Rarefied Heirs Q&A

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I was thinking that some good summaries of my fellow elders talks would be, be bold to know that there are things that are better. That would be my summary of Jim’s talk. When your kids are like, but I really think this tramp stamp on my face would be super cool and beautiful. You could remember Jim’s talk and be like, no, be bold with my kid. There is something better. I believe it. Sure you can get a tramp stamp on your face, that would be extra irony. Dave Sock I would summarize as don’t bluff your sin to your kids. So be bold to know that there are better things, don’t bluff your sin. Jonathan’s I would summarize as be mindful of Michael Jackson.

And start with the man in the mirror, that’s right. You gotta start. The man in there. You gotta look at yourself and then make that. Woo! Yeah. Exactly. Okay, good. So, questions that you guys have first before we make ourselves answer other ones. Doesn’t the Bible teach covenantalism? Wasn’t that your question? Yeah. Did I get that right? Did I get that summarized? Good. Excellent. You know, you always want to make sure you know what the other person is asking before you.

Yeah, there seems to be some kind of generational promise referred to in the passage in Ephesians 6, in the children needing to obey, based off of a promise that is connected to the Fifth Commandment of obeying their parents. So doesn’t that and since Ephesians is likely written to we can assume predominantly Gentiles how is Paul applying the fifth commandment promise to To kids if there there isn’t some greater Even covenantal obligation is that actually a better fair summary of your question the new covenant He just dropped the mic, yeah. I mean, though the 6-1, 6-3, 6-1 through 3, based on that would suggest that the kids are part of the Mosaic Covenant, that’s what’s explicitly being referenced, is the fifth of the Ten Commandments of the Mosaic Covenant, which we would say is fulfilled in Christ.

And I would say that the fact that he’s pointing out not necessarily that every one of them are getting the land, but that that was the kind of promise that if you obeyed your parents, you actually got something better from it. So I don’t take Ephesians 6, 1 through 3 as saying that those kids are going to get the land, but rather that in its original context there was immediate, even temporal promise and benefit from obedience. And so Paul is likening that promise of blessing, promise of even tangible blessing. He’s pointing out that when you obey your parents, that’s not just because they said so or even just because God says so, but because God makes that fruitful.

And so I would say that’s not Paul bringing them into the Mosaic Covenant. That’s Paul pointing out that that’s how God works even in that first time when it’s summarized like that to obey your parents. That there’s a sweet reason for that. And so likewise any kid in any generation who obeys their parents in in Jesus’ name can anticipate good things coming from that. It’s not just a thing that they have to slog through, because God says, no, God says, you do this, it’s right. And there’s good that comes from it. So I take that as a broader, as an example of how God works, rather than saying that those kids are, Paul is thinking that they’re in the Mosaic covenant.

Well, the land and the promises to the Israelites are still going to be fulfilled in the future. So that has not been made good to them yet, the new covenant. We got in due to when we got the Holy Spirit to live inside of us and became new believers through Jesus. But the land promises and all the rest of that stuff still is to be given to them in the millennium. So the Jewish kids listening to Ephesians 6 actually did have the land of Israel in mind. Yeah, they would say they would. Uh-huh, sure. I accept that. Hi, Chris. Jim, Jonathan.

I mean, I really, the only thing I would add is just to reemphasize what you said about good things to come, even of a material nature. But as the whole of scripture, kind of the general thrust of it, whether you read from Proverbs or the first command with a promise, they are. So Jim has talked about this, it meant to men, I think even on Sunday night to when there is a promise given in Proverbs, for instance. It is a reasonable expectation that God will consistently work in that way and not a guarantee that its airtight will happen in every case because that you may live long in the land. What if somebody died prematurely? Does that make God a liar? Well, no. But generally speaking, if you obey your parents, it will go well for you materially in this life.

And that principle is clear in Ephesians 6, and obviously from Proverbs 2. Which would mean in light of the New Covenant bringing that about for the House of Israel and the House of Judah that there would have been in all of the remnants so far of Jewish kids obeying their parents. They actually haven’t seen the fulfillment of the land parts of the promises. But even whatever temporal benefits they’re getting are sort of even like a foreshadowing of when it is finally and fully fulfilled. Even though Ephesians is of course an emphasis of the Gentile city, the clear, you know, like with Romans, like with Ephesians 2, we know that there are distinctly Jewish and Gentile intended target audiences as well.

So yeah, that’s reasonable. So Ian is asking, in light of the fact that we’re going to gender hell in a handbasket, and we see male and female not being even really recognized, let alone promoted, what can we as Christians do to appropriately exalt the male-female distinctions that God has given us for the sake of our children’s children. Okay? Yeah, at a high philosophical level, again, I do think to take the true, the good, and the beautiful, whatever that is, And you think of that as a filter. So you’re going to drop into that filter whatever the wisdom of the age is telling you. Boys can be girls and girls can be boys.

