Amen. Well, um, as Lexi said, we're gonna continue this series. If you've got your Bible with you,
Ephesians 6, and we're gonna just jump straight in. And um, today we're gonna be talking um to children. Who in here is a child of a parent? Just make sure you're listening, okay. Some of y'all aren't listening, okay. Like, that's not me. Everybody got here. By God's providence in two people. No one in here is self made. You are not the byproduct of two people's passions. You're a byproduct of the providence of God in two people.
And that actually, as we get into this today, I want to start with that. We're going to be in
Ephesians 6. I want to start with that because I want to go ahead and let you know I have historically been a bad son. I was not obedient to my parents. I made life very difficult at an early age for my parents. I'm going to share a little bit of that story here in just a little while, especially as I got older. But I I was not, you would not need you would not want to look at me and say, do that. Some of the we actually have some people. Uh the justices were with me. Uh well, I say with me, like it was my place, but um we went to school together, elementary school and middle school together. I had a rep, you know, I had a reputation. Um, I I I did what I wanted to do, how I wanted to do it. I just was not a good son. And I know people will it like really quickly excuse stuff like that by saying, Well, you're just a kid, and you know, kids are this way, but I want you to understand something. There is a place for godliness even in our children. And you don't get it there by even what Charles was just saying. You don't get it there by coercing it out.
Parents, we're going to talk to all of us next week. We're going to talk mainly to children, but but there is a place of godliness for our children to obtain, and there is a way for Christian children to live. And Paul describes it here and prescribes it. He describes what it looks like, and he tells us that it should be done. So if you are a child today, I want your ears. And that's not just for one side. And we're going to take two. Basically, parts of this.
I want to talk the first part of the sermon. I want to talk to those who are around 12 to 18, or maybe you're in your 20s and you're still living at home. And then the second half of my message, I want to talk to adult children. Okay. And uh spend a little bit of time maybe helping us with what Paul tells us here in
Ephesians 6. Starting in
verse 1, this is what Paul says: Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is, everybody say that word with me. Right. Then he quotes Moses in the Ten Commandments when he says, Honor your father and mother, and then he makes a small comment of his own. This is the first commandment with a promise, and then he comes back and tells you what the promise is that Moses was told in the commandments, that it might go well with you, and that you may live long in the land. Come on, somebody. For a long life that God says is tied to, listen, a long life that is tied to how you treat. Your parents. I didn't know this until I got older. If I would have, I might have been a little bit more cautious. Come on, somebody. Might have been a little bit more weary or leery rather of doing certain things and saying certain things and acting certain ways. If I would have known this, we're gonna take a look at this today, and we're gonna start in just a second by talking specifically to that age group of around 12 to 18 or living at home, not quite married, not quite living on your own, still kind of under your parents' care.
Before we do that, let's pray one more time. Let's ask the Lord. Uh, to meet us in his word and help us with what's going on, maybe even our own hearts today. Father, thank you so much already for this time of worship. You really are worthy of everything. As Charles said, it's all yours. Even our hearts belong to you. And so would you fashion them this morning in a way that is in alignment with your word? Holy Spirit, wherever there is need of conviction and repentance, would you flood our hearts with those things? And would you help speak to us in ways that we can understand? Each of us individually are carrying our own weight and our own load, and we're working through this thing called life. Holy Spirit, would you meet each of us? In the church as the body of Christ, would you meet us individually, Lord, even though we are here together corporately, would you do a work in our hearts? We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.
Well, the theme of these verses is obedience and honor. And in order for us to probably walk through this, it'd be good just to define those words. A lot of times in church, and a lot of times and just in general, we have words that we throw around, we say all the time, and then we don't really know what they mean, but we say them a lot. And that's where the phrase or the saying semantics comes from. You start to say things, but you don't know what they mean, or you're saying things just to say them. And so obedience and honor. Just like as we've taught the last couple of weeks towards husbands and wives, when you talk about submission and when you talk about authority, sometimes the idea of obedience and honor, even in the church, has kind of become a sour thing for people. I think that a lot of times, even in the church, people have a hard time honoring people. They'll even make comments. I've had this said to me, maybe people thought I was prideful, and that might have been a good thing. I don't know. But they would say things like, Now listen, before I say this, I don't want you to get the big head. Well, let me determine whether I get the big head or not. Just give me the comment. You know what I mean? Like just why don't you let me wrestle with whether or not I'm prideful before you tell me I'm prideful and then give me the comment? You know what I'm saying? But it's almost like an assumption that if we tell you something that honors you, we've got to be careful because you're gonna take it and you're gonna run with it the wrong way. And so now the culture, even in the church, is very difficult for people to honor people. Did you know that the scriptures actually say Paul says, outdo one another in giving honor? Do you know that the people who want to be honored the most are usually the ones who honor the least? It's a pretty interesting thing. And in our culture right now, currently, and it's obvious that this was the case when Paul was writing to the church in Ephesus, that the family unit was at stake and that Christian families needed to be strengthened and formed after the image of Jesus. And Jesus and the Father. Operate in this unity and this spectacular way to let us know that this is what families should look like, a father and their son. And Jesus would often do things like I like in order to glorify God, the most, that that the most glory that God can get from me, Jesus said, is for me to be obedient. And Paul would later write that Jesus became obedient to the point of death, death on a cross. So you have never been more obedient than Jesus. Jesus has given his life to honor the Father and to glorify him. And this is how sons and daughters should be towards their parents.
