Parenting with Purpose | Dave Lanuti

Well, uh, I think it must have been hard parenting me when

I was seven years old.

It was the night before Easter, and my dad took my brother

and me to the Catholic church

where we attended the night before.

Easter is called the Easter vigil if you

were raised Catholic.

And, uh, my dad sang in the choir.

I don't remember where my mom

and my sister were on this particular night,

but my dad sits, my brother

and I down right in the middle

of the church right there in the pew.

And he says to us, be good as he goes

and leaves us to go sing in the choir.

We weren't good. This wouldn't be a good story

if, if we were right.

But in our defense,

the Easter vigil is the longest service

in Catholic church history.

Like it's the kind of service

where you sing every single verse of every song.

And we all know that the,

the priest has like some shortcuts available to him

that he could take to shorten things up,

but he doesn't take any of those on the Easter vigil.

My brother and I knew we were in it

for the long time, uh, for the long haul.

And we were miserable. Uh, we were bored out of our minds

until hope they started passing out

candles and lighting them.

That's right. And our tiny unsupervised hands, my brother

and I now held fire,

hide it under a bushel.

No, we were gonna let it shine.

And so we thought, you know what?

The hymnals seem like a good place to start.

And it turns out hymnals are perfect kindling

for the wooden pews that they keep 'em in.

That's right. We tried to blow it out to our astonishment.

Yes. What you're picturing is right,

all the hymnals catch fire

and then the pew in front of us, there's shouts,

there's screams, there's chaos.

My dad comes running from the choir,

he literally pulls my brother and I out of all the wreckage

and he drives us straight home.

I don't even honestly know if

that solemn Easter vigil continued in my absence or not.

I have no idea. But I could tell you

what our night was done.

So I tell you, it must have been hard to be my parent.

It's helpful for me to remember that from time

to time when my kids do dumb things.

It's just helpful to remember I was a mess too.

And even if you'd say today that you have good kids,

and I think I do, I think I have really good kids.

Parenting seems to be getting more

and more complicated, doesn't it?

As parents, we blame a lot of things though.

But I think the primary reason we all think parenting is

getting more complicated is

that we've actually abandoned the book that tells us how

to parent our children as God has faithfully parented us.

And that's one of the main ideas I

want to share with you today.

We are to faithfully parent our kids

as God faithfully parents us in this book.

In fact, I wanna give you the two other main

ideas right off the top.

Uh, parenting is not about behavior control.

It's about heart change.

And a parent's job, a parent's role is

to faithfully represent God.

We represent him even as we fail.

And especially as our kids fail.

And make no mistake, parents

and kids alike, we're going

to fail more times than we care to admit.

So we're gonna need help, we're gonna need encouragement,

and we're gonna find it today in God's word.

So open up with me to Ephesians chapter six.

We're actually picking up right where we left off last week,

right after the verses to husbands and wives.

Um, but it's real short six verses today.

I'm gonna read it to us now.

It says this, and starting in, in, in verse one, children

obey your parents in the Lord.

For this is right, honor your father and mother.

This is the first commandment with a promise

that it may go well with you

and that you may live long in the land.

Fathers do not provoke your children to anger,

but bring them up in the discipline

and instruction of the Lord.

This short passage is part of a larger section of scripture

that's often referred to as the household code.

Uh, Paul actually introduces this whole thing,

several verses before in verse 21, setting it all up.

He says, uh, that we are to, we're submitting to one another

out of reverence to Christ.

And then he goes on to explain how that pertains wife

to their husbands and now children to their parents.

But notice it's that out of reverence to Christ's part.

That is our motivation again.

And as we zoom way out, we see this bigger picture of

what God has been up to as he's been restoring everything

that has been broken on earth.

Paul's been building this story explaining

what God's been up to in the first three chapters

of this letter to the, the church in Ephesus,

that God is working to unite all things in him, in Christ,

things in heaven and things on earth by faith in Jesus.

This includes all nations on earth

and it includes every man, woman,

and child who believe in Jesus being united back to God.

