The Family Matters – Session 1

Let's welcome body backham thank you body. That can't be the way I was supposed to come up with with you. This weekend, we're going to explore this idea of the family, and we're going to look at it from a particular perspective. I wrote a book several years ago called The Family Shepherds, and the idea behind that book was to answer some questions. It followed a book called Family Driven Faith, and Family Driven Faith was really an exposition of Deuteronomy six that the theology of the family. Here's what we're called to be. And there were a lot of questions about, Okay, what does that look like? So what do we do practically, what do we do in order to make this happen? And there's a lot of reasons that those questions arise. One of them is cultural degeneration. As a culture, we have become less and less conformed to the biblical idea of family, less and less conformed to the biblical concept of manhood and womanhood, and that it's becoming even more radical today that we're moving away from biblical ideas of what it means to be a man, what it means to be a woman. Literally now we're moving away from that idea and what it means to be a husband, father, a wife, and a mother, what it means to be a parent, what it means to parent our children, and so as as the culture sort of degenerates in this regard, it makes things more difficult for those of us who come to faith and have a desire to conform our lives to biblical teaching. It's kind of like as men. You know, I remember, you know, growing up as a man, just learning certain things, right, like when you were walking down the street with a woman, you walk on the curbside. That's just what I was taught. Coming into a room, you open the door, right, these I mean these You know, you're on a crowded bus and a lady comes on and you're sitting and she's standing. You get up, she says, down right, I mean these are things. These are just things that I was taught. But you know there are women who were offended by those things. Now, now it doesn't bother me, amen, I just doesn't bother me at all. Right, you don't want to go through the door, that's up to you. I'm still gonna open it. Right. You want to arm wrestle, me over, who's going to open the door? I went right. But there are a lot of young men today who are growing up in this environment where they're just being hammered all the time in this regard, and they're being talked these people talk about traditional values. We talk a lot of these biblical values of women as weaker vessel to be cherished and protected. Right, and then the culture is just hammered away. You know, that's not true, that's not real, that's not right. And then all of a sudden, we're supposed to figure out out how to be married, and they were supposed to figure out how to be parents, and that makes it difficult. And then even within the context and confines of the church, we're having issues with that. We're having problems with that. We're losing we're losing our understanding of biblical masculinity. In fact, now masculine. We don't talk about masculinitymore. We're talking about toxic masculinity. Right, it's a disorder. Did you know this toxic masculinity? It's a disorder. I read about it. I have it. Yeah. Again, you know what do we do? And so we feminize the church anything that's masculine, We just don't like. Last year, we talked about apologetics, and if you remember, one of the things I talked about is the fact that we don't like apologetics because it's too masculine. It's just not nice. It's the eleventh commandment, thou shalt be nice, and we don't believe the other ten. Right, And anytime, anytime, you know, plant your feet, square your shoulders, lift up your chant and say what thus say at the Lord. That's a little too masculine for a lot of people today. And so the church has become less masculine, preaching has become less masculine. And again, all the while we're trying to figure out how to be husbands, fathers, how to be mothers wives. So all of these things are important, and that's why we need to address these issues, and we need to address them from a biblical perspective and without apology. And so that's what we're going to do over these sessions that we have today and tomorrow. Listen to this from Richard Baxter in his book The Reformed Pastor. Baxter gave the book The Reformed Pastor. I think it was published in eighteen forty seven, but it was the result of a series of messages that he gave in a pastor's conference I think a year or so before that, and he was pleading with the pastors of his day in England. Again, this is in the eighteen hundreds. In the middle of the eighteen hundreds. Listen to what he says. We must have a special eye upon families to see that they are well ordered and the duties of each relation performed. The life of religion and the welfare and glory of both the church and the state depend much on family government and duty. Now, it's really important that you understand something here when Baxter talks about this again the title of the books, the Reform Pastor. He has a clear understanding of this reform to ethos. God has given us three institutions, the Church, the family, the state. Those institutions all have jurisdictions. They need to operate within their jurisdictions. And when they're not operating within their jurisdictions and doing what they're supposed to do, the whole of society is in trouble. So that's why he says the life of religion and the welfare and glory of both the church and the state depend much on family. Government and duty. Why would Baxter say that. Here's why, because he understands something that we don't understand anymore. You See, we've come to believe that raising children is in the purview of the state, and it ain't. It's not the job of the government, g U BNT. It's not the job of the government to raise children. It's not the