Gospel Shepherds Part 2

Let's pray, shall we? Father, once more we come to you asking you to minister to us from your word. The opinions of men and schemes are multiplied by the thousands and yet your word is clear to us. It gives us a model, it gives us a method, it gives us an underlying foundation from which we can truly raise children that would be more than a match for this world and that would love and serve you.

So our prayer is that you would guide our thinking this afternoon and help us so that we will be better equipped to raise warriors for you. Well, thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, last week we started out by talking about shepherding the heart of a child. and we want to finish that this week. We noted that as a parent, you need to recognize that you are a shepherd.

That you are a shepherd. You're a shepherd because you're a child's guide to life. You're not just the mean, the big man, bad policeman who's trying to get them to do what you want them to do. You're a guide to life. you are there to help your children understand life. So you're their guide to life. You're a shepherd because you're helping your child understand himself and understand the world in which he lives.

He gains a correct assessment of himself and of his world, of God. And what you're doing is you're helping him to understand the world through biblical categories. you can never understand the world apart from biblical categories without those categories you will misinterpret and thus you won't be able to live the way god wants you to live it's interesting i was talking to uh tim fry just before dinner i don't know if you know but tim fry is involved in timothy's involved in all kinds of research plant research and doing all kinds of things. And I said to him, it's interesting how no matter how hard people work at GMOs and all this sort of thing, how you can never escape the curse And Timothy response was yeah you wouldn believe how deep the curse goes okay well he and I had a conversation that my guess is a bunch of his colleagues will will not be able to understand the world and the data that they're dealing with because they don't have the categories that will explain the world and so you're a shepherd because you're giving them um you're helping him to understand himself and the world.

And the only way you can do that is bringing him up in biblical categories so he can interpret properly. He has the right frame of reference to understand what's going on in the world. You're a shepherd because you help your child understand not only the what's of his behavior, but the why's as well. You just don't want him to know what he's doing wrong, but why is he doing it wrong?

And why should he do it differently? And why he has those feelings and so forth. You're a shepherd because there has to be a richer interaction than merely telling your child what to do and what to think. You want to be wise. You want to unfold the meaning and purpose of life. You want to give them direction so that they disclose themselves and understand, so you understand who they are.

We saw last week the importance of shepherding because of the significance of the heart. What your children say and do is merely a reflection of the heart. The behavior starts in the heart. It's not just something out here. It starts in the heart. And by the way, that's not just for kids.

That's for everybody. Can I illustrate it this way for you? Let me illustrate it this way, and I use this a lot as I'm counseling folks to try to get them to understand that anything that expresses itself out here is in the heart. I use adults as an example here, okay? Here's a person who's involved in an adulterous affair. Did he wake up one morning and say, I think I'll cheat on my wife today?

Well, some people do that, but that's normally not what happens. What happens? Here's a guy who works hard all day, and he comes home, and he wants to tell his wife, and his wife doesn't care. He doesn't care. Well, listen, don't bring your work home. I don't want to hear about it.

Well, pretty soon, you know, he's kind of discouraged, and he starts thinking, I wish my wife would understand me. And then he starts thinking, I need a wife who will understand me. I need a woman who will understand me. Pretty soon it's like I have to have someone who will understand me. And lo and behold, what happens? There another woman at work who understands him Now eventually an affair or I sorry not an affair an adulterous relationship begins.

Now, where did that start? It started in his heart. Now, when our children get into a fight with each other, it isn't just that they decide, I wonder what would happen if I swung my fist and aimed for my brother's nose. There's something going on. I want something. I want to get something.

This will make me happy. I think I'll go after it. There's something going on in the heart. You have to understand the significance of the heart. Jesus made a big deal of that in Mark chapter 7 and parallel passage Matthew 15. Right?

In both those passages, they're essentially the same. Jesus makes a big deal out of the fact that what comes out starts in the heart. We said that we need to recognize the importance of shepherding because the basic issue is not behavior, but what's going on in the heart. All right? We get sidetracked by behavior. We tend to just get them to correct the way they're acting.

