Parenting Seminar 2026 - "Biblical Dynamics of Family: Beginning" by Glenn Hitchcock

She and I have this ongoing

competition, uh, in Rummikub,

and for a while I'm just always winning.

And she said, well, you know, the tide will turn soon,

and it has. I haven't beaten her in Rummikub in a while, so after

last night I was feeling good enough to challenge her and Well,

after talking about submission, I submitted to her will. I lost.

We're glad you're with us here today. If you were not with us last night,

the basis of last night's lesson was on submission.

We talked about great— the great family of

God from the standpoint of marriage,

the importance of submission in the role of marriage and how that

in submission, the members of the family

first submit to God, then they submit

to one another out of love

for the Lord, in the spirit of Christ.

Not that the husband, who is the initiator of love in the relationship—

he is the head of the house, God is the head of the house,

but he is the initiator, The husband is the initiator of love in

the house, and he is placed there

by God because we

mentioned that Eve took the lead and usurped the authority,

and God took it away from Eve,

which she never had, and gave it to her equal,

who is her husband, and he would rule over her.

Not because she's less than, not because she's kind of

ignorant or anything like that. Far from the case.

Because she is his equal. She's just

as smart as you are, guys. Probably knows a lot

more than we'll ever know. And yet,

you are the head of the house, the initiator of love and

relationship. Everything starts with you. You as

you receive commands from

the Almighty. So God generates families,

and our seminar today is based upon the concept

of the Christian family, where Christ

indeed is the head of our families,

and we take our submissive roles before

him And because of him. And everything that

we do is because of our relationship to him. And thus, when it

comes to our children and when it comes to our spouses,

we are there by relationship and not

ownership. It's hard for me to imagine this,

but there are so many who believe that, well, these are my kids and I

can do anything with them. No, you can't. Oh, that's my

wife and I do her and I married her and I can— no, you can't.

These relationships are

vouched by God, bonded by God, and it's a matter of your

relationship to your children. It's a matter of your

relationship to your wife. It's a matter of your relationship to your husband.

You don't have them by ownership.

You have them by relationship.

As a matter of fact, when I think of

kids, especially when I was dealing with some folks that were kind of

in an abusive setting, they often thought of their kids as what I

call TCK kids, trophy case kids,

by ownership. I bring them out when I want

to display them before you, and let you see how beautiful they are and all

that stuff, but when I close the door, I can do with them whatever I

want to do. And in our kids program,

and the spouse abuse shelters, and things like that,

there were a lot of so-called trophy case kids there.

Little did the parents know that these are not TCK

kids, they are GBG

kids, gifted but

And as gifts of God, I happen

to know that my child— and I say my child accommodatingly,

knowing that I'm a steward of God's gift

of this child— is in my hands to take

care of, to preach and live good news before

her or him, in the presence of God,

to God's glory, that one day

she or he might turn around and do the same thing

for the gift that God would gift them with one day,

another child. That's the basis of the Christian

experience known as the Christian family.

God gifts— gifted us these

children. And as such,

just like we should see each other, we see

our children as a soul who happens

to be in a body, rather than a body

who happens to have a soul.

What makes them precious They're

in the image of God. They have an eternal soul.

And as stewards of that eternal— of their eternal destiny,

by reason of our teaching and discipline and demonstrating

before them how we live our lives,

they will either choose heaven or

choose hell. They're only going to

repeat what you give them, what you feed into them.

And so that's kind of a little snippet of

what we talked about last night. Gotta get busy today because

I got a lot of work to— well, I say a lot to cover,

but, uh, we're trying to see as far, as far

as we can get today. We want to talk about, uh, the beginning of family.

And before I do that, might there be any questions from last night's discussion?

Okay, I don't think— well, you told me last night, well, we're so tired,

we don't want to ask you anything. Wait until today.

That's what you told me, so I'm gonna be watching.

When we talk about, uh,

biblical families, we're talking about

relating to or being in accord with the Bible—

biblical families. When we talk about dynamics, we're talking

about characteristics or manner of an interaction,

a certain behavior.

A group of people— family is a group of people who are closely

related to one another by blood, marriage, or adoption.

