God's Word and Your Family - The Blessing of Family Worship

You may be seated. I know it's not a familiar psalm, but it's interesting what it says in that first stanza, verse 10. They in God's law refused to walk as covenant would not keep. All his deeds they soon forgot as miracles of light. Forgetting God's word.

Please turn over in your Bibles with me to Deuteronomy chapter six. Deuteronomy chapter six, the last of the books of Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy chapter six, and we'll read this morning verses four through nine. Deuteronomy chapter six, verses four through nine. If you're using your pew Bibles, that's on page 165. Deuteronomy 6, beginning at verse 4.

Hear now God's word. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and 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 and when you walk by the way, when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as signs 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. Thus ends this portion of the reading of God's word.

Prayer for Illumination

Let's pray. Father, we pray that you would meet with us now as we get into your word. Father, we need your Holy Spirit. Father, we need you with us as our teacher. We pray that you would allow us to put away the things of this world and fix our eyes upon you now. We pray that you might increase, and that we might decrease. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, I had planned with all intent. I had done all my reading, and on Tuesday morning at 5 a.m., my plan was to preach to the Ephesians, or sorry, Esther chapter 1. We're not going back to Ephesians chapter 1. Esther chapter 1. And then on Tuesday afternoon or Tuesday at 10 o'clock, the elders met and they said, you know, we think we would like you to do another sermon specifically on family devotion, family worship. How do we as families grow in grace? How do we as husbands, how do we as fathers nourish our families? And how do mothers nourish their children? How do we see families building up disciples? And so with that, we come to Deuteronomy chapter six. Deuteronomy chapter 6, where this first part is the great Shema, right?

Sermon

This is what every Israelite child, when they would wake up in the morning and before they went to bed at night, they would recite this verse. It would say, Shema Yisrael Adonai Eloheinu Adonai Echad. And they would go on and they would talk about how they needed to love the Lord their God with all their heart. And then every Sabbath, when you would get together, the person at the front of the synagogue would Hit the bima and he would say, shema, shema, shema. Listen, listen, listen, hear, hear, oh Israel, hear God's word. God's word was central to the life of the Jewish, it was central to the life of the church in the first century and it's central to our lives today.

So how do we live this out? Well, first I'd like to work through the text of what this says, and then I'd like to take us to a few different places in scripture about how do we live this out in our lives. So first, what does the text mean to us today? What's actually written in this passage?

Well, God starts out with this declaration that he is one. God starts out with this declaration that he alone is God. There's not other gods, right? The kids and I have been working through the Greek myths in their schooling, and I'm always surprised how petty these gods are, and all these little areas where this god is in charge of the hunt and of baby animals. I don't know how that goes together, but there's all these crazy stories about all these false gods, and this was the culture in which the Jews would have lived. You know, you would have had the god of the storm, and the god of the ground, and the Philistines worship the merman god of Dagon, the god of the sea, and all these other mini-gods. And here, God says, no. Listen up.

There's one. There's one, I'm it. I made the heavens. I made the sea. I made the land. I made you. I made the animals. I made the grass. I made all of it. Now listen up, hear my words. I'm gonna tell you how you walk in grace. I'm gonna tell you how you walk, and how you live, and how wonderful of a God I am. So listen up. Listen up, and I don't want you to forget this. And it's not just to go to you, but it's also supposed to go to your children. That's, if I'm gonna summarize it, it's God saying, I am the one true living God, and I am blessing you, and I want you to pass on this blessing to your children who come after you. And that's where he goes, right?

In verse five, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. A single heartedness devoted to God. It's not like you could love God and then kind of, you know, love your idol over here. No, no, all the idols aren't gods at all. You're not allowed to have any of them. That's why we have in his law, Deuteronomy or Exodus chapter 20, the first commandment. You shall have no other gods before me. Why? Because there aren't any other gods.

