Opening Illustration: “18 Summers”. My wife and kids spent a few days visiting family this past week. I was sitting at my kitchen table, working on the message for today about parenting. There was a song that jumped into my playlist that I never heard before called “18 summers”. It was a song about how quickly time moves. It was a song about a dad’s perspective on how the 18 summers he had as a dad with his child – and now they are gone. The chorus of the song goes like this:

Eighteen summers gone like that.
Eighteen years you don't get back.
Eighteen trips around the sun, don't it make you wonder.
Why holding time's like holding sand.
Always slipping through my hands.
What I'd give to hold you for another.
Eighteen summers.
Oh, eighteen summers.

It was one of those songs that just absolutely grabs at your heart and punches you in the gut at the same time. Whenever I listen to songs like this, I’m always asking, “Why? Why did you write this? I still have questions for whomever wrote the song “Christmas shoes…” So there I was, in my house alone, crafting a message about parenting, while having my heart ripped out about parenting. Before I knew it, I found myself talking to my dog about being a parent. That’s how bad it got. And then, the next song comes on. I don’t remember the lyrics, but it drew me back to Deuteronomy 6: ⁴ “Listen, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. ⁵ And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength. ⁶ And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands that I am giving you today. ⁷ Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. ⁸ Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders. ⁹ Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

God, in His kindness and gentleness, reminded me that I don’t have to be the perfect parent. I just need to let my children see Jesus in me. The reality of time, as a parent, is hitting me a little harder lately as my oldest child enters high school. As parents, we have these moments where we feel the tension between the days and the years. The days feel long, but the years feel short. Today, we come to a passage, that at least for me, has helped resolve some of that tension as a parent. We have a passage in front of us that tells us as parents our goal is to…Let your children see Jesus in you. 

Let’s open our Bibles to Ephesians 6. We enter the last chapter of this book. As a church, we have been going through the entire book. Sermon Series: Ephesians: Masterpiece in Progress. That series titles is a great reminder about who we are as parents. God’s Word is alive and powerful, so let’s read with expectancy. Read Ephesians 6:1-9. Pray. 

Before we get dive into these verses, let me remind you of something: What did we learn about Ephesians 5:21 last week? It’s a connecting verse. If you go back to 5:15-20, we learned that we have to be consumed with what matters most. We must be filled with the Holy Spirit. What God leads Paul to write about is how we live a spirit-filled life in our marriages, with our parenting, and with our work. These are three “life laboratories” that Paul uses to demonstrate what it looks like to live as someone filled with the Holy Spirit. And all three of these areas were centered around the household structure in biblical times. While the section of verses we read today are addressing two parts of the household, I am drawing them both under the same umbrella – the umbrella of parenting. So, let’s go back to where we started and what it means to be a parent: Show Jesus to your children. 

1) Show Jesus to your children. (vs. 1-3) Look at verses 1 through 3 again: ¹Children, obey your parents because you belong to the Lord, for this is the right thing to do. ² “Honor your father and mother.” This is the first commandment with a promise: ³ If you honor your father and mother, “things will go well for you, and you will have a long life on the earth.” So, last week saw the purpose of marriage is holiness. Marriage is an illustration of Jesus and the Church – and part of that illustration is that we become more like Jesus. We also know that a part of marriage is procreation. God desires for a Christian husband and a Christian wife to have children. It’s a calling that is given to so many families. But it’s not a calling that is put on every family. Just like marriage isn’t absolute – God calls some people singleness – having children isn’t absolute – God calls some families not to have children. Also, God calls some families to have children through non-biological means. 

But what is absolute in Scripture is that Christian families with children have the same calling: The calling to show Jesus to your children. And that’s exactly what verses 1 through 3 puts in front of us. Paul starts by addressing the children. It’s important to understand that Paul is addressing the Christian community with the city of Ephesus. We know, from research, that the culture that existed in Ephesus did not put a lot of value on children. It was not uncommon for a parent to sell or give away their children to be slaves, prostitutes, or gladiators. But in the Christian community within Ephesus, the Church had a high value of children. The command to children in verse 1 is obey your parents. That’s the obligation – but what’s the explanation? Well, it’s good for children to obey their parents because you belong to Jesus and it’s the right thing to do. How is obedience to parents the right thing to do?

