Welcome to the Liberty Baptist Sermon Archives.
The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist
Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us
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message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.
And here for this Sunday school hour.
Normally we are in our series on world religions and cults, but
we're going to be apart from that series this morning because
of our missions conference and looking forward to all that God
has in store for us. Hasn't it been good already this
week? All right, don't get too
excited. All right, hasn't been good
already this week. I'll tell you, last night was
great. The food that we had was just
absolutely incredible. The amount of food, the fact
that we ate a lot of that food was also pretty impressive as
well. But it was a good fellowship, a
wonderful time, but looking forward to what God has in store
for us here today. Psalm chapter 127, if you will.
Psalm chapter 127. And once you found your place
there, if you would also go to Matthew chapter 28, just leave
your ribbon there in Matthew 28. If you've got one, put your
finger in there. Matthew 28, if you don't have a
ribbon, Psalm 127 is where we will be here this morning.
And I want to talk to you about perhaps the neediest mission
field in the world. And, you know, we could think of
a lot of different places that are needy places for the gospel.
We think of places like communist nations, like North
Korea. We have missionaries, and I
don't want to say too much, we are live streaming, but we
understand that there are missionaries that are out there
who are trying their best from the outside to be able to reach
people on the inside. And there are people in North
Korea, by and large, they don't even know the name of Jesus
Christ, you know, Kim Jong Un, and they know that entire
family. They Revere and sometimes
worship that family. Every house has to have a
picture of their dear leader right there in the home.
But they don't know the name of Jesus Christ like a Muslim
countries all around the world where they know Jesus only as a
good prophet, but yet they don't know Jesus Christ as the Savior.
And by the way, Jesus Christ wasn't just a good prophet.
He was and is the Savior. He either is who he said he was
or he was delusional and a liar. He could have been just a good
prophet. No one that's just a good man
goes around and says follow me and you'll have eternal life.
He's either who he said he was, which by the way he is who he
said he was, or he's delusional and a liar.
We know who Jesus Christ is and there those Muslim countries
that have that great need and we think of them as well.
There's a lot of needy mission fields that are out there.
I think of the missionaries that we have in places like Papua New
Guinea, in places like Southeast Asia, in places like South
Africa, and then even places crazy places like Poplar Bluff,
MO, you know, OK, that's not too crazy.
But you know what, there's, it may be pretty crazy.
OK, All right, that's right. Listen, even plates in Missouri
need the gospel still, all right.
And so we know Massachusetts, this area, we've seen
Bridgeport, CT on Thursday, we saw Keene, NH on Friday.
The need for the mission field is great.
No matter where you are, You literally could take a world map
and throw a dart at it and I'll tell you wherever it lands,
that's a place that needs the gospel.
Now, by the way, don't do that to a map.
That doesn't sound like a good idea, but I'm just saying the
idea is as you could just find a spot and any of those spots need
the gospel. But I would submit to you here
this morning, I want to consider this for the next few minutes,
That perhaps the neediest mission field at all isn't even
a traditional mission field. That the neediest mission field
at all isn't a locale somewhere on a map, on a globe, or on your
GPS. But perhaps the greatest and
neediest mission field is this. Listen, your own family, that
the greatest and neediest mission field is your own
family. Say, pastor, how could that
possibly be the need in North Korea, the need in communist
nations, the need in Muslim nations, the need all around the
world? You just said this.
How could it just be my own family?
Well, listen, how does world missions happen?
Well, it's because missionaries who come outside of the local
church go to those places and they're supported by other local
churches. So yes, those are needy mission
fields that have missionaries and have supporting churches.
But where? Where do those missionaries come
from? Churches.
Where does that support come from?
Churches. What are those churches?
They're just people, families. And without the family being
what it ought to be, there is no world missions.
But even take world missions out of it here for just a moment.
You need to be a missionary to your own family.
You need to reach your own family with the gospel, whether
they are under your roof and you're raising children or
whether it's grandchildren, an extended family or whatever it
is. You are primarily the person who
is going to reach those people. I could go to your house and try
to help you and I hope that I can and Diane and I could help.
I hope that we could reach extended family for Christ.
We would try to do our best if we could.
We could send brother Mrs. Abels over to be a help.
Certainly we could do that. But I will tell you this, no one
is in a better position to reach their own family and to train
their own family than you. And God calls us to do that, to
be missionaries within our own home.
Let's read Psalm 127, if you would.
