| Introduction In God's wonderful providence, we have the privilege of baptizing Leland Hoy today. The occasion of his baptism gives us the opportunity to consider two things: our involvement with the raising up of the next generation and God's faithfulness, particularly as it relates to his promises. Though it is the parents' primary responsibility to raise their children in the fear of the Lord, God has placed Christian parents in the church where other Christians have covenanted to help them. It may not take a village to raise a godly child as some have said, but it sure helps to have a church family that is actively engaged in the upbringing of its children. As members of this covenanted community, we have promised to one another to help each other raise our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. At the same time, the concept of faithfulness is very important to us. The idea of one sticking to his word, the idea of trust, of doing what you said you were going to do are all desired in our relationships. A friend who sticks closer than a brother is highly valued. A completely devoted husband or wife is more precious than rubies. I am convinced that the worst experience for the church family to go through is one of our children forsaking the God of his parents. I tried to think of something worse, maybe the death of my wife. But even then, the glorious hope of reunion in heaven and the resurrection curbs the pain and we don't sorrow as if we did not have hope. But one of our children forsaking their God! Oh, I can't imagine greater pain. That is exactly what is going on in Judges 2. The very next generation following the one who entered the Promised Land forgot their Lord. I. One of the Saddest Verses in the Bible, 10 A. The generation that grew up in the Promised Land did not know the Lord. 1. They were enjoying the blessings of the Lord in the Promised Land. a. Living in houses they did not build. b. Eating from fields they did not plant. 2. Yet they did not acknowledge the God who gave these things to them. B. They did not know the works of the Lord. 1. They did not experience the great miracles God accomplished during the conquest. 2. Not only that it seems that their parents did not teach them about the great works God had done. 3. And here comes the first lesson for us: we must keep the works of the Lord before our children. a. The generation who saw the works of the Lord served him, 7. b. We have to be telling our children about the things God has accomplished. 1) This idea is imbedded in the Scriptures. Ex. 13:14 –So it shall be, when your son asks you in time to come, saying, "What is this?" that you shall say to him, "By strength of hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. And it came to pass, when Pharaoh was stubborn about letting us go, that the LORD killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both the firstborn of man and the firstborn of beast. Therefore I sacrifice to the LORD all males that open the womb, but all the firstborn of my sons I redeem." Psalm 78:1-8 – Give ear, O my people, to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old, which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children, telling to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, and His strength and His wonderful works that He has done. For He established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children; that the generation to come might know them, the children who would be born, that they may arise and declare them to their children, that they may set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments; and may not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not set its heart aright, and whose spirit was not faithful to God. 2) So parents are you telling your children about the great works of God. a) Are you telling them about the great work of salvation accomplished for them? b) Are you setting God before them in word and deed? 3) Oh, when think how much I have failed my own children in this area, it is hard not to despair. 4) But that is what repentance is for. a) We repent from failing. b) And we start doing it. C. The generation who did not know the Lord fell into deep sin, 11-13. D. Because they didn't know the Lord, they were judged severely, 14-15. 1. The idea here is that God sold that generation to slavery, 14 a. Two generations ago they cried out to God and he delivered them from slavery. b. Once the influence of the generation who knew the Lord is gone, they are back into slavery. 2. And here is another lesson for us: parents, failure of one generation to pass on the Lord to the next generation brings judgment upon the next generation. a. Is this what we want for our children? b. Judgment and wickedness? II. A Look at the Parents A. We might be tempted to think that those parents in the time of Joshua were terrible. B. But I suspect that they were a lot like us. 1. They seemed to want to serve the Lord. Josh. 24:16-17 – So the people answered and said: "Far be it from us that we should forsake the LORD to serve other gods; for the LORD our God is He who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, who did those great signs in our sight, and preserved us in all the way that we went and among all the people through whom we passed." 2. Yet, they seemed to put up with false religion around them, 2. a. They weren't too concerned about the influence the world had upon them. b. They were willing to co-exist with ungodly thinking and behaving among them. C. In here lies our third lesson: God calls for a radical dedication to himself and radical approach to sin. Ex. 34:10-17 (referred to by the Angel of the Lord) – And He said: "Behold, I make a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation; and all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the LORD. For it is an awesome thing that I will do with you. "Observe what I command you this day. Behold, I am driving out from before you the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite. Take heed to yourself, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land where you are going, lest it be a snare in your midst. But you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images (for you shall worship no other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they play the harlot with their gods and make sacrifice to their gods, and one of them invites you and you eat of his sacrifice, 16 "and you take of his daughters for your sons, and his daughters play the harlot with their gods and make your sons play the harlot with their gods. You shall make no molded gods for yourselves. Mt. 5:28-30 – But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. III. The Beauty of Serving Our God: There Is Always Hope. A. By now you may be thinking, "that's me! I am that parent!" 