Fathers, Do Not Exasperate Your Children

So today is Father's Day, and if you're regular around here, you know that there are only a couple of times throughout the year that we go away from the normal book that we're preaching through. And so Mother's Day, Father's Day, Thanksgiving, Sunday, New Year's, and Christmas, Advent, and Easter are really the only times that we go away from it. And so today we're on one of those Sundays. you know, make a big deal of Father's Day, except that I think that fatherhood is something that's in a sad state in our society. There's a lot of ignorance, a lot of misunderstanding, a lot of wrong, bad fatherhood. I don't know how else to describe it. And my hope this morning is that we as Christians would be able to grow in our understanding of what it means to be a father, and what that work actually looks like. And the funny thing is, when you start reading about mothers or fathers, and you start reading commentary about it, or sermons about it, in preparation for those kinds of days, you'll often find that one thing you'll find is that Scripture doesn't give a whole lot of very particular do this and then that. It's not like, you know...

tabernacle worship where it's like this is how you're going to do it and build it and this is what you're going to look like and here's how it's all going to go. There's not a prescription that way. There are principles that Scripture teaches us about the work of motherhood and fatherhood. And the interesting thing is that when you read commentary about it or you read sermons, so much of the work and so much of what it is is taken for granted. There's not a lot of discussion in commentary about this sort of stuff. And the reason is because I'm convinced is because that's not something that they were dealing with. That wasn't a conflict or a source of tension or ignorance when these things were written. But now it is. We don't know how to be. Fatherhood is not something that men are confident in. It's something they're afraid to become. And then if they are fathers, they don't quite know what to do with it. They didn't learn from their dads or their grandfathers, their uncles. And so our work in our day is to cultivate what it means to be a father.

And to start with what scripture says and work mine in that text to figure out what does it mean? What is that actually? What's the implication for us? What's that look like? Why is that significant? To the end that we would become better fathers ourselves. And so our text this morning is Colossians chapter 3, just two verses, verses 20 and 21. Would you stand for the reading of God's word now? This is the word of the Lord and it is eternally true. Children. Be obedient to your parents in all things, for this is well-pleasing to the Lord. Fathers, do not exasperate your children so that they will not lose heart. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. Now, you might wonder why, if we're going to talk about fatherhood, I put in the verse immediately preceding it about children, telling children to be obedient to their parents in all things.

treat their children and what they're supposed to produce. One of the things very simply we can understand before we dig in very deep to this text is that fathers are to lead their children, teach their children, instruct their children in all things, and children in turn are supposed to respond to that love, that care, that instruction, that discipline with obedience. And so the first thing that fathers, parents really, are to expect of their children is obedience. You really actually ought to expect your kids to do what you tell them to do. That changes as you get older somewhat because they're becoming, obviously they start out babies and they grow up to be adults. And so their interaction, a child's interaction with his parents changes as they get older. And so when I say you should expect your children to do what you say, I have in mind younger children. But as they start to transition, it's not that they shouldn't, They don't have to obey their parents anymore. It's that their parents are going to continue to be building upon the foundation that they've built in their early years. That when they're young, we're teaching them to obey. We're modeling and we're instructing good decision-making for them. And we're telling them what to do. And we're explaining to them why that's important and why that's necessary scripturally. Our kids ought to know that God tells them, commands them, and requires of them that they obey us in all things in the Lord.

Really, the only exception is if you're to tell your child to sin, then they're not supposed to obey you. But they must obey you even when they think that what you're doing is rigorous, unnecessary, stupid. We've all been kids, and which one of us could say, our parents didn't tell us to do things we thought were dumb at the time? And yet as you get older and you mature, you start to see the wisdom in the things your parents told you to do. And the things they told you not to do. And so children are to be obedient to their parents in all things. For this is well pleasing to the Lord. This is something that as parents, and especially fathers, you have to expect. It's the baseline that your kids will obey you. It's not something that's, it's not negotiable. Now, when I speak that way, I realize even in my own heart that I feel the bar going up and I feel the pressure going up. And how am I supposed to do that? How am I supposed to do that? And you know what Calvin says about children obeying their parents?