But it's hard. You know, if you start thinking about it, we're in a culture now again that that is very much against the nuclear family. If you don't think that's true, just open your ears for about five seconds on any place other than the church. And they're screaming autonomy. They're screaming, you don't need your family. They're screaming, rebel against your parents. They're screaming, you don't need anybody, make yourself uh the best you can be, and based on what you think is right, and based on what you think is best. And that's why I really do. I applaud those of you that are fostering, those of you that are trying that they're going to classes to foster, and those of you that are adopting, you represent something so spectacular in the body of Christ. To take on where some parent might have left off, and then giving yourself to them in a special way is very, very beautiful. And it's very much the nature of the gospel in that way. I love it. And I love it that so many families here are doing that. And I'm it's almost a point of my life where I'm kind of like, how do we figure out how to do more of this? But Um, it's it's hard. It's hard to obey. You remember being a kid if you're an adult? Do you remember being a kid? And if you are a kid right now, do you know how those times where it hits you, where your parents want you to do something? And it's literally the phrase that comes out and comes to mind is you're literally ruining my life by asking me to do this. Come on, somebody. You mean you remember? I remember just being like, you're literally you're ruining my life. My 12 year old life. It's a full life. And now you're ruining it, okay? Maybe you're too far removed from that time, and you've moved over into thinking that you were the best child in the world. Who knows? But the bottom line is every child has to learn how to be obedient. And it's difficult.
Let's define it real quick. Let's define obedience and honor so that we can work through this today. Obedience just means this it's really simple. Doing what your parents ask of you. That's obedience. Now you this is like a black or white issue. You either obey or you don't obey. You either do what they say or you don't do what they say. Now I'll get to this point in a second, but obedience now, people are oftentimes, it seems like in our culture kind of uh saying, Well, you know, you don't even know really if you can trust your parents or not. That's what kids are being fed. You know, you should trust me. I don't know, your parents may not be doing it right. The school system kind of can get that way sometimes, you know what I mean? Like in the public education realm, not to say the teachers are this way, we love our teachers and all that kind of stuff, but like in the public education system, sometimes it can almost feel like that there's this hovering of like, parents, y'all got to get on board with what we're doing, you know? And so it's hard sometimes. Thank, thank God for godly teachers in the public education system. Amen. Come on. So, but it's it's like our world is bent on trying to get uh parents in a gap between parents and kids. To where kids are rethinking everything about their parents. You know, it's always been, it's always seemed like that kids have this natural bent to be like, gosh, my parents are lame, gosh, my parents are out of touch. I think that is pretty natural. But there is this sense of when it shifts from my parents and I are on the same kind of like vibe to I don't care to do anything my parents ask. That's a whole different attitude than we're not we're not in the same generation. Those gaps exist, but the gener uh the gaps that exist in as far as obedience, it seem like they be they're widening. It seems like it's more appropriate, or it's like parents in some ways get more okay with the fact that their kids do not obey them and that this is kind of just how it is. That's their stage of life. We have all these uh secondary arguments over uh whether or not you should spank or whether or not you should ground or whether or not they should have a phone, and we miss the forest for the trees. Obedience, just as Charles just said, obedience is a matter of your heart way before it's a matter of what you're doing and saying. And so if you're 12, 13, 14, 18 years old, or you're in your 20s living with your parents for just a second, do you do what your parents ask you to do? Paul says, children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor means to respect your parents and regard them as important. Respect your parents and regard them as important. Do you honor your parents? Do you respect them? Do you speak to them respectfully? Do you regard them as important? Do you realize that your parents are a part of your formation?
Now, I this is something that I'm gonna talk to a little bit more in just a second, but I understand the difficulties of if you're being parented by somebody who is not a believer. And I I want to say something that that I've said it uh in the first part of the series when we were talking to wives. When I said, hey, I don't have any problem saying wives submit to your husbands. Because if I'm talking to godly men, godly men are never going to ask their wives to submit to something that's unbiblical, immoral, or unethical. And if I'm talking to godly parents, they're not going to be asking you kids to submit to anything that is immoral, unbiblical, or unethical. Now, if you're 12 to 18 or you're living at home, if your parents ask you to do something immoral, unbiblical, or unethical, I don't think you have the obligation to obey that. Can you hear the 12-year-olds going, you heard that? But let me tell you something. That caveat, you don't have to obey your parents if they ask you to do something unbiblical, unethical, or immoral. Most of the time, 99.999. You know those Clorox commercials where they're talking about they kill 999. They have to say that because just in that 0.0001% chance that those germs are still there. There's probably a 0.0000001% chance that your parent might ask you to do something immoral, unethical, or unbiblical, but more than likely, the issue is, is it has nothing to do with it being unethical, immoral, or unbiblical. It has something to do with it not being our preference. And preference oftentimes, come on, older people in the house, you have watched preference become law. In your heart, and then when you transgress my preference that I hold as law, you've now done something un immoral, unbiblical, or unethical to me. We gotta be really careful that the only thing that has full authority in our life is the word of God. Now, I'm