1. That is how I felt when I was preparing this sermon. 2. "O Lord what do I do?" B. There is no need for despair because our God is faithful to his covenant promise to be a God to us and to our children. 1. Look at the hope in verse 16: nevertheless, the Lord raised judges who delivered them. A. Do what Joshua challenged Israel to do. Josh. 24:15 – "And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD." 1. Joshua challenges them to commit themselves to Yahweh or not to commit at all. 2. But for his family, Joshua had already decided that they were going to follow Yahweh. B. Joshua understood his role as the head of the house and made a decision for his whole house. C. He did not buy into the idea that his kids would decide what they wanted to do once they were old enough. {TRANSITION: So, what is it going to be of the next generation? People in the next generation, what is it going to be of you? Once your parents in the faith are gone, are you going to remain in the faith?} {TRANSITION: The other side of the coin is the faithfulness of the Lord} V. The Basis of God's Faithfulness: His Own Character. A. God will stay true to what he told us he is going to do for us, not because of his love for us, though he loves his people with infinite love. B. God will follow through in his promises because of whom he is; he cannot do otherwise. 2 Tim. 2:13 – If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself. C. Do you see the beauty of this? It is not because of whom we are; rather, it is because of whom he is that he is faithful to us. 1. Can you imagine if God's allegiance to us as his people was based on our allegiance to him? a. Can you imagine if he used the same standard of faithfulness that we use in our relationship with him? b. More often than not, our allegiance to God is nothing more than a relationship of convenience. 1) "Today is not convenient to serve the Lord, so I'll skip it." 2) "You know, I worship the Lord most Sundays, so it is ok to skip this one to take care of my own interests." 3) "I already fulfilled my duty on the Lord's Day by giving an hour to him, now it is my time." 4) "I have been so good more days than I have been bad, so it is ok to indulge in sin." 5) "It is a special occasion, God will understand if I don't do what he wants me to do this one time." 2. Praise be to his name that he doesn't deal with us in the same way we deal with him! 3. A great example of this is in Ezekiel 20:1-22 Ez. 36:22-32 – Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'Thus says the Lord God: "I do not do this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for My holy name's sake, which you have profaned among the nations wherever you went. And I will sanctify My great name, which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst; and the nations shall know that I am the Lord," says the Lord God, "when I am hallowed in you before their eyes. For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them. Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God. I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. I will call for the grain and multiply it, and bring no famine upon you. And I will multiply the fruit of your trees and the increase of your fields, so that you need never again bear the reproach of famine among the nations. Then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good; and you will loathe yourselves in your own sight, for your iniquities and your abominations. Not for your sake do I do this," says the Lord God, "let it be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel!" D. And the proof we have that this is all true is the incarnation of God the Son, 19-20. 1. All the things God promised were declared and sealed to be yes in Christ. a. This does not mean that God's promises weren't true before Christ came and then became true after he came. b. Jesus Christ is the ultimate demonstration of God's faithfulness. c. He is the final declaration of God's unwavering commitment to bring to pass all his promises. 2. We know that this is true objectively because Christ has come, but we also know it subjectively because of the indwelling of the Spirit, 22. 3. Thus, because of Christ's fulfilling all things on our behalf and because of the testimony of the Spirit in our hearts we are able to say with the prophet: Lam. 3:22-23 – Through the Lord's mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; great isYour faithfulness. VI. God's Commitment to His Promises Meets Everyday Life A. We embrace what God says is true regardless of what is going on around us. Heb. 13:5-6, 8 – Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." So we may boldly say: "The LORD is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?" … Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Rom. 8:35, 37-39 – Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (NO DAMAGED GOODS) Rom. 8:28-29 – And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. 1. Parents, sometimes this is going to be all that you have. 2. "It doesn't seem like God is the God of my children, but he promised to be and I'll trust him." B. We do what God says trusting that all the promises attached to obedience will come to pass. Pro. 22:6 – Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it. Pro. 13:24 – He who spares his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him promptly. Pro. 22:15 – Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; the rod of correction will drive it far from him. Dt. 6:1-9 – Now this is the commandment, and these are the statutes and judgments which the Lord your God has commanded to teach you, that you may observe them in the land which you are crossing over to possess, that you may fear the Lord your God, to keep all His statutes and His commandments which I command you, you and your son and your grandson, all the days of your life, and that your days may be prolonged. Therefore hear, O Israel, and be careful to observe it, that it may be well with you, and that you may multiply greatly as the Lord God of your fathers has promised you—'a land flowing with milk and honey.' Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. 4. Because of God's unfailing faithfulness parents are to be all the more diligent. 5. We can't say, "it doesn't work." 6. Parents must be encouraged to be parents because what God says he is going to do, he is going to do. 7. This is true in all areas of life, not just parenting. Ps. 37:4 – Delight yourself also in the LORD, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Conclusion
So, what do we do? We trust in the Lord with all our heart. We believe that all his promises will come to pass in Jesus Christ. We listen to the testimony of the Spirit of God in our hearts. And we do what God commands. Great is his faithfulness unto us for his name's sake. Amen
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