All right, Psalm 127 says this, a song of degrees for Solomon.
We'll look at that and consider that probably at the end of the
lesson this morning. Except the Lord build the house,
they labor in vain. They build it.
Except the Lord keep the city. The watchman waketh but in vain.
It is vain for you to rise up early.
I just want to just say Amen right there.
I just like that verse. All right, it's vain for you to
rise up early. All God's children ought to say
Amen to that. Like what's the point of waking
up early? But some of you wonder that
right now being a 10:00 service, right, it's vain for you to rise
up early to sit up late to eat the bread of sorrows.
For so he giveth his beloved sleep low.
Children aren't heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb
is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a
mighty man, so are children of the youth happy as the man that
hath his quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but
they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.
Now you say, I see what you're saying there, pastor.
I see the the thought process of the family and the need for the
family to be what it ought to be.
But what does that have to do with missions?
Well, I want you to take that place where you have keep that
ribbon there in Psalm 127 and go over to Matthew chapter 28.
I kind of want to look at these texts together.
This isn't maybe a typical expository message of which I
would preach, but we are going to treat these verses correctly
here this morning because that's what we do.
We do rightly divide the word of truth, but I want to look at
these together now. We look at Matthew chapter 28,
beginning of verse #18 what we're looking at is called the
Great Commission. These are some of the last words
that Jesus gives his church. By the way, He's giving him to
the church because the church already exists here.
It wasn't created on Acts chapter 2.
It was empowered, but already called out and created by Jesus
Christ. We've talked about this many
times here before. And so he's giving this
Commission to the church. You say, well, why is that
important? Because if he was just giving it
to the disciples, the disciples are dead and gone.
And that means the Commission is not for us.
But if he gives it to the church, that means the
Commission is for us today. And the Commission that Jesus
gives here is just as real to those disciples as it is to us
today. So listen to this.
And Jesus came and spake unto them, being the disciples, being
the church, saying, all power is given to me in heaven and earth.
We just saying that, didn't we? That didn't just come from a
hymn. That's from this verse right
here. Go ye therefore, and teach all
nations, baptizing him in the name of the Father and of the
Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all
things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with
you alway even unto the end of the world.
Now, what is this Great Commission composed of?
Well, it has three different parts.
The first it says to teach all nations.
Well, what is that process of teaching all nations?
It is proclaiming the gospel message.
You say, well, why would you say that?
Well, because the next step is baptism and nobody gets baptized
until they get saved. That's the order, isn't it?
You don't find anywhere in the Word of God where people are
baptized without knowing Jesus Christ their Savior.
There's a reason we call it believers baptism, because once
you have trusted Jesus Christ your Savior, then you are placed
in the water. You're placed in deep water,
Amen. And then you're brought down and
you're brought back up. And we'll talk more about that
in a moment. So first you teach all nations,
you teach them, you preach the gospel, then they are to be
baptized. And then it says verse 20,
teaching them to observe all things whatsoever.
I have commanded you, well, what's that thought process
there? That once you're saved, there's
some things you need to learn. Now, wouldn't it be great at the
moment we got saved? That though Lord just kind of
implanted a chip in our brain And all of a sudden everything
you need to know about the Bible, you just, you knew it.
And all of a sudden you had Grok or ChatGPT in your brain and all
of it was about the Bible. And you know, it just like that.
It don't work that way, does it? Or maybe some of you think it
works that way. I don't know, but but it doesn't
work that way, does it? We have to be discipled.
We have to be taught. We have to have other believers
to be able to help us. We have to have other, we have
to have Bible preaching and Bible teaching.
That's why it's important for you to be in church and not just
to be a Lone Ranger Christian, to be able to be in church, to
be able to get the preaching and the teaching and the fellowship
from other believers. But, but I, I see that there's
these three steps that we're to go and teach old nations.
We're to baptize them and we're to to obey.
And I want to think about this this morning that how does that
apply to us in our homes if we're looking at our home as a
mission field? I think Psalm 127 makes it clear
we've got to teach and train the family.
Go back to Psalm 127 here. I know I'm making you go back
and forth. I'm sorry about that.
All right, So you say I'm not sorry.
You're right, Margarita. I'm not sorry.
All right? You've been here long enough to
know I'm not sorry to make you turn in your Bibles.
All right, That's good. Yeah, take it easy, lady.
