfully imparted by us to our children, to where it goes down into them as we hope it goes down into to us, to where it goes deep into them and sticks, not only through their lifetime, but they successfully pass it on.

To their children also reaching their children in the generations to come. This is actually, guys, Moses' burden as he is standing before the people of Israel in Deuteronomy chapter 6. The children of Israel are about to go into the promised land, and Moses looks at this collection of moms and dads that are gathered here on this occasion. And he's not only thinking of them, but he's thinking of their children, and he's thinking of their children's children, and he's already got this multi-generational vision and is wanting to give to the people of Israel a strategy for imparting God's wisdom, God's words, their faith as parents and their children to where it reaches even the generation of their grandchildren.

Look what Moses says in Deuteronomy 6. He says, now, this is the commandment, the statutes and the judgments which the Lord your God has commanded me to teach you, that you might do them in the land where you are going over to possess it, so that you and your son and your grandson might fear the Lord your God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you all the days of your life. Oh Israel, Moses says, you should listen and be careful to do it. That it may be well with you, and that you may multiply greatly just as the Lord, the God of your fathers has promised you in a land flowing with milk and honey.

So we know here Moses is concerned about them, their children, their grandchildren, and he's about to give to them a pattern to follow a strategy that is designed to help parents to successfully pass their faith on to their children. And the generations beyond, with the time that we have, here's what we'll do. We'll look at 5 things, 5 of the best things that you will want to do as a parent. In order to successfully pass God's words on to your children and grandchildren, no matter what age your children are.

It's never too late to apply these things that we'll be learning from Deuteronomy chapter 65 things you'll want to do to pass God's words on to your children. And your grandchildren. All right. And so you set up and you're like, good, some parenting advice here.

I need parenting advice. So Pastor Milton, bring it on. Tell me how to change my children. Tell me how I can succeed in passing God's word on to my children.

OK, here we go. Number one, You be a good listener to God. You be a good listener to God. Moses begins by saying, here, oh Israel, listen, oh Israel, he says, you might think, I thought you were going to tell me how to get my children to listen to God's word.

Well, we'll get to that, but Moses wants to talk to you first. And he tells you to make sure that you are listening to God. And so I just want to ask you, mom and dad, are you listening? To God Are you listening to God?

The Hebrew word translated here is the Hebrew word shame, that means to listen with the intention of obeying. This word does not mean, speak to me and then I'll decide what I want to do about it. The attitude of this verse is, God, I don't even know what you're going to say yet, but whatever you say, I'm telling you right now I'm going to do it. That's That's shama, OK, to listen with the intention of obeying.

In fact, sometimes, many times this very word is translated obey throughout the Old Testament. In fact, over 90 times, at least in the King James Bible, this word is translated as obey. When Samuel said to Saul, to obey is better than sacrifice, it's this Hebrew word that he uses here. It means to listen with the intention.

Of obeying. So he's saying, I want you to listen. This is the first priority to hear, to listen. Moses' first command to you and I as parents is not make your children listen.

Rather, his first instruction is you listen, you make sure that you are listening to God. And this is the first command. So I think we can paraphrase it in this way, make sure you're listening to God as a first resort. Some of us listen to God, but we listen to Him as a last resort, right?

There's been a lot of times in my life where I knew what God wanted me to do. I knew what his wisdom was, but I had my own ideas and I set aside his wisdom because something else felt so right in the moment. And so I went my own way and did my own. Thing and got myself into trouble, brought hurt to myself and to other people in my life that I am called to love, and then I come crawling back to God and say, OK, what was that that you said, Lord?

I'm ready to listen now. You ever done that? Well we listen, but we listen as a last resort after we've exhausted all of our ideas, then we come to God and we're ready to listen. When I think what Moses would say here is, listen to God as a first resort.