job of the church to raise children. It's the job of the family to raise children, and it's the job. Listen to this statement again. The life of religion and the welfare and glory of both the church and the state depend much on family government and duty. Why Because God has very clearly given to the family the duty and responsibility of raising, training, educating, and discipling children. It's not the state's job to educate children. Not that's outside of their jurisdiction. Okay, now we've given it over. But from a biblical perspective, that's outside of their jurisdiction. Now, the welfare of both the church and the state depend much on family government and duty. Why Well, if God has clearly given the duty and responsibility of the family to raise, trained, mentor educate and disciple the next generation, then where does the church and the state get its future leaders from from the families. And who are they dependent upon to see to it that those future leaders are well rooted, grounded, trained, discipled, educated, mentored and discipled. It's the family. Okay, so Baxter understood this. If we suffer the neglect of this, we shall undo all. What are we likely to do ourselves to the reforming of the congregation if all the work be cast on us alone. Families neglect that necessary duty of their own by which they're bound to help us. If any good be begun by the ministry and any soul, a careless, prayerless worldly family is likely to stifle it or very much hinder it. Whereas, if you could but get the rulers of families to do their duty, to take up the work where you left it and help it on, what abundance of good might be done. I beseech you. Therefore, if you desire the reformation and welfare of your people, do all you can to promote family religion. Do all you can to promote family religion. And when he talks about family religion, he's talking about family discipleship, family worship. Okay, if you're serious, if you're serious about the reformation and welfare of your people. Here's where you start. It is essential. Let me give you another one. Olifer Haywood, another Puritan writer. I know not how a minister can employ his time, studies, and pen better next to the convicting inversion of particular souls than in pressing upon householders, particularly fathers, a care of the souls under their charge. This hath a direct tendency to public information. It changes things when heads of households see themselves as family shepherds, when heads of households see it as their responsibility, as their duty to raise, trained, mentor educate and disciple their children. So where do we start? I believe that there's four key areas that we start in. We'll be able to address three of them. One is family, evangelism and discipleship. We'll talk about that tonight, Family evangelism and discipleship. Another is marriage in Richmond. And marriage in Richmond is incredibly important because your marriage is the foundation upon which your family and your children's security is built. Amen, you didn't become a family when you had children. You became a family when you got married. Children don't make you a family, They just enlarge your family. And they are not the sole focus and goal of your family, they will leave. And if you give all of your attention and effort to them, when they go, your marriage will be over. If you can't say men, you ought to say ouch. So marriage and Richmond is incredibly important. I mean, it's foundation. We must not forsake our marriage. For our children, we must not be okay. And then child training and the last one lifestyle evaluation. And we'll say more about these, but let's look at that first. Let's look at family evangelism and discipleship, because this is the key to being a family shepherd. Is this idea of evangelism and discipleship. If we don't know anything else, if we don't do anything else, this is where we have to start. By the way, that baby not bothered me at all, Like not at all. You let that baby make all the noise that baby wants to make. Okay, So what do we have to know? And this is essential? And here here's why it's so important that we start here. There's there's so many people that I run into, men and women who feel like, you know, I can't do this because probably the number one reason I can't do this because I wasn't raised with this example, that's number one. Or I can't do this because I don't have enough training, education, experience, information or whatever. But those are the two main objections. Number one, I didn't grow up with this example, therefore I can't do this. And I get where people are coming from, right I do. I get where people are coming from, but they usually don't really believe that. They don't really believe that, right, And all you have to do is press just a little bit right. I've had this conver station again with men and with women on behalf of men and sometimes women who found themselves in that position of this shepherding and leading role. Never seen this, never had this example. Okay, fine, tell me about the family that you grew up in, and they'll tell me about this terrible dysfunctional family. Right, my dad wasn't this. My dad wasn't that. My dad wasn't this. My dad wasn't that. You know, it's abuse, all these other things. And I say, are you all those things? No, I'm not, huh, And they usually don't get it right off, right, So you're not those things. So your objection to being a family shepherd is you can only do the things that you've seen. But just by telling me what you saw and how in most of those other areas you've chosen to do something else, you just proved that you not only don't believe, but you know that that's not the case. Why is it that your father was lazy, couldn't hold down a job, but you do? And then when it comes to parenting, it's like I didn't have an example when you didn't have an example of holding down