All right, Psalm, Psalm 127. I mean, she's right though, all
right? I just didn't didn't like her
being being right. All right, except the Lord build
the house. They labor in vain that build
it, except the Lord keep the city.
The watchman waketh, but in vain.
You know, it's the Lord who builds the house.
It's the Lord who is the one who rises.
Listen, it says in the very next verse, you can get up early, you
can stay up late, you can do whatever you want, but if you do
the work without the Lord, you're in trouble.
Can I put it to you this way? If you want to raise your
children, if you want to reach your grandchildren for Christ,
if you want to do it yourself with the power of God, you will
fail. We'll say that again.
If you do it yourself without the power of God, you will
completely and totally fail. You say, well, I've got some
good podcasts I'm hooked into. I've read some books.
I I have some other people who have helped me and encouraged me
there can there's not necessarily something wrong with
that. As long as those people and
those things are speaking biblical truth.
There's certainly nothing wrong with that in and of itself.
But I will say this. If you are not raising your
children and your family and the nurture, the admonition of the
Lord and you're, you're busy, you're doing all this stuff.
It says you can stay up early, you can get up early, you stay
up late, but without the Lord, you're just doing a lot of work
and a lot of activity, but you're not really accomplishing
what you think you're accomplishing.
So what do we need to do? Well, we need to be able to
reach our families for the Lord. I think there's a pattern given
to us in the Great Commission that can help us.
And the first thing we saw in the Great Commission was to go
and teach all nations. What does that mean?
We need to give the gospel to our families.
Listen, Missions Conference has been great.
Missions Conference is wonderful.
We ought to send the gospel all around the world.
That's what God told us to do, the Great Commission.
Acts chapter one, verse 8. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, unto
thee uttermost parts of the earth.
That's what we're supposed to be able to do with the gospel.
But listen, wouldn't it be a shame if we're so encouraged
today to send the gospel all around the world, But we don't
do the same in our own home, and we don't do the same with our
own family. Listen, if you're a parent here
today, your objective #1 is not that your children go to a good
college. Your objective #1 is not that
your children have a fast car when they're 16 years old.
Listen, if that was the case, I was an utter failure because
they didn't have cars at 16, let alone fast cars at 16.
But listen, your primary goal was this, that my children know
Jesus Christ their Savior. Now, where are they going to
hear that? Where are they going to hear
that? They're going to hear that in
the House of God. They're going to hear that here,
but they're also going to hear that, listen, and ought to hear
that in your home as well. Now, listen, do people get saved
when they're adults? Well, yeah, a lot of you did,
didn't you? How many of you got saved when
you were an adult? After you're 18?
Raise your hand. All right, that's great.
That's a lot of you. All right.
It's like one side the other. This is this is interesting.
All right, So I didn't know we we segregated you all that way.
So then put all the people that got saved young on this side and
not over here. But listen, how many of you that
are adults would say this? It would have been so much
better if I got saved when I was young.
Yeah. And listen, God, God through
your life, he worked, didn't he? I mean, God, God in his
Providence saved you when he did.
And he helped you meet the people that you did and all
that. But you understand that the Lord
would have saved you from some heartache and some troubles.
Listen, Mom and Dad, you have the opportunity to make that
difference in your child's life. You have the opportunity to give
them perhaps what you didn't even have yourself, which was to
be able to know Jesus Christ their Savior at a young age.
And we just talked about this in the men's charges, more in the
men's devotion. Brother Dave talked about
testimony and having a testimony and we talked about that.
You don't need to necessarily have the testimony.
Well, you know, I was, I was a heavy alcoholic.
I was in jail. I was all these things.
Listen, if the Lord saved you from that, praise the Lord,
Amen. But it's also wonderful to say
this. I got saved when I was five
years old. I got saved when I was six years
old. It's just as much of a miracle
they get saved at that age. And think of the things that God
saved you from and the things that God got you out of as as a
as a child. In essence, what I'm asking you
to be is a home missionary. You know, often times we talk
about home missions. We're talking about the United
States. The Mallards are home missions.
The Riveros to Easton were home missions.
The the Shives home missions. No, you need to be home missions
within your home and that includes your children.
Some of you say, well, I don't have children in the home
anymore. Do you have grandchildren?
Do you have people that you can influence for the Lord?
I remember a few years ago that I met a, a, a couple at one of
the churches that we were preaching at.
They had grandchildren. They were very discouraged about
the fact that the grandchildren were not being raised in the
nurture and the admonition of the Lord.