The passion of every godly parent, is it not? In fact, I would just say of every parent is for their children to listen to them, right? Don't you want that as a mom and a dad? There's no worse fate to befall a parent than to be speaking heartfelt things to the child, especially wisdom, and your child gets this glazed overlook in their eyes.

How many of you have ever experienced that as a parent? How many of you have done that to your parent? All right, see, we've, we've all done that. and when you witness that as a child, that glazed overlook, you're like, how do I get past that glaze?

Maybe I should talk longer. Maybe I should talk louder. Maybe I should threaten or do whatever, but as a parent that's a nightmare to see that glaze, and you've got something that you think the child needs, but they're not listening. The heartbeat of every parent is to want their children to listen because what, we're smarter than our children are.

Amen. we've been around the block a few times, we've got years on them, we've learned a lot of things, many times the hard way and we're wanting our children to avoid some of the heartbreak that we've experienced. And we've got this wisdom and it's so good and so perfect, but it's like shaped like a puzzle piece, but their heart doesn't have an opening that's that shape and it won't fit. And we want our children to listen.

I don't know what issues Solomon had with his sons, but read the book of Proverbs. He's always telling them to listen. Chapter 1 verse 8, here, chapter 4, verse 13, here, my son, chapter 4, verse 20, my son, give attention to my words, chapter 5, verse 1, my son, give attention to my wisdom, incline your ear to my understanding. Chapter 5, verse 7.

Now then, my sons, listen to me, chapter 7, verse 24. Now therefore, my sons, listen to me, just to name a few. Our desire as parents is for our children to listen to us. And so we come to Moses and say, tell me how to succeed and successfully imparting God's word to my children.

And to get them to listen, and Moses says, Well, step one, you make sure that you are listening. To God. You need to be a good listener. To God.

One of the greatest favors that we can do for our children is for we ourselves as moms and dads to be good listeners to God. Secondly, You want to follow the pattern Moses lays down and increase the chances of God's word being successfully passed from you down to your children. Number 2, be a passionate lover of God. Be a passionate lover of God.

Moses is wanting to help you as a parent, but you'll notice he's not even mentioning children yet. You listen to God, and then he's also telling you to be a lover of God. He says, Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God. The Lord is one.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your. At the core of Moses's multi-generational vision is love, a passionate love. The blazing core of this multi-generational vision is a white hot love for God in the bosom of a mother and a father. This is not just God is a judge who commands and we slavishly obey.

No, there's a love relationship that is to be there, and Moses is saying you've got to love God with all of your being, heart, soul, and might. In fact, notice the language. It's the language of love. He says the Lord is our God, Jehovah is our God.

This is an exclamation. He's not just God, but he's our God. Not only do we belong to Him, but he belongs to us. God in all of his might and all of His perfections.

He's our God. The language of possession. It's the way somebody talks in a Hallmark card. You are my Valentine.

You are my girl. You are my man. There's possession, and Moses is excited about this. Jehovah God, He's our God.

He's ours. He belongs to us. And not only that, but he says the Lord is one. The Lord is one.

You can paraphrase this, Jehovah is number one. What's partly being conveyed here is priority. He ranks number one. And all of our priorities.

Jehovah is far and away our #1 priority. Everything else is a distant 2nd and 3rd and 4th priority. And not only that, but there is the idea the Lord is one. You can paraphrase it.

The Lord is the one and only. He's number one, and He's the one and only. The Canaanites in the land that they were about to enter, they had 1000 deities. Whatever the need was, they had a god for that the clouds, rain, the crops, the land, fertility, having children, what's your need?

Yeah, we've got a deity for that. Here's the deity you go to, and here's how to please this deity. They're about to enter into a land with 1000 different deities. And Moses says, Jehovah is the one and only.

You don't need 1000 deities. You have one deity with 1000 names who can meet all of your needs, and he's your God. In fact, the name Jehovah literally is translated, he is, he is fill in the blank. He is my righteousness.

