Thursday, February 25, 2010

The Importance of Discipling Our Children in the Home

This post contains my notes from a message by Voddie Bauchman. I heard this sermon recently, and was challenged in my original thinking about my role as a parent.

The Centrality of the Home in Evangelism and Discipleship of the Next Generation

According to recent studies, Southern Baptist churches are rapidly loosing the next generation of believers. The studies show that between 75% - 88% of "churched" young people leave their faith by the time they've reached the end of their 1st year of college.

Because America's birth rate (1.9 children per family) is now below the replacement rate (2.1), we're not having enough children for our culture to survive. For example, in France, the birth rate is 1.5. Muslims in France are having around 6 children per family. That means that in 2 generations, France will be a Muslim country by sheer numbers alone! The French have unwittingly exchanged their culture (by not producing the next generation of children) for fleeting prosperity.

Sound familiar? America's not too far behind. Just think how many Christian people think that having more than 2 children is too many! "One for her, one for him. Now we're done, Amen!" We need to get a Biblical view on children and not conform to the worldly ideals that have taken hold in our way of thinking. God believes that all children are a blessing ~ Just read Psalm 127:3-5!

With this current precedent in place, that means that to replace the 75% of young people leaving the faith, it would take 2 families to get 1 Christian into the next generation. What does this look like? According to the Southern Baptist Convention, our generation has 16 million professing Southern Baptists "on paper". That means that:
The 2nd generation (my children) will be 4 million.
The 3rd (my grandchildren) ~ 1 million.
The 4th (my great-grandchildren) ~ 250,000.

What about evangelism? After all, we have all kinds of outreach ministries in the church, don't we? Yes, we can reach the unsaved, (and are commanded to do so by Christ Himself in Matthew 28:19-20) but recent studies state that it would take reaching 3 people to replace the 1 Christian teen who has left the faith! Currently, according to studies by the Southern Baptist Convention, in regular outreach ministries, it takes 43 people to reach just 1!

The churches will continue to be filled, but according to estimates of the Southern Baptist Journal of Theology, only 1/2 of the church members are even saved. In broad terms , that means that Christianity is dying in America, 1 home at at time, 1 generation at a time. Pastor Bauchman states, "We divorce ourselves from the issue by hiring youth pastors to make it better." So how can we turn this around? Pastor Bauchman used the complete context of Ephesians 5:15-6:4 as a guide.

A. The Context
1. There are 3 contrasts
(vs. 15-18)
a. Walk wise; days are evil. (vs. 15-16)
b. Don't be foolish; understand what God's will is. (vs. 17)
c. Don't be drunk with wine; be filled with the Spirit. (vs.18)
2. There are 3 commands (vs. 19-21)
a. Be worshipful. "Sing and make melody in your heart to the Lord." (vs. 19)
b. Be prayerfully thankful. "Give thanks always for all things to God and the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." (vs.20)
c. Be submissive to Biblical authority. "Submit yourselves one to another in the fear of God." (vs. 21)
d. When these commands are obeyed, then the next point can be followed, which is:
3. There are 3 contexts (5:22-6:9)
a. The relationship of wives/ husbands (vs. 22-33)
b. The relationship of children/parents (vs.1-4)
c. The relationship of servants/masters (vs. 5-9)

B. The Fifth Commandment ~ "Honor thy father and thy mother"
1. It is the first commandment with a promise ~ "that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee."
a. The first four commandments are from God to man ~ there are no promises attached ~ we must simply obey!
~ I AM God ~ Don't get another one!
~ Don't make anything that looks like Me!
~ Don't mess with My name.
~ Don't mess with My day.
b. The last six commandments are man to man.
~ The fact that this commandment is first on this list screams its importance.
~ "Honor thy father and thy mother."
2. This commandment is for the community of faith, not for the individual child.
a. The home is central to discipleship! (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)
b. Parents are to impress loving the Lord, serving, and worshiping Him to their children.
c. Parents are to "talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up."
3. This commandment was given to the Israelites before they were going to inhabit pagan lands.
a. "Be fruitful and multiply".
b. Disciple children in the home so they don't look like the culture surrounding them.
c. Our current society is a pagan culture as well, and we need to train our children to be different than the culture.
d. The community of God will disappear if we don't.

C. Fathers: Disciple your children.
1. Parents don't train their children ~ they hire youth pastors to do it.
a. In the last 30 years, there has been the largest increase in youth outreach, but a decrease in youth baptisms. (According to the book "Raising the Bar")
b. For a child to be Spirit-filled, we shouldn't lead them to the youth pastor ~ we need to lead them!
c. The child's spiritual temperature is based on whether or not they are submissive to their PARENTS as a spiritual authority.
d. Unfortunately, the parents have willingly stepped aside, handing their sacred responsibility over to their child's youth pastor.
e. What is the current approach to youth ministry?
1. To evangelize teens
2. To disciple teens
3. To equip them to evangelize others.
d. HOWEVER ~ this approach is:
~ Un-biblical
~ Anti-thetical to the Biblical model
~ Simply doesn't work (hence the 75%-88% current failure rate)
2. The church needs to teach the parents how to disciple their children, not do it for them.
a. The church doesn't tithe for its members ~ it teaches them to tithe.
b. The youth ministry should exist to equip and assist parents as the parents do what God has called them to do!

Although I haven't experienced the "blessing" of teenagers yet, I'm challenged by the wisdom of Pastor Bauchman's charge. All to often, we as parents, don't realize the responsibility to teach our kids what we believe and why we believe it. Perhaps ignorance, thoughtlessness, or feeling inadequate is the reason. We hope that simply taking them to church will reinforce our values and beliefs. We allow "programs" such as children's ministries, Bible stories, rap sessions, youth camps and conferences do our jobs for us. These things in themselves are good ~ please don't misjudge what I'm saying. My children receive the blessings of the many people who love them and desire to teach and train them as well. These programs just need to be in addition to our discipleship at home.

The following was taken from A Wise Woman Builds Her Home:

"Did you know that we are losing our children to the world before they ever step out to go to college? Why is this? Is there glaring hypocrisy in our own lives? Was there too much worldly influence allowed in the home that caused them to go astray? Was there a lack of biblical teaching in the home leaving it up to the church folk and Sunday school classes?

It is fully the parents responsibility to teach their children what the Word teaches about everything under the sun! This is a sacred responsibility ~ do not hand it over to another! If they have a stronger foundation in the 'why' behind their belief in God, they will be able to stand firm ~ if not, they will be plucked right out of the ground as soon as anyone questions or confronts their faith.

I believe every Christian home should teach biblical apologetics for this very reason. Over and over again we find examples in Scripture were the Word of God was not taught to the next generation and they quickly forgot and followed wicked ways. God was angry and brought curses and destruction upon them. Teaching God's Word must be seen as imperative and not merely an option. Let us not be a people who drops the torch as we pass it down to the next generation."

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