And especially it includes families being united back

together, husbands back to their wives

and children back to their parents.

And this letter to the Ephesians,

Paul first reminds us of the gospel.

He begins by reminding us that we have a father.

God is our Father.

If we put our faith and trust in Jesus, he goes on

to explain that, that the father's love

for sinners has finally arrived in his son, Jesus Christ.

It's good news for all people that if we trust in Jesus,

that if we put our faith in his death

and in his resurrection, then we will be forgiven.

That we will no longer be considered dead in our trespasses

and sins, but we will be made alive together in Christ.

That not only that we will be adopted into God's family

and once in God's family with him as our Father, the way

that we can live our life will bear a powerful testimony

to this good news to the gospel.

That once in his family with God as our father,

we will have a chance to walk by his spirit in light

and in truth and in wisdom in his family.

God the Father shares graciously all things with us.

He loves us and he cares for us

as he's growing us up into the image of Jesus Christ.

And so in light of all that, he says,

husbands love your wives.

And now children obey your parents.

The gospel is the context for our sermon today.

The gospel is also the motivation. We look to Jesus.

Remember out of reverence to Christ, he says in verse one,

then children obey your parents

and the Lord for this is right.

How cool is it that Paul directly addresses children here?

Uh, he assumes that his congregation is made up of,

of a multi-generational church, that,

that children are present with their parents

as they hear this message

that there's responsibilities being shared directly

to parents and directly to kids.

I think that's awesome. I I,

I remember several weeks ago we did that.

We invited our children into our services together.

I hope we get to do that again. It just feels like family.

So Paul tells children directly,

kids obey mom and dad.

There's no indication of compulsion here.

Children are willingly and joyfully to obey parents.

Have you tried this? Kids obey

if only it were that easy, right?

If only the first time we told them they would just

obey personal pet peeve.

Um, I I I hope we can all get over the parenting.

Like counting to three trick.

This is kind of an aside,

but you know, the, like the Johnny, uh, I'm gonna count

to 3 1 2.

Okay? Johnny, you know what happens when I'm gonna get

to three, I'm gonna start over again.

Johnny. One, two. Can we just agree to stop that?

I mean, think about what this is communicating

to our kids versus what Paul is saying here,

how God wants us to obey our parents as to the Lord.

We would never do that to God.

God, it it wants us to obey right away all the way

with a happy heart.

Can you picture God doing that with us? Dave?

I'm gonna count to three. Don't you like

those hymnals on fire?

Dave, walk two. I digress. I digress.

Um, how important is this anyway?

How important is it that we obey our parents?

I find it fascinating to look at other places in scripture

where we find the same idea.

Jesus himself mentions honoring your father

and mother five times in, in the gospels.

But Romans 1 29 has stopped me in my tracks

as I was preparing.

Disobedience is listed right there in this list

of horrific things, including murder, including, uh,

deceit hating God, inventing evil.

And then right there in the middle

of the list disobedience to parents.

So in short, disobedience to parents is a sin.

Now, before you go run

and tell your kids that Pastor Dave called them a little

sinner, uh, it might be helpful

to remember your own disobedience to your parents, right?

If you really wanna be thoughtful about it, you may pause

and remember your own disobedience

to your heavenly parent as well.

I promise you that will cause you

to move toward your children

with a little more grace the next time they misbehave.

Here's an observation,

whether they're your biological child,

your adopted foster child, your grandchild, the things

that irk you most about your kids are the things

that are exactly like you, like

reproduces, like, ugh, they're so stubborn,

they're just like me.

It's so frustrating, right?

Well, no, children are not commanded to obey mom and dad

because mom and dad are geniuses.

Somewhere around age 13, every kid thinks, huh, my mom

and dad aren't as smart as they made me think once.

Um, they, they know that nor are kids committed to obey mom

and dad because mom and dad are perfect,

nor are they commanded to obey parents unconditionally.

Paul's not saying that we should follow

our parents into sin.

Remember last week, we looked at the same verse.

