WELCOME
Good morning First Baptist. We welcome you to worship this morning. Be sure to remember your brothers and sisters in Christ throughout the week as you pray for them, and as the Holy Spirit brings their faces to your mind. Be sure to also connect with them in the ways that are possible. And if you have any questions or would like to talk to someone, please don’t hesitate to contact the church through the church telephone and leave a message. (519-733-4144)
Songs
Call to Worship
And Jesus said, “Come!”
To all mothers and all children: he said, “Come!”
to the motherless and the childless: he said, “Come!”
to all who long to be mothered: he said, “Come!
Come unto me all ye who labour and are heavy-laden,
and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for I am gentle and humble of heart
and you will find rest for your souls.”
Good morning FBK – and welcome to worship
Prayer (1 Kings 3)
O Lord our God,
though we are as little children,
not fully able to discern the spiritual forces
coming in and out of our lives,
you have chosen us as your people.
Give us, your servants, understanding minds
to discern between the good and evil
surrounding us each day,
that we may choose what is good and pleasing
in your sight. Amen.
Songs
Prayer
Prayer of Confession & Assurance
With great joy we welcome you, Lord Jesus! The journey has been long and we have longed to Gracious God , on this day of the festival of the Christian Home, the celebration of Mother’s Day, the witness to the eternal love of Christ, remind us that we are responsible for caring for each other. We are called to lift up rather than tear down; to support rather than abandon, to reach out when others have turned away. Give us hearts of love that, in all places and times, we may be a witness to the hope that is found in Jesus Christ.
Patient and forgiving God, we come to you this day.
For many there is a celebration of Mother’s Day and all that our mothers have given to us and taught us; but for some, these memories are too painful, of those who could not parent, who were able to have their own families. Remind us that your blessings are poured out in many ways, through many people- many different women who have surrounded and taught us whatever their physical role in our lives. Give us the confident faith that reaches beyond our own lives to remember & help others. Helps us to think and see outside of ourselves and make sure we show it too!! Forgive us when we sink into our own selfishness and pettiness. For it is in those times that we turn our back on you. Bring us back to you, to the awareness of your eternal love. In Christ’s Name, we pray. AMEN.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON:
Christ, our cornerstone and our salvation, offers to us hope and comfort. On this Mother’s Day Sunday, the day on which we celebrate Family, help us to make our home in Him. AMEN.
Blessed Assurance
All In The Family
Today's Message: Pastor Marlee Page
Last week, we looked at how the Christian marriage is a picture of the Christian gospel. Today, we are going to see how the Christian family is also a picture of the Christian gospel.
When the Gospel really touches us, we begin to change in surprising ways. Jesus lived and died and rose again not to make our lives a little more tolerable but to change us entirely into his image. And throughout the letter to the Ephesians, we see how all encompassing that transformation is.
Here in Ephesians 6:1-4, the focus is how Christ transforms the child-parent relationship.
Scripture Reading: Ephesians 6:1-4
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honour your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise – “so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”
Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.
You have to understand something here – we did touch on this specifically a bit last week how this applies to last week in husbands and wives relationships, but it also frames this week with families and next week with the workplace….
These passages all flow out of the command in 5:18 to be filled with the Spirit.
Being filled with the Spirit means we actually live as Jesus-followers, that our faith actually has an impact on who we are and how this changes our relationships.
That’s what we want, isn’t it?
So, in His kindness, God shows us what it looks like to live as Christians in our families.
But when we talk about families, there can be a lot of complications. Families bring much joy, but they can also bring much pain. Today is Mothers day here in North America and I know that for some – its not necessarily a day that’s filled with Joy and fond memories…. And that makes it hard….. And I think it’s possible for us to believe Christ can transform the world over but do we actually believe He can transform our families?
That kind of thinking limits Our God. It means we’re willing to believe in Christ’s redemption only so far, and then we stop. We think, “God could never change this.” We may not say it, but our actions and sometimes our inactions, say it loud and clear.
This causes me to wonder, in light of this passage today:
How many of us stop believing in this Holy Spirit -power of resurrection that lives in us when it comes to our families?
How many of us believe change can change the world but can’t do much in our own home or our families?
The call of Jesus is to follow him. And part of that following means going out on mission to the world. But part of that following is also staying home and living as if Jesus is real in your own homes, within your own families. And that’s the goal Paul is aiming for in this passage—Christians actually living as Christians in the home. That’s probably the first place He intended us to start!!!
That’s not always easy and for most of us, it’s probably the most important thing He has called us to do which can make it even harder!
But You know what??? He is here to help… by His Spirit- He can support us, guide us and fill us up to do this!