Right, it's just Him. And so you love Him with your whole heart. You love Him with your whole soul. You love Him with, I love the word here, it's meodecha. It's all, we translate it, we translate it strength here, but it's like all your veriness, all your power, everything, every ounce of energy that you love is meant to be directed towards God. And everything that you can squeeze onto, that's how tightly you cling onto the Lord and Him alone.

But he's given us his word, and this is God's gift to us. The God of the universe speaks to us. Speaks to us in languages we can understand, not in Babel, not in a language that's unaccessible to us. But you can actually learn Hebrew. You can actually learn Greek. And those who have learned those languages have translated it for you here. You can read it in your own language.

This is a blessing to us. And so what does he say in verse six? And these words which I command you today shall be on your heart. And notice what he says. And you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk in the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as signs 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." This is This is saying it's a B at the core of who you are. It's kind of this interesting word play that it's using here where it says, and you shall teach them diligently.

This is the idea of like, you have a knife and you need to sharpen that knife. And when you sharpen that knife, you don't just, have you ever sharpened a knife on a honing stone before or seen someone sharpen a knife on a honing stone? You can't just do it in one pass, right? Go over it multiple passes, different times, and every time it gets dull, what do you have to do? You have to sharpen that knife again. This is that idea here that you're drilling it into your children, you're continually sharpening your children.

It's the reality that our hearts get dull. It's the reality that we'll come to God's word and sometimes it's... We're just dull, we don't remember what we just read, or we've just become cold towards what we're reading, or we're just not even living it out. The point is that parents especially have this obligation and this blessing that you get to continually sharpen your children.

You continually get to give them that gift that these words might go to your children. And then it's, how do you do that? And that's where the rest of it goes in verse seven. You shall, verse seven, you shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up.

God's word should be a part of our daily lives, not something that just happens on Sunday morning, okay guys, come on kids, get in the van, it's really busy, I know, just shut your mouth, get dressed, let's go, let's get to church, you need your Bible shot. No, it's our whole lives are meant to be filled with teaching our children, our grandchildren about God's word. I mean, this is the beautiful blessing when we have a God in transvision of all things, when we see that, look how beautiful God made the winter outside. Or when you're about to drive in those icy conditions and you're about to get in your car and go along the way, will you stop and say, guys, we need to pray and ask God to give us safety?

Or when you actually arrive there safely and you saw something along the way and you're able to talk to your children about, you remember that guy who was driving nuts? Yeah, I don't think that's preserving life. Do you think that he was keeping the sixth commandment? No, he could have killed someone.

As you're walking along the way, God's word is in your mind and you're thinking about things. And when you saw your brother or a sibling hurt their other sibling, when one of your sons hits their daughter, you're able to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, son, hold on. Did you love her like you would love yourself? You're able to take from the words of Christ, you're able to show them God's word. This is what it means is that we live in a constant area where we're thinking about this.

Now, I've been amazed by Olivia's capacity to do this. And I'm not going to use my family very much with this, but Olivia does something that every once in a while annoys me, right? When I sit down and we're watching a movie, I'm like, I want to veg out. I just want to sit down. I just want to just entertain me, you know? But when Olivia sits there and we're watching a movie, she'll pause the movie and she's like, can you believe they did that?

And you're sitting there watching a kid's movie, but she's just pointing out to the kids, like, don't act like that. That boy is really selfish. Don't do that. Is it really good that those two kids are kissing? No, that's not what God wants you to do. Hold on. But the point is that I was, I'm just of this mindset, like, oh, you know, you're just entertained by entertainment.

But I think that's what God wants us to do is talking about it, asking, is this the way things are supposed to be? Is this how we walk in Christ? So as you walk by the way, and when you sit down, and when you rise up, and then verse eight and nine goes on, you know, to bind them as a sign upon your hands, and there to be as frontlets between your eyes, and you're supposed to write them on the doorposts of your house and upon your gates. Jewish people have taken this so much that they take this literally, where they literally have what are called phylacrates. You hear Jesus talking about that one time. You can go to Israel or go online today, and you can actually buy a phylacrity.