And it's got to go deeper than that. You can get your children to do what you want them to do. You can get them to act certain ways, but unless they understand why they're doing that, You haven't completed the job. You need to really help your children or to understand the importance of shepherding because to really help your children, you have to be concerned with the attitudes of the heart.

Now, I think this is about where we were maybe a little bit further, but we'll start here. How then does this affect correction and discipline? With all that in mind, with this idea of shepherding in our minds, how does that affect your correction and discipline then? What's going to happen with your children? Well, the first thing you have to see is you must require proper behavior since God's law demands it.

In everything I've said, you have not, do not hear me say, ignore behavior. Okay, that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is don't stop with behavior. Okay? So you haven't heard me say just ignore behavior. we don't want to become a bunch of Freudian psychologists who say, well, we can't do anything until we get down deep into their heart and understand what motivated them.

No if you hit your brother you in trouble If you knock your sister down you in big trouble You can do that Why Because God says you can do that All right When every single one of my children shoplifted as all of yours no doubt do you know we had to deal with that behavior. We had to make them go back and apologize to Sharon and do all that sort of thing. But then you have to go beyond that.

Okay? You have to deal with that behavior. So you deal with the behavior because God's law requires that you deal with it, but you also help your child to understand how his straying heart resulted in that wrong behavior. That's where you need to go. I know I was here because I look at my examples now to know we were looking at those. The two children fighting over a toy, right?

All right, what do we tend to do? We tend to ask the question, who had it first? Well, that just ignores the whole issue. Okay, that's an issue of justice. As I said last week, or as Ted Tripp said, who had it first in his issue of justice, justice operates in the favor of the child who has the quicker draw, whoever gets to the toy first. So by just saying who had it first, what do you do?

You unwittingly teach, if I get there first, it's mine, right? What you have to deal with is two children fighting over a toy. if you're talking about the heart they both have coveting hearts they both are into this idea that if I only possess that thing I will have joy and you're standing in the way of my happiness and I don't care what you want I don't care what you think I gotta have be happy even if it's at your expense now both of them have that problem all right so you have to deal with the heart. Again, you remember the example of the teenage daughter who's dressed immodestly and you say, you're not going to school like that.

Go right upstairs right now and change. You're brought up better than that. You know better than that and so forth. If that's all you do, you'll get her to change her clothes, but you won't get her to change her heart or you won't be on the path to God changing that heart. You need to help her understand why does she want to dress that way? And there's hope to thaw of reasons.

It depends on the person, right? Can't be like secular people who can identify people and pigeonhole them right away. What? Maybe she wants her approval of her friends. Maybe she really wants to. boys. Maybe she wants this.

Whatever the case may be, you have to get to the heart. Your correction has to address the heart because all behavior reflects an attitude of the heart. And here's the point. You got to unmask the sin of the heart because that leads to the cross of Christ. That leads to the cross of Christ. Because every time when you're going for the heart, You're uncovering a heart that is bent toward evil.

All right. And so you want to move them to the cross of Jesus, that they see that Jesus is the answer for their straying heart, that their heart. As they come into this world, our children naturally have a bent against God. And so showing them the bent and even showing them that they can't do what God says is going to lead them to the cross. Now, another question comes up.

If we understand shepherding right, then how do you get to the heart? How do you get to the heart then? Well, someone look up Luke 6.45. Luke 6.45. All right. Who will read?

Levi, read that for us. The good person out of the good treasure of the star produces good. The evil person out of the evil treasure produces evil. For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Okay, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. So here's a real easy way.

Listen to what your children say. Listen to them. Listen carefully to them. I will never forget. Boy, I've got all kinds of examples flooding my mind right now. I won't pick on my children.

I'll pick on someone else's. I remember being with John Street one time. And one of his boys, Jay or James, I can't remember. They're twins. He's got, you know, the two twins. We called them Jimmy J for short.

But I don know if it was J or James but one of the boys said to his dad Dad if you get me a Nintendo 64 then I be happy and I never ask for anything ever again Alright? Well, there's all kinds of fertile ground there for getting to the heart. What does that say? What have you just heard? What's the heart being revealed? desire for material things material things will bring me happiness in fact he's just got done saying the ultimate happiness for me will be found in Nintendo 64 of course Nintendo 64 is probably fossilized by now isn't it yeah alright what else have you heard from that heart What else is that?