He is our provider. Whatever the list is, you find in the Old Testament throughout the Old Testament, so many names being given to God as that blank is filled in and God's people discover things about Him that He is the all-sufficient one. He is all that we need, the provider of all that we need. So let everyone else have their 1000 deities and try to cover all the bases.

We've got one and he's the one and only and he covers all the bases. We have one God with 1000 names. And we are to love Him and enjoy Him with all of our heart. All of our strength and might And again, you may say, Pastor Milton, I, I had my pen out.

I was ready for some parenting advice here. You're telling me to listen to God and you're telling me to love God. I want something practical. Let me tell you something.

There are few things more practical than this. The best gift you can give to your children. is to love God first and foremost. And let me tell you why.

Let me tell you why. Like it or not, your affections are the most highly contagious thing there is about you. So be very careful what you love. You young parents, I wish I could go back and start over again.

What you love, those idols that you love. Your affections are the most contagious thing about you. Be very careful what you love, because your children will be marked by what you love. The greatest likelihood is that your children will be influenced more by your loves than by your lectures.

Mark my words, come back to me in 20 years, and I know you'll say that that's exactly true. And my own A household. I've had 4 children. Just a silly example that I share with the men a lot of times.

I became a Pittsburgh Steeler fan back in 1973. And I have 4 children and coincidentally, They're all Pittsburgh Steelers fans. How did that happen? have I sat them down and tried to disciple them in the ways of stealer nation?

have I taken them through a catechism, a Steeler catechism and said, no kids, I want to train you to think in a certain way and to love the Pittsburgh Steelers. I never did that. I was never intentional about it, but my love for that team and what they stood for was caught by my children. That's a fairly innocent example.

there are more sinister examples that I can share of different idols I've had along the way in bringing up our children. Iollaries that have marked my children. And what, some of those idols, some of those loves and affections, God delivered me from, and I'm like, Oh thank you, Lord, and I'm moving on for the Lord. But what, the marks have been made on my children, and they don't get delivered from those idols the same day I get delivered from them.

Your loves, your affections are the most contagious thing about you. Be very careful what you love. And Moses is thinking about your children here. He's thinking about what they need.

They need a mom and a dad who listen to God and who love God with all of their heart and with all of their strength and with all of their might. Jim Berg, one of my professors in college, says it this way, I love this. He says, the next generation, the next generation must be tempted with God. They must see by our passionate, God-loving lives that he is good, that he is delightful, and that he is desirable to make one wise.

I'm afraid that those who observe our lives may be led to the delusion that other things such as prestige, money, sports, recreation, control, or relationships with others are the ultimate good, delightful, and desirable pursuits of life. We must tempt them with God. That's one of your jobs as a parent, tempt your children with God. Show them by your passionate, God-loving lives that he is good, that he is delightful, and that he is desirable to make one wise.

And you might say, well, I've been telling my kids that. I tell them that every day, but are you living a passionate, God loving life? Because that's what your children are more likely to be influenced by. So listen to God.

Secondly, be a passionate lover of God. And thirdly, let God's words be on your heart all the time. If you want to increase the chances of succeeding and imparting God's wisdom, God's ways, God's words to your children and grandchildren, let God's words be on your heart all. The time he says these words which I am commanding you today shall be on your heart again.

He's not said anything about children yet. He's dealing with who you are. Living an authentic life before your children. And he's saying, God's words need to be on your heart.

Take the words of God, put them upon your heart, and keep them there. He's not saying put the Bible on your iPhone. On your iPad, put the Bible on your shelf at home. That's good.

That's good, that's good. He's saying take the words of God and shelve them in your heart. As a parent, that's one of the best things you can do for your children is to store the word of God in and upon your heart. He says, on your heart.

We talk this way. When you are thinking about somebody a lot and you see them, you may say, hey, you've been on my heart. What are you saying by that? What you're saying is I've been thinking about you a lot throughout the day.