And so this grandmother asked her daughter after this
question, do you think that once a week, or I don't remember the
frequency of it, if I send you a Bible, will you give it to my
granddaughter? And that on FaceTime, once every
few weeks, we can do a little bit of a Bible study.
What a blessing. Now, does that work in every
situation? It may not.
I understand that and I recognize that.
But this woman's heart was this and her husband's as well.
I want to try to do whatever I can to reach my grandchildren
for Christ. And if the daughter is not doing
what she ought to do, I want to do what I can without being
insulting, without being disparaging.
I just want to, you know, I want to be able to teach them about
who the Lord is. Do not be laid back about your
children's spiritual condition. Verse #1 says that except the
Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh, but in vain.
You are the watchman for your children, Mom.
You are the watch woman for your children, Sir.
You are the watchman for your children.
God has placed you, had placed you as the leaders.
They placed you as the nurturers, placed you as the
parents of those children to be able to, to do what you can.
And listen, it's not just about, well, I want my children to have
a better life than I did. And I understand that sentiment,
but I'll tell you this, if you wanted to have a better life
than you did teaching the Gospel, make sure they know that
they can be saved by the blood of Jesus Christ.
So what do we do? We go and teach all nations.
Make sure that you are teaching your children about their need
to be saved, but then also to baptize them.
That's the second part of the Great Commission, isn't it?
And this is where I'm gonna kind of take, I don't want to say
liberties because we don't twist the Word of God not to make it
say what we want to. And you ought to make sure that
when your children are saved that they are biblically
baptized. It's important for them to
follow the Lord and believers baptism.
What do we say about that? That's the very first step of
obedience. We don't baptize babies at
Liberty Baptist Church. The reason we don't baptize
babies is because nowhere in the Word of God was a baby ever
baptized. Nowhere do you find that.
And you always find in the Word of God that someone says that
they believe in Jesus Christ their Savior, they trust the
gospel, and then they are baptized.
That is always the order that it's found in the Word of God.
And so because that's the way it's done in the Word of God,
that's the way we do it at Liberty Baptist Church.
And by the way, as Baptist, historically, that is what we've
done. And there are people that are as
Baptist gave their lives for that kind of doctor.
Brother Abel's and I just a few days ago did a whirlwind tour of
Boston and we did everything you could possibly do in Boston in
about 3 hours. But one of the places that I
wanted to take him was the a Freedom Trail.
And you know, all the tourists are out there.
And one of the places we went to is where the Boston Massacre
was. And we're all familiar in this
area with the Boston Massacre. But you may or may not be aware
than the very same spot, or he's very close adjacent to that
spot, that about 100 and so years before, there was a man, a
Baptist named Obadiah Holmes that held to biblical Baptist
doctrine and was willing to literally be whipped in front of
dozens and dozens of people instead of taking a fine and
admitting he was wrong for what he believed.
And you know that it was from that man stand that Boston
changed because there was a Baptist Church that was formed,
There was a president of Harvard who decided that he wasn't going
to baptize his children because he saw the the power of that
doctrine lived out that man. No, no, it's important for us to
believe this doctrine, not because we're Baptist, but
because it's Bible. And by the way, I'm a Baptist
because we believe the Bible and the Bible alone.
That that's what made me bad. I wasn't always a Baptist.
I grew up as a Lutheran, but I realized that it wasn't the
catechism in the Bible. It wasn't CCD in the Bible.
It wasn't things in the Bible, it was the Bible in the Bible
alone. That's how I became a Baptist
when I was saved. But what are we to do?
We're to baptize. We baptize in deep water.
But then what do we do? I want us to look at this.
The Bible sometimes uses this idea of water.
In fact, Ephesians 526 talks about the washing of the water
of the Word. And so can I make an application
about that? Was we look at baptism being
full immersion? Now listen, when it's full
immersion, you got to go all the way down.
When you're all the way. Down.
Guess what? It's all around you.
The second person I baptized here was Brother Jim Jerome.
And I remember we went down to Houghton's Pond.
In fact, I think, I think Dwight and Diane, you were there at
Houghton's Pond, weren't you? And I wasn't used to baptizing
outside. I sure wasn't used to baptizing
in a pond. And we, we, we got out there and
I asked Brother Jim Jerome to kind of get ready.
He got himself ready and I was ready.