This passage gives us two insights, one for children and one for parents.
- Christian children love God by honouring their parents.
- Christian parents love God by discipling their children.
- Christian children love God by honouring their Parents
Look at verses 1-3.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.“Honour your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise—“so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”
What does that mean? The key word in verse 1 is obey.
To obey means to both hear and respond to the hearing. The idea is of someone hearing a knock on a door and going to listen to the one who knocks. It’s hearing and doing.
Obedience isn’t easy, is it? It’s an interruption of our regularly scheduled life. It means we must do something, often something we don’t want to do. And when Paul uses that word children, he’s talking to young and old – all of us truly, this is a word from God to all of us, “Obey your parents in the Lord.”
But there’s more to it than just blind obedience. God isn’t asking us to obey just because. Look at the phrase at the end of verse 1, “in the Lord.”
What does that mean? It means the obedience we show our parents, as Christians, is reflective of our obedience to God. When we seek to obey because it’s God’s command, we seek to follow God. It’s the way young children bring their Christianity to bear on their relationship to the parents. Christian children obey their parents because in doing so they are obeying God, their true Father.
Paul then goes on to say obedience is right. Why is it right?
Well, no matter where you go in the world, obedience to parents is the norm. There’s no culture world-wide that goes against this way of thinking…. Honestly, many go to much greater extremes that we do.
But it is right for a Christian in a different way. It’s right for a Christian because it is connected to an old command. Look at verse 2,
“Honour your father and mother.”
Do you notice the quotation marks there? Paul is quoting the Old Testament — Exodus 20:12 and Deuteronomy 5:16 — the fifth commandment of the Ten Commandments. With this quote, he shifts from young children in the home to all children everywhere of all ages and stages of life. The Ten Commandments are binding on us all. They’re the basic structure of a good life that God established from the beginning.
Now, see that parenthetical phrase in verse 2?
“(this is the first commandment with a promise)”.
Some say that’s not right. They say there’s a promise in the second commandment. Well, there is something like a promise there, but it’s not what Paul’s referring to. The second commandment includes a universal promise applying to the whole law, but this is the first to include a promise tied to a single commandment.
What was the promise? Look at verse 3.
“so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”
What does that mean? Well, let me tell you what it doesn’t mean. It doesn’t mean honouring your parents is a way to earn a long life. Some wonderful children have short lives. Furthermore, honour can’t be about receiving a reward at all. It isn’t honour if it’s done to gain something.
That’s different- some may call it flattery: That’s not honour.
Honour is respecting another because of who they are, not because of what you can get. Honour focuses on another. Flattery focuses on yourself.
So if obedience is a way of honouring your parents when you’re young, and if your parents tell you not to run into the street and you disobey and get hit by a car, you won’t have a long life. But what about something less dramatic?
What about just a general disposition of disobedience to your parents? Will life go well for you? If you reject the guidance and instruction of your parents, you won’t learn to live, and you won’t have a good, long life. Not because your parents are geniuses with all the answers but because your obedience to parents is training for obedience to Christ, and if you don’t obey Christ, you will not have what we consider the good life.
God calls young children to obey as a way of honouring because it’s training for the future, and your parents can look at you all grown up and see their work wasn’t in vain. They raised you imperfectly but they raised you right.
Now as we grow, the primary way we honour isn’t obedience. Honouring our parents take on other forms.
This is easier for some than it is for others. Some parents aren’t very honourable. And though Paul is speaking to a Christian family, if you were raised by non-Christians, or even parents who claimed Christ but didn’t live like it, it’s very hard to know how to apply this command. It may be hard for you to honour them. But God doesn’t put a qualifier on the parents, does he? He doesn’t say, “Honour your Christian father and mother.” He just says, “Honour your father and mother.” The qualifier belongs to the children, “honour your parents in the Lord.”
Jesus changes our relationships. Even if he doesn’t change the warmth between us, he changes us, and we respond differently. When God calls us to honour our parents, of course, he knows that some parents are hard to love, some are hard to admire, some are hard to accept. But you can honour your parents even if it’s really hard to love them or admire them or accept them because if God commanded it, he will provide a way to obey it. And I will say, as you honour your parents, don’t be surprised if those feelings of love, admiration, acceptance and maybe even forgiveness if needed also come. They may not be there now, but God can create them.
So how do we honour our parents? Well, here are three ways.
First, treat your parents with the proper value and weight they deserve. You can’t treat them as if they don’t matter. They do. Recognize them as significant. Tell them they are. Tell them they matter to God and they matter to you. When something good happens for children, most parents fill with pride and joy. Let them enjoy those moments. Share your life with them. Let them see the impact they had on you.