not one of these people that's gonna sit here and Bible thump you all day long. I like to talk about other things than the Bible, but if this is not our authority, Then we'll use other things to try to establish godliness or spirituality, and they will be so far from God's heart that we may find ourselves reaping things that we don't think we should reap because we're doing what we feel is best. And we are in a culture saturated with people who love clinging to a Jesus that's not found too many times in the scriptures. We want a Jesus that'll cater to our preferences, and therefore, you know, we can find loopholes. So if your parents are asking you to do something that squashes your prep your your preference, here is the biblical prescription and description. Obey them, for it is right. And here's what you can do. If you're a if you were like me, my parents would tell me something. Um again, I was not a good son, so I would go to my room. There's some actually really hilarious videos. It's like it shows like millennial crashing out on parents after they get disciplined. And this was literally me. I would go shut the door and I would just be like, you know, I wouldn't be making a sound, but I'd be like punching my pillow. I'd be like, oh I'm gonna leave packing a suitcase, like I'm gonna run away from home, you know. So dramatic, right? Uh if you were like me, so you would say, you know what? Here's what I'm gonna tell, go back to week one, and I'm gonna go back to here with kids. If your husband, wives, if they do something that's out of order and children, if your parents do something out of order, let's trust God that God will deal with them. Let's make sure that we're doing what God asked us to do. If we submit or we're obedient to our parents, let's trust that God will take care of our parents if they're off. But we don't want to do that, do they? We will just kind of want to do our own thing. Come on, real quick. Somebody, there was an actual real kid. You weren't a fake kid. You were a real boy. You're not a wooden boy. I'm a real boy. You're a real kid. You had problems with what your parents do. We had a literal whole revolution in the 60s and 70s where literally people were saying, I do not want this authority in my life. And if people want to get, I love it. I love listening to older people. Kids don't know anything about respect these days. In the 60s and 70s, you folks were doing LSD and running around doing all kinds of God knows what. And you're talking about this generation? You know, come on, chill out. You know what I'm saying? Come on, somebody. You know, we're talking about we had the sexual revolution over here in their life. These kids these days, y'all are at Woodstock tripping on stuff, throwing up peace signs, talking about how y'all were doing it right. Come on. Yeah, our kid, our kids aren't that bad, right? Like maybe, maybe we have learned some things. But what was the heart through every one of those generations? Rebellion doesn't have to be a full-on revolution, it just could just be this distance in our heart. From doing what we know we should do when our parents ask us to do it.
So here's a few questions. I like inventories. This is why I like our encounter retreat. Um, when we do our encounter retreat, there's a lot of these moments where we do what I call inventories, where we're asking questions and we're doing things to say, do you know where you are in this particular area? The most horrible thing that could be true of any person's life in here is that you don't know where you are with God. The first question that Adam and Eve ever get asked by God is, Where are you? And he didn't ask them for his sake, he asked them for theirs. The worst thing that could ever happen to a Christian is them not know where they are with God. I take inventories, we take inventories so we can know where we are with God in a specific area. So if you're around the ages of 12 to 18 or you're still living at home, let me give you a few questions so you can rate your obedience and the honor you have for your parents. Let's just run through these pretty quickly. Number one would be. Do you react poorly when being corrected by your parents? Do you react poorly when you're corrected by your parents? You don't have to answer out loud. Please don't. Or maybe your parents will be like, that's right, amen. Okay. Is your attitude towards your parents typically pleasant? Parents, quit looking at your kids right now, okay? Just keep your eyes forward. Are you quick to obey your parents' instructions? Do you delay? Do you put it off, or are you quick to do what they ask? Do you listen to your parents with the intention of doing what they say? In other words, when your parent is instructing you, are you sitting there thinking, Oh my gosh, I'm so tired of being lectured right now. Or are you thinking I'm ready to do what I'm being instructed to do? Do you listen to your parents? Sorry, do you think about and desire your actions and your life to reflect well on your parents? If if you would have asked me this question when I was 13, 14 years old, I'd be like, no, I don't give a rip. And and I probably would have said it out because outright because that's just how I was. But Do you think about and desire your actions and life to reflect well on your parents? Let me ask that again, but from this perspective, because Paul says, children obey your parents in the Lord. Just like wives are being asked to submit to their husbands, like the church submits to Christ, and husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church. So there's all these things about in Christ, in the Lord, all these things are tying back to how we are with the Father. So my thought would be is if you're not caring or thoughtful about how your life reflects on your family, you're probably not also thinking about how your life reflects on the Lord. You know, you don't care about if someone sees you doing something, what that means for how they would view God through you. See, all of these things about our family point to something bigger than our families. Wives, if we can't, not we, wives, if you can't submit to your husbands, then it shows a poor attribute of the church being able to submit to Christ and the authority of the Word of God. If husbands aren't loving their wives as Christ loved the church, then when people see you not loving your wives sacrificially, then they probably think that cross really isn't that big of a deal. And then, children, if you're not obeying your parents in the Lord, then it probably means you have a bad way of obeying your Lord Jesus, if he in fact is your Lord.