Peter said, we must obey God rather than men.

Although I admit, I've often said the words

because I said so when my kids ask why do they need to obey?

Uh, there's better biblical answers to why

and how children should, should obey their parents.

And we can find three right here in this verse.

The first one is this. They need,

they should be obeying in the Lord.

This could also be rendered as to the Lord.

It's the same idea that's flowing

through this whole section of scripture.

Uh, in other words, why should they obey?

Well, out of reverence to Christ, submission

to to, uh, in obedience, appearance is rooted in our love

for Jesus that's rooted in the gospel.

Second, for this is right, he says, we don't need

to oversize this.

Obeying your parents is simply the right thing to do.

Um, you know, we, we all pretty much say things like,

because I'm dad.

That's why, and this is actually kind of close to that.

I think the reason we all say this,

even though our kids roll their eyes every time

we say it, because I'm dad.

And that's why is because God has ingrained this idea

and I in us, in all of us, that it's just right to obey mom

and dad, even though we choose not to.

And third, because it's commanded in God's law.

In verse two and verse three, uh,

Paul specifically references the 10 commandments

that were given to, uh, Moses in Exodus chapter 20.

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

So if we believe that God's word is truth

and we believe that God's way is best, then we're going

to align our lives and relationships to what he says.

And he says, honor your father and mother.

This is the first commandment with a promise

that it may go well with you

and that you may live long in the land.

Now, this promise does not guarantee that obedience

to your parents is gonna give you some sort

of immortality or invincibility.

We, we sadly all know, uh, tragic cases where,

where children have died tragically too young.

And I, I actually, I know there's some of you here

that are firsthand experience with that,

and I can't imagine, but this promise was originally given

to the children of Israel.

But Paul's expanding on it here,

making it universally applicable to all of us.

Paul actually adds words here that aren't in Exodus 20.

They aren't in the original 10 commandments.

He adds the part that it may go well with you.

Those words aren't in the 10 Commandments, just the,

that you may live long in the land

and this is what he's driving at,

that if you do this generally it's gonna go well.

It's not a guarantee that every,

every day is gonna end up in perfect happiness,

but generally we can expect

to experience God's best when we're obedient to him.

In other words, if we were

to take a big step back from all this

and we're to look at a healthy church, if we're

to look at the family of families and,

and figure out how can we get healthy again,

it's not gonna be possible

unless the parent child relationships are marked by love

and by trust and by obedience and honor.

If we get that right,

Paul's saying it's gonna go well for you.

And then verse four, Paul shifts his instructions directly

to parents, specifically fathers are instructed here.

And it doesn't mean that mothers don't need

to heed these instructions.

This is can be seen as an extension of the headship

of the husband, that God, uh, that Paul has established,

excuse me, that God has established in the

previous few verses.

Um, so he says,

and by the way, just by way of reminder about that headship,

remember if, if you were tracking with us last week,

husbands are set up as the ultimate

servant in your marriage.

If you miss that sermon, go back and watch it online.

It's a good one. But the, the, the instruction is

for fathers and mothers alike.

But he says, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger,

but bring them up in discipline and instruction of the Lord.

So Paul's instruction is first negative,

and then he moves towards the positive.

So we're gonna stand, uh, on the negative for just a moment,

then we're gonna move toward the positive.

So negative, do not provoke your children to anger.

Provoke means to exasperate, to frustrate intensely.

This kind of continues Paul's comments earlier about anger

that he said just a couple, uh, chapters before, be angry

and do not sin.

Do not let the son go down on your anger

and give no opportunity to the devil.

In other words, don't forget, there is an enemy out there

that is trying to bust up your family.

He's been doing it since Genesis three.

And anger is a great weapon for him to bust up families

for dividing children from their parents.

So do not provoke your children to anger.

Literally means, Hey, show some restraint

in the Roman culture of the day.

There is this, uh, uh, unique, I guess is the right word,

uh, cultural phenomenon called patria potus, the authority

of the head of the house.