It's a little tiny scroll that's gonna have the Ten Commandments written on it, and that's gonna be put inside a little tiny box, and that box has leather ropes, and so you put the word on your hands here, and you wrap those leather cords around your arms, and so Jesus says, you make your phylacrities long, but you don't actually keep the word that's in it. You bind it between your eyes, you make a big show of your prayers, but you don't actually have God's word in your mind itself.

And this isn't meant to be taken literally, as in we literally get a little Torah scroll and we put it on the doorpost of the house. It's not what that's, literally it's called a mizuzot. That's what Jewish people would do. You walk into the house, you're supposed to touch the mizuzot to remember, oh, God's word is on this house.

Jesus is saying that wasn't the point. That wasn't the point of this, it's supposed to be in your heart. It's supposed to be in your mind, it's supposed to be washing over you. And so, this is what God, this is what it's saying, okay? This is what it's saying. But I'm worried, because what we're about to go into, I'm gonna get into some nitty gritty.

We're about to go into other places, specifically in the New Testament, where God directs His church to do this. But see, there's a danger that you have here that the Jews also walked away with. It's legalism. There's a danger you have here that the Jews also had, it's legalism. These words are not meant to tell you if you do all these things, then you will be righteous before God.

No, actually it's quite the opposite. If we go through the Ten Commandments, we're at Deuteronomy chapter six, you just have to look over at Deuteronomy chapter five, there's the Ten Commandments. And they condemn us as sinners. They condemn us as thieves and liars and blasphemers, Sabbath breakers, covetous, idolaters, right?

I mean, it's not meant to show you legalism, it's meant to drive you to Christ. And so as we come into this next section where we're going to get into the nitty-gritty, brothers and sisters, I don't want you to be weighed down with a sense of legalism, and a sense of you taking it, you know, oh, if we do this, our family's gonna have a perfect life, and we're gonna be perfect before God. No, you will have Christ. And you're gonna deal with some ugly things in scripture, some ugly realities of who you are in your heart, but the point is is that that's what the scripture does, is it points us to Jesus.

First Point

And so first I'm gonna talk to you husbands. Husbands and fathers. Husbands and fathers. If you had a visitor come to your house and look at your life, look at your schedule, see your appointment book, sat down at a meal with you, who would they see as your God? If somebody examined your life and saw your priorities by where you're spending the most amount of time on and who you talk about most, who would they say your god is? And now this isn't a popular thing to do in American culture, me calling out fathers to lead their families, but indeed, that's exactly what God says, you are the head of your home. You have a wife to care for, you have children to care for.

Ephesians chapter five, we looked at that. Isn't it amazing, in Ephesians chapter five, God says, husbands, love your wives just as Christ loves the church. And we immediately jump to the very end where it says, even dying for her. But we miss the primary way in which we die every day to our wife.

Washing her in the water of the word. Husbands, what is the primary way in which you love the church like Jesus loves the church? What's the primary way in which you love your wife like Jesus loves the church? You bring her the Bible. You talk about the things of God with her. You lead your families in the gracious love of Jesus Christ.

This is the gracious challenge I'm putting before you today. You are given this wonderful God-blessed challenge this morning to lead your families in grace, to bring them to the word, to care for your wife. Isn't it interesting as well, when the fathers got the instruction from God in Ephesians chapter six, God gave you two challenges, didn't he?

Challenge number one, don't provoke your children to wrath. Challenge number two, train them up in the fear and instruction of the Lord. Don't provoke them to wrath. Train them in the fear and admonition of the Lord. So you lead your wife. by washing her in the word. You will lead your children by instructing them in the word. Husbands, this is God's blessing to you. You get to care for your family by washing them in the word. You get to pray with them. You get to care for them. In my own life, I have been so blessed by, when I became a Christian, being invited into Christian homes. and visiting different families and seeing godly men with believing children and wives who loved them.