• It’s the natural order that God created
  • Culture and societies have long held that children obeying their parents creates stability
  • When kids stop obeying their parents, that’s when the threads of culture begin to unravel
• Paul points back to God’s law in verse 2
  • Paul quotes parts of the Ten Commandments
  • Just in case we miss the law written on our hearts, God has clearly revealed His law to us

There’s a part of my flesh that wants to stop right there. I could make parenting simple and say “Obey what I say because it’s what you are supposed to do.” And a lot of parents will take that posture. Illustration: “Do as I say, not as I do”. I remember as a teenager “kindly inquiring” to my dad as to why he would tell me to abide by the speed limit, yet, he would find good reason to not follow the speed limit. His response was simply: “Do as I say, not as I do”. Now, I picked up on his sarcasm at the time. But, if I’m being honest, I want to parent that way a lot of times. But that’s not the full story of parenting. Now, the third reason why children obey their parents take the first reasons and shifts them away from the parent and back to God. Why is children’s obedience to their children the right thing to do? Go back to verse 1: ¹Children, obey your parents because you belong to the Lord, for this is the right thing to do. If a child belongs to the Lord, what can we deduce what has happened? The assumption is that they have heard the gospel of Jesus Christ and have made Him their Savior and Lord. Because of that, the child should desire to obey God. And since God says for children to obey their parents, a child should be motivated to obey their parents for God’s sake. But there is even one more layer deeper that is fundamental to parenting.

Don’t miss this: Children know their parents before they know God. Children will perceive who their parents are before they perceive who God is. That means, as Christian parents, who we are points our children to Jesus. The first experience of God a child receives is through his or her parents. The best way that we can parent is by being consumed with Jesus. The more you are consumed with Jesus, the more you will show Jesus to your children.  And let me remind you about something: It’s never too late to start showing Jesus to your children. Don’t believe that lie from Satan. Illustration: Alma and the rat. Dog killed rat and left it in the driveway. We had a neighbor that loved to complain. Well, that day, as my dad had the rat in a shovel, there was a look in his eye that I had never seen before. Before I know it, the rat goes flying over the fence. My dad’s sheepish grin quickly fading when we saw the surprise on my fence. I think what amazed me the most is seeing the rat flying back over the fence. My dad knew it wasn’t too late to show me the right thing to do. It’s never too late to show Jesus to your children. Parenting is tough. It’s a joy, but it’s hard. And it’s hard because…Parenting is heart work. 

2) Parenting is heart work. (vs. 4) Look at verse 4: ⁴ Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger by the way you treat them. Rather, bring them up with the discipline and instruction that comes from the Lord. Paul addresses fathers in verse 4 – and I’ll explain why in minute – but I don’t want the emphasis on fathers in verse 4 overshadow who was addressed in the other verses. Three times, Paul addresses parents and fathers and mothers. Mothers and fathers are both called to parenting. Mothers and fathers are called to be unified. I know many of you are single parents, were single parents, or grew up in a single parent home. If you are a single parent, let me say something quickly:

1. God sees you.
   • He knows the burden and weight.
   • You are carrying the weight of two.
2. God will sustain you.
   • He cares for you deeply.
   • As a single parent, stay deep in the reservoir of Jesus.

Here in verse 4 though, we see God address the fathers. A Roman father had absolute authority over his family. He could sell his child into slavery. Force them into labor. He could take the law into his own hands and apply it to his child. This was the typical father figure at the time of Paul’s writing. But that’s now that we see in verse 4. There are two challenges given to parents, particularly the father, in verse 4.