He says, it's scarce that there's one in a thousand children that obeys their parents. And it was just shocking to me to read that that's what he said about it. Because I was like, oh, you mean they got to obey, and you mean I got to knuckle down, I got to make sure they do everything, and it's got to be just so. And then here's this commentator, and he says, you know, it's really a thing that's hard. It's not just this given easy thing. It's very difficult. And our expectations ought to be seasoned with Scripture. And so when I say to you what scripture says to you, that your children ought to be obedient to you in all things, I want you to have the perspective to not go home and devour your children in the process. Because as soon as the children are told, you're to obey your parents in all things, for this is well-pleasing, there comes a check immediately to the fathers. Fathers, what?

Do not exasperate your children. And that's what I want to talk about this morning is what is exasperation? What's it look like? How's it happen? How do you fix it? Because it's a very common temptation, and it's not a temptation that's only necessary. It's not only a temptation to us. This was written thousands of years ago, a couple thousand years ago, and it was a problem then. And it was a problem before that. And this is something that the Lord has to say to us. He could have said all kinds of stuff to us as parents about how to love and to teach our children how to raise them. And this is what he says. Do not exasperate your children. Now, that's a negative command, right? That tells you what not to do. And I want to come to what we're supposed to do instead. But I want to understand first, what is exasperation? To exasperate someone is to be impatient with them, to be overly

rigorous or severe with them, to be impossible to please or to be satisfied. That's what it is to exasperate someone. Now, you may think of a workplace or a job you used to have where you had a boss that you could just never please. He just always was critical. You never did it good enough. And what was he doing except exasperating his employees? Now, some of you have parents like that. Some of you are parents like that. You can't be pleased. You're impatient. You're quick. You snap at your kids. Your kids grow up in an environment where there's this constant looming frustration or disapproval of their parents. They never know. It's the antithesis of security and protection. It's constantly wondering. I'm walking through the minefield of my life in my house wondering, when am I going to get...

When am I going to step on the mine and have a problem? That's what it is to exasperate someone. And I want to say to you now that while fathers are told not to exasperate their children, that includes mothers. It absolutely includes mothers. Mothers are just as capable of exasperating their children as fathers are. Now it's Father's Day, and it's addressed to fathers. So what I want to say to you fathers is, one of the things is, you have to be sure that your wife... the mother of your children, isn't allowed to exasperate the children. That she's not allowed to be impatient and incorrigible and unsatisfied and overly severe with the children. She's not allowed to be that either. This scripture is to her. And it's your job as a husband and as a father to see to it that the children that God's given you are not exasperated by either one of you.

Now, here's the thing about exasperation, this type of exasperation. The one who's committing it often doesn't know that that's what's going on. They've often got a reason for the way they're behaving the way they are as a parent. You ever see someone, you go, you're at the park and the kid falls down. There's two things that people will do when their child falls down. What are they? The first is freak out, Diane says, and then what? That's the other one. Yeah. So the freak out is mom. I mean, drops everything. She runs over. Are you okay? Are you okay? You know, and not all moms do that, but you have seen this at the park, right? Just you go with me that far and realize that that happens. Okay. The other response is stop crying. There's just this flat line, just no engagement, just, you know, and why? Well, because you don't want to raise a sissy.

I don't want my son to grow up and not be able to handle tough things. And so when he falls down and skins himself up, get up. You're fine. Now, is it appropriate to say that to your children? Yes, sometimes it is. Is it appropriate to run over and make sure they're okay? Yeah, sometimes it is. The million-dollar question is when. When is that the right thing to do and when is that not the right thing to do? It's just one of the reasons that it could be exasperating. Have you ever seen kids that they won't cry, but their chin is quivering? They're holding it together. We call it a stiff upper lip. They're trying with everything they've got in them not to crack. Where did they learn to do that? Who taught them that that's how they had to handle difficulty, that they had to stuff it? Most often it was their parents, it was their dad. Is there a time for a child to respond that way? Yes, there is a time for your children to learn

get back on the horse when they fall off. But the trick of it is to get them to do it because they're secure, not because they're scared. And that's real hard work to determine what's going on because the outward behavior can look very similar. There are many kids who will respond that way because they've been exasperated. And they know that if they cry, if they crack, if they have a hard time, you're going to come down on them like a ton of bricks. Or you're going to tell them, go cry in your room and come back when you're done. I don't want to deal with you when you're like that. Now, is that parent's intention to exasperate his child? No. Does that mean he's not exasperating his child? No. How about this? Things that parents say or believe that are actually exasperating. I've told him not to do that before. He should know better. It's so obvious I shouldn't have to say it, let alone again and again and again. How about, he doesn't listen unless I talk to him like this.