And so these all these things kind of tie together. Last two questions are the are this: Do you care about what your parents say and how they live? Parents, this one's a hard one because sometimes your parents can see through your bull crap. You know, I can, at the end of the day, I can come in here and say all kinds of stuff and do all kinds of stuff. But my kids that are in here listening to me right now, they go home and see me as me. And there had there there doesn't need to be a discrepancy between how I am here and how I am at home. If there is, then they they would be able to call that out and say, hey man, that's kind of hypocritical to be up, you know, to be like, hey, you're talking about doing all this stuff, but you don't do all those things. So, parents, what do you value? What do you care about? Because if your kids are having a hard time, this is a good, this is a great prompt. If your kids are having a hard time obeying you, don't just get mad at your kids. Go straight to the father and say, you know, Father, am I obedient to you? Because I don't think I'm frustrated with my disobedience to you as much as I am their disobedience to me. And so we've got a part to play. If your kid's doing something that irritates you or that that drives you nuts and you can't figure it out and you're losing your grits over things that are maybe not that big of a deal, but you won't sorrowfully go to God over your stuff, maybe get the order right, parents. Don't get mad at your kids about something that you'll stubbornly sit before the throne of grace and go, I'm not changing. I'm not doing that. I don't care what so and so said, I'm not gonna do that. Then don't get mad at your kids when they literally look in your face and go, Nope. How many times have you stood at the foot of the cross and seen the sacrifice of Christ and said, Great sacrifice, I'm glad I'm going to heaven, but I'm not obeying past this preference. So there's a mercy that should come into our hearts as parents to say, I get that. Doesn't mean that we don't discipline our kids, as we'll talk about. It doesn't mean we don't discipline our kids, but it does mean we have mercy as we do it. And do our kids see us as people that live with mercy, saying, I care about your obedience. But but I'm not sitting here trying to extract obedience from you because my Jesus isn't extracting from He's gracefully pulling me through His mercy and compassion into a life of obedience to Him. Lastly, are you obedient only when it's convenient or does it or when it doesn't cost you anything? Again, 12 to 18. Does it fit within your busy schedule to obey your parents? Does it fit your what you're able to do? When your parents ask you to do something, are you only able to fulfill that when it's convenient or doesn't cost you anything? You do not, 12 to 18 living at home, you don't have to learn how to disobey your parents. That comes naturally. What you have to learn is how to obey and honor your parents. And listen, there is no magic trick to learning obedience. I need some adults in the house to help me on this one. There's no magic trick to learning how to obey. You learn how to obey by obeying. And it sometimes doesn't get easier, sometimes it gets harder. It's like sometimes when you first get saved, God throws you these law pitches, you know? These law pitches that, man, you can just crank them. I did that for God. Oh my God, I was faithful in that. I did that. And then as you start following Jesus, he seems to throw curve balls from time to time. You say, why would God do that? Why would God make things, and we would say our terminological, why would he make things harder? He's not making things harder, he's revealing your nature. He's pulling you into a more holy life. And, you know, if if we're not teaching our kids that obedience is something you learn, then when they come to know Christ or if they know Jesus, they're going to relate them obeying the Lord to obeying you. We're going to talk about this next week. And I hope, man, I hope it lands with us because I'm deeply convicted about this when it comes to our parenting. But they are our kids, children, you have to learn how to obey. Are you committed to that? Because in you being committed to learn how to obey your parents would also mean that you would be willing to be fashioned and shaped in a way by Jesus.
I want to uh finish up today by talking to adult children. So uh 12 to 8, 12 to 18, you're living at home. Um you're off the hook for for the rest of the sermon. Actually learn a little bit here because I want to tell you a little bit um about my story. I want to talk to adult children because um when you leave your home, um the the biblical phraseology would be, especially if you get married, you leave your family and you cleave to your wife or you cleave to your spouse. Leave and cleave have been how I was taught, right? You leave and cleave. But maybe you you're you're older now, you've moved out. Um, you are no longer obligated to obey anything your parents say. They are not in charge of you anymore. Okay? Some of you are like, that's exactly right, that's why I moved out. That was my heart, man. That was sort of where I was. Um, but you don't you don't have any obligation to obey your parents anymore, but you have every obligation to honor them. And and and um out of my own story and out of watching. And hearing stories, one of the things that I know is probably becoming the most difficult thing for adult children to do today is to honor their parents.
