Teach Them

Series: Family Matters

Category: Discipleship, Family

Speaker: Jason Williams

In the final sermon in the Family Matters series this past Sunday, we looked at the biblical mandate for family discipleship. In Deuteronomy 6, Moses challenges the leaders of the home to take responsibility for teaching their children and their children’s children to love the Lord with everything they have. We began by looking at the goal of discipleship: to love God with everything you are. Distinct from religious activity, true discipleship leads to a deep and abiding relationship with God. If this is the goal of discipleship, then Moses lays out an important prerequisite. Parents must first have the Truth of the Bible written on their hearts. How can parents lead children to a place that they don’t know how to get to themselves?

 It is the responsibility of the church to teach children about how much Jesus loves them, how God has a purpose and a plan for their lives and He is calling them to live their lives according to the unwavering Truth of the Bible. However, as soon as they leave the church, they walk out the door back into a culture that tells them that the Bible is outdated and irrelevant, do what feels natural, there is no divine plan for their lives and their self worth is based on performance.

 Parents are the ones called by God to stand in the gap between what they learn at church and the contrast they experience in the world. As the church comes alongside parents as a partner in this amazing task of family discipleship, the primary responsibility falls to the parents to live out their relationship with Jesus with their children in the everyday moments of life.

What does discipleship look like in your family? Are you in a discipleship relationship? How can you lead your family to a place you don’t know how to get to?