This is the culture that he's speaking to here.

This gave the father unlimited power over his children,

that if his children misbehaved,

he could inflict severe physical punishment that actually,

if a child misbehaved,

the father could have his children sold into slavery

because of misbehaved.

He could actually legally command the death penalty if his

kids misbehave, misbehaved.

Imagine that instead of counting to three

or a timeout, right?

And Paul is saying in the, in the Christian household,

it shouldn't be like this.

This kind of unrestrained tyranny of a father

or of a husband is not

what a Christian home should look like.

So show restraint.

Don't provoke and frustrate your children.

Don't do more harm than good.

It's tragic when kids are brought up in an environment

where they're constantly in fear

of the next volcanic eruption from mom

or especially from dad.

But it's not just outbursts of anger

that can frustrate our kids and provoke them to anger.

Let, let me uh, give you seven ways we

provoke or frustrate our kids.

And you're like seven Dave that's kind of heavy handed.

Maybe just two would be enough.

But I want you to know, these are seven things I'm learning.

These are seven things that I'm tempted to do, seven traps

that I have fallen in from time to time.

I'm a co struggler among you, so I'm just sharing with you

what I'm learning as a parent.

But the first thing is this, our selfishness.

This is at the top of the list.

When we forget that our children belong to God,

it gives us it, it sends us into a whole

world of parenting trouble.

If you wanna see this in action, go

to a soccer field on the weekend

and watch the parents watch what happens when, when a kid

misses the penalty shot

or when a kid blows it

for the whole team and they lose the game.

Watch the parents' response.

Sometimes they, they, they have this personal embarrassment

that le leads them to anger.

They lash out the kid saying things like, well,

I'm signing you up for, for, uh, extra lessons,

private lessons starting tomorrow as the kid just kind

of shrugs and is ready to quit.

Is this more about the kid

or is this more about us as a parent trying

to make our kids into our personal trophies?

I mean, that, that's the kind of selfishness

that makes everything about our hopes, our dreams,

our expectations, our reputation,

rather than encouraging God's plan

and his desire for his children.

Second, our severity.

I want you to think carefully about the punishments

you choose for your children.

All kids are different,

and I'm not here to prescribe one punishment over the other.

I'm just asking you think carefully about this.

Don't respond in a moment of emotion.

Ask yourself two questions.

Will this punishment lead to the growth

that God desires for his children?

And does this severity

of this punishment appropriately match the behavior?

Third, our inconsistency.

This is when one day, one thing is ignored,

and the next day the exact same thing is punished.

I'll be honest, when I fail at this,

it's when there's like a difference between

what happens in public

and what happens in private, like privately.

If they do a little bit of misbehaving, I'm like, it's fine.

It's whatever. I don't feel like dealing this right now.

Let 'em go. But in public, they're making me look bad.

And so the exact same misbehavior you can come down

and punish and that, that frustrates our kids.

When that happens, again, it's more about us

and our selfishness, how we feel

when we forget who they belong to.

Fourth, our failure

to distinguish childish foolishness from sin.

Kids are kids and kids are gonna do foolish things.

We just need to know that they may not know any better.

A child getting a Lego stuck way up his nose is not the same

as a child trying to lie to his parents about

how it got stuck up there.

You know, um, like the, the Lego thing, that's not a sin.

That's a kid. Being a kid that's foolishness.

But lying to your parents, that is a sin.

And a wise parent will be able

to distinguish the difference when he, when he

or she is discipling his kid moving forward.

Uh, fifth comparison to other kids.

Why can't you be more like your brother?

These kinds of words are like poison to a kid's heart.

The only measuring stick we should be using is our growth

toward the measure of the fullness of Jesus Christ.

Sixth are hypocrisy

when we ourselves fail in the exact same way,

but it goes unpunished without a consequence.

Like when you say, Hey, don't talk to your mother like that,

when you yourself are disrespecting

your wife in front of the kids.

Seventh, our failure to acknowledge their growth.

This is when nothing is good enough. Ah, you scored a goal.