And then you start asking questions. Okay, does this comport with what’s true, what’s good, what’s beautiful? Obviously in that one it’s a little easier in terms of the gender confusion because Scripture is pretty clear in that you go back to the creation and Genesis. You can also, I believe again, God’s revealed the truth of the good and the beautiful in nature. So you can observe how nature works. Is it, does the rest of nature look like it’s this gender whatever, or does it just go against nature? And I would suggest in that particular instance it goes against nature. It goes against what God’s word indicates, and it goes against nature.

I believe God’s given us as his image bearers, just a certain little, can I say, BS meter, where we just, you know, you look at the head of the health department, you know, for our nation, and you look at that and you just fundamentally go, that doesn’t work. What’s his name? Well, he goes by Rachel Levine. But so there’s a lot of tests that can be applied. And so then helping our kids to think these things through. When my kids would come to me with lesser issues, but still important, I’ve used in our parenting seminars example of the one kid that wanted purple hair. And he was trying to make the case that he just woke up that day and just thought purple hair would be nice.

And I insisted that, no, you haven’t thought about it deeply enough, that there’s some other issue of the heart going on that’s driving that desire for purple hair. So helping our kids to really examine their hearts in light of whatever is true, good, and beautiful. And I keep going back to true, good, and beautiful, but it’s it’s problematic in that. Again, we don’t have, it’s not like you’re going to go to a dictionary of true, good, and beautiful and look it up. You’re going to have to use wisdom starting with the Word of God, opening your eyes and looking at how He created the world, and then ask yourself, does this seem to go with that or go against that? And more often than not, a lot of these reasons, the lie is trying to get people to rebel, bottom line, that, you know, as God said, it’s all about rebellion. And so in my case, I perceived that with my kid, it was a form of rebellion, a rebellion against what’s normal, against what’s acceptable.

He wanted to push the edges, and that wasn’t a good motivation. So, in helping your kids, do draw their attention to the truth, the good, and the beautiful, and that’s anything from, obviously again, the Word of God, training the Word of God. It’s studying nature, exposing them to good music, good art, all of that. If you go back to a church, throughout church history and you look at the major figures in church history, they were pretty good scholars in a lot of other areas of life besides just Bible. I know Jonathan Edwards was quite the botanist, and I don’t think that was just because he had a lot of free time, But I just think those guys also saw that was another way to get close to God and understand who God is in His nature by just studying the creation.

So I don’t know, you guys can add to that. We had a code word in our house in particular because I try not to go shopping ever. So it applied less for me. But during a time when Moe was taking the kids shopping and they were listening to a lot of cross politic, Toby Sumter had apparently written a blog post about purple hair. And the kids had listened to that with Moe and then they decided that any time that they were out in public and one of the kids saw something that they had a question about, And they’re like, if they saw Rachel Levine walk by in Costco, the kids would immediately, without saying, hey, what’s up with that person, they would say Toby to Moe, or to myself, but it happened more often to Moe.

So they’d say Toby, and then she would know she needed to look around to see, yeah, to see the purple hair, or to look for the equivalent of the purple hair, so that then they would remember when they got in the car to have a conversation about that and talk through it. So it wasn’t an effort to try to deny that there were people, you know, who were consciously trying to embody, you know, something that was not masculine or feminine, but then we would talk about it. And generally speaking, we would try to even at home not be entertained by, you know, thinking that the people doing that were funny like we were laughing along with them. So if they were a total clown show we might laugh at how ridiculous their behavior was but we would try to not watch movies or things where we sympathized with the gay character or the effeminate dude you know who was barely leading his house. So we tried to not enjoy that like we shared in that culture but identified it and did bring it up and again when we saw it out in

the wild you know work through it talk talk through it. Yeah and I want to emphasize like go back to purple hair just it’s not the purple hair that’s neither here nor there. It’s why the purple hair is what you have to get. Because, you know, like my son was old enough at the time to say, well dad where’s the verse? It says, I’ll shut up, I’ll have purple hair. Yeah, well okay, you win, go get, go dye your hair. You know, it’s no, I said yeah, there is no verse but there is an issue of the heart going here. You are attempting to go beyond what would be deemed normal in our culture, in our society. Why? Why are you seeking to do that? And again, you’re going to almost always drill. When you find these cases, the refusal to accept your gender, you’re going to find at the root of it a form of rebellion, a non-willingness to accept the way God has made things. My answer is pretty simplistic, and that is just for us to be faithful where we are and love our young ladies and young men unto loveliness and masculinity.