a job either, Right, but you figured out how to do that? Are you smelling when I'm stepping in? So we really don't believe that. But here's what we've done. We've created this unrealistic expectation of what it looks like to be a family shepherd. We've created this picture, this dealing picture in our minds, right, of parents who walk around hairly and pious. Right, you have to talk like that. It's just's the that's the right, just always in prayer and always and right. This is the picture that we've created. It's a completely and utterly unrealistic picture. It's unattainable by anyone. Right, And so we say, okay, here's this unrealistic, unattainable picture of what it means to be a family shepherd. I didn't have an example of that, by the way, nobody did. Amen. I didn't have an example of that. Therefore I can't be that. No, you can't be that because it's unrealistic. Right, And oftentimes here's what we do. We set those things up to excuse us. Right. I know I have a duty and responsibility and it's quite overwhelming. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna create in my mind this unrealistic picture of what's being asked of me. Then I'm gonna say, can't do that because it never had an example of it. That way, I get pity instead of judgment. So let that go. This is this is not about some idyllic, you know, picture of perfection as it relates to shepherding our children, right, sheperding our man, shepherding our children. It's just, you know, just keep it between the lines, right, Sometimes that's all we keep it between the lines. You know. They all made it through the day. Amen, Hallelujah, Raise the Lord. Okay, so we let that go. What is it that we do have to have? What is that we do have to know that we do have to understand and you don't have to have examples that. The first thing is these three issues. You have to you have to know what the gospel is, you have to understand evangelism, and you have to understand discipleship. That's it. This is this is ground zero for being a family shepherd. You got to understand what the gospel is, you have to understand evangelism, and you have to understand discipleship. Now, when I talk about the gospels, there's a couple of things. We need to understand what the gospel is not, what the gospel is, what the gospel requires, and what the gospel produces. Now, when I talk about what the gospel is and is not, there are several several things that we talk about. We talk about talk about the gospel, right, we'll say, you know, the gospel is all of the teachings of Christ or all of the requirements of Christ, or the gospel is whatever that is not that is not the gospel, or it was really popular, it has been really popular over the last several years, you know, to talk about the gospel as you know, love God, love people. Right, that's the gospel, Love God, Love people. No, Actually, that's a summary of the law. That's the summary of the ten commandments. Love the Lord you've got with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. That's the first four commandments. Love your neighbor as yourself that's the last six commandments. So love God, love people. It is not only not a summary of the Gospel, but it is a summary of the Law, which is the opposite of the Gospel. And the law is not the gospel. Right. What the gospel requires all the Gospel is repentance and faith. That's it. That's all. The Gospel requires. Repentance and faith. And I know I pause right there just to let you say what you just said. Well, no, well what about you got to get holiness righteousness. No, that's what the gospel produces. It's a very important distinction because if you can be holy and righteous as a requirement that you meet for the sake of the Gospel, then you don't need the gospel. If you can be holy on your own, if you can be righteous on your own, then you don't need the gospel. If you can obey on your own, you don't need the gospel. See, that's what the gospel produces. The gospel requires repentance and faith, and the gospel produces obedience, it produces holiness, it produces righteousness. This is incredibly important for parents because so many of us get this backwards. We try to teach our children to be that which only the Gospel can produce without giving them the gospel. That is the only thing that can produce it, and that creates works righteousness, self righteousness, legalism, moralism. Okay, what is the gospel? The gospel is the good news of what God has done in the person and work of Christ to redeem sinners by his grace and for his glory. That's that's the gospel. And the people will say, well, let me give you this several these five points. The gospel has to be the historic gospel, the God centered gospel, Christ centered, cross centered, and grace centered gospel. This is what we have to get. So we have to know what we have to understand. Okay, the historic Gospel. Well do I mean when I say the historic Gospel? I mean the gospel is a message about something that happened in history. Amen, It's about what God has accomplished through the person and work of Jesus Christ. It is historic. It is historic. It is also God centered, not man centered. The Gospel is God centered, not Man centered. The Gospels about God's work, not man's work. The Gospels about God's glory, not man's glory. The Gospel doesn't begin with you know, God needs you. God wants you God because God doesn't need anything. If God needed something, he wouldn't be God. Amen. If you need something, that means you lack something. By definition, you're not God. If you lack something, Okay, God doesn't need you. He's going to prove it because one day you're going to die and the world's gonna keep on spinning and somebody's gonna get all your stuff. Okay. And by the way, it's only when you understand that God doesn't need you that you can truly appreciate the significance of the fact that