What abundance of the heart has been expressed by that? Okay? Yeah, idols. We've got an idol going on here. Okay? So you see, you've got to listen to what they say.

Spend time listening. Spend time listening to what they're saying and so forth. You know what? Here's another thing. I don't have it in your notes. One of the things that I found helpful, of course, my boys tended to, well, the girls too, I would listen to the music that they liked because that told me something about them, you know.

And I want to, again, I could tell you something about my children from the music they liked. I mean, the boys were into the indie rock scene, you know, the, I don't know, the cool philosophical kind of dudes that sounded like they were crying. What was his name? Or the group's name? Bright Eyes. Weepy Bright Eyes.

I mean, that said something. That said something. Okay, I kind of can tell the bent of them. And, you know, the girls listened to something different. That showed me a different bent in them. They just watch what they do.

Listen to what they say. enter their world which is a lot of work it's a lot of work to get into their world I can remember one time driving back from wrestling practice and when I was listening to their music and finally I said well I been in your world long enough let quit But anyway, listen to what they say. Here's another way. Ask questions. Ask questions.

Proverbs 18, 15 says, He who answers before he listens, that is his folly and his shame. If you're spouting off answers before you listen, you're foolish and shameful. Okay? Listen. Ask questions. Proverbs 18.15 then goes on to say that the heart of the wise discerns things, listens to facts.

So you want to get facts. You want to understand. So what kind of questions can you ask? Let me just give you a sampling of some questions. What did you want in that? Or what did you desire?

Or what did you seek? What were you aiming for? What were you hoping for? Okay? This question kind of gets to the payoff. What's the payoff?

There's a payoff for tackling your brother and slugging him. There's a payoff in that. What was it? What were you going to gain from that? What did you hope to gain from that? All right?

Someone's going to gain something when one of the sisters is real snitty with the other one. All right? It's not just stop talking to one another like that. God says you're not to use that kind of talk with one another. Very true, and that's what you need to say. But then you need to find out what's going on here.

What's the payoff for talking like that to or about someone? All right? What would make you happy? Or what makes you think that this would make you happy? So they're fighting over a toy. Well, what would make you happy about getting that?

Shotgun. Okay, you know that whole deal. That's not a big deal unless you have six kids. Then that gets to be a really big deal. all right well why is that going to make you happy right and listen there's all kinds of answers to that because they don't have to sit scrunched up to my brothers and sisters and I can do what I want and all kinds of other things I don know I can remember all the answers what were you here a good one What were you thinking when you did that What were you thinking when you did that How about this?

What makes that so important to you? Or what do you hate or love the most about that? Now let me give you a little rule of thumb. every one of those questions starts with what what happens when you say to your child why did you do that what's the answer you're going to get I don't know I don't know because I wanted to there you go that was very helpful wasn't it one of the things and again this isn't biblical but this is just something that I've learned When you ask what questions, you get solid data.

Okay, that's a little sterile, isn't it? When you ask what question, it gives you something solid to work with. When you ask why questions, when someone asks you why, your tendency is to shift the blame. Why did you hit your sister? because she, right, did this. And you know what we tend to do? Then we tend to get on that one.

Okay? When you ask why, too often you get I don't know or you get someone shifting the blame. Now, it's not wrong to ask why questions, but if you start asking particular what questions, you tend to get facts that you can work with. You tend to get what's going on. Now, there's all kinds of other questions you could ask. There's still more.

We could go on for two hours on the questions there. You can think about what kind of questions to ask. The point is you're trying to get to the heart. Okay? So to get to the heart of your child requires then interaction or communication that is more than one way. Let me show you a verse that God used to just put a dagger right through my heart.

Proverbs 18, verse 2. This was a killer for me. In fact, I've got it highlighted. in my Bible. A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion. The reason why that verse cut me down is because as I was reading a book, Ted Tripp's Shepherding the Heart of a Child, from which a lot of this material is taken, he talked about the fact that too many parents are real quick to tell children what they think and what they ought to do and not very quick to gain understanding of their children.