In um 2018, I had a just a break breakdown. I was still functional, I was able to do everything I was normally able to do, but if I got alone long enough, I was gonna lose it. Anybody in here ever lost their grits before? Y'all know what that means? My grits was getting lost daily, okay? Um, in fact, I was driving through here this week, right up here, there is an advanced auto parts. Um, one day I was going to pick up Kingston. He was at the old, y'all remember when we were meeting at the old warrior elementary school. That the school was still having kids there, and uh I was picking up Kingston. I was getting in Car Line. Car line's enough to make you lose your grits, but I was going to Carline, I wasn't even in it yet. I had to pull over in that advanced auto parts. Because I was crying so hard. And I know y'all all think I'm just the biggest baby in the world and I cry all the time. And I do, I do cry a lot. But this wasn't like I'm upset, like sorrowful crying. This was angry crying. Anybody ever did any of angry crying stuff before? That's weird, you know? Like you, it's a weird vibe, the angry crying. In 2018, I had this breakdown because all of these memories started coming back to me of things that happened to me when I was a kid. And um I I I don't think, I don't think that anybody should ever ignore horrible things that happened to you as a kid. It does not mean that you need to make out like it's not a big deal. In fact, that's obviously what I had done for so long that I had suppressed all these things that had happened to me and things that I witnessed and things that I experienced that kids should not experience. And I didn't know how to handle it. I was so angry with my parents. My mom and dad divorced when I was around four years old, and those years were the just painful, awful years. I love my mom. I love my dad. I've definitely been a lot of story of God's grace and all that. But I think important for today to say that at that point, I was really going through it. So much so that I uh I would come home and I would be swearing, I would be just absolutely losing it. Um fortunately, my kids were, I think, too young for me to get them involved and all that. But I was just really messed up. I was just not in a good place. One particular point, me and Jennifer were in the kitchen, and I was just, I was giving my parents what for? They weren't in the room, obviously. You know, I'm just venting and sharing. I'm just all this stuff. And Jennifer, I'm looking up at Jennifer, and Jennifer's looking like, what do I do? You know, what do I do? And she ended up saying, I think you need to go talk to somebody, aka, you need to go get help. Like, you need therapy. Like, this is some deep stuff. And so I took her up on that. I ended up going, and I want you to know that this church is pro-therapy, but I want to say that with a caveat. Therapy is not sanctification. No counselor can do what the Holy Spirit can do. So you go to counseling. Get all the help you need. Sit on that couch and cry. Sit on it and swear. Whatever you gotta do, because that's what my therapist was like. If you need to swear, I was like, oh buddy, I'm ready. You know, I was just so angry. Like those are my therapist was like, no, these are the words that are coming out of you to express, so let's get it out. Don't suppress it. Let's get out. So you get on that couch and you say and you do whatever you need to know, but you need to know that when that counselor's session is over, the Holy Spirit wants to do work in your heart. And uh, you know, I would go to those sessions and I would just never happen to me. I'm just barking out everything that I could remember. And my counselor was so great, he just did a fantastic job handling me. And eventually he came to the spot where he said, you know, um, you're gonna have to actually talk to your parents. And I was like, no, no, no, no. I was just wanting to say all this stuff. I have no interest in actually going to them and figuring things out. I just wanted to whine like a little baby. I just wanted to say what was in my heart. I didn't care anything about going to them. In other words, there was nothing in me that desired to get to the point of actually honoring them. I just wanted to talk about it in a way where I could dishonor them. And you might be in that spot. You may see your parents as people that it's hard for you to even think of one thing you could honor about them. I got done with all of those sessions, and I remember it was 2018. The reason I remember it so much is because this was the year Roland was born. It was a very, very difficult time in the Fox household. I mean, when I look back at it, we were barely holding on, it felt like at times. How in the world we got through that season. But I remember having this moment where I was like, I'm so upset because when Rowan gets born, I don't know who I need to hand my kid to first without feeling some kind of way. And I know this might sound super petty to y'all, but I was so worked up over it. You can ask Jennifer, I was so worked up over it. I mean, I would be borderline like panic attack. When Rowan comes, who do I give Rowan to first without causing a problem? Maybe you have family like that. And all I could think of, I could listen to me, I could not even enjoy my fourth kid coming into the world because I was so worried about what would happen with my parents in that room. Eventually I got there. Thank by his grace, I got there and I was able to enjoy Rowan coming to this world. But I was so messed up over it.
And what I realized during that time is a thing that I've now noticed that's happening across the board with a lot of adult kids, my age, maybe a little bit older, maybe a little bit younger, is now we have learned therapy speak. Now we can use phrases and words that we've learned in therapy. Or can I say some of you may not have spent the money and you just went to Instagram? I want to say those people are not licensed. If you're getting therapy from Instagram, shut it down. Go pay the 120 to the 150, do whatever you come to me. I'll give you a cash advance. I'll do it. I'll help you out. Go to a licensed therapist. Because the Instagram people are crazy. Yeah, I was just listening to this person on Instagram. I don't care. I want them to see your face. I want them to read you. Instagram therapists can't read you like a therapist can. They've been trained to read through all your stuff. You can't hide in a therapy room. That's crazy. Get your therapy, but I learned therapy speak. Then I found out I got all these words now from therapy. I was codependent. This was toxic. This is abusive. I need boundaries. And listen, we got people running around using all the therapy speak. Here's the problem: they are not maturing. They are bubbling their immaturity. If you think going to therapy is going to help you list out all your grievances against the world without the world coming back to you and say, but what about you? You going to therapy for the wrong thing. Because this whole situation didn't happen just because you were an innocent little victim. And that's the other thing that I just want to make sure is very clear. You're not always the victim. You say these things happened to me, I had no part in it, I understand. But now in Christ, I am not a victim of what happened to me. Because of Christ, I am, and you might not like this, you may think this is cheesy. I don't care. I am a victor in Christ. And the scriptures say that no weapon formed against me, even the weapons of my past and my trauma do not mean I have to forfeit the commands of God. And so you may have had horrible things happen to you. You may be in the middle of horrible things. Let me tell you something. God has the ability to work in you power and glory and the goodness of God. I went to those therapy sessions because I wanted to whine about being a victim. I found out I am more than a conqueror in Christ. And my past, even though it was very harmful and hurtful, did not mean that I couldn't do what God asked me to do. I found a loophole in therapy that helped me sidestep the command of the Lord.