God loves you. So it's God's centered. It's Christ's centered. The Gospel is Christ's centered. So God has accomplished through the person and work of Christ. Christ died for sin once for all the just, for the unjust, in order that he might bring us back to God. Right. God made him who knew no sin, to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Okay, it is Christ it is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Isaiah says it this way, all we, like sheep, had gone astray. Each of us had turned to his own way. But God hath laid upon him the iniquity of us. All the gospel is the good news, for God has accomplished through the person and work of Jesus Christ. The gospel is cross centered. The gospel is cross centered. This is incredibly important the gospel. The gospel is not something that people can add to their lives to make them better. The gospel doesn't come to us and say, listen, you're doing a good job. Here's something that can get you over the hump. That is not the gospel. The gospel does not come and say, you're a good person. This can make you better. The gospel is cross centered. The gospel says you are a ruined sinner, and God crushed and killed his only begotten son on the cross because that's what your sin deserved. The gospel is bloody. Your sin is significant. My sin is significant. You didn't just make bad choices, amen, Your sin is significant. My sin is significant. So it's cross centered. And then finally it's grace centered. By grace, are you saying through faith, not as a results of works. Amen. It is grace centered. So that's what I mean when I say a biblical gospel. There are so many things that we either add to or take away from this gospel. But in order for us to be family shepherds, that's what we have to get. That's what we have to understand, this historic, God centered, Christ centered, cross centered, grace centered gospel because it's only then that we can understand evangelism. Okay, it's only then that we can understand evangelism. Listen. Evangelism for a parent is not about getting your child pray the prayer. Hey man, I've had conversations with that parent on a number of occasions. You know, just just a little I just don't know, little Johnny. It's just you know, and he's you know, and he's this, and he's that, and you know, Johnny's twenty years old and living on Fools Hill and you know, all this other stuff's going on, and I'm like, well, we just need to pray to God will save it. Oh no, He's saved. No, you see. Okay, See, Okay, so you just describe somebody to me and I don't. I don't. I can't. I can't see hearts and souls and I can't. But the person that you just described to me, it's not a saved person. Oh no, he's saved. He saved. What Wow, I don't understand. No, no, no, no, no no no. I was there. He was seven years old. He walked the aisle, he prayed the prayer. I was there, he said. Okay, So you are taking the experience of a seven year old thirteen years ago over the reality of a twenty year old today. That's a parent who saw their duty as get the child to pray the prayer. It's magic. Just get them to say the words and then presto chango, hocus pocus. Done. Done. It's because we again, when you understand the Gospel, it changes the way you view evangelism. Several thing we have to get and this will lead us into these other areas that we're going to talk about. The fallen nature of man, the supernatural work of the spirit, the role of the human agent, the nature of conversion, and the fruit of repentance. So when we talk about the fallen nature of man, what do we mean, Well, what we mean is that man is not just sick in sin, dead, in sin Ehesus two. Right, you are dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walked, dead in your trusts in sins. So oftentimes you like to, you know, use the illustration of the person who's you know, who's drowning, and you know, you throw out the life preserved her and and God will save you. But you got to reach up and you got to grab it. Horrible illustration. Horrible illustration because dead men don't grab things. Amen, I'm not a doctor. I don't play one on TV. A couple of things I know, though, and one of them is dead men don't grab things if they do. Run right, You have to understand the fallen nature of man. You have to understand what your child's need is. Because here's we fall into this trap. We believe that our children are basically good. And that's again, that's a that's a lie. It's a lie. It's a lie. People who say that don't have kids, your children. Their children are not. They're not basically good. They're not, you know, and I know when they come, which is all this press, and they are they're precious, precious little sinners. They're falling, they're falling. And what they need. Again, if my child is basically good, then they just need some guidance from me, some rules from me, some principles from me. But if my child is falling in atam and it's a ruined center, then they need to be saved. To see how that little tweak changes things. Secondly, the supernatural work of the spirit. We have to understand the supernatural work of the spirit, that God saves sinners, that God saves sinners. Again, Ephesus too made us alive together with Christ. You were dead and He made you alive together with Christ. That's the miracle of regeneration. It's the miracle of the rebirth. Dead men don't grab things. Well then, how how if repentant and faith is required and you're dead, how does that happen? Regeneration the spirit makes us alive together with Christ. This changes that, This changes the way you approach your children because when you understand that you are dependent upon the Spirit of God for this supernatural work, moves you toward prayer and dependence on God. Thirdly, the role of the human Agent's the role of the human agent repentance in faith. Repentance in faith, not just praying a prayer