And Ted Tripp tells a story about he's counseling this one guy and he says, do you ever talk to your son? And the father said, sure I do. He said, well, give me an example. He said, like the other night. The other night at dinner, he told me he wanted a bike. I told him to eat PSPs.

Okay? All right? I want to tell you what I think, but I don't want to take the time to listen to you, and I don't want to take the time to understand you, and I don't want to invest the time and the effort to get to know you. A fool takes no pleasure in understanding. And dads, that's a lot of what we are. We're fools because we don't want to understand.

We just want them to get in line and we bark at them and tell them what they ought to do. And we don't take the time to know their hearts. That's what we need to be doing. And Proverbs 18, 2 makes that very, very clear to us. I think that's important for us to understand. Here's another example that pops into my head from that book.

Ted Tripp talks about the time his family or another family they go out and buy their son some shoes sneakers, okay and they come back and he doesn't like them he doesn't like the shoes now, I can tell you what my typical response would be right? my typical response would be something like this Number one, we don't have the kind of money to buy the shoes that are cool. Number two, you ungrateful wretch. You ought to be thankful for anything you get.

You right? You know there are people walking around barefoot and you got a dad who will give you shoes You know the routine But then you find out here a kid it not the shoes It's that anybody who wears that kind of shoes is a dork at school. So the issue is not in gratitude. What's the issue? The fear of man, right? Proverbs 18, not Proverbs 18.

I remember it is now. The fear of man is a snare. The fear of man is a snare. So you've got to take the time to investigate, to understand what's going on in the heart, because with that you begin to understand your teaching and your correction is going to take a different way. And you can bring them to the cross and help them understand the grace of God and the glories of Christ in these interactions.

Now, we need to see the central place of the gospel to your shepherding as a parent. What does Romans 1.16 say? I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God to salvation. Will proper parenting produce believers? And the answer is, there are no guarantees. but the gospel is powerful and the gospel is attractive and it is the power of God to salvation for our children okay the gospel is the power of God to salvation there is no little formula that we must follow now someone says what about the proverb that says train a child in the way in his way and he will not depart from it I think that that's a warning I think that it says train a child in his way you train a child in the way that he's naturally born and he won't depart from it that's what that proverb is saying if you train him in his natural tendencies to evil he's not going to depart from that it's not a promise from God that if you pull all the right strings and push all the right buttons you're going to get an obedient believing child at the end of the whole process.

That's not what that's saying. And I don't know anywhere else in the Bible where we're told that. But I will tell you this, the gospel is powerful and the gospel is the very power of God to save people And if the gospel is central in your family watch what the gospel can do Children will not believe will believe not because parents have followed a correct formula but because the gospel is suitable to meet humanity's needs and that includes your children.

It's suitable to meet their needs and so the gospel has to be the central focus of our parenting. Okay? The central focus of parenting then is the gospel. And that may surprise you. We've all kind of grown up with this idea that the central focus of parenting is get them to do what's right when we tell them to. But it's not.

Right? It's to equip them so they can live life independent of us and serve God. All right? What does that mean? It means the gospel has to be central. That means then that you must address not only the behavior of your children but the hard attitudes of your children.

You know why? Because God works from the inside out, so our parenting goal cannot merely be well-behaved children. Don't put your hope in rules as the means of changing your children. Okay, the gospel has to be central because your rules will never change your children's hearts. Your rules will never do that. Look over at Romans 5.

Romans 5. verse 20 now the law now that's talking about God's law now the law came in to increase the trespass but where sin increased grace abounded all the more so that as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness, leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Do you see what he says? Why did God bring the law? God brought the law to stir up sin.

What? Yeah. Why? Because if you look in Romans 7, the Apostle Paul says, when the law said don't covet, you know what I wanted to do? I coveted. And then he goes on to say, so does that mean that the law is evil?

No. The law is righteous. But what is evil What the evil part of the equation Human hearts When the law of God says no the human heart is so rebellious that it wants to say well I want to do that very thing So don't expect, if God's law does not change a human heart, certainly your rules will not change a human heart. OK. So since they don't accomplish change, it's foolish to think that rules will change.