So here's our model for discussion

in the stages of family. There are 6 dynamic features

of the Christian family. I gave an overview last night.

We're going to hit the beginning this morning, Lord willing.

The beginning: God's providence to

give us structure in our families. The bubble:

protection in the family where our kids grow and bond

and find security in the home. The boundaries: the parameters

set based upon submission and the scriptures.

The behavior, parenting, and their submission to God as they

relate to their children and to each other, as well as the world and in

the church. This is what the importance of being in a Christian family,

in a Christian home. And the benefit, the promotion, uh, the succession

of promotion. Eventually our kids are going to leave us,

and you may say, oh, that'll be a great day, that's wonderful.

Well, And then the byproduct— they will take

on the role that you took on when you were gifted a child.

It starts all over again. This, I believe,

constitutes 6 dynamic features of the Christian family.

And so I want to talk about the beginning, in the formative years, where we

began to look at how God put this family together.

God made man in his own image. So God created man in his

own image. In the image of God he created him; male and female

he created them. Then God blessed them, and God said

to them, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion

over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, over every living

thing that moves on the earth. And in the formation of

families, therefore, we have the basis for that, the scriptures

of God. I noticed this is That's going fine. That's going crazy over

there. That's getting me going. Don't look at that. Just look at this.

Okay, so God said concerning— thank

you. God said concerning family, it's not good that man should be alone.

So God brought forth mom and dad. A man

shall leave his father and mother, his family, and be joined to his

wife, and they shall become one flesh. Genesis 2:24. And forth.

Genesis 2:24

Genesis 3:16, the woman would

Genesis 3:16

bring forth children and her desire would

be for her husband. All this, remember from

last night, family came about in this beginning.

Their structure, the family structure, was intentionally

gifted by God, and I can't emphasize that enough.

God gifted us with children.

God gifted you with your husband. God gifted you

with your wife. What God therefore

has joined together, let not man do what? Don't put

us under a separate. Why? Because God provided

that husband to you. He may be a mean old windbag,

but you chose him. And she may not do everything you want

her to do, but you chose her. What brings it together where

there is some peace and harmony in the family are the scriptures of God

through submission. And again, we talked about that last night.

This beginning as provided by

God is a structure of submission, therefore, to God.

It is a structure of bonding and unity, and we're going to talk about these

individuals It's a structure of interdependence and autonomy.

The family is a structure of industry. You know, we get

busy, we work, we labor, and we work

with one another in the family of God. So I want to look

first at the structure intentionally gifted by God. You know,

in Psalm 27, the Bible tells us

about the first stage of form— formation.

Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who builds

it. That's the beginning.

It starts with God. It did not start when

you said I do and you decided we're going to build the house.

It started when you said I do before God with your— in your marriage vows,

and you trusted God to help you in your

marriage. One of the things I learned when I first became

a husband, a Christian husband. I first obeyed the

gospel. After I married Christ, I married

Mercedes. I did not have the kind

of experience that she had coming up in a Christian home.

My home was completely different, and all that I learned

about the Christian home I learned through the scriptures and the demonstration of

my wife and her family and the Church of Christ.

And I will still tell you that today, the greatest families

in the world are located in the Church of Christ.

Yeah, like I said last night, family is like chocolate

fudge— real sweet, but there are a few nuts. But don't, don't concentrate

on the nuts. Stay with that which is smooth. Stay with

that which unites. And so God gives us

a beginning, and I was able to just monitor and watch Faithful

elders and deacons took my wife

and myself under their wings. We were inside

homes eating,

enjoying one another's company, helping to work

with their kids when we had no kids. But we saw, well,

we won't do that, you know, look at that. But we learned

structure. How to

give focus and attention to

godly examples in the home.

Whenever you have God's people,

know that God is providing. And the key, the key

thing to remember about this— well, let me, let me deviate just for a second.

To those who will say, and I've had a few Brothers and

sisters from time to time that will tell me, well, God's no longer providing for

us. And I'll say, don't be a Mrs. Job.

Because see, that was her problem. When material things were

taken away, and when certain family members were taken

away, you know what Mrs. Job said?

I know you know. But basically she

said, God's not providing anymore. Why don't we just curse God and die?