Thursday, I was driving down the interstate and I was thinking through this sermon, and
Mark 7 came into my mind. If you have a Bible, turn there with me. Also, it's getting harder to say if you have a Bible, turn there with me if you don't bring a physical Bible. So some of y'all bring a physical Bible every once in a while so we can hear them pages rustling. Come on, somebody. Just want to hear a page flip in the house of God. Man, y'all are boring. Come on, lighten up a little bit. My gosh, we're just joking around. Talked about my trauma. You got to lighten it up before you go in the next hard-hitting spot, y'all. Okay. Psychology. All right. Driving down the road Thursday and thinking about this. Oh my gosh, this verse comes in my mind and the Lord hits me. I want y'all to know this is fresh for me. This is so fresh for me. I was like, oh my goodness, I was. Have you ever been some have you ever encountered something with God where you're thankful that He hurts you? He just like, He just backhands your heart. So, oh my goodness, I did not see that. There's this wonderful set of verses here in
Mark chapter 7. I'm gonna start in
verse 9. I'm gonna read through
verse 13. Jesus is talking to the Pharisees, who are quite literally taking preference and elevating it to the point of law. And now people are doing what the Pharisees prefer and not what the actual command of God is. Listen to what he says to them. He says, You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition or your preference. For Moses said, Honor your father and mother, and whoever reviles father or mother must die. But you say If a man tells his father or his mother, whatever you would have gained from me is Corban. That is a term that just meant dedicated or given to God, then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down, and many such things you do. I realized that when I started going to therapy and way before that, Because when I got saved, I was one of those people that got saved. Um, I wasn't soft peddling a Christian life. I started doing radical things as soon as I got saved. Like immediately, I started working on how I talked. Immediately, I started reading scripture all the time. Immediately, you couldn't keep me out of church services. I wanted to be at everything, I was like, I have this is this is what has happened to me has been insane. And so I just, I mean, I changed. I still had a lot of changing to do and still do, but it was immediate. And I realized that I found a place where I could glorify my gap between my family. I found a church where I could go in and be spiritual, but be distance, distance and dishonoring to my family. I could go with my spiritual gift and my talent and my willingness to learn and all this, y'all. I'm hear what I'm saying. I went into the church and I honored people, spiritual mothers, spiritual fathers, and I would go home and I'd have lip about taking out the trash. And I found a way. To say Corbin to my parents. I have a life dedicated to God and you won't be seeing me much. In fact, it's so funny. The first job, this actually the second job I had, I would lie to my mom about going to work, and I'd actually go and just hang out at the church building. I was so like, oh, I'm I'm so in and I'm so about this, I'm so dedicated. I'm gonna be here every time the doors are open, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that. And if my pastor, if my youth pastor asked me to do something, I'm gonna do it. So much so that if you asked me to do something, I'd lie to my parents about going to work, not go to a shift and make money. Instead, I'd go to the church and I would do something for the church. I found out a way to spiritualize my disobedience. I found out a way to tell my parents, Corbin, anything that you should be getting, I'm giving it to God. And I actually think that that's something that's happened. In the church, where we've got lots of families where the church started saying, and I was a part of this movement, I think, a little bit, where we preach the family of God here so much that people actually abandoned their natural families. They would do stuff for people in the body of Christ, but wouldn't do stuff for their own family members. They would honor men and women of God in the body. But would have a difficult time honoring the people that God ordained to bring them into the world. You can't honor God fully if you're not honoring your parents.
And I think I want to end with that because here is my plea with you. I know that sometimes what ends up happening is we have really bad situations, and then someone ends up saying something like, How do I honor? Somebody that that that abusive, how do I honor somebody like that's so difficult? How do I honor somebody who doesn't live a righteous or holy life? How do I honor somebody who is who is not good? I think this is for both younger kids and for uh adult children as well. And I want to say this because what I'm not doing, I don't want to hear you something, because this accusation started to come in the church, too, is that church leaders and pastors will cover up abuse. That is not the point of what I'm saying today. I'm not greenlighting that you should honor abuse. I'm not saying that you should be obedient to immoral instructions. I think I've been clear on that. But when I was in this thing of how do you honor somebody that you feel like has hurt you so bad? How do you, and by the way, in 2018, I went and sat down with both of my parents separately, and I told them everything that I had gone to therapy about. I told them, I said, listen, this is this is what I've been dealing with, and I'm I feel hurt. I I can't believe this stuff happened. I I'm overwhelmed, and I I feel like these things never got dealt with, and I didn't feel like I was protected, and I didn't feel like I didn't feel like this and this and this. I was finally able to articulate as an adult what I think I was feeling back then. And both of my parents treated me so well. I can't thank God enough for how much that healed my heart, to where today there's enjoyment with my parents. I actually had to go back to my parents and later on, and even my brothers and sisters and say, I, you know what? I came to you and I said, you did all these things and I had all these things against you, but I you should have things against me because I was not a good son. And I acted in rebellion and I was disrespectful and I was disobedient. I did all these things. And I can't imagine how difficult I made life for you when I was, y'all, I was a liar. I was a thief. The reason I didn't have problems with alcohol and drugs in college is because I had done it when I was 12, 13, 14 years old. It wasn't a big deal to me. I mean, I was a bad kid who did not do anything. Their parents asked a lot. I'd go on trips for days as like a 13, 14 year old, and nope, I mean, I was I was a bad kid. So it's the grace of God to be able to say, you know, there were things done to me, and there were things I did to you. And I want to repent. I want to say, forgive that. And there was this exchange, this beautiful grace, an exchange of forgiveness for that. And I hope that if any of you have anything like that going on, you're able to do those things because it is a beautiful picture of how God's grace should work in our lives, where there's humility and there's willingness to say, I'm sorry, I didn't realize. I'm sure there'll be moments even in my parenting where I'll go, I didn't even realize I did that. And I want to make sure that I'm ready, that I can, if there are exchanges like that, that I can do that by practicing these types of things. I'm not greenlighting honoring what someone did that was abusive.