Just spent the weekend with a bunch of artsy types, and I honestly did, and there were a lot of dudes with skirts, and there were, and actually a stunningly beautiful dude on stage last night where I was actually convinced that it was a lovely young lady until he sang a bass solo, which turned it from lovely to grotesque instantaneously, and also saw lots of young people. And I mean, it’s not like we have everything dialed, but we love our kids. I will say that without apology collectively. And when you see young people who know how to look like they’re loved, that is a compelling thing. And it comes to wearing a dress well, wearing a suit well and conducting yourself well, actually engaging people in conversation.

So there is something that, the bar today is so incredibly low that we just have to step over it. So when we, if we parent well, if we love our kids well, provide for them security and shelter the sort of upbringing that we’re trying to do by intention. It will stand out like a sore thumb in this culture and look compelling. So that sounds like a simple answer, but it has gotten that simple in the last handful of years.

Well, and I mean, like you guys do at your house, so praising your wife for what she’s doing at home in front of the kids, praising the girls when you give them. So praise and providing opportunity for them to see what that’s like, where they don’t have to go run a company to get their dad’s attention. They don’t have to go be the boss of somebody else to finally get somebody to say thank you to them. They actually do what they can at their age and they get praised for that. And we look for ways to provide them opportunities in those different avenues like you were talking about. So the dudes get praise in one way, the daughters get praise in another way.

So the husband praising his wife for what he sees her doing, not being a CEO, but the CEO of the house, for jizzle. And the wife also giving her kids a good example of being strong while expecting expecting her man to be leading. So the wife showing the son, the wife showing her daughters as well. No we’re going to find out what dad has to say. We need to hear what dad has to say. And then dad might ask mom for her thoughts on it as well. Give me some help. But she is not running ahead of him. And then you’d think over time that would add up in their little minds of, oh, that’s how it works. guys responsible, the wife helps in all of the ways that she can, not because she’s lesser, but because she has a supporting role. So if I was summarizing that, how can you guarantee perfect obedience without ever yelling?

Okay good, that’s it, ready go. The only ones who are not yelling, okay Jim, yes go ahead. Well speaking from all the mistakes I made in that department, yeah, going back to what some of the stuff the other guy said, you are going to yell. We’re going to sin in that regard. Then you repent. When your kids begin to see you growing, you repenting, you changing. What’s coming to mind for me right now is this happened more with my older sons who were getting to be young men and I I had found myself getting into the trap of trying to always bend their viewpoints to my viewpoint. So I’m talking now, I’m talking to a 19 year old, some gay 20 year old.

And you know my son Jesse, and Jesse’s not shy and has opinions. And we would get into some debate and something would come up at the dinner table, and pretty soon we’re verbally tussling to try to persuade the other person. And to the point that would then get sinfully heated, and one of us would have to take a walk around the block to, you know, cooler jets. And when I learned that I was wrong in trying to coerce my kid to think like I think at all points, and didn’t give him the freedom to differ from me, especially in areas where there was biblical freedom to differ. That was a huge event today, now that they’re all in their mid-30s.

They love getting together with their old man and spending time, and I love getting together with them. But that took me coming to a place where I just was allowing them to be individuals. But then going back to the repentance theme, when they’re younger and you blow it, When they see that you’re real, that they don’t expect you to be perfect, your kids are, I know you’re not perfect, but when they see that you’re humble, you repent. Over time, that pays dividends, and then they start to become more responsive to your instructions and fight you less. If they too are growing and being accountable to the Lord, if they’re not, then you have discipline things you have to deal with there.

I mean, they say measure twice, cut once. If you reverse that, yell once, take twice as long to do the job. So like, especially with my kids, I’m thankful, I think, yeah, I mean, I’m thankful, I’m I’m thankful that they don’t even respond well to my yelling. So it’s not even a shortcut. And as I have tried to recalibrate that of what I want. So okay, the thing that I actually want is to be in fellowship, which happens through obedience. It doesn’t happen through disobedience, but if what I actually want most is fellowship, that changes how I am wanting them to get the job done. Whereas if what I actually want the most is for them to get the job done, then that is setting me up for methods to make that happen that are probably again going to make it take longer and even the older that they get, you know, they are not, which is good.

I am thankful that like they are too strong at this point to really be thinking it’s their fault when I yell. So Mo has helped, I mean in my better moments maybe, I have helped to communicate to them a strength, and obviously it doesn’t work like with your boys, they’re not ready to be that kind of strong. But when they are in fellowship and confident enough in the Lord that Dad getting mad they know is dad’s problem, not theirs. Then that kind of immediately, that feedback immediately to me is like, oh yeah right, I’m not even pushing a button that works. I can’t even get that button down. So yeah, wanting fellowship more and then them being strong enough to realize to, they’re the mirror that says I’m actually the one out of fellowship, not their lack of having done the thing yet.