Uh-uh. Look at the positive example of Mrs. Job. She should tell

us God provides for our families. Amen?

God will always provide for our families because it's not what, what you

lost in your family that matters. It's what you have

left. What did Job have left?

His integrity, his relationship

to God, He did not see his children as being

property. He saw his relationship

to God more important than anything else, and he

knew that God would still provide for his family.

Listen, today God's providing for your

family in ways that maybe you don't see. Hopefully before this

seminar is over with though, you, you shall see it.

Unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.

God not only provides for our families, he extends our families

in various ways. He protects our family.

That's more about the bubble that we'll talk about later on.

It's in vain— it is vain for you to rise up, sit up

late, to eat the bread of sorrows, For so he gives his beloved sleep.

Home should be a place of rest.

Y'all found that out last night after listening to me, didn't you? You went home

and got some rest. That's a resting place. It's a bubble.

It's a safe haven for all members regardless

of what we think of each other. You know, if you go home

and prepare to go to bed And you have a discussion that leads

to an argument with your wife, settle it before you go to bed. Don't let

the sun go down on your wrath or your anger. Why? God has

extended a place of rest called home where

we ought to be able to refresh, renew,

reform, and live

in peace. What happened?

Did I go

too far? Okay, yeah.

And children are a heritage from the Lord. The fruit of the womb

is his reward. Brethren,

God continues to gift us with the

gift of children.

God's gift of children. Should be

a welcome opportunity.

Now, all kids aren't the same.

Although they're gifts, they don't unwrap all at the same time.

Some of them unwrap a little later, and some you want to unwrap sooner,

but they won't unwrap. But you gotta hang in there.

Isn't that right? You know, I can only tell

you this. Like my daughter told her

coworker 2 days ago, her coworker is dealing

with a— what was it, Mercedes? Was it

a 21-year-old or 19-year-old child? 19. And she said, I can't—

she just won't come around. She just won't come around. And Lauren told her,

well, I can tell you from experience, you just got to be patient.

My parents were patient with me. I was— And it wasn't

until it clicked on for me. And so she said, there's hope,

I can assure you. My parents taught me that.

Parents, there's hope for your child.

There's hope for the behavior that they display. And we'll talk about that.

Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of our youth.

Aim it and train our children.

They may be sharp as an arrow, but if we're not aiming and training

them to the goal of heaven, then we

have wasted God's precious gift.

And happy is the man who has his quiver full of them.

Arranging and perpetuating family

is what the Christian home is all about.

They shall not be ashamed, but shall speak with

their enemies in the gate.

God help us to sustain our homes.

We have to know and understand this is all intentionally

gifted by God that we can sustain,

perpetuate, arrange, aim, and train our

children as well as one another.

As we're training our children, we're training each other,

spouses. My way and

your way should be God's way, and if it's

not, let's work on making it that. That's what submission is all about.

There's also structure through submission to God's word and Again, kind of

what we talked about last night. All of us on our own can judge our

own wealth or poverty by the relationship that we have with others.

We are chosen to be rich through good relationships.

The spiritual man is concerned about other individuals.

Submit yourselves one to another in the fear of God. We talked about this last

night. Everyone, regardless of our relationship, must be based on love

for the Lord. If I don't love the Lord, then I'm not going to submit.

I must learn to love Jesus. The structure of

submission comes from God through

the scriptures. It's a great mystery, but God is comparing our

relationship to his relationship to the church that

involves a relationship of sacrifice, a relationship

of service. Why? Because he loved

God enough to do for us what we couldn't do for ourselves.

So this structure of submission, our responsibility to Christ,

therefore in the church, is parallel to

the responsibility of the husband and wife. We submit because

we love the Lord. We submit to one another because of love

for the Lord. The husband submits to the wife because of love

for the Lord. The wife submits to the husband because of the

love of the Lord.

And members submit to elders because of the love of

the Lord. And so everyone

comes with baggage. Find someone who

loves you enough to help you unpack.

That's what the Christian family is all about. Family is

all about— helping each other, including our children,

to unpack what needs to be unpacked, or to

unwrap what needs to be unwrapped. It is a structure

of imperfection and dependent trust.