repentance in faith catechisms. The catechism says, say it this way, But what is it to repent? To be sorry for sin and to hate and forsake it because it is displeasing to God. It's repentance, right, not to be sorry, I got caught, Not to be sorry, you're mad, right, And I hate and forsake my sin, not because it's brought bad things into my life, but because it's displeasing to God. Okay, that gets us to understand the nature of conversion that would become new creatures in Christ. All things pass away, new things have come, and the fruit of repentance. That's what we look for. Okay, that's what we look for. Again, think about the difference between this and prayer, prayer, and then discipleship. Discipleship the last piece of the muzzle. So we have to understand the gospel, right, this historic God centered Christ centered, cross centered, grace centered gospel. We have to understand evangelism. When you again, when you understand evangelism, Now, evangelism is not about me getting my child a prayer, prayer, It's not about me convincing my child. It's about me making the gospel clear to my child over and over again in many ways, from many different angles, okay, over the course of their life. And there are many building blocks that we put under our child's life in order to help them understand the Gospel. And then there's discipleship. And if he's in chapter six, any verse one, children of your parents and the Lord, for this is right, honor your father and your mother first command with a promise, and that may be well with you. You may live long in the land. Father. By fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bringing them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. This, of course, is taken from Deuteronomy chapter six. If you look at Deuteronomy six, verses five through seven, these words that I am commanding you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children. You shall talk to them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise. So this isn't on going process, this discipleship process. I talk about these three phases of discipleship. That first phase of discipleship is the really that training phase. And in that phase we say to our child, give me your attention, right, give me your attention, because in that again, if you don't give me your attention, I can't teach you anything. Children will be your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Children will be your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Have they learn how to obey? They have to learn how to do what they're told when they're told, with their respectful latitude right. They have to. They have to. It's essential because everything else that they're going to be taught has to be built on that. Teachers in classrooms understand, you cannot teach your class if there's not classroom discipline. Amen, there has to be classroom just did why do you? Why did we? Why were there things like detention and that board that they used to have. When I was in Man, we used to have to go to Coach Pitts's class, which was terrible cause because Coach Pitts, you know, you just you'd much rather one of the other teachers applied the board than Coach Pits. But the other problem was he's Coach Pitts. So if you got in trouble, you had to go see Coach Pitts to get your squats, and then you had to see coach at practice later on and explained why you got sent to it. I was bad, man, it was bad. But why have all those things traditionally and historically existed. Because you can't teach without discipline, okay, And so we start there. We start there with that discipline and training phase. Give me your attention. Then we do that that. I call it the catechism phase. The catechism phase. Give me your mind, Give me your mind, children of being your parents in the Lord. If this is right out of your father and your mother's first commandment, with a promise, they may go well with you and you may live a long on the land. Fathers, do not provoke your children anger. Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. You have to teach them what to believe and why to believe it. You have to teach them to believe like Christians. Okay. And so I call this that catechism phase. This is where we get them the information, those facts, long before they're ready to use it. Right. And when I say the catechism phase, one of the things that we use in this phase is literal catechism, right, which is learning something through a series of questions and answers. You know, the Probably the most famous catechism is the Westminster Shorter Catechism. A lot of people like catechism. Where is that? I never heard of catechism? Yes you have? What is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is to glorified God and enjoy him forever. Wait, where have I heard that before? It's catechism. It's the most popular a catechism in the world. Right, that's that's that's okay, That's that's how we that's how we teach scripture, memory, things like that that we get in there. And again I get people who, and I kind of understand it, who object to this. You know, I just don't want to do all of that rope memorization stuff. Well why why? Because I want my children to value a relationship with God. Okay, great, Do you want you want them to have a relationship with education? Do you want them to have a relationship with math? Reading? Do you want them to enjoy those things? Yeah? You do? And you don't hesitate to force them into rope memorization on any of those things. Why? Because you believe that they are essential to your child's life and you wouldn't dare neglect them. I'm a glass step further because you believe you'd be a bad parent if you allowed that to be neglected. Can you imagine, Can you imagine somebody who said that they, you know, they weren't educating their child, that they weren't preparing their child