Well, what happened on that other one?

Or you got a 93 on that test? What'd you get wrong?

Honestly, this is the one I failed at the most as a parent.

One day I was at a restaurant with my son.

We were talking about fears,

and I asked him if he was afraid of quicksand.

My son grew up with this irrational fear of quicksand.

He thought it was gonna get him everywhere he went.

He was really kind of disappointed that we still

to this day, haven't actually seen quicksand.

I don't even know if quicksand is a real

thing to be quite honest.

Um, but he said, no, dad, I'm not afraid of quicksand.

And I said, well, what are you most afraid of?

What's your biggest fear in life?

And he thought, and he thought, he said,

I think disappointing you is my greatest fear.

It's like, oh, dagger to the heart.

I don't know how many times I've often thought the same

thing about my dad before he died.

I mean, the, the crazy expectations of growing up as a,

as a pastor's kid must be incredible.

And I've often failed to see and to celebrate my, my son

and my daughter's victories.

So those are some of the, the traps I've fallen into

that can provoke or frustrate my kids.

So let's not do those. So what do we do instead?

Paul moves us toward the positive.

He says, we, we bring them up in the discipline

and instruction of the Lord.

The word bring them up is the same word as nourish.

It's the same idea that you could use

as you plant a tree in your garden

that you make sure it has the nutrients it needs,

that it gets the sunlight it needs, that, uh, the, the,

the soil is good, it gets the water it needs.

You're, you're bringing it up.

And this bringing it up describes a process.

Parenting is not a one-time event.

It's not something that it just happens and it's over.

It's a process. And that is good news for parents

because that means it's not too late.

Parenting doesn't hinge on our last failure or success.

If, if the last conversation you had

with your kids was a disaster.

Well, good news. You're still mom, you're still dad

until they meet Jesus one day or you meet Jesus one day

or he comes back again.

When Cindy and I, uh,

dropped off our Senate college last year,

we didn't declare mission accomplished.

Our job is over.

We could have, if we considered our job as, uh,

behavior control managers, you could say,

yeah, all right, he's outta your house.

You're not controlling his behavior anymore. You're done.

But that's not our job.

Remember, our job is to faithfully

represent God to our kids.

So we haven't stopped, nor will we stop in this regard,

but it looks different today.

Now we're continuing, uh, to pray for our son, hoping,

praying that he continues on his own

and what we've already taught him in God's

word while he was in our home.

It reminds me of Paul's words

to Timothy, and these are awesome.

Uh, listen to this continue.

He says, in what you have learned

and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it,

and how from childhood you have known the sacred writings,

the Bible, which are able to make you wise for salvation

through faith in Christ Jesus.

What makes these verses amazing is Paul's actually referring

to Timothy's mom here,

and his mom is named in the letter to Timothy.

Her name is Eunice. He's also referring specifically

to Timothy's grandma, and she's named, her name is Lois.

That these two women as mom

and his grandma were the ones

that taught Timothy God's word.

Isn't that cool? So shout out to godly, uh,

prayerful grandmas

and grandpas that are teaching their

grandchildren God's word.

I applaud you way to go. Grandmas and grandpas keep it up.

So how do we bring them up?

We bring them up in discipline and instruction.

Discipline means training.

The training regimen of a loving Christian parent is

to be framed by the transforming power of the gospel.

Uh, we can't be too overly severe provoking them to anger,

but discipline is required.

We are to faithfully parent our kids

as God is faithfully parenting us.

So again, we look to God's word, we look to his example,

we look to our heavenly Father for a cue on this.

The author of Hebrews writes it this way.

He says, for the Lord, disciplines the one he loves.

And he chastises every son whom he receives.

It is for discipline that you have to endure.

God is treating you as sons for

what son is there whom his father does not discipline.

He God disciplines us for our good

that we may share in his holiness.

For the moment, all discipline seems

painful rather than pleasant.

But later, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness

to those who have been trained by it

with God The Father is our example.