But I want to bring us back to one thing and a story that helped me with this. The command doesn't say, honor your mother and father, if it's convenient for you. This was one of the problems I was starting to have was how do I honor when I have all this grief and this trauma and all this junk from my past that I'm tying to my parents? How do I do that? And my parents, by the way, I'm just gonna honor them. They are great. I love that God's been able to work through all that. So I don't wanted to paint this awful picture of them. But we had to work through our stuff. I was working through that, and many of you know Glenn Schaefer. Glenn Schaefer leads ATI. He's also the founding pastor of Destiny Life Church in Claremore in Owassa, Oklahoma. Oversee this church. And there have been years over the years they've spent time with us where, you know, just maybe days of just sitting with them. And sometimes, even, you know, before Rowan was born, we'd get on the phone and Amy would, Amy would talk to us. Amy Schaefer would talk to us. And I don't know if we just needed, I don't know, a mama or something at that point to just say some things to us that, you know, how Mamas, you know how you are. Sometimes you dad'll say it, and it's kind of like, all right, dad, get out of here for five seconds. Let mom talk for a second, you know. Uh But I remember they're very good at this. Sometimes they don't tell you an answer, they share a story. I think Jesus does that a lot, you know? He doesn't say yes or no, he says it's kind of like this. And then you you you understand the answer through the story, through the parable. Amy was raised by an abusive alcoholic father who was a womanizer. And early on, she ended up getting married and moved out of the house, and she very much distanced herself from her father. Never changed. Stayed the same way. And the Lord began to deal with her about this scripture honor your mother and father. Her mother had passed away. So she felt like, you know, I don't have an opportunity to do that now. But Lord, how in the world do you honor an alcoholic? How do you honor a womanizer? How do you honor someone who has done all of these awful things? And she told us a story about how the Lord brought back to her remembrance that he had served in World War II, that he was an infantryman or something like that. And I want to speak to this on the idea that this isn't necessarily practical, but this is very spiritual, what I'm talking about. Because you might sit here and go, Well, you just don't. You just, there's just no way you can arm, you just write them off, and that's just how it is. But I felt like when she was sharing this story, she was like, No, there is a way to honor. It just may be that it has to be something tied to something other than what you've experienced. And she got on the phone, she called her dad up, and she said, I'm saying it like she said it. She said, Daddy, I just want to call you and tell you thank you so much. I just want to honor your service in the military. Oh, thank thanks, baby. It was good hearing from you. That kind of thing. Hung up. You might say, well, is that even necessary? It's not about what they're getting from you. It's about what's going on in your heart that makes you willing to give. Some of you have things against your parents, and I honestly think that it probably makes sense that you have that beef and that rub. It's difficult.
But I want to encourage you with two things. Number one, ask the Holy Spirit, where can I honor my parents? And be sincere, be genuine about it. Where can I, if this is an issue for you, where can you look into their life and you can say, This is something that I can say, you know what? This is a good thing. This was a right thing. I want to honor that. The second thing would be this. Watch how you talk about your parents. It's not a very spiritual thing to say, but I heard it again the other day, and I thought, you know, this is really good advice for most of our situations. But if you don't have anything good to say, somebody finish it for me. I love it. Y'all know this. Y'all spiritual warriors right now for Christ. Okay. If you don't have anything good to say about your parents, don't say anything at all. Better to be absent of honor than full of dishonor. And ask the Holy Spirit, where can I honor? Because even in this church, I have done this and I've heard others do this. So if you've done this, I'm not putting you on, I'm saying I've done this as well. I have put my parents on blast before. I've said things about them, tied things to them. I didn't honor them in the way that I talked about them. And I knew that I didn't because I left an impression with the people I was talking with, with the impression that my parents were this or that, or they didn't have a favorable impression of my parents. And you might say, well, I'm not gonna run around just saying a bunch of stuff to them that's not true. Yeah, you're right. That is so cringy. You ever been to a funeral where they're talking about somebody and you're like, that person that they're talking about does not exist. That person I guess is not that person. Y'all ever been to something like that? You're just like, that's not right. We're not talking about saying something that's untrue. But maybe you withhold the dishonor that comes with what is true. Maybe you maybe there's not so much eagerness for you to talk about how your parents have done it wrong. Maybe there's not so much eagerness to talk about the trauma. And that is to say, it doesn't mean you suppress it. Get help. Talk to somebody that can help you. But for the sake of being able to do what the commandments of God are, not to sidestep them, not to say Corbin. No, no, no. God, I'll honor you, but I'll never honor that person. I'll honor you, I'll give everything to you, but I cannot, I cannot find one good thing to say or honor about my parents. If nothing else, they were God's choice in bringing you into the world. Maybe on Mother's Day or Father's Day next year, you can just say, I'm so thankful that God chose you. To bring me into this world. Find a way to obey the command. Find a way to honor the parents that God chose for you. I know that comes with a laundry list of stuff, and I don't have time to get into all that, but I feel like if some of y'all even have some things you need to talk about after after the service with that or share about that, please do. Get on the path, walk it out. Don't abandon this as a, well, I'm convicted about it, but there's no road. I need, I, for me, I need a path. I need to start walking. What do I need to do next? So maybe you need to pray. Maybe you need to ask the Holy Spirit, what is there to honor? And maybe there's a withholding of you to be so so quick and so eager to share about your parents in a negative light. Whichever two of those, or maybe even both, as we close in prayer, I want you to really take that to Him.