I keep thinking about you. You've been on my heart. So what Moses is saying is for God's words to be on your heart means that you're meditating upon them, you're thinking about them. They're front and center in your consciousness, at all times, meditating, day and night.

The words of God need to be on your heart. As parents, we're thinking about our children's hearts, and man, how do I reach their hearts? How do I get God's word to be on their heart? And Moses says, first, let me ask you, is God's words on your heart?

This is Father's Day, so Let me just ask you dads, what's on your heart. Dad, The words of God. Or is it other things? Is it lust Sexual sin.

Sports. Hobbies, money. Or maybe what's on your heart are all the grievances you have against your wife. And boy, you're thinking about that all the time.

And as you think about that all the time, it saps your energy to where you can't be the dad. that your children need for you to be What's on your heart? Is it the words of the living God? Bless your children by letting the words of God be in and upon your heart.

I've shared with our men before that when, when I was in high school, I didn't really think about it a lot at the time, but There were a number of school day mornings I'd come downstairs and take a shower. I'm coming out of the shower to go back upstairs, and every morning my dad sat there in his study. I could see him as they walked by with his Bible open, reading God's word. I loved my dad's Bible.

It was so well worn. The oil from his fingers was on the pages. When I got a new Bible when I was in high school, the first thing I did was I took my fingers and rubbed it on the pages. I wanted it to be oily like his pages were.

His Bible was loved over. Every word was cherished. And just as a teenage boy, just walking upstairs and seeing him every morning with his Bible open, he'd look up and say good morning, and I'd go on. I didn't really think about it a lot at the time.

But what it did to me? As a teenager, I felt safe. It was like, what, we're OK. We're going to be OK as a family because Dad's listening to God.

And that in ways that I couldn't have even started to quantify at the time, but I can now looking back, my dad was slaying 1000 giants, and he was ministering in my heart in countless ways just by that visual every morning. This has everything to do with parenting. Listen to God, be a passionate lover of God. And let God's words be on your heart all the time.

You say, Come on, Pastor Milton, give me something I can do with my kids. All right, here we go. Teach God's words to your children. But you see why it's important if you're going to teach God's words to your children, you've got to first listen to Him or you're, you're not going to know what to teach.

Or what you and I would do is we'd just make stuff up and say this is what God says. Right? We've done that We'll just say whatever and say this is what God wants you to do. No, we need to listen to God.

We need to love God. We need to let His words be on our heart to where that is our meditation. And then out of the overflow of that we teach our children from a life to a life. Teach God's words to your children.

Verse 7, you shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down and when you rise up morning and night when you're about your business, sitting down, rising up, lying down. In all settings it just comes out because it's what you're thinking about. The word that is translated teach diligently is actually the Hebrew word that means to engrave. That's the literal idea of the term, quite literally.

This Hebrew word means to wet and to sharpen something so as to make it penetrate. Into something. In fact, in Deuteronomy 32:41, the text says, I sharpen my flashing sword, and the word translated sharpen is this Hebrew word translated teach. So we, our goal with our children is not just to throw truth at them, but to engrave the truth upon them into their lives and into their hearts, such that the truth penetrates into the fabric of their lives.

We want to engrave God's truth into them and we want it to go deeply. How can we do this? Let me, we don't have time to elaborate on each of these. Let me just throw some suggestions at you.

If you want God's truth to go deep into your children, obviously, do everything we've been learning up to this point. But let me give you some other things. Number 1, be a good example. Right, you say one thing, but you're living another.

Your children are going to follow your example more than they will your, your words. So be a good example. Number 2, spend a lot of time with your children. You can be a phenomenal example, but if your kids never see you, then your example is not all that valuable because they don't see you exemplifying the things that God wants them to do.

Thirdly, discipline your children. Discipline them. Be willing to introduce lovingly pain into their lives for the purpose of training them in the way of righteousness, but make sure that whenever you do this, you always minister healing and love. Both during and afterwards, faithful are the wounds of a friend.