And, and, and I kind of, you know, when you're a pastor, you
have a way of doing it and you've done it for a while.
And Brother Abel's kind of test this you, you, you do, you're
almost automatic in the way not that it's special.
You're not automatic in what you say and the specialness of it,
but in the way that you kind of make sure they go down and come
back up. Because I'll tell you, I'm
really good at burying him in the likeness of his death.
Sometime raising in the likeness was resurrection.
I have a little bit of trouble with.
So what do we find? Here's Jim Jerome, we're in
water. This is not fiberglass.
This is a pond. There's rocks.
There's all these little places. And I said, I said, you know,
brother Jim Jerome, if you accepted Jesus Christ, your
Savior, he says, I have. I said, well, according to your
profession of faith, I baptize you, my brother, in the name of
the Father and of the Son, the Holy Holy Ghost buried in the
likeness of his death. And I planted this foot over
here, right? I planted it over, but I didn't
realize it dropped down about 8 or 9 inches.
And so I said I. Bury you, and I said I bury you.
In the likeness of his. Death and I'll tell you he went
all the way under and raising him up.
We have a video of this. I probably I'm glad I didn't
show it this morning, but and raised him in the likeness of
his resurrection. I'll tell you, Jesus didn't
struggle in his resurrection like I struggled getting Jim
Jerome out of the water. It was awful.
But you know what? When he was down, he was all the
way down. When he was down, he was
immersed. But when I think of washing, of
the water of the Word, listen, you know what you ought to do
with your families once they're saved.
You got to immerse them in the Word of God.
I'm not trying to. Twist the scriptures here.
But I'm telling you this, if you were going to be a home
missionary, you better immerse your families in the word of
God. You know, we immerse them in
sports. And I'm not just talking about
sports like the socks and the Pats and that stuff.
I'm talking about Little League. I'm talking about pee wee
football. I'm talking about hockey, all
those things and listen in and of themselves, that's not a bad
thing, but when that becomes their life.
That's a. Problem immerse them in the word
of God. They can.
They've memorized their favorite movies.
They've memorized their favorite TV shows.
Listen, let them memorize the Bible.
Say this week we're going to we're going to memorize one
verse this week. You know what's amazing?
Kids can do pretty much what we tell them to do if we actually
plan on doing it. You know what you do before you
eat at night? You can do this.
Just have a Bible verse on a note card we passed around the
table. Everyone's going to read it
once. We're going to memorize it this
week, pass around a prayer card for a missionary, and we're
going to pray for this missionary tonight.
Immerse them in the Word of God. Immerse them in those things.
Deuteronomy chapter 6, you know. What?
Turn to Deuteronomy. Chapter 6.
Why don't you do that? Go ahead and do that quickly.
Deuteronomy, Chapter 6, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers,
Deuteronomy. All right, Deuteronomy chapter
6, because this idea of immersing yourself, immersing
your family in the Word is not foreign to the Word of God.
This is something that we find all throughout the Word of God,
and I don't think you can find a better passage about it.
The Deuteronomy chapter #6. Look at what it says.
Now these are the commandments, the statutes, the judgments with
the Lord your God commanded to teach you that you might do them
in the land, whether you go to possess it, that thou mightest
fear the Lord thy God to keep all His statutes and His
commandments which I command thee, Thou, thy son, thy son
son, all the days of thy life, thy days may be prolonged.
Listen, the fear of the Lord doesn't mean you're cowering in
fear like God's going to backhand you, but it is a
reverence, it is a respect, it is understanding.
Listen, it's understanding who He is and understanding who we
are. That's the fear of the Lord's.
Don't get weird about this idea of the fear of the Lord.
It's like, I know who he is, I know who I am, I know my place.
He says you need to have a fear of the Lord.
Why look verse #3 here? Therefore, O Israel, observe to
do it that it may be well with thee that they may, that they
that ye may increase mightily as the Lord God of thy fathers that
promised thee in the land that floweth with milk and honey.
Here, O Israel, the Lord our God is 1 Lord.
By the way, that's still true today.
Verse 5 and. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might.
Listen with every fiber of your being you ought to love them,
which means this with every fiber of your being.
You want your children to love them.
Every fiber of your being. You want your grandchildren to
love them. By the way, and I'm talking
about children by the, that also means you're adult children.
And maybe they're not living for the Lord right now.
Maybe they've never lived for the Lord.
Listen, that is your responsibility as best as you
are able to, to be able to fulfill that.