I know many had parents who didn’t show their love or speak of their love for you—and both matter. I was blessed to have parents who were always able to say they Loved us and hugs and kisses were a daily occurrence even now, but that’s not the way for many.
Sometimes, we don’t say what we should because we don’t know how it’ll be received. Well, maybe they need you to make the first move. Honouring your parents means not withholding love.
Second, forgive them. This isn’t easy. But Jesus doesn’t call us to easy things. But He does promise to be with us and to help us. We don’t walk in the same shoes that our parents and grandparents did….not even remotely the same world either…. Your bitterness and resentment, even if justified, just weighs you down and wears you out. Jesus wants to free you from it. Will you let him?
Third, free yourself and your parents from your need for their approval. How many of us won’t ever feel validated in this world, no matter how successful we are in other areas, until we get the approval of our parents? And I wonder how many of us actually withhold honour to our parents because we’re waiting on some undefined approval from them.
You can let go of your need for their approval because all the approval you long for, all the approval you’ll ever need, all approval for eternity is yours in Christ.
The gospels show us various times in the life of Jesus when God the Father broke through the clouds and said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” Do you know what the gospel says? The gospel says you’ve been adopted by the Heavenly Father and those are his words about you.
Do you see how freeing that is?
You’ll never honour your parents until you see how completely you’re approved in Christ.
You’ll never forgive them until you see your forgiveness in Christ.
You’ll never honour them until you see the value and weight God has placed on them for your good.
I know it can be hard, but a Christian child of any age- loves God by honouring their parents, because Christ can redeem everything. Let’s not limit God at this point. Let’s let him be God and let’s be his obedience children.
Now, an insight for parents:
- Christian parents love God by discipling their children
Look at verse 4.
“Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”
God calls parents to disciple their children. You can’t make your children Christians, but you can make it easy to love Jesus in your home.
You can endeavour to make your home ring with gospel joy.
You can endeavour to make your family not only a family of Christians, but a Christian family—sold out for Christ and his cause.
God has more for us than the hum-drum life of work, rest, and entertainment.
He has more for your children than extra-curricular activities and college scholarships and good jobs.
He has the storehouses of grace and glory for your family.
And our problem is, as C.S. Lewis famously said,
“we’re far too easily pleased. We settle for mud pies when a holiday at sea is there for the taking.”
Though Paul uses the word “fathers” here, these words apply to fathers and mothers. But in Paul’s day, the children were under the father’s complete control. He could have them killed or sell them into slavery. No law stood in his way. And we think the command to obedience and honour is difficult to hear! It’s easy to see in that kind of culture how a child would be provoked to anger or desperately afraid.
But Jesus brings justice. He sets things right. That’s why Paul begins with a negative command,
“Do not provoke your children to anger.”
Now we may not live as the first century did, but this is still a frightening statement because it’s saying that there is a possibility for a parent to create in their children a settled anger and resentment that lasts for a very long time. Now, of course. there will be times a child gets angry. Who doesn’t get angry? But there’s a big difference between intermittent anger and deep, abiding anger as a result of your upbringing.
How does that happen? Well, parents can be too hard. They can give unnecessary commands, be too heavy-handed, or just down-right mean. They can be easily frustrated and lash out at small things where all questionable behaviour is treated equally.
They don’t care about discipling and training the child. They just want the child to fall in line and it noted that they are the ones In-charge. They are more concerned about disciplining than discipling.
King Saul was like that. In 1 Samuel 20, they were at dinner and Saul noticed David wasn’t there as he should be. He asked his son Jonathan where he was. Now, Jonathan knew Saul was mad at David, wanting to kill him, and helped him avoid the dinner. Jonathan was doing the right thing, but Saul didn’t care. He wanted him to fall in line. Saul said to his son, “You, son of a perverse, rebellious woman.” Then went on to command David be brought so he could be killed. When Jonathan asked what David had done, Saul thrust his spear at him. So Jonathan rose from the table in fierce anger. And rightly so.
That’s a parent who is too hard and mean. But it’s also possible for a parent to be too soft. For example, in Genesis 37, we see the failures of Jacob as a father. What was it? He was too soft on his son Joseph. He favoured him above the others, and it led to the anger of his other sons. Eventually, they sold Joseph into slavery.
The point is it’s easy to provoke our children to anger. We don’t have to be evil King Saul. We can be kind father Jacob and do just as much damage. When we fail to treat our children as a stewardship from the Lord and instead view them as servants for our agenda or necessities for our emotional state, we provoke either them or our other children to anger.
A Christian parent doesn’t see their children as either an annoyance or an emotional crutch but instead understands them to be a stewardship from the Lord, for his sake, and seeks to bring up their kids in the instruction of the Lord.