When you discipline a child, there's always a soul wound, and you need to put equal energy into healing that soul wound as you put into perhaps inflicting that faithful wound. But you got to be willing to discipline. There were a number of times my dad and mom would say things to me as a kid. It just didn't penetrate very deeply into me.

But on the other side of discipline, an amazing miracle took place. Whatever it was they were saying got etched a little more deeply into me, and I'm grateful that my parents were willing to To discipline me. Also encourage and affirm your children. When your children do obey and they do the right thing, and they do what God wants them to do, make a big deal out of that.

Celebrate that. Celebrate God's artistry in their life. don't let your children grow up as one young man said to me, who said to me, the only time my dad is ever passionate towards me is when he's angry at me. And so not surprisingly, this kid always found ways to make his dad angry at him.

Because some passion is better than no passion. So when you, your kids do something right, they need to see you being very passionate about that. Also, be patient with your children. When our children observe that we've run out of patience with them, it creates a block and it literally hinders the truth that we might speak to them.

You are never more unheard by your children. Than when you are manifesting angry impatience towards them. And then sixthly, be ready all the time. Like Moses says, talk when you're sitting down, rising up, lying down, and going about your business.

You've got to be ready. Your children's hearts are not always wide open, and the older they get, the fewer the occasions when the door of their hearts swings open. You just got to be there and you got to be ready. God's words got to be on your heart because there are moments when their heart will swing open and you've got to be sensitive to the spirit and ready to speak, right?

And then let me throw one more suggestion at you, and that is And my children, 2 of my children were in the first service, and they chuckled when I stated this. Because I need to work on this, be succinct. B Succinct I told myself when I, before I had kids, I will never be a parent who talks too much. I will never do that.

And I think my children would say that I still have growing to do in that that area. Think about the book of Proverbs. The book of Proverbs is the only divinely inspired parenting manual in existence, and it is a book of Proverbs, which are succinct. Piy statements of truth, right?

Teaching us that it is better as a parent to speak to your children in Proverbs than to speak to them in paragraphs and pages and books and volumes, which we can do if let loose. And obviously you can go overboard with that. I'm not saying just your child's weeping and crying and you just got some zinger of a statement. It's just 5 words and you just walk away, I'm a great parent.

I'm not, you get the point, be succinct. I can elaborate more and more and more, but that would not be succinct, so. 1/5 and final instruction that Moses gives if you want to increase your chances of successfully passing on God's word to your children and your grandchildren, model a life of full surrender to the lordship of Jehovah. Model a life of full surrender to the lordship of Jehovah.

Look at this. He says, You shall bind them as a sign on your hand. They shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorpost of your house and on your gates.

Now let's not get caught up this morning with the literalness of the language we clearly know and everybody agrees what this symbolizes. This is a sign, he says, as a sign on your hand. It represents something. In other words, what it represents is that the words of God apply to every area of life.

Everything, all of your life is surrendered to the Lordship of Jehovah. Put God's words as a sign on your hands, basically saying these hands belong to Jehovah. They are surrendered to the Lordship of Jehovah God. Take God's words and put them on your forehead.

Representing your mind, saying this mind is under the lordship of Jehovah. When it's right here between the eyes, which is what the literal language conveys everywhere you look, you're seeing that in your peripheral vision. Everything, everything you see, the world around you is under the lordship of Jehovah and under his words and your mind and the way that you think, what comes out of your mind in your words, what goes on in your mind, what comes into your mind is under the Lord.

Lordship of Jehovah, your hands are under his lordship, your mind is under his lordship.

Also, he says, write them on the doorpost of your house. So your home, where you live, everything that happens in your home is under the lordship of Jehovah God. And then he says, write them on your gates. That's where people conducted business.

and civic affairs. So in all of your dealings, your hands, your mind, your eyes, your home, Where you conduct business and civic affairs. All of your life is under the Lordship of Jehovah. And Moses is saying, I want you to live a life of totality.