Which, by the way, is never talking. When someone says that, it's never talking that's justified with that. It's always yelling. Or nothing else works. These are the reasons that we as parents offer up for our behavior. But the fruit of it, of these sorts of things, is exasperation in our children, oftentimes. If you're on the other side of that, consider for a moment how you were growing up, when you were a kid. If you're a parent, you're an adult. What was it like when you were on the other side of that sort of treatment? Was it helpful? Was it encouraging? Did it strengthen you and make you feel secure and build you up? Or did it have a negative effect? Was it tearing you down? Was it making you unsure? Was it making you more timid? When you're on the other side of it, you can easily understand that these sorts of rationale for our behavior as parents can be the very thing that lead to our children losing heart.

And they're common today. If you're not sure what I'm talking about, just go to Walmart. Just hang out. Just go have a date at Walmart. And just walk around toward the back. Walk around near the toys, the sweets, and the checkout. Just walk around in those areas. And what you're going to hear is all kinds of things being done and said to children that you know they shouldn't say, they shouldn't do that. That's mean. That doesn't work. And I'd submit to you that the reason you know it doesn't work is because you've either experienced it and or done it yourself and seen that it doesn't work. And that's why you know when you hear it, you're going, that's not good parenting. Or you look at the kid and you see them and you see they're just waiting. They're just like a soda pop that's never been opened, that's just being shaken and shaken and shaken. At some point, it's just going to blow.

So I want us to see that the reasons that we have in our own minds for behaving and exasperating our children when we're impatient, when we're severe with them, when we cannot be pleased, we're not satisfied, that this actually teaches us something about us as parents. And the thing that we learn is that we're not very knowledgeable about how to raise children. Let me ask you this. As a parent, are you confident that you know how to raise a godly child, that you know how to make them secure? that you know how to give them the things that they need, that you know when to say yes and when to say no and when to push and when to pull back and what to say to them when they're struggling? Or is every new season of life in your child's development scary? I think the vast majority, and you may say, well, I got a bunch of kids and I got it all figured out. I got three kids and so I got it all figured out with a little one. We know what to do when they cry. We know it's teething or we know it's gas or we know it's whatever. But what about your oldest one?

Do you know what to do with them? What's that, Di? Not yet. And so I want us to recognize and to embrace the humble reality that we as parents don't know what we should do. And that actually is a very frustrating reality to us. When you don't know what to do with your children, the likelihood that you're going to be nasty to them or exasperate them for exposing your ignorance goes way up. When you have a problem and you know how to solve it, you tend to be calm. Because you're like, oh, I know the lay of the land here. I know how this works. I have faith to see it through to the end. But when you get into a situation where you go, I don't know. I feel like it's a free fall. I don't know how it's going to land. Oh, here comes the impatience. Here comes the nitpicking. Here comes the, you know, I cannot be pleased. And it's because you're insecure as a parent. And so if we can just admit from the beginning.

That we're insecure as parents. We don't know what to do as our children go off to school or as they graduate from school or as they start puberty or as they start wanting to date or they start wanting electronics or whatever it is that's going on in your house. If you'll start with the humility that I'm not exactly sure how as a Christian I should handle this, you'll have made leaps and bounds in this fight against exasperating your children. Because you'll hit these situations with humility in yourself that will prepare you to handle what is coming at you. But there's a danger if you'll come along. I've just asked you to say, will we come to the place where we'll acknowledge our ignorance? And as soon as you get people to acknowledge their ignorance, there's a danger that comes right along with it. Satan's right in there. He slides right in before the door closes, and he's got a temptation for you.

And his temptation is that if you admit you don't know exactly what you're doing, that you will be tempted then to disengage until you know what to do. That you'll be afraid of failing, and your response to a fear of failure will be to withdraw or to disengage, to put space between you and your children, between your hearts. And I'll admit to you, and we'll all agree, that parenting is not easy. But if you admit that parenting is not easy, And your response to it is to distance yourself from it. It's the surest way to screw it up. It's no better. Which means that we must work as parents not to exasperate our children and that we would not avoid engagement with them in the process. That we're going to learn to not exasperate our children. We're going to be growing in that as we're engaged with them.