OK. It's foolish to think that rules will change people. They don't. They don't. You've heard me tell the story about the shotgun rules, right? I've told these stories so many times in different places I don't remember where I told them the rules for riding shotgun in the van when the kids were little when something like this when mom is going with us she gets shotgun if mom or dad is the one driving the oldest one gets to sit shotgun to town the next one gets to ride it on the way back.

So you can get real complicated. Now, if we're in town for more than 30 minutes, then whoever's next gets to ride it for 30 minutes in town. Right? If we're there for more than 30 minutes, well, then we change, and so more people can ride. You know, you know how that goes? You done that?

Right. And so what happens is, we get a bunch of kids that start saying, no, I don't want to ride in the shotgun. Let him do it. Because we have that rule, right? No, they started arguing about how much time the person who had in the front seat. The rules never change their hearts.

And that's what you've got to understand. Don't think that making a bunch of rules is going to change your child's heart and make them what God wants them to be. So what you're saying then, Pastor, is don't have any rules. No, I did not say that. What we are saying is rules and laws serve the purpose of restraining evil and showing the need of the cross.

So I'm not saying and neither does neither does the Bible say get rid of all rules. It says understand the point of it. All right. Because you know what? If you didn't have rules. It would be the first one who got to the van got to ride shotgun.

And if there was a tie, there'd be a fist fight. Right? So, and by the way, I'm not saying make all these complicated rules. Don, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that. What you've got to understand, though, is your rules will never produce change.

But they will show the need for change. Because then you can start saying, why do you think you always want to sit? What is it that makes you say you always want to sit in the front seat? What's going on there? I don't know. I'll tell you what's going on.

You have a corrupt, depraved heart. And you need a savior, right? I love this little poem. It's a little poem, and I think Charlie knows it by heart. I don't yet. But it talks about the difference between the gospel and the law.

It says this. Run, John, run, the law commands, but gives neither feet nor hands. Better news the gospel brings, it bids me fly and gives me wings. Right? Run, John, run, the law commands, but gives neither feet nor hands. Better news the gospel brings, it bids me fly and gives me wings.

You see, the law can't, the law says this is what God demands, but it doesn't give you what's necessary. All it does is exposes the depravity of your heart. The gospel comes along and commands me, but the gospel changes me. Right? The gospel then changes me, and I want to obey. That's the difference.

So understand the place of rules. All right? You've got to have a well-ordered household, right? If you didn't say everybody in bed by 8 o'clock, what do you think would happen? So the rules restrain evil, give you a certain amount of order, and exposes a sinful heart, but it never changed that heart. Now here's one that's real important.

Don't give your children a keepable standard. Now I don't mean by that. Listen to what I'm not saying. I'm not saying sin. So don tell your children you got a half hour to vacuum the floor and get your toys picked up It not what we talking about here Okay It not what we mean You know a lot of people say well they not Christians they can obey God from the heart anyway so why tell them what to do You know, that's some of our Calvinism getting us to say, well, they're depraved, they can't do anything to please God, so why even tell them to do?

Because it exposes their hearts. and when you give them a keepable standard it drives them away from the cross for example your child faces a bully at school so what do you say? you say, ok, son ignore him just ignore him stay away from him don't go near that kid you just stay away from him now let me ask you something what kind of supernatural grace is required to stay away from somebody? None. But if you say to him, I'll tell you what God tells you to do.

God tells you to go back and let's think about something good to do for him. And I want you to do good to him. And you need to keep going back and doing good. And you must never fight back in the same way that he fights you. You can only fight back with weapons of good. that is impossible without the grace of God and what that does is begins to expose a child's heart because he'll say something to you like but mommy I don't want to do that right I don't want to do that see you can give him a keepable standard that says stay away from that kid or you can say here's what the gospel says is what you need to do you expose the need for Christ then.

But if you just give them these simple, keepable standards, they never come face to face with their poverty of spirit and their need for the transforming grace of God. All right? That's why it's so important to do that. Don't give them a keepable standard. Don't give them that. OK.