And a common theme in their lives were, at least once a day, typically right after a meal, they would get into God's Word. Sometimes it was short, sometimes it was long. It just depended on the family. But they spent time in God's Word. You know, the psalmist says in Psalm 55, verse 17, evening and morning and at noon, I will pray to you and cry aloud and you will hear my voice. Do you pray to God with your family when you sit down, knowing that he'll hear your voice?

But I'm gonna guess there are some objections by a few of you, and I'm gonna break up these objections in a few ways. So husbands and dads, you might say, well, I don't read so well. It's really hard for me to read. Okay? Read. Read slow. The more often you read, the better you'll get. Have some humility. It's okay if you don't read well. It's okay, God didn't say here, you know, teach them diligently to your children, but only if you read well. No. No, just read it. It's not based upon how good you are at reading it, The question is, are you faithful to God in doing the things that He desires of you? You might say, well, I'm no theologian, right? There's things in the Bible that I don't understand and I don't get, so I feel ill-equipped. How am I supposed to read the Bible? What if my wife has questions and I can't answer them?

Welcome to my world. It's okay. Just show some humility when that happens. It's okay, you don't have to have all the answers. Actually, sometimes it's a wonderful thing to say, I don't know. Let's pull out some Google and let's go to some different websites. Let's pull out our study Bible. Let's ask Pastor Brian later and see if he can help us out.

It's okay to do that. There are times in which you're both going to sit there and go, we have no clue. And that's okay. It's okay, you're plummeting the depths of the mysteries of God together. Have humility, it's okay, husband, if you don't have all the answers.

You might say, what if I mess up? Right, what if I say, okay, we're gonna do this. This year's gonna be the year where every breakfast we're gonna sit together, or after every dinner we're gonna sit together, but what if I mess that up? What if I forget for a couple days, or if I'm just a sinner? So you just keep on sinning?

No. No, don't worry about it. Get back on the bike and keep going. Don't worry if you mess up. Don't worry if you miss a few dates. Confess that to the Lord. Apologize to your family and keep going. But you might say, but I haven't done this for years. Hold on, I've been married for 40, 50, 60 years and I've not been good at this. Okay?

So let's do it together. There's no better day to start than right now. Get into God's word together now. You've got this, the Holy Spirit is in you. Not by yourself, not by your own strength, but God is telling you today, this is your blessing. This is your covenant obligation. Start today.

Maybe you say, well, I'm not good at praying out loud. Well, okay. I think there's a common thread in a lot of these, and it's pride, and a lack of humility, right? I don't wanna do this because I'm not good at it. I don't wanna do this because, well, my family, I'm embarrassed that I'll be embarrassed in front of my family. It's okay, let your children see you struggle in prayer. Let your grandchildren see you struggle as you try to find the words. Guess what they're going to struggle with? Finding the words to pray themselves. This is hard, and it's okay. It's not a performance. It's living out our faith in an authentic way before our children and grandchildren, before our wives.

Now, if you're like me, I know I had this objection. It was a pretty cheap objection. My kids don't sit very well. Okay, shorten it up. I'll never forget the day that I heard a big name seminary president say, if you have little children, don't read more than a paragraph. And I thought, oh, whew. It's not like this big, huge thing. Sometimes little seats, they can only handle a paragraph or two at a time. That's OK.

You don't need to give them the whole steak at one time. Just give them a bite. We're about growing oak trees here, not making a flash in the pan, right? You wanna, over time, feed your children long-term, make them strong. Train your children, accommodate your children. If your children think it's boring, don't give up. Kids, you know that's true.

Sometimes you just think family worship is boring. And sometimes I think eating mom's vegetables is difficult. Not all hard things are bad things. Right? It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. Involve your children. But there's a reality that some of you might say, and I'm gonna get off husbands here in a second, I know you've had a lot of pressure on you, but some of you might say, I'm just too busy. This is all well and dandy, but I got cows to take care of. I got fields to plow. I got work to get done. I need to make sure I'm at my job on time. There's just too much to do. Well, that's a question of priority, isn't it? What did we look at last week? What is God's word? God's word is more valuable than gold, sweeter than honey. It converts the soul, it enlightens the eyes.