Rather than a compartmentalized life, here's what we do. We have different compartments of our lives, do we not? And Jehovah is Lord of this area and this area. This area, not so much.

This area, definitely not. This area, maybe so, and we live fragmented, compartmentalized lives. And our children watch us go from one area to the next throughout the course of a week. They watch us do that.

And they watch us. Yeah, Jehovah is Lord over Mom and Dad here but not here. They watch us on Sunday morning and we're worshiping the Lord. We're raising our hands.

We're listening to God's word. We're saying amen and they're like, Man, Jehovah is Lord over Mom and Dad when they're on the Linden Street campus. And then we get in our car and we drive off the campus and we get on the freeway. And Jehovah is not Lord of our freeway driving.

It's a whole different set of rules, and the way that we speak about and react to people on the freeway who don't drive as perfectly as we always do. Jehovah clearly is not Lord of our attitudes. And as we go throughout the week and we're in different situations, our children observe, Man, I guess Jehovah's not Lord over that area. They see Dad at the cash register and They give him too much change, and Dad sees it.

The child sees it, and he's like, I'm not going to say anything. I'm going to put that in my pocket. Jehovah's not Lord over such situations. But then Dad's back at church on Sunday morning, raising his hands.

Jehovah's Lord. Jehovah's Lord. And our children watch us live these fragmented lives of partial surrender to the Lordship of Jehovah. Here's the insidious thing about that life.

As our children watch us, Under his lordship in this area, and then we step out of this area into an area where he's not Lord. And we do that all the time. Our children are watching mom and dad leave the faith again and again and again. We walk away from his lordship.

We walk away from the faith. We're trusting in God. We're under His lordship, and then some trial comes and we freak out. We flip out and stuff comes out of our mouth and it's as if everything that we said a minute ago we believed is no longer true.

All the things we sang about and said amen to on Sunday morning is no longer true. It's like they're watching mom or dad walk away from the faith in that moment. And our worst nightmare as parents is that our children will grow up and walk away from the faith, but we just need to ask, are my children watching me walk away from the faith thousands of times? Maybe I'm teaching them how to walk away from the faith.

There are some children who grow up in Christian homes and they walk away from the faith and they don't really feel like they're walking away from anything all that valuable because mom and dad freely walked away from it again and again and again. Am I making sense? Moses is saying, I'm calling you to a life of totality. No compartments.

Jehovah is Lord of everything. Everything. Don't ever walk away from the faith. Be fully surrendered to Him.

Be a good listener to God, be a passionate lover of God. Moses is saying, let God's words be upon your heart. Teach them diligently to your children. Talk about these things out of the overflow of what is on your heart, and let all of your life bear the marks of the lordship of Jehovah, living a life of totality.

God's word tastes best to your children. When it comes to them packaged in the form of a parent who listens to God, who loves God, who meditates on God's word, and who is fully surrendered to the lordship. of Jehovah God. And may God help us to deliver God's truth to our children.

In this parental package, let's pray together. Lord, I think of all every point that we've looked at, I can think of, I can point to ways that, yeah, I've done that here and there, but I fall short in more ways than I succeed, and we thank you for grace. We thank you for forgiveness. We pray, Lord, that for any ways that any of us have fallen short, that we would know that this is what Jesus died for.

He died for father's sins and mother's sins that have hurt and affected our children, and may we run to the cross. It's what you died for, Jesus, and know that there is forgiveness with you, and may that grace melt us down and melt our hearts into deeper layers of obedience to you. You're a good God for broken fallen dads and moms. May we taste deeply of your grace through Christ today.

Help us to live this out, Lord, and And to be the type of parents that you've called us to be so that we can make the impact. that you want us to make in delivering your truth to the next generation and beyond. We thank you also for this opportunity to give of our offerings to you, Lord. Receive these funds, do much with every penny that is given for the glory of Jesus.

In whose name we pray, and all God's people said, Amen.