All right. The law of God, impossible for the natural man, teaches the need for God's grace. We never want to give Listen we never want to give our children some sort of mechanism and some approaches that help them to learn to manipulate their world apart from God And they can learn to manipulate their world apart from God. Avoid the kid, alright? I learned from this, a good lesson.

Avoid uncomfortable people, right? and I can start manipulating my world without reference to God. No. If you don't hold out the standard of what God requires, if you don't hold that out, then you rob your children of the mercy of the gospel. That's why you never, never shy away from telling them what God requires because then they begin to understand something radical has to happen for me to do that.

You bring them face to face with their need of Christ. All right. Make it a habit of nurturing your children in the gospel. Nurture them in the gospel. Now, what do I mean by that? In the tradition that I grew up in, the tradition went something like this. you keep giving your kid Bible verses until they come to the point and they say, Mommy, what can I do to receive Jesus in my heart?

You get them to pray the prayer. You wipe your brow. They're going to heaven. Troubles are over. Right? No.

No, never. No. You nurture them in the gospel. You keep talking about law and grace, law and gospel all the time. It's part of your daily conversation. Okay?

It's like, wow, Dad, what God requires is impossible. Yeah, you know what? God requires perfection. And you know what? No one is getting into heaven without a perfect record. What?

That's right. Unless you have a perfect record, you don't get into heaven. But, Dad, nobody has a perfect record. That's right, except for one. Who is he? Jesus And you know what When you trust in him you get his perfect record so that when you get to heaven gates there it is And you not pushing for decisions You just talk about the gospel The gospel is powerful to save people and so you nurture them in the gospel You make it part of your conversation.

You make the law and the gospel part of your shepherding task. And you bring that in to all the different situations that your children are in. You talk to them. Well, you know, why? Why? Why is there racial prejudice when they get a little older?

Why is there racial prejudice? Well, because man is a bent towards evil and he hates people that are different than him. But God has made mankind from one race or one man. And and and so we need what God says you've got to love everybody. and you can't do that. You know? I love this one.

I'll remember, I can still see myself. I can still see my three boys in their room. It was a hot summer night and it was when we were in the old house. Remember the old house? When we lived there? I remember going up into their room and I can remember it being stifling hot.

It's bedtime and one of the boys asked me, why are sharks mean? now what are you going to do with that say let me go down and get the world book encyclopedia out and i'll get back with you on that or is that now the time to talk about the curse of sin in the world see every just about every interaction with our children can be gospel packed if we're looking for it you see so nurture them in the gospel don't just make it a sermon and a decision. It's the atmosphere of your home. It's about Jesus and his saving ability and our complete inability and what God requires.

Now look, superficial parenting never addresses the heart and biblically it produces superficial children who can't handle life. They won't be able to handle life because they won't know what makes them tick. Your job as a parent is to help them understand what makes them tick. Not just to get them to do what you want, but to get them to understand why their hearts are straying and God's answer for their straying heart.

So biblical parenting means shepherding the heart, helping children understand themselves and God's world and how sin works. human heart and how the gospel meets the most profound needs of humanity. It involves helping them understand their motivations, their goals, their wants, their desires, lining it up with what God says, lining it up with the gospel and helping them understand. It exposes the true nature of reality out there and it encourages faith in Christ.

So shepherding the heart is so essential in our parenting and the gospel has to be central to that task. All right, I don't have my watch today. and I never bring my phone up here. It's 237. All right, if you have questions, you have to write them down. If you have questions, seriously, some of you look like you have questions. Okay?

So write those down and stick them in my envelope, and we'll try to answer them. All right? So do that because we want this to be as profitable as we can and 2 is when the children are supposed to be practicing so we need to quit So let stand and we be dismissed with prayer and the choir can sing. Father, thank you for your word and its sufficiency for us.

Thank you that it gives us the categories by which to understand this world and all that is in it and the categories to understand our own hearts help us to be faithful in this lord what we've talked about this afternoon takes a great deal of energy and effort and time and can only be done by your enabling grace make us parents who plead for your grace so that we can be faithful to our children as shepherds. Thank you now, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.