That we as parents cannot say, oh, I'm so bad at this. I guess I'm not qualified. I just can't do it. Because who suffers? In that environment, who suffers? The children do. And I want you to realize that disengagement is another way to exasperate your children. You ever hear that kids are acting up because they want attention? You know they never act up in positive ways, right? It's always negative. They're always getting negative attention. when they're acting up. What does that tell you? Is it true that kids act up? Thank you, honey. Is it true that children act up when they're not being loved and cared for, when there's distance between them and their parents? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Every one of you who has kids has what I call a canary in the mine shaft in your house. That's one of your kids. And a canary, you know, in the mine shaft, you'd always take a canary down there in a basket to know when the gas levels got too high because the canary would die.

That's where that saying comes from. Miners take that little yellow canary down there, and when the canary died, they let you know you had to get out. The air quality was too bad. And every one of you has a kid like that. Now, thankfully, they don't die. But they are the one in your house that indicates to you what's going on in your house. And they don't do it with words. They don't sit down and, hey, Dad, you've been treating Mom like garbage lately, and I just wanted to let you know. That's not how it goes. Their behavior is what demonstrates it. They are the indicator. They're the bellwether in your house of whether you're exasperating your kids, whether you're loving your spouse. If you don't know who it is in your house, talk to someone who knows you. If I know you, I could probably give you a good indication. If it's not me, then your small group leader or someone, they'll be able to tell you who it is. And one of the ways they may be exasperated is by you just being disengaged with them.

You're not wanting to muff it up anymore, so you disengage with them. And then they don't know what to expect. And children don't actually tend to do well when they don't know what to expect of them. They tend to act out. They tend to turn inward. They tend to disobey. They tend to wilt. They lose heart when their parents are disengaged from them, when they're exasperated in that way. And so the danger is that you as a parent would behave in such a way and speak in such a way to your children that they would lose heart. Now, what does it mean to lose heart? Well, it just means to have given up, to just not care, to have lost the light in their eye. They're discouraged. There's whole genres, like the whole goth way of presenting yourself. That's like the picture of lost heart. Those kids have lost heart. When I was growing up, There was one of the popular bands that I listened to a lot was Green Day. Have you guys heard Green Day? Listen to Green Day? What is every song that he ever sang about? It's about his dad. Leaving, not being engaged with him, not caring. And he's just sad about it. Every album, everything he ever wrote was just about how he misses his dad and how he's angry that his dad never loved him. That's it. He lost heart. And he wore black eyeliner.

And he represented a whole culture that the connection between all of them was they'd all lost heart. And they found other people of kindred spirit to talk about it with, sing about it with, sing about it for. So losing heart's a dangerous thing. It's not something you want in your children. But losing heart is not a black and white thing. It's not like, you know, have we crossed the line into my children have lost heart and it's all hopeless now. That's not how it works. Losing heart is like a thermostat. Or a thermometer. You know, there's degrees on them. So it could be freezing cold. It could be cold. It could be cool. It could be comfortable. It could be warm. It could be hot. And it can change. And that's how it is with your children and losing heart. If you start to see that they're disengaging, that they're acting up, that they are withdrawing, you should have a light go off and your buzzer go off in your head and say, they're losing heart. They're not encouraged. They're not strengthened. They're not secure.

to do what I'm telling them to do right now. And the million-dollar question is, what do you do about it? What do you do if you see that your children are losing heart? They're acting up. What are you supposed to do about it? Well, you turn the temperature up. You warm them up. By turn the temperature up, I don't mean you knuckle down on them and you discipline them more and you grind it out with them and you have big, long lectures with them about their behavior and their heart. What I mean is you warm them up. You love them. You realize that you as a parent have not been loving them, but rather exasperating them. They've responded to your behavior with the idea of giving up and stopping fighting and not caring whether you approve of them or not. And so your work is to warm them up. And the younger they are, the quicker they'll turn around, generally speaking. A three-year-old that's lost heart will turn around a lot faster than a 13-year-old, generally. There comes a point at which...