This is the inheritance God has given to you to pass down to your children. You can give them an inheritance of a house, which they're probably going to bicker about when you die. You can give them an inheritance of a farm, which they'll probably fight about when you die. You can give them all sorts of inheritance that's eventually going to ruin and be moth-eaten and fall away. Or you can pass down to them something that will last forever. What's your priority? Will you give them an inheritance that goes forever? Husbands, fathers, lead your family in God's word. Wives, I didn't forget you, don't worry. Wives, encourage your husbands. Support your husbands in this. Wives, be there as a faithful helper.

Sometimes that might mean asking him to remember to do family worship with you. It's okay that sometimes you're, oh, I shouldn't excuse your husbands, but if you need to ask him, are we going to read the Bible today? Do it. He might just be forgetful. But spur him on towards love and good deeds. But the question is, what happens if they don't do it?

What happens if your husband, especially if you have children, what happens if your husband won't read the Bible to the family? Or you can think about Abigail, who even though Nabal, her husband, was a fool, still did the right thing. You can still do the right thing even though your husband neglects his duties.

Read the Bible to your children. Go and get the Bible yourself after dinner and go read it to the children. Right, it's amazing what the scriptures say when Paul is talking about the believing wife who's married to the unbelieving husband. What does he say? He says that the unbelieving wife sanctifies, or sorry, the believing wife sanctifies the unbelieving husband. It might be that by your faithful training up of your children, as you're reading the Bible to your children, that your husband someday might have that seed of faith planted and might grow himself. It's interesting, again, what 2 Timothy said. Who was it that taught 2 Timothy the holy scriptures? Did you pick that up? In 2 Timothy chapter 3, it said that somebody taught Timothy the holy scriptures.

It wasn't his dad. It was his grandmother and his mother who taught him the scriptures. Maybe that's your calling in your life today is you don't have any children in your home right now, but you might have grandchildren or great-grandchildren that you can read the scriptures with. Set up a time on Zoom or on Skype or FaceTime, whatever, and just ask, and I just read story Bibles to the grandkids for a little bit.

Right, where you share this inheritance with the children who come after you. Again, it's interesting that verse four five and six and seven and eight and nine isn't limited to fathers. Yes, fathers, you have the primary obligation here, but it's also directed towards women as well. This is a covenantal thing we do as families. We lead in God's word.

Now there's stuff for kids. Now, yeah, good job, looking up. Now there's stuff for kids. Right, kids? Kids, I've already talked to you about sometimes it's not going to be easy to sit still during family worship. Try. Right, you're learning patience. It's a good thing.

Right, when you are attentive, when you pay attention to God's word, you know what you are to your parents? You're a blessing. God's already said in Psalm 127 that you are a blessing from God. You're the rich inheritance that God has given your parents. But children, when you'll actually sit still for a few minutes and listen to God's word, you bring glory to your father in heaven. When you listen to God's word, you bring glory to your father in heaven.

Another thing for you kids, ask your parents questions. Okay, when your parents are reading you the Bible and you don't understand something, that's okay. Ask your mom and dad, say, what does that mean? I don't understand what that word says. That's okay, it's good. Maybe your mom and dad might say, I don't know either, and say, can you get a dictionary? That's okay. Ask your parents questions. Try to be patient with your parents, right? Your mom and dad might not be good at doing this, and that's okay. That's okay, kids, be patient with your parents. They're sinners who God is working on also. But kids, there is something that God is telling you here specifically. All right? All eyes here, kids, kids. All eyes here, kids. All right, do you guys get this? All eyes here, ready? This is God's word to you, right? When your parents are reading the Bibles with you, you have one command, you ready?

Put your hands on your ears. Go ahead, put your hands on your ears. Listen, listen, listen, okay? Make sure you're listening. Parents, I'm gonna encourage you as you're doing family devotions with your kids, involve them in it. Let them read some Bible. They're gonna struggle with words, I promise you. You probably struggle with some words too. That's okay, work through it with them. It's just a couple of practical how-tos.