1. Don’t treat your child in a way that leads them to anger
   • Why does Paul focus on children not getting angry?
     • Why this emotion?
     • Anger is an emotion that can devour other emotions
     • Unrighteous and uncontrolled anger can control you, rather than you controlling your anger
     • Unrighteous and uncontrolled anger can deaden the soul
     • If a child is constantly brought to a place of anger, it can wreak havoc on them
     • If we can help our children control their anger, it opens up the potential for other emotions – joy, love, and kindness – to flourish
   • So, we don’t provoke our kids to anger
     • We don’t ridicule them
     • We don’t yell at them
     • We don’t say harsh or hurtful things to them or about them
     • We don’t compare them to other kids
     • We don’t try to emotionally manipulate them
   • That means, as parents, we have to think about the proactive things we can do to prevent unrighteous anger
     • We have to do the hard work to make sure our parenting is heart work.
   • Application: I’m not perfect at this by any means, but I tell my kids three things (almost) every night:
     • “I love you, I’m proud of you, and I’m so glad that I get to be your dad.”
     • My kids hear me pray (almost) every night:
       • “God, help me to be the best dad that I can for this child.”
     • My hope is that those three statements will proactively position me as a dad to do the heart-level work needed for them
     • Your goal as a parent isn’t behavior modification
       • Your goal is heart-level change and heart-level obedience
       • We need to do get the heart of our kids
     • Sam and Art get trophies as kids from my dad
     • What’s the second challenge in verse 4? 
2. “Rather, bring them up with the discipline and instruction that comes from the Lord.”
   • The only way to live out verse 4 is if you know your goal as a parent
     • Do you remember the goal of a husband from last week?
       • It’s to do everything you can to prepare your wife for when she meets Jesus face to face
     • Parenting is very similar
       • You are preparing your child to be used for God’s kingdom for God’s glory
       • Lord willing, we get 18 years to train up our children to be Kingdom warriors
       • That means you will instruct, train, and discipline your child for this purpose
     • You need to know your goal as a parent and you need to communicate this goal to the child.
       • When a child knows where you are going, as a parent, it makes sense to them why you do the things you do
       • Emphasis: Give your child a vision of God’s kingdom and God’s victory.
       • Let your children hear you say, “God has big plans for you.”
         • And believe it as a parent!
           • You need to believe it for yourself as well
           • If you don’t know Jesus, you parenting starts with you accepting Jesus as Savior and Lord
           • GOSPEL PRESENTATION

I know this can all be overwhelming, so let me say one final thing. Some of the simplest and most profound parenting advice I’ve been given is this: “Have fun and talk about Jesus a lot.” Very briefly, I want to look at verses 5 through 9. As I mentioned early, Paul shifts to a different part of the household code in biblical times. But I want to keep these verses in the idea of parenting. So, here’s what we see last: Let your children see who you work for. 

3) Let your children see who you work for. (vs. 5-9) These final verses talk about masters and slaves. Two important things:

1. Slavery is wrong
   • Scripture is clear on this
   • Paul purpose in writing these verses wasn’t to bring about the abolishment of slavery, but rather, how to live a Spirit-filled life within the context that many people found themselves
2. The slavery in biblical times was not like the slavery we’ve seen in American history
   • Slavery was mostly economically driven
   • It was estimated there were about 60 million slaves in the Roman Empire
   • While not right, it was a normal part of life

As a reminder, Paul was addressing the Christian community. That meant Paul was addressing Christian masters and slaves. I want to focus in on verse 7: ⁷ Work with enthusiasm, as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people. While the slave/master relationship was not good, the calling, in the midst of the bad, was to remember who you are working for. The calling is this: Work for God, even in unjust relationships. Our kids are watching and listening when it comes to our work. Our calling is to work through Christ, work like Christ, and work for Christ. God uses our work relationships to teach us to work with excellence for Him. Modeling this attitude and ethic for our kids is formative. It’s a reminder that everything we do is all part of the journey to be with Jesus.

That song I listened to this week ended with these lyrics: 

Dorm room number 205
A grown man trying not to cry
Can't wait to see all you're gonna do
Your mom and me and two aching hearts
Driving home in an empty car
Thanking God for the gift of raising you
For eighteen summers 

That second to last line grabbed at my heart: “Thanking God for the gift of raising you”. No matter what season of life you find yourself as a parent, see the gift of your children. I know some of you have newborns that you just want some sleep. I know some of you have teenage drivers… and you just want them to come at night so you can get some sleep. There are those of us who are somewhere in between all of that. And there are some of you who have adult children. Whatever season you are in, it’s never too late to show them Jesus. Let them see Jesus in you. Let’s pray.

Previous Page