In the way that God works, you may have a 16-year-old who's completely lost heart, and if their father comes to them and has this watershed moment with them and says, here's who I've been, and here's what I've done, and here's how I've failed you, and I'm sorry, and please forgive me, and from now on, I'm not going to continue in this way, that the 16-year-old might actually turn around pretty quickly because he's finally been loved. I remember hearing a story one time, my former pastor, of a man in his church, this old farmer. who had a really rebellious 16-year-old son. The man was an elder. And his son was just terrible and miserable to his mother. And you know what he did to his 16-year-old son? Out in the barn? He whipped him with his belt. He spanked him. And that was the beginning of the change in his son. Because he finally communicated that he loved his son and that his behavior wasn't acceptable to his father. And it wasn't he spanked him and was disengaged from him.

There was a sweetness to it. His father finally came home and was engaged with him. So if you notice that your children are not meeting your eye when you talk to them, if you notice that they're agreeing to what you're saying before you're done talking, if you notice that when you come home, they don't care to tell you what they did today and they're the kind of kid that normally would, if you notice that they start wetting their bed, if you notice that they stop eating their food, there's all kinds of signs that show you. I could go on and on, and I could ask other people, and you'd have more things. You'd say, oh, yeah, it was this thing. And each one of your children will be different. There's not a universal, like, oh, well, they're doing this. It's your job as parents to know your kids and to know what their signs are and how they're loved and what it means for them. What are they like when they're doing well, and what are they like when they're not? That's your job as parents. I can help you as a pastor. We can talk about it. Yes, I'm certainly happy to do that.

that's primarily your job to know that and to figure it out. That's part of the work of being a parent. So we're not to exasperate our children because we don't want them to lose heart. What are we supposed to do? How are you supposed to keep from exasperating your children? And what are you supposed to do when they are exasperated? Well, I want to give you three things, not from this text, but from Ephesians and then from Psalm 103. about what you're supposed to do positively because Colossians only gives us the negative or this is what you're not supposed to do. And what's the opposite of, you know, the question we're trying to answer is what's the opposite of exasperation? And we could go through and say, well, what's the opposite of impatience? And you'd say, well, it's patience. And I'd say, what's the opposite of being overly rigorous and severe? And you'd say, well, not being that. And I'd say, right, but tell me positively what it is. Letting them do whatever they want. No, no. What's the opposite of never being pleased?

Will you always be pleased? No matter what they do, you're always pleased? No, that's not quite what Scripture tells you. And so we actually need to learn what it means. So I want to start by reading to you a parallel passage to this section in Colossians. In Ephesians 6, Paul wrote both books, goes through and says the exact same things to a different group of people. And so in Colossians, he says, fathers, do not exasperate your children so they will not lose heart. In Ephesians 6.4, he says, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger. And you go, that's the same. And I say, but then there's a positive instruction. But bring them up in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord. Now, I want to start by saying what bringing up is. How many of you learn by doing with somebody? That's what bringing up is. It's apprenticeship.

Some of us can study it. We can read, and we can learn how to do something. Some of us can have it explained to us, and we'll understand it. But I think the most common way that people learn is by doing it with other people. And along the way, they're being explained. This is how we do it. This is why we do it. This is apprenticeship. This is how people always used to be trained in their professions. You would job shadow. Someone who did what you wanted to do. You'd go to work with them. And you'd be asking questions and they'd be explaining to you. That's what it means to bring up your children. It's an apprenticeship. You're bringing them up. You're taking them along with you on your walk as a Christian and you're explaining to them, here's how we do things. Here's why we do things. Here's what God has said. Here's the danger if we don't do things. You're bringing them along with you. You're showing them.