Listen, when you sign on

to obey the gospel, you sign

what's known as a declaration of dependence,

not independence, but dependence on

God, to walk by faith, not by

sight. The same is true in your family.

We must have a declaration of dependency on God,

to trust him by faith, to train

our children to train our husbands, to train

our wives in the fear of God because we

love God and we love each other.

Amen. So submission is a choice, not top-down

but bottom-up. So let's talk about

the structure of bonding. Any questions?

Okay, let's talk about the structure of bonding and unity.

The story of Ruth and Naomi serves as a

powerful example of the strength of family bonds. In the face of tremendous loss

and adversity, Ruth remained steadfast in her loyalty and devotion to her mother-in-law,

demonstrating the power of familial love and commitment.

Ephesians 5:25 calls upon husbands to love their wives

Ephesians 5:25

as Christ loved the church, a standard that extends to all family

members. This support system builds resilience and fosters a sense of belonging

and bonding. This is a source of unconditional

love, encouragement, and comfort. Bonding time should

be your most treasured time, and it takes

place in the structure

of the family.

Family bonding time— what does that mean?

The acrostic of time, treasuring intimate

memories eternally. When I

think of all the times when we were gifted our child,

how did we wait so long? How did

we wade through a number of losses trying to be parents?

I can recall the very moment that we became

parents. And what a tremendous relief

that was, and the bonding that took place. As a matter of fact,

my wife— oh, look, she may get upset

when I say this— she took

Lauren, went into

the nursery, closed the door, and wouldn't let me in until the next day.

They were bonding. She was nurturing,

breastfeeding her and all, and she just wanted that

time with her. And after the years of losing

babies and all, my wife was a baby's

mom, and they wanted that bonding time.

And I remember it as though it was yesterday, and I'm sure you can say

the same thing for yours. And so bonding time,

Now, I probably shouldn't have put this up here, but I

remember many of the bonding years with my grandparents.

My family involved the extended family. If it

were not for my grandparents, both of them lived to be

at least 100 years old, and one,

her mother was 110. And so I lived

with folks that were generations earlier than I ever was.

But as we were bonding with them, these are some of the quaint sayings

that they would say to us about materialism. They'd say, there's plenty

of cheese in the mousetrap, son, but you never see a happy mouse

there. I didn't forget that.

When it comes to people, she said, some people are like porcupines. They have

a lot of good points, but guess what? You can't always get close to them.

I remember that. I use that in my lessons

sometimes. I just used it here, didn't I?

There are no ugly babies.

I wanted to argue with her about that, but she

wouldn't let me. Integrity.

She used to say, you can be groomed, plumed, and perfumed,

but still stink in the nostrils of God. What do you

mean by that? Well,

when you tell a lie, you can dress it up and make it pass

to a lot of people, but you can't make it pass with God.

So she taught us about integrity. These are bonding memories

that I had without my mom and dad, but with my grandmother or

grandfather, or my auntie or uncle, or so on.

And then sorrows and difficulties. She said, if you expect it— and we talked about

this a little bit last night— if you expect to go to the Promised Land,

you would have to go through the wilderness. And again,

families are like chocolate fudge, real sweet with a few nuts.

These are some of my fond memories. My oldest

grandparent, like I said, was 110.

She would rub along the edge of her fingernails,

and every now and then she'd do this.

And when I asked her how she's doing, she said, baby,

I'm a little rough around the edges, her arthritis,

but the Lord holds my corners, her dementia.

She knew enough to know that God was

in control of whatever time she had left. Through aches and pains,

she taught us it's not about the loss of health that

matters. It's not about the loss of wealth that matters.

It's what truly is And for her,

these are some of my bonding moments.

So it's also a structure of interdependence and autonomy.

Parents can create a nurturing and loving environment where family

members feel connected and supported. Open and honest communication

allows family members to express their thoughts, feelings, and concerns, leading to

better understanding and resolution of conflicts. Of conflicts.

Where Christ is the head of the home, establish a culture

of love and respect within the household. To set aside quality

time for family activities— that's

saying a mouthful, isn't it? Say amen when you can.

Making memories and celebrating rituals and traditions.

Every holiday around Christmas.

In my family, we would put together

a jigsaw puzzle,

and as we complete the jigsaw puzzle, the oldest members of

our family, they would put the corner pieces in and

would initial it, and in some cases they would sign it.