We are to likewise discipline our children in love Again,

the goal in this passage here is not about behavior

control management.

The the goal is heart change.

Its holiness that God is growing our hearts into his

likeness, and it will yield peaceful fruit

of righteousness in our kids' hearts.

That's what it's all about. And this is our training manual.

This is the instruction that Paul is talking about.

It's God's word. Because look, parents,

children are gonna ask hard questions.

Where will you turn for the answers?

Children will ask things like, dad,

why did my friend hurt me today?

Dad, why does our neighbor down the street have two moms?

Dad, how do I know if I'm in love?

These are great questions. They're hard questions to answer.

As a parent and loving parents,

even if they don't know the answer, will wisely reply.

What does God's word have to say about that?

And, and even if you don't know the

answer, you can look together.

This is how we do it. This is discipleship.

This is teaching our kids to turn to God's words so

that they may see the world around them

with a biblical lens.

This is bringing them up in the discipline

and instruction of the Lord.

And those last three words of the Lord are important.

In fact, they're vital. I know we wear plenty of hats, uh,

as parents, we're the medic, we're the chef,

we're the cheerleader, we're the teacher, we're the coach.

We're like a lot of things.

But remember, our biblical role as parents is

to represent God.

The one that we are trying to, to teach them about.

In other words, behind parents who teach

and discipline their children stands the Lord God the

Father himself.

Ultimately, parenting is not about getting our kids

to depend on us.

It's about getting them to depend on God.

That through godly discipline

and biblical instruction, through meals together, through,

uh, at prayer time at night, through conversations

during carpool that they would come to know and to love

and to follow and to depend on God, the father himself.

I wanna put up a chart for you guys that we use in,

uh, and hope for parents.

Uh, this shows a child's dependence,

and there's two lines on.

Parents goes down into the right on

God goes up into the right.

See, when a kid is born,

it's like off the charts high there.

Uh, like if you don't feed your kid, they will not survive.

They're completely dependent on you.

But notice that's not a straight line going across.

We don't want a kid that's 60 years old still completely

dependent on us living with us, right?

So that line goes down.

We want our children to become increasingly

less dependent on us.

While at the same time that line of

that dependency on God is going up into the right.

We want them to increasingly become more dependent on him.

And notice if like reproduces, like we need

to be as parents growing in our dependence on God if we

expect our kids to follow in that way.

So the key to doing this is again,

to understand your child first belongs to God.

Uh, I think a beautiful, uh, passage that represents this.

In fact, it represents all of our faith beautifully.

The gospel and our role as a representative

to our kids is two Corinthians five, 17 through 20.

It says this, therefore, if anyone is in Christ,

he is a new creation.

The oldest passed away. Behold the new has come.

And all of this is from God who through Christ reconciled us

to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation

that is in Christ.

God was reconciling the world to himself

and not counting their trespasses against them.

This is the gospel that, that Jesus did it all for us.

And then get this entrusting to us.

The message of reconciliation, God is entrusting to you.

This message, this gospel message. He's saying, here it is.

Parents, I'm entrusting this message to you.

Therefore, in verse 20, we are ambassadors

for Christ God making his appeal through us as parents,

to our kids, to our neighbors, to the world around us.

The ambassador doesn't call the shots,

doesn't write the message, uh,

write the doesn't set the agenda.

The the ambassador represents the one who sent him.

That's your role as a parent.

You are Christ's ambassador, his primary chosen instrument

to represent his gospel

and his truth to your kids in your home.

And that way, your home is actually God's embassy.

It's not about church buildings. Once a week for an hour.

Your home is the primary environment,

which in which you were

to bring up your kids in loving discipline

and biblical instruction.

You cannot subcontract this job.

I understand the temptation.

I hope we have like the most, um, talented group of kid,

city staff and middle school

and high school pastors that I've ever met.

No matter how talented are they are, no matter

how prayerful they are, how wonderful they are,

how cool they are, how fun they are.