You're not expecting them to figure it out on their own. That's a monstrous way to parent your children, to expect them to figure out what righteousness and wickedness is apart from you. It's your privilege to teach them that and to spare them all of the pain and heartache of figuring it out themselves. You get to teach them that. So you bring them along. The Greek word that's translated, bring them up, means let them be fondly cherished. And there's a way of bringing someone along that, that's just grinding them into the ground. You say, I'm going to bring you along. I'm going to teach you how to fold clothes. And it can be the most miserable experience in the world for the two of you. I'm teaching them, but it's just awful. Or you can be bringing them along and it can be a, when it's done with love and affection and care for them, it's really sweet. It's really, really sweet. I just read this article this last week from

put out by NPR about chores and kids. And it compared how Americans' kids do chores and how indigenous Mexican kids do chores. And the contrast was, you know, American kids hate to do chores. And we have to bribe them to get them to do it. We'll do this, you know, if you do this, then we'll go here. And if you don't, then we're not going to be able to do that. Or you'll get your allowance or you won't get your allowance. This is how Americans do this sort of stuff. And it was contrasted with these indigenous Mexicans. And it was saying these kids absolutely love to do chores. They take pride in it. They compete in it. The little one comes and says, I can fold clothes. And the other one comes and says, I can fold clothes and cook dinner. They delight in it. It's really a sweet article. And the question is, well, why? I want the latter one. Do I have to move to Mexico? What they said was,

The reason that those kids in Mexico loved to do chores was that when they were little, like one to three, and if you've had a one to three-year-old, you know they want to help you do everything. They're always underfoot. And it's irritating. And that's why your kids don't like to do chores. It's because you're irritated by them being there, and you've taken the season in which they want to help. You've forsaken it. You send them away. Go play. Go do something else. I can only work when you're doing a nap, when you take naps. You get rid of them. And you lose that season. You don't capitalize on it because you don't bring them up. And then when they get older, you expect them to do it, and to not only do it, but to do it well, and to do it with joy. And they don't, and they grumble, and they complain, and they don't think it's fair, and their kids, brothers, friends don't have to do it. The failure was you didn't bring them up when they were willing. Now, why don't we want to bring up our kids? Why don't we want the two-year-old helping cook? Well, they slow things down.

They make messes, big messes. All the dry ingredients, poof, you know, goes flying, big mess. They put salt in instead of sugar. You know, they do all kinds of stuff, just mess it up. But these Hispanic kids, and this is NPR, okay, National Public Radio. This is not Christian. They're just observing. What those kids did, what those kids had was parents who loved them and brought them up and taught them how to do the work fondly. They enjoyed it. They liked working with the kids. They were willing for it to take longer. They were willing for the mistakes and the broken eggs. They were willing for all of that. That was them bringing them up with compassion. And this sort of love and care and acceptance and joy that those parents had in their children, even in those little years, is the bedrock of any sort of good parenting.

You actually have to love your kids. You have to like them. If you always want to get away from your kids, you have a problem. Am I saying you never should want to get away and have a weekend away with your spouse? No. But if that's all you want to do is get away, you're not going to bring your kids up. I can tell you that. You won't bring them up in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord because they're a hindrance to you. They're a bother to you. They're in your way. And that will only become more obvious and more... pronounce the older they get and the more of them there are. And so we're to bring them up. If they're discouraged, if they are demonstrating signs of exasperation, what do you do? You realize you probably haven't been loving them and caring for them. And what should you do? You should hug them. You should kiss them. You should look them in their eyes. You should encourage them. You should get off your phone and put them to bed at night, crawl in their bed and talk to them for a half hour past bedtime.

or an hour or two, however long it takes for them to be content and meet your eyes and be happy. And the dishes or the whatever can wait. You have to forgive them. Too often parents get so upset at their kids. Kids sin, they do something. Maybe it's just childish. They broke the nice dish. And they're sorry. They're sincerely sorry. They did not do it. They weren't throwing it at their sibling because they were mad. They dropped it and they broke it. Forgive them. Tell them you forgive them. Meet their eyes and convince them that you forgive them. Teach them with hope. Over and over and over again, teach them. One of the common conversations between Vanessa and I in our house is I say, Honey, they're not grown yet. We're not done yet. And we can't expect them to be adults because they're not. They're not there yet. We still have work to do. They don't think like we do. They don't process like we do. They don't see the world the way we do. They don't have the experience that we do. And it would be crazy for us to expect them.