We already talked about choosing a small chunk, right? Please, please have mercy on your kids when you do family devotions. It doesn't need to be half an hour, 45 minutes, Lord forbid an hour long. You don't need to do that. Just bite size, have mercy on them, teach them.

It might be that you need to get a few copies of the same translation. Each person read one paragraph or one verse. So that way they have to pay attention to the words themselves. And when it's their turn, just tell them, remember, you're supposed to be at verse 15. For some big families, that might mean that they get to go through a whole chapter before there's another person reading. That's OK. Pay attention. Pay attention.

Pray. I would encourage you during family devotions, sometimes it's okay if just the husband prays or just the dad prays, but I would encourage you especially to involve your wife and children in family worship. Ask them to pray. Ask them to pray. Teach them to pray. This is about the whole family coming to the throne of grace together, praying with the king together. Another brass tax, how do I do this, is singing. All right, not all of us are able to sing very well.

That's okay. If you need a copy of the Psalter, let us know. We can get you a copy of the Psalter. If you don't know the tunes, that's okay too. There's an app. Literally you can get it online or on your phones. It's a Book of Psalms for Worship app. If you can't remember that whole title, it's on the front of your Psalter. Literally type this into whatever app store you use and it will come up. And you can click on the tune and hit play.

And trust me, my family has to do this. and just sing it, sing it. Maybe devote one psalm a month where you just slowly work through one stanza at a time so you can learn how to sing the psalms. But involve your family with it. Be gentle with it. Again, family worship is not this stale, formal thing, but make up hand movements for it. That's okay.

Is there something in the psalm that talks about shouting to the Lord? Let your kids shout. Get them involved, let them see that God's word is something that's meant to be living and breathing and active, not just stale words on a page. All right, sing. Read God's word. Pray together, sing. Sing God's word together. I would say if you're really ambitious, you can catechize.

I didn't bring a copy of my catechism with me. I should have, but there's like a book online. Let me know if you need one. Or you could just take home your bulletin from each week and work on one question a week. just reading it over, talking about it. If you have a hard time memorizing, go on. Again, this is just brass tacks. I'm giving you guys real practical things you can do here.

Go on YouTube, type in Holly Dutton, or even you can just go on YouTube and literally type in the question of the catechism, and you'll find a song of somebody singing that question of the catechism with the answer. That's why I have a hard time when I try to do this from memory, from the pulpit. If I sing it to you guys, I can remember it, but I can't say it off the top of my head. It's okay, sing the questions together. But there's a reality of what God says, right? Train up a child in the way, and when they get old, they will not depart from it. That's not an absolute promise, but it is a principle.

If we want to see the tomfoolery that we have seen this week in our country, and we think that, oh man, there's just like no more common sense. Common sense came from parents passing it down to their children. When we depart from God's word, we see our country dissolve into chaos. When families fall apart because husbands aren't leading their families, we get the family falling apart in culture. When we don't have wives who are helping their husbands and training up their children in the fear of the Lord, guess what? We get children who are tyrants. When we get children who aren't told to sit still and to listen and to pay attention to the way in which God has said, this is the path, do not depart from it, why would we be surprised when our nation departs far from his word?

This is exactly what we sang about in the Psalm earlier, isn't it? They forgot God's commandments, forgot God's miracles. And what was the result? They departed from God's ways. brothers and sisters, husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, grandparents, children.

Closing Prayer

This is the Word of God. Walk in it every day. Talk to each other about it. Dwell in it. There's blessing because in it the very Son of God is taught to us. Let's pray. Well, Father, we thank you so much for the blessing it is to have your Word. Father, we pray that your Holy Spirit would take away any foolish things that I have said today, and that the pure gold alone would be left. Lord, we pray that we would be a people who would follow after you, who would love you with all of our hearts, with all of our souls, with all of our strength, and that we would pass down those gospel blessings.