Well, how do you do that? Now, this is especially true
with the youngsters. All right, I don't know if I've
ever used the word youngsters before.
I think I just aged myself right there.
All right, verse six, With the the word which I command thee,
this day shall be in thy heart. Thou shalt teach them diligently
unto thy children. Thou shalt talk of them when
thou sittest in thine house, when thou walkest by the way,
when thou liest down, when thou risest up.
So how often are you supposed to talk about the word to the
children? All day.
Now look at verse #8.
And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand.
They shall be frontlets between thine eyes.
Thou shalt write them upon the post, thy house and on thy
gates, and it shall be when the Lord thy God shall have brought
the end of the land which he swearing to thy fathers, to
Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob, to give The great and goodly cities
which they build us not, and houses of good things which out
fill us not, and wells dig which out dig us not, vineyards and
olive trees without plant us not when thou has eaten and be full.
Then beware lest thou forget the Lord which brought thee forth
out of the land of Egypt, out from the House of bondage.
Here, here, here. Here's what's, here's what he's
talking about here. All right, Jonah of Israel about
to go in the promised Land. That's what Deuteronomy is all
about. It's the second telling of the
law. They're about to go in the
Promised Land. Moses is giving his last
instructions because he's not going over with them.
And he's saying this. There's going to be another
generation who's going to get into the Promised land and
they're going to have all this good stuff.
And if you don't? Teach them why they have that
good stuff. Then they're going to get away
from God. So you make sure that you talk
to him about it all day. Listen, he says make sure your
clothing reflects that you're a believer in Jesus Christ.
There's something there, Amen. Make sure your clothing reflects
that you're a believer. And he says this, make sure your
home reflects you're a believer. Write it on the post of the
house. By the way, you can have a
little pillow in your house that says, you know, As for me and my
house, we serve the Lord. I think every believer has that
in their home. But I'll tell you, it's not just
having about a throw pillow or cross stitch on your wall.
It's about this. We're actively everyday
immersing our family in the word, by the way, how can you do
that? How can you do that if you're
not reading it yourself? Yeah, that went over about.
As well as I thought it would. I know, darling, that's how I
feel. I know.
How can you immerse your family in the word if you're not
immersed in it yourself? You cannot.
I'm not trying to get on to you this morning, but I'm just
saying this is the way it works is we've got to be immersed in
it. We've got to be reading it
because we can't pass on something that we're not in
ourselves or we pass it on to them without doing ourselves.
And overtime, you know what that breeds?
Rebellion because you are telling them to do something
that they see you're not doing yourself.
Hey, make sure you pray before bed.
And they say, well, I never see Dad pray.
I never see Mom pray. You do your devotions today and
they say, well, I don't know if I've ever seen mom and dad do
devotions. What do you do?
Have a family altar. Have a time where?
You say we can't do it every day.
Start with once a week just for 5 minutes.
We're going to read a couple Bible verses.
We're going to pray. We're asked for prayer requests.
Start small. Don't, don't say, well, we're
going to do it every day and we're going to do it for an
hour. Well, you know what's going to
happen? You've you're not going to do it
and you're going to quit. Let's do something small and
start from there. Can I tell you one of the
biggest regrets that I have as a father?
And it's easy for me to say these kind of things because
Diane's not in here. But we've, we've talked about
this before, was that I wasn't as faithful the family altar
that I wanted to be. Now I'm thankful we got good
girls that love the Lord. But I'll tell you what, the Lord
filled in a lot of gaps because Dad was too busy doing the work
of the ministry and I was trying to help everyone else and I
wasn't helping my own family like I should.
So what do we need to do? What do we need to do?
We need to make sure we immerse our families in God's Word.
So what do we do? We go and teach all nations the
Great Commission. Make sure your family save, do
all that you can. You teach them or baptize them
to immerse them in the Word of God, washing with the water of
the Word, and then teach them to obey.
Now go back to Psalm 127 very quickly.
Psalm 127. And no, I'm not sorry to have
you moving around your Bible. All right, Psalm 127.
It says this in verse. #3 lo, children are in heritage of the
Lord now. There's some days that don't
feel like that. There's some days you.
Say, Lord, I know they're a blessing, but right now I don't
feel like it. But they are blessing or in
heritage of the Lord. Fruit of the womb is His reward.
As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of
the youth. Happy is the man that hath his
quiver full of him. They shall not be ashamed, but
they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.