To perform the way we do when they're not us. Kids having a hard time? Take them out on a date. Put your phone away. And when it buzzes and they look at you because they know that you're supposed to immediately get your phone when it buzzes, no matter what time of day or night or whatever's going on in the house, just leave it in the car. Go for a walk. Go throw rocks in the creek. Go catch a turtle. Go for a bike ride. Go do something. And communicate to them that this is actually what's important. That all that other stuff can wait. So bring them up. How? In the discipline and the instruction of the Lord. We could spend weeks talking about this part of it. It's sort of the bedrock of Christian education, and I don't want to go into all of that. Other than to say, it's your job as a parent to discipline and to instruct your children in the Lord. It's not the Sunday school teacher's job primarily. It's not my job primarily.

It's not your school's, you know, their teachers primarily. It's your job. Now, that doesn't mean that you can't use supplements to help. That's for you to decide as a parent. But the discipline and the instruction of the Lord is your responsibility. You teach them. And don't be ashamed about it. You're cloistering your kids and you're teaching them this closed-minded worldview and you're doing them harm. No, you're not. To teach them to be Christians and to serve the God who made them is not to do your children any harm. even if there are people in the world who would tell you that you are, to train them up in the discipline and the instruction of the Lord. Don't expect them to figure it out on their own. Don't pawn the work off on other people. You do it. You teach them. You talk to them. You answer their questions. Lastly, Psalm 103, verses 13 and 14 say, Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord...

has compassion on those who fear him. For he himself knows our frame. He is mindful that we are but dust. So what is another thing that your children need? How do you keep from exasperating them? You have compassion on them. You realize that as a father, as a parent, your primary work is to have compassion on your child. And if you've ever had a father, whether it's your blood father or some other man, have compassion on you when you fail, you will never have found so great a motivation as that. You can have 10 taskmasters riding you with whips, and you'll perform better for the man you love and who you know loves you. You'll be happy to do it, happy to sacrifice, happy to give. So just as a father has compassion on his children, David here, King David, takes it as a given that we as fathers would have compassion on our children. Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the Lord has compassion on those who fear him. Why? Why does he have compassion on us? Because he knows our frame. He knows we're weak. He knows we're but dust. He knows that when he made us, what he did was collect up some dirt from the ground and fashion it into us. That's what he made us out of. That's what we'll return to when we die. And so he has mercy on us, knowing that we have the constitution of dust. And so you as fathers and as mothers,

You have to have compassion on your children. They aren't adults. They can't meet the bar that you set for them, especially if it moves around from hour to hour. In your dealings with them, you have to remember their frame. They're not little versions of you. Some people will joke about our kids and say, well, they're just little versions of me. And in one sense, that's true. They do come from you. They are inclined like you. But they're not you. And the biggest way they're not you is that they're not as old as you. They're not as big as you. They don't understand things like you do. They're weak and they need our compassion. They need our compassion when they're tired. I remember one time I went, I drug Levi up to Toledo for a day. I don't remember how old you were. You were like 14, 15 maybe, something like that. And we drove up to Toledo, which was like three and a half hours away. Painted for 10 or 12 hours. I don't know, it was a long day. And we were hustling all day. Picked him up at his house at like five in the morning. We worked all day.

And we drove home that night. And Levi was done. And he slept the whole way home. And I wanted to tease him that he wasn't a man. Why can't you stay awake? What's wrong with you? And I talked to Dan about it. And Dan just said, he's growing and he needs sleep. And he's not lazy. And he was not lazy all day. He worked hard all day long. And then he was tired because he was still growing. And I wanted to make fun of him. And Dan simply saying to me, he's growing. He works hard, and I don't think you ever said to me, but I understood, that's not something to make fun of him for. You know, in some manner, Dan was telling me, you ought to have compassion on him. You ought to realize he's just 14 or 15. And if he was lazy all day, then you, I mean, ride him like a rented mule. But if he wasn't, and he wasn't, let him sleep. And it was very helpful. Be compassionate when they're tired. Be compassionate when they're upset.

You know, having a daughter has been different than having a son in the things that upset her and the way she responds to being upset. Karis is much more likely to cry about things and to just kind of have this like, but I just, you know, my boys don't respond that. They might go throw something, but Karis would cry about it. You be quiet. That doesn't work very well. Honey, you can be quiet. You're okay. Mommy and daddy are here and we love you. You can be quiet and go to sleep now. That works. Be quiet. Go to your room and cry it out. That doesn't work. It's not compassionate. Have compassion on them when they're struggling to understand something. I tried teaching one of my kids to read one time. It was terrible. It was miserable for both of us. No compassion from me. None. And it wasn't that he was necessarily being lazy, but I did not remember his frame. Have compassion on them then. Have compassion on them when they forget how to do something. They are children after all, and they're not as good at things as you are.