academically, that there weren't that they weren't you know, we'd call the people, right, We didn't even have to know who the people are. We just pick up the phone and be like, operator, you need to give me the people, and there'd be somebody knocking on your door. We heard that you are not, you know, educating your child. You're not this, you're not dad, you're not the other. But yet we got families, Christian families who are not catechising their children, who are not disciple of looking their children, never engage in family worship, and nobody says a mumbling word because we don't care, because we worship at the altar of education and that is our God. And we believe that we are successful parents to the degree that we get our children the proper education and from a spiritual perspective, as long as they don't do anything really bad, we're okay. This is what we believe. When the rubber meets the road. This is what we believe, and don't argue with me. Don't argue with me. I'm right, and I know I'm right. How do I know I'm right? Because we behave in accordance with what we believe. Everybody does. Everybody behaves in accordance with what they believe. And you have people who cannot figure out how to find time for the spiritual development and discipleship with their children, but they take them to every practice and get them involved in reactivity. Mm hmm. We behave in accordance with what we believe, and we do not believe that this is important. So first phase is that that discipline training phase. Give me your attention. You've got to give me your attention, right, And this is those this is those first few years of life. Okay, our children when they come home, when they come home to us, their survival, their survival is dependent on us paying more attention to them than they do to us. Amen. We can do. We do airthing right. Beyond everything right, we gonna do airthing. But at some point, uh, that needs to change. That our children must come to understand that their survival depends on them paying more attention to us that we do to them. Give me your attention, because I've got stuff you need and I'm committed to giving it to you, but you have to give me your attention. Then it's give me your mind because I'm gonna give you this information. I'm gonna get it in there. You want to understand it, you won't be able to handle it all. Same thing with your math facts and everything else. Right, you want to understand all this, but it's important that you get these foundational pieces so that we can build on them. Then there's the third phase, and that third phase is the discipleship phase. And that last phase, so we go from give me your attention, give me your mind, give me your hand, and then that last phase is where we walk with them and teach them to apply these things. And here's the great irony, folks, the devil is a liar. We have come to believe that when our children reach a certain level of maturity, it's important for us to let them go and for their peers to be the bigger part of their life. That's exactly when the discipleship face kicks in, exactly when when they reach biblical adulthood. Biblical adulthood is around twelve thirteen. That's why we see Jesus at a couple of ages twelve and thirty. Right, twelve when he reached adulthood, and thirty when he reached what would then have been considered senior adulthood. Couldn't have been an elder before thirty. Right, And this is the time when we say, give me your hand, walk with me. Let me show you how these things are lived out. Okay, this is that picture of discipleship. So a yain, no rocket science here, it's not complicated. Being a family shepherd starts with this idea of family evangelism discipleship. We got to understand what the gospel is. We got to get that. We understand what the gospel is, and then we got to understand what evangelism is, which is this continued commitment to repeating the truths of this historic, God centered, Christ centered, cross centered, great centered Gospel to our children from a variety of different ways and different angles and perspectives throughout their life. Okay, and then understand what discipleship is those three phases, give me your attention, give me your mind, give me your hand. Okay again, not the idyllic, unrealistic picture not complicated, really quite simple, not easy, really quite demanding, but it is what's required on us. And again, this is not a formula. You know, you do this and you will get that. No, this is not a formula, okay, but this is something that we commit to because we know that it's what God requires us. And He is sovereign over the ends as well as the means a man. And what that means is God is sovereign over the salvation of our children, but also what's the means for people to come to faith the gospel. So He's put our children in an environment where we are their shepherds and we're committed to the Gospel. Well, praise God for that. Amen, let's pray. Father, We thank you. We thank you for this night, for this weekend, this time that you've given us. Thank you for all of these brothers and sisters who've come have committed themselves to being equipped in this area. And we pray that you would use that for your glory and for the sake of our families, for our children, for the next generation. For I pray for those who have come feeling overwhelmed or at the end of the room, I pray that as we go through these truths, it would become more and more clear that you have not called us to anything extraordinary, but to merely trust you and obey you in the small and mundane things. And we ask that as we do that, that you would cause it to bear fruit. For we pray this in Christ's name and for his sake. Amena, thank you, Vodie. We'll see everyone back here at nine o'clock in the morning. Doors open at eight thirty. Make sure you check out the Wrath and Grace product table. You are dismissed