We knew what their handwriting looked like because it was on the backside of that

puzzle. We'll flip the puzzle over,

we'll seal it, flip it over, put a front

page important news event from that year,

and if there's a child that was born, we will put their handprint or footprint

on the back of that puzzle with either

a silver dollar or a dollar bill and seal that puzzle up.

And when that child graduates from high school, guess what they

get? They get that puzzle.

And I have a Zane Grey puzzle.

And my wife and I, when we

were too broke to go out and spend a lot of money back then,

we worked on puzzles. We got to

know each other working on those puzzles. Bonding time,

being able to just celebrate rituals and traditions.

And every Christmas, somebody in our family had a baby,

and we have a puzzle waiting for that child.

Later on in my ministry, uh,

when family members— now I'm not recommending y'all do this because

Neil and Irm, y'all may go broke.

Every new baby would get a silver dollar from the preacher.

And I would order them from the men. Family had a newborn child

in there, I'd give them a silver dollar, and they'd give me a picture of

their newborn baby. And on my bulletin board in my office

were all these beautiful pictures of these children.

And I still have those pictures. Now those children,

a lot of them are your ages, or even older probably. But they

grew up. And when they grow up, they call and

say, Brother Hitchcock, I need to ask you something. And I say, what?

Jason, is that you? How'd you know?

Jason, I know you. I'm your dad. I got your picture on my board,

son. What do you need? And we'll

talk and deal with situations that

may be in his life and all. And they're growing up,

they don't play the gospel, they have kids, and a lot of them are at

the Peninsula Church now. You know, we returned there in 2017, but that's a

different story. And, and some of those same children

whose pictures were up on our board are members in our congregation.

One of them's one of our deacons. But making memories,

celebrating rituals, can lead to other things. We'll talk more about that

later. But a structure of industry— each member of the family should

know and respect the value of work and

initiate, as initiated through parents.

Sure, child labor is positive, by the way. Colossians 3:20,

Colossians 3:20

it's positive. Should be.

Daily chores, that's positive. Memory work,

positive. Schoolwork, positive. Prayer talk,

positive. Church work, very positive. Integrating these

into your child's lives will help them, especially when we get to the behavior

part. Sometimes they're too busy to act out because they've got commitments

that they have to do. A lot of kids act out because they

just don't have anything to do.

You know, we treat them Like

trophy case kids, we know we can give them materialism and they'll

be happy, we think. But that's not true.

They're not trophy case kids.

They're gifts from God. They need more than

materialism. They need something spiritual that will challenge them and keep

them employed in the industry of

serving and glorifying God Almighty.

I don't get a lot of amens on that, but I'm telling you,

that's where it is.

Well, work is not a bad word, folks.

And that's the beginning of family. That's family.

What questions do you have? I know that was kind of

quick, but I'm coming up on the other one here too. So when you think

of families, Family represents

father and mother in love.

And when that's the case, God sees it, he always says

yes. That's my view of family.

Fathers and mothers in love, as affirmed by God,

God will say yes to that. That's the structure

of families. Children are a

gift. Gifted by God, when you don't treat them

like trophy case kids with a lot of gaming

and money and all that other foolishness we throw

at our kids— yeah, I said it's foolishness. You don't like it, you can see

Neil afterwards. But it's something that

we need to examine very carefully and closely.

You say, well, I want to challenge their minds. Yeah, but challenge their spiritual

line also. Most of the games I've been seeing, they don't challenge the spiritual line.

I'll just say it right up. We need to

challenge their spiritual lines.

Okay, well,

that's coming up on the ball is my next one.

You want to take a break

Yeah, listen, let's take a break. Before we do that, let's have a closing prayer.

Gracious God, our Father in heaven, we thank thee for the

structure of our family, for the scriptures to help us to guide our family,

Father, and for submissive fathers and mothers and children

who comply to thy holy precepts,

Father. Help us to treat our children as your gift

and not as some tinker toy. Help us, Father, to love one another.

Bless our families, Father, as we work together to deal with

each other and our children, that heaven will be our home. In Jesus' name,

amen. Let's take a little break and we'll be back shortly.