They don't have the experience that you do. So have compassion on them. Do all of these things because that's how God treats you, actually. We treat our children the way God treats us. That's the call. And God doesn't exasperate us. He teaches us. He leads us. He bears with us. He's kind and gentle and long-suffering toward us. And that's how we ought to be to our children. Raise children that you delight in, that you love, that you want to be around when they're grown. Be the kind of parent that your kids want to be around when they're grown. Some kids can't wait to get away from their parents. Don't raise kids like that. Don't be the kind of parent that they can't wait to get away from. Trust God and pray for them. Pray for your own work with them, and you'll see God work. That's sweet. I've seen kids of my own children when they were exasperated and had lost heart, and I've seen them come back. And it was God's mercy to our family. And he's merciful to all of us. And so don't lose heart in this work as a parent. Give yourself to it.

And I mean it if your kids are grown. If your kids are my age, give yourself to it. Love them. Don't exasperate them. Let's pray. Father, we love you and we thank you for bearing with us in our weakness. We pray that you would help us to love our children in every way that you have loved us. We pray, Father, that you would give us the desire of our hearts that we would see them grow and mature into godly men and women who love you and who fear you and who keep your commandments, who delight in your law. and who love sinners. We pray, Father, that you would give us grace to do this work, that you would help us to bless them and to teach them and to instruct them. We thank you for our children, Father, and we ask that you would be merciful to them and to us. Forgive us for all of our sins. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Would the officers please come forward now? We now have the privilege of remembering and celebrating the death of Jesus Christ.

And his blood shed, his body broken for the forgiveness of all of our sins. And so I want to read to you the words of institution. Dearly beloved, we are about to celebrate the holy communion of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. So let us consider how the Apostle Paul exhorts every one of us to examine ourselves before we eat the bread and drink the cup. For just as the benefit is great if we partake of the supper with a repentant heart and a living faith, so also is the danger great if we receive this meal in an unworthy manner. For scripture says that he who eats and drinks unworthily eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. Therefore, I warn those of you who are not baptized members in good standing of a Bible-believing church or who are currently living in any sin against your knowledge or conscience that you not profane this holy table. This meal is not for you. And yet I do not say this to exclude any repentant person, no matter how serious their sin, but only to exclude those who continue in sin and refuse to repent.

Examine your consciences, therefore, to know whether you truly repent of your sins and whether by trusting in God's mercy and seeking your salvation in Jesus Christ alone, you are resolved to pursue holiness and to live in peace and love with all men. If you have this testimony in your hearts before God, then be assured that your sins are forgiven through the perfect merit of Jesus Christ our Lord, and I bid you in his name come to his holy table. And although you feel that you do not have perfect faith, and you fail to serve God as you ought, yet if by God's grace you are sincerely sorry for your sins and infirmities, and you earnestly desire to fight against all unbelief and to keep his commandments, then be assured that your remaining imperfections do not prevent you from being received of God in mercy, he himself making you worthy partakers of this heavenly food. For we do not come to this table as righteous in ourselves, but we come seeking our life in Christ, acknowledging that we live in the midst of death.

Let us then look upon this sacrament as a remedy for those who are sick and consider that the worthiness our Lord requires of us is only that we be truly sorry for our sins and find our joy and salvation in him. United with him who is holy by faith, even Jesus our Lord, we are accepted of the Father and invited to partake of these holy things which are for holy persons. Therefore, beloved, listen to the words of the institution of the Holy Supper of our Lord Jesus Christ as they were delivered by the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians chapter 11. For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, in the night in which he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, he took the cup also after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Let us pray.

Our gracious God and heavenly Father, we thank you for sending your son, Jesus, into this world to live a perfect life, satisfying all of the law, pleasing in your sight. And I pray and thank you that he bled and died for the forgiveness of our sins. I pray, Father, that you would be merciful to us for his sake, that you would look on him and his shed blood. and that you would receive us, that you would bless us, that you would strengthen us, that you would give us joy. Father, feed us, nourish our souls as we proclaim the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. Glorify yourself, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.