That last phrase is so important. Most parents are good, and will raise their children with discipline and instruction. But a Christian parent notices those last three words, “of the Lord.” It’s not our discipline and instruction that matters. It’s Christ’s. It’s our duty to help our children follow Jesus.
This means parents must be aware of the rhythms of life.
- How is your week structured?
- How much of a priority is Jesus in your family life?
- Is church a checklist item on Sunday morning or is it an anticipation on Saturday night?
- Is youth group dependent on the children’s sports practice or it is the reason you have to call the coach to explain their absence?
Your rhythms of life either prove or disprove the reality of God and the reverence you show Him.
If you never pray or read the Bible in front of or with your kids, if you never talk about Jesus in any regular, open way, if you never invite others into your home for the sake of the gospel, if you never serve Jesus together as a family, if you never ask your kids about who they think Jesus is, if you’re just thankful you’re a Christian and going to heaven but your Christianity hasn’t made an impact on the way you raise your kids, you haven’t yet realized the glory your family is missing with Christ.
It’s all too easy to just let life come at us, but a Christian parent loves God by helping their children follow Jesus. A Christian parent is active, treating them as a stewardship from the Lord. Like Jesus, a Christian parent pursues. You can’t save them, but you can point them to the Saviour. You can make the Saviour real in your home and in your life.
Let me close with this. Some of us didn’t grow up in a Christian family. Even if our parents were Christians, they didn’t parent us that way. And some of us were really- I don’t like to use the word bad- maybe difficult children, and we’ve never made things right. We love Jesus but we haven’t yet decided to honour our parents. And some of us are not the parents we should be now or in the past, and we’re not sure how to change.
So what do we do now? Well, here’s a question I’ve been considering this week. It applies to this verse and to everything else in life:
- Do I believe that Jesus is a redeemer?
This means:
- I respect him as king—one who watches over me.
- I listen to him as prophet—one who speaks with power.
But do I trust him as Redeemer – one who makes all things new?
When we trust him that way, we stop quenching the Spirit, and He starts working in our lives. Jesus can change the story of your family and my family, starting today. And he’s asking us, “Will you let me?”
Do you need redemption in your family? It’s yours in Jesus.
Do you need grace to honour your parents? It’s yours in Jesus.
Do you need help valuing and forgiving your parents? It’s yours in Jesus.
Do you need moment by moment help to parent your children? It’s yours in Jesus
Everything you need is yours in Jesus because Jesus Christ gave himself for you.
That Jesus is a redeemer, means no family is too far gone.
You may think, “We’re a mess.” Well, ok. Let’s be Honest!! We all are. All you have to do today is say to our Lord, “I’m your mess.”
The Triune God is at work in our life to bring redemption. And in that Trinity we have the Son who loves and honours the Father perfectly, and the Father who never provokes to anger and knows how to discipline and instruct, and the Spirit who sustains it all.
The WHOLE God is invested in the WHOLE you. And he’s asking us today, will we trust him or will we limit him?
Let’s decide right now to trust him. Who knows? Our crazy families just might prove to other crazy families how wonderful God is.
Prayer
Prayer – For Mother’s Day
Loving God, we give thanks today for Families – Parents and Children
And on this day, we most especially give thanks to mothers!
Thank you for mothers who gave birth to us,
and women who have treated us as their own children.
You teach us how to be good mothers,
cherishing and protecting the children among us.
Help us mother lovingly, fairly, wisely and with great joy.
Help us raise our children to be the people they are born to be.
We need your comfort here today, God,
because some are missing mothers, some are missing children,
some are parted by distance or death.
Comfort those who have given up their child for adoption,
or who chose not to give birth, and had an abortion.
Comfort those who longed to be biological mothers, and could not.
We pray for those here whose mothers have disappointed them;
we ask for grace in relationships where there is pain and bitterness,
for healing in relationships where there is abuse and violence.
Help our congregation be a space where people can feel mothered,
their gifts and talents appreciated and nurtured.
Finally, we pray today for mothers around the world;
mothers who cannot feed their children,
mothers who are homeless or without a homeland;
mothers who must teach their children about the dangers of bombs and bullets.
Help us create a world where mothers can raise their children in peace and plenty.
God of mothers, who created mothers, who came as a child and had a mother,
God our Mother, loving us with a sweeter and deeper love than we have ever known,
hear our prayer this day, Amen.
Song
Benediction
Go forth in peace, Church. Bring hope to this world.
Go forth in love; bring joy to this world.
Go forth in the knowledge that goes with you, loving and guiding your steps.Amen.
Have a great Week!