But I mean that recalibration can get off. Should I sin that I could have a parenting opportunity? Yeah, no, right? So should… Yeah, what gives some practical… Repeating the question gives some practical scenario situations in which you’re repenting in front of your kid, obviously, when you’re sinning against them. What if they don’t know that you’re sinning? Do you need to make that right or repent in front of them in that moment? Painstakingly so? Or as a pattern that is obvious that makes it clear that that’s what’s happening? Well since I rolled that hand grenade into the room, I’ll go first and off the top of my head so other guys obviously can chime in.

I would say that, well, first of all, as public as the sin is, as public as the repentance ought to be. So, you know, if you take the dinner table blow up conversation and my family is a family of six and all six of us are there at the table and I lose my cool and snap at one of the kids, my repentance and confession of that and asking for forgiveness of that it ought to happen as publicly as the offense was and as soon as possible. And what I’ve been praying for myself lately and consciously is repenting before you feel like it. So I think there’s a temptation to cool your jets. Well, like, no, get right and maybe the jets will follow.

Now but mean it. I mean, don’t lie, of course. But then, if I were cheating on my taxes, and I were audited and Sonya knew about it, but then it affected the family in such a way that we were penalized by the IRS, or I went to jail or something. I mean, it is clear that though they don’t witness it, my sin has an effect on the family. And so that would absolutely be the kind of thing that would be appropriate for me to seek the forgiveness of those who have been affected directly by my, I mean, and of course to the congregation or even to the school, I would have to own that and say, I did this and I invited in this kind of consequence.

Again, if it were for the school, For instance, it would be affected by my absence immediately. So then a public confession is appropriate at that point. Are there sins that are just of the heart that we’re just dealing with on a constant, on the regular repenting of and moving on? Yes. I don’t think that our problem, though, is that we are going to be confessing sin too much. When in doubt, go ahead and repent directly to those that you’ve wronged or who are affected by your sin as soon as possible and as publicly as the offense was. So sins from the past that maybe are brought afresh to our consciousness and we want to deal with them.

Well, I think the principle would be the same. And that is, I think that we dispensationalists tend to sell short the reality of what does Wilson call it, covenantal permission? Is that what it is? So bringing in. Which is the household covenant made between the husband and the wife before God as a vow, not an Old Testament one. Right. Yeah. Well, and that is the sort of thing where… I mentioned in my talk that if Dad is harboring secrets, sins, then everybody’s in trouble. Right? And because supernaturally, God has a thousand different ways of bringing that to light, whether it is in the behavior of my kids or myself.

So you want to deal with things from the past, right? And so the principle would be to not to give those things a foothold, not to give them an opportunity to take former gang traction in our households. So now you’re nodding. What would you say, Dave? I would say that if you feel like the child isn’t understanding or you feel guilty about maybe you haven’t been paying attention to something to them in the proper way, that you need to tell them that seek forgiveness of your inattention. And even if they are not quite realizing it, you know, I want your forgiveness for not paying attention to you a little more the last couple weeks.

And it seems to me you want that and need that or something along those lines. I would definitely though say if your conscience is pricking you, it is definitely somebody you need to clear up with them. Now there are wisdom choices there. I mean if you’re screwing around, you know, in something that the child doesn’t need to know about, dad hasn’t been right with you the last couple weeks and I want to pay attention do you more, let me know how you feel about that, that kind of thing. And it all depends on the age you’re talking to and how much they understand that. But if your conscience is pricking you, you want to make that right with whatever that’s doing so you can have a free reign with that person or that group, whoever it may be.

Kids, here we are watching the State of the Union. Daddy had a bad thought about the president. You need to forgive me for that? Probably not, Mrs. Not that one, but don’t have that either. And how about we have Dave pray and we can be done. Father, we come to you and say that it does appear to me that we have a congregation here that wants family and their children and their parenting. And the blessings that you give us through all the youth and the young lives that are being raised up in our congregation. Help us that have been around longer be wise in giving them advice and help them to go way beyond what we understood about this, as they have the blessings of all these discussions.

And I hope that they understand that we want them to be much better than we are and that we’re raising up a generation that reaches higher and pleases you more. And it’s a great privilege to be with people that want to do that. So we thank you for those things. We thank you for these people and all the hours that they’re putting in raising up that next generation. And of course we thank you most of all for your son, Jesus Christ. Amen.