If you're an adult child or even right now, if you're a 12 to 18 or you're living at home, if there's this issue of obedience and honor in your heart, let's just take it before the Lord. And then Lexi's gonna come and close us out and want us to always have this time of prayer at the end of service. Help us to continue to protect that. When Lexi closes us out here in just a second, give yourself to that. If you need prayer, please. I mean, it is my heart's desire. I know Trace feels this way too. We do not want to be people who shy away from prayer. If you need prayer today about what we talk about or about something else. It's all up for grabs. We would love to pray with you, okay? And we'll make ourselves available to that. Will you pray with me as as we close? Father, thank you that we are not without great examples. Lord, I even thank you for some moms and dads here in this church that have helped heal my heart. I thank you for mothers and fathers in the spirit. That have been good representations that have pushed me back to honoring my mom and dad. Lord, I know that there are there's a tenderness. It can be so hurtful to be dealing with these family issues. That's sort of why we named it this series, is just like, what have we gotten ourselves into? Sometimes family can be so difficult. You're dealing with so many different attitudes, Lord. You know. You know, you place us in our families. You know every grievance in our heart, from us and against us. But I just desperately desire to see in my lifetime more godly families. I want to honor those families here that are walking it out. Father, I thank you for conviction in all the right places of our hearts today where. We might need to move on this word. What is it that we need to do? What is it that we might need to say? What is it that we might need to stop saying? Help us. Holy Spirit, give us the ability and the power to do it. We're asking all these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Fox. I'm sure a lot of us would echo the sentiment that that was so helpful. So, Fox, thank you really. I'm so thankful for our pastors and for sometimes the hard words that they share, but you know, they're necessary. They're good. So thank you for that. This week we have a lot going on. And so as we step into this coming week, let me share a little bit about what is going to be happening. And before I do, remember that the very, very best place to see this every week and remember what's going on is the Move Church app. So if you don't have it yet, unlock your phone, tap that disc on one of the seats in front of you, and download it so that you can be involved. We want you to be around. We wanna be with you. So make sure you do that. Couple things to note tonight is Sunday night church. Just by a show of hands, did anybody grow up going to church on a Sunday night? Okay. A couple of us. So Sunday night church is something we do every once in a while. And we're gonna have worship tonight. There's gonna be a word shared, and we're gonna have dinner together, a light meal after. So it I love it. It has like that nostalgic feel to me of growing up as a kid, going to church on Sunday nights. It just feels a little more relaxed, a little more comfortable. It just feels like family. And so that we want to invite you tonight at five o'clock. Come back here. Kids are welcome. Just come worship with us, eat with us. We would love for you to be here. Um, so that's tonight at five here. And then tomorrow we're starting our seven days of fasting. And over the past couple of years, this is really something that our leaders have set aside time for having a uh a calendar through the year of times where we fast corporately. And so this is starting tomorrow for seven days. Uh I love something Fox brought up so much today about fostering and that um. That role that a lot of people fill, if people in our church are filling. And it reminded me so much, Chandler and I, most of you guys know this. Chandler and I are going through foster classes right now. And one thing that we keep hearing: if you have sat in one foster class, you have heard that the goal of fostering is reunification for kids and their biological parents to get reconnected to one another. And Through these classes, we've heard so much about how vital it is that in every child there is this desire for them to be connected to their parent. And so when we talk about fasting, this is something that we encourage you to do so much. Please, please make fasting a part of your daily or your regular rhythm with the Lord. Because in each of us, there is this longing, there is this desire to be connected to our Heavenly Father. And fasting is a great way to do that. To say no to the things that satisfy our stomach or satisfy our attention so that we can draw close to the Lord. So please participate with us. If you have any questions about it, or maybe you don't know where to start, come talk to someone after service. We'll have some more people around. So join with us over these next seven days. And on Wednesday morning, we are gonna have prayer here at 5 30 a.m. I know it sounds early, but listen, if you're gonna be tired and probably hungry, just come be tired and hungry with somebody else. Come and pray on Wednesday morning. You don't have to get there right at 5 30. We'll be here until 6 30. So anytime, come and join us. It has been such a sweet time together. So we hope you'll do that. And then next Sunday, Move Kids, parents, Move Kids are gonna be having their costume party next Sunday in their classes. So if you have a little one that's back there in those rooms, nothing too scary. But kids are welcome to wear their costumes next Sunday. So join us as we do that. Before we go, would you guys just stand with me? We're gonna say our sending liturgy to posture our hearts again as we head out. So let's read this together. We are not leaving this place. We are being sent. We are obeying the command of our Lord to go. So send us, Lord, to find you in secret, in prayer and devotion. To love and to care for our families, to strengthen and encourage our brothers and sisters in Christ, to faithfully work as unto the Lord in the marketplace and home, to wisely steward all you have given us, to recognize our place and ability in our community, to witness of your goodness and grace to neighbors and nations. Send us now in your presence and power. Amen. Amen. You are dismissed, and we'll see you tonight at five.
