Foundations of Faith: Discipling Our Children Together
Devotional
Sermon Summary
Bible Study Guide
Sermon Clips
### Quotes for Outreach
1. "Parenting is very difficult. It's a struggle. In the early years, I find that most kids, it's difficult to keep them alive. They have no sense of self-preservation. At any given moment, they're going to teeter off that thing, try some new stunt, and put their lives at risk. As they get older, while they may have more sense of self-preservation, they apparently don't realize how close their parents are to killing them as they become teenagers. But it's our job in that difficulty of being parents to really sort through all of the different demands that life has." [03:39]
2. "We spend so much time in our parenting focusing on the things of possessions and achievements and things that will fall away. Some of these things are important; they help build character, they give our children opportunities to do well in life, to be successful on their own, and they're not unimportant. But when we love these things and we find these things to be more important than the eternal factors, the eternal fruit, the eternal things of God about our children's relationship with Jesus, we've sacrificed something that was way too important and valuable." [15:13]
3. "If your kid becomes the star quarterback or the head cheerleader, what an achievement. It really is an amazing achievement. But if you did that at the expense of any commitment to Jesus, and now they're bound for hell, what right have you done by them? Or if your kid is in the top 10% of their school and they're really smart and they're going to have a really successful career as a scientist or some other amazing intelligent career, yet they never knew Jesus, what right have you done by them?" [15:46]
4. "We need to protect our kids. One of the other ways that we protect our kids is that we become our children and our grandchildren, our niece and nephews, and all those kids that you know in your life, we should become their prayer warriors. We should be on our knees every day praying for those kids in our lives that God would protect them. We are at a spiritual battle, folks. There are things that the enemy and his demons are trying to do to knock our kids down, and the only way that war is fought is through prayer and through the word." [39:12]
### Quotes for Members
1. "Direct your children onto the right path and when they're older, they will not leave it. I found that families who really are Jesus-centered families and who have really laid that foundation on a far less statistical rate have children who stray. There are still kids who stray even if you do all the right things. It happens because our kids still have free moral agency to choose what they want to in life. But if you want the best chance of your children to carry on the tradition of faith that you've planted in them, become a Jesus-centered family. Lay that foundation of faith, make it part of the day in and day out." [35:11]
2. "Repentance from dead works. In our lives, we are very selfish people and we live for ourselves. In fact, the world tells us we should do that—do what's right for you. And so we live for ourselves. What the foundational principle of repentance here is that I'm going to do a 180 and I'm going to turn. I'm going to stop living for myself and begin living for God. That means I'm going to stop sinning, I'm going to turn away from living just for myself and acquiring things and using people to my advantage, but rather I'm going to start living for God and His glory and as a result, loving others and being generous and helping others." [28:33]
3. "Faith towards God. The word faith also translates to the word belief, and these are those important things that we believe about who God is. God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God sent His son Jesus to die for us, to die for our sins, something that we couldn't do on our own, and He gave us eternal life. Three days later, He rose from the dead. We learn that God is love and God is true and God is just—all important things to know. So we learn about the character and the nature of God, who He is and what He's done for us, how He loves us, how He wants to have a relationship with us." [29:36]
4. "The resurrection of the dead. This is concerning what happens to us after we die. While our bodies may die unless Jesus comes first, for most of us, our bodies will die and then we'll be in the ground for who knows how long. But the Bible gives us hope and says that's not the end. One day our bodies will be lifted from the ground. Everyone, believers and unbelievers, will actually be resurrected from the dead. For those of us who put our faith in Jesus, we're going to have an opportunity to live with Jesus in a real place—a new Heaven and a new Earth." [33:10]
5. "We need to protect our kids from evil. That might mean turning on those many opportunities you have on a lot of devices to turn on safe boundaries, turn on internet filtering. It might mean making sure your kids don't have full access to YouTube. Maybe they're going to come home like mine does and say, 'Dad, all my friends can watch YouTube but I can't.' Tough, because your mind and your heart and your ears and your eyes matter more to me than what the other kids think. In time, he'll have more and more ability to see things and experience things as he matures and is ready for those things." [38:08]