No matter how much goldfish we they throw at your kids,

no matter how much pizza that the,

the student pastors shove down those kids' throats,

they cannot compensate for the absence of loving discipline

and biblical instruction from you in your home.

The goal of parenting, again

is not behavior change.

Oh, that'd be really nice if they behaved right.

The goal is heart change, that our kids, by his word

and by his spirit, would be growing into the measure

of the fullness of Jesus Christ.

That we as, as Paul says,

that we may no longer be children tossed to

and fro by the ways and carried about by every wind of,

of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness

and deceitful schemes.

There's so much of that going on.

There's so many messages bombarding our kids

that they're being tossed around by the waves,

rather verse 15, speaking the truth.

That's the gospel in love.

We are to grow up in every way into him.

Who is the head into Christ? That's the goal of parenting.

That we are growing up like Jesus into his likeness.

You guys, this is a hard job.

Maybe the toughest one on the planet, exhausted, worn out.

Parents are called day after day

after day to, to wake up and try again.

Well, here's some good news.

Your kids don't need to see perfection in you parents.

They need to see your dependence on God.

And what God is, is after is not your success as a parent.

What he's after is your faithfulness.

That's good news for parents and kids alike.

That's why, uh, I I I published the book is why we have hope

for parents is it's the reason we created this class.

And even with all the good news there is, I want you

to know there's no guarantee here.

Sometimes we could do all the things, all,

all the right things as parents

that we could raise up a whole family that loves Jesus

with their whole heart, mind, soul, and strength.

And because of sin,

good parents can still raise struggling kids.

Sin divides families that separates us from God.

That's why Jesus came to set you free.

But until he comes back,

and that is our hope that he's coming back

to set all things right until that moment comes, until

that day comes, the Bible's pretty clear.

You can expect hard times. You can expect suffering.

And so I I want you to know we're not le sending you out

to like go figure it out.

Good luck. We want to walk alongside you.

We want to equip you.

I I want to invite you to join my wife

and me starting next week.

We're gonna be offering this class called Hope for Parents

and, and in hope for parents.

Uh, in the book that's written, I I try

to share right now real life, tangible hope

that is rooted in the gospel.

That we walk through the gospel narrative, uh, of,

of God the Father parenting us from Genesis to Revelation.

You can look at some of the pictures from the class.

By the way, there's grandmas in this class.

There, there's a woman in this class.

I dunno if you'll see her in one of the pictures who's like

literally pregnant.

She went into labor during the last class.

So like all the way from

just literally had a baby in the class to a grandparent.

You guys are welcome to come.

You will be encouraged by this class.

You're gonna be in God's word.

And most importantly, you're gonna be connected

with other moms and dads that have the same struggles.

You can learn from each other, you can encourage each other.

You can pray with each other.

And then, uh, Cindy and I, we're just gonna share

as much biblical truth as we can to encourage you

to learn from you as well.

I wanna invite you to join us.

We're gonna be offering it here, uh, at the Raleigh campus

and at the Apex campus.

And we're doing it during service, you guys.

So like your, your your, your kids will have childcare.

They'll be taken care of.

There's literally no excuse, but you gotta register.

The campus pastors will give you some, uh, uh, next steps on

how to register for your campus.

And if you can't make it to Apex

or to Raleigh starting next weekend, let me know.

I I'd love to get that book in your hand

so you could study it either, uh, in your own home

or with your own small group.

Just let us know. We, we want this to go to as many people

as we can, but join us parents.

It's not too late. It's not too late.

There is hope for you and your kids.

I hope I get the opportunity to continue

to share it with you starting next week.

Let's pray together. Father God. Huh?

It's good that we get to call you Father

because you are the good and perfect father.

Yeah. We ask for your help as parents because we need it.

We ask for your help because you hear us.

We ask for your help because you are able.

So God, may we parent our kids as a response to the way

that you faithfully parent us.

And in the process, God, would you grow us all up?

God, grow our hearts, transform us from the

inside out into the likeness, into the character

of the incredible, uh, of the holy, uh, son Jesus Christ.

We pray in His name. Amen.