Ask a question about this sermon
1. "Parenting is very difficult. It's a struggle. In the early years, I find that most kids, it's difficult to keep them alive. They have no sense of self-preservation. At any given moment, they're going to teeter off that thing, try some new stunt, and put their lives at risk. As they get older, while they may have more sense of self-preservation, they apparently don't realize how close their parents are to killing them as they become teenagers. But it's our job in that difficulty of being parents to really sort through all of the different demands that life has." [03:39]
2. "We spend so much time in our parenting focusing on the things of possessions and achievements and things that will fall away. Some of these things are important; they help build character, they give our children opportunities to do well in life, to be successful on their own, and they're not unimportant. But when we love these things and we find these things to be more important than the eternal factors, the eternal fruit, the eternal things of God about our children's relationship with Jesus, we've sacrificed something that was way too important and valuable." [15:13]
3. "If your kid becomes the star quarterback or the head cheerleader, what an achievement. It really is an amazing achievement. But if you did that at the expense of any commitment to Jesus, and now they're bound for hell, what right have you done by them? Or if your kid is in the top 10% of their school and they're really smart and they're going to have a really successful career as a scientist or some other amazing intelligent career, yet they never knew Jesus, what right have you done by them?" [15:46]
4. "We need to protect our kids. One of the other ways that we protect our kids is that we become our children and our grandchildren, our niece and nephews, and all those kids that you know in your life, we should become their prayer warriors. We should be on our knees every day praying for those kids in our lives that God would protect them. We are at a spiritual battle, folks. There are things that the enemy and his demons are trying to do to knock our kids down, and the only way that war is fought is through prayer and through the word." [39:12]
### Quotes for Members
1. "Direct your children onto the right path and when they're older, they will not leave it. I found that families who really are Jesus-centered families and who have really laid that foundation on a far less statistical rate have children who stray. There are still kids who stray even if you do all the right things. It happens because our kids still have free moral agency to choose what they want to in life. But if you want the best chance of your children to carry on the tradition of faith that you've planted in them, become a Jesus-centered family. Lay that foundation of faith, make it part of the day in and day out." [35:11]
2. "Repentance from dead works. In our lives, we are very selfish people and we live for ourselves. In fact, the world tells us we should do that—do what's right for you. And so we live for ourselves. What the foundational principle of repentance here is that I'm going to do a 180 and I'm going to turn. I'm going to stop living for myself and begin living for God. That means I'm going to stop sinning, I'm going to turn away from living just for myself and acquiring things and using people to my advantage, but rather I'm going to start living for God and His glory and as a result, loving others and being generous and helping others." [28:33]
3. "Faith towards God. The word faith also translates to the word belief, and these are those important things that we believe about who God is. God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God sent His son Jesus to die for us, to die for our sins, something that we couldn't do on our own, and He gave us eternal life. Three days later, He rose from the dead. We learn that God is love and God is true and God is just—all important things to know. So we learn about the character and the nature of God, who He is and what He's done for us, how He loves us, how He wants to have a relationship with us." [29:36]
4. "The resurrection of the dead. This is concerning what happens to us after we die. While our bodies may die unless Jesus comes first, for most of us, our bodies will die and then we'll be in the ground for who knows how long. But the Bible gives us hope and says that's not the end. One day our bodies will be lifted from the ground. Everyone, believers and unbelievers, will actually be resurrected from the dead. For those of us who put our faith in Jesus, we're going to have an opportunity to live with Jesus in a real place—a new Heaven and a new Earth." [33:10]
5. "We need to protect our kids from evil. That might mean turning on those many opportunities you have on a lot of devices to turn on safe boundaries, turn on internet filtering. It might mean making sure your kids don't have full access to YouTube. Maybe they're going to come home like mine does and say, 'Dad, all my friends can watch YouTube but I can't.' Tough, because your mind and your heart and your ears and your eyes matter more to me than what the other kids think. In time, he'll have more and more ability to see things and experience things as he matures and is ready for those things." [38:08]
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