Now it says happy as a man have quiver full of them.
You say, Does that mean that there's an amount of children
that we're supposed to have? Well, there are different
quivers for different things that they did.
There was no standard amount, but you have the amount of
children. The Lord has you and desires for
you to have that. That's that's between you and
the Lord. Don't ask me about telling you
how many children you ought to have.
That's not my business. I know a pastor who says
something like this. I'm not the priest.
Your home. And I don't want.
Not going to answer that question for you.
I'm not going to help you with that.
That's between you and the Lord. But I do know this.
It says as arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are
children of the youth. Meaning this.
Are you ready where you point them as where they'll go.
Teach them. Teach them where you point and
they'll go. I've told you this story before,
at least some time ago when I was a Cub Scout, one of the
things that we had to do to get a badge was to go to do archery
and we had to go to an archery range.
And I remember going, I mean, I was probably like 7 or 8 years
old. I don't know how old I was, but
I was a Cub Scout. I never made it past weed blows,
you know, because I, I washed out.
So that was said I couldn't make it past that.
But I remember going the archery range and I had the, I was
pulling the arrow back and we're, we're, I think we're
indoors in an indoor archery range.
And someone said, Hey, Adam and I went like this.
What? What?
For some reason. Everyone ducked for some reason,
kids screaming for some reason I didn't get edge.
I can't imagine. Why?
Well, why? Why was everyone work?
Because where I pointed is where it's going to go.
Was at the range a few. Weeks ago and and I was with
brother Dave and I'm aiming at the target.
I'm telling you, I'm aiming at the target.
I'm sighted, right? This is a gun range, by the way,
this time, not a, not a, a, a archery range.
I've, I've given up the archery stuff all right, but it's gun
range. And, and it was funny because I,
I, I shot a couple times and I looked at that said, boy, those
holes are so small on the target that I can't even see them.
He says, well, that's because there are no holes on the
target. You missed the.
Target. I just thought they were just.
Really small. He said, no, no, you, you
missed. And so I was more careful
watching the next time and I, I shot, I missed the target.
I saw a little puff of dirt in the berm.
I was hitting the berm. I was hitting high.
Well, there's a lot of reasons for that, my mechanics and all
kind of different things. But you know, I I could look at
the gun and say, yo, this is a bad gun.
Or I could say the person holding the gun is a bad shot.
And it would be the second. Not the first the gun sighted,
right? If it's what it needs to be,
listen. It's what they call operational.
It's on me. Now listen.
I'll be careful how I say this. And I would be.
Very, very compassionate. How I say that.
I mean this in all sincerity. When your children grow older,
they have to make their own decisions.
You can do everything. Right.
You can get them to. Church, you can model that which
is right. You can see him saved.
You can see him baptized and listen, they have to make their
own decisions when they're older.
I am not preaching the fact that if you do everything right, they
will stay in church forever. And if they're not in church
that you are to blame. Listen, that's between you and
the Lord and I do know this. They have free will to do what
they need to do. And by the way, just because
they're still in church and serving the Lord when they're
older doesn't mean you did everything right.
Because I look at myself and I think.
I thank the Lord that we. Have two beautiful daughters
that are adults that are serving the Lord and doing right.
But I can't take the credit for that.
I mean, doesn't verse #1 talk about that except the Lord build
the house? But I will say this.
There's a general principle that's involved in here.
Point him in the right direction, point him in the
direction they need to go, and the Lord will do what only the
Lord will do. You know what I want my.
Children to do. I want them to know mom and dad
love Jesus. I want everything.
In my home, to point them to the fact that they love Jesus, That
we love Jesus. You know what that means?
That means we're careful about what we watch on TV.
You know why? Because the TV shows we watch
ought to show the fact that we're believers in Jesus Christ.
We're careful what we. Put on the screens in front of
them. You know why?
Because we want to make sure that everything they watch that
comes in front of their eyes helps them understand that we
believe in Jesus Christ. We want to make sure the.
Activities we partake in are all about this, that they are
understanding that we are Bible believers.
I'll say this, I want them to understand the activities we
don't participate in. That we don't.
Participate in help them understand that we're Bible
believers. Why do we?
Bring them to three services a week.
Why don't why pastor? Because you're a pastor.
Well, that is part of it, but I wasn't always a pastor.
There came a point in our lives where we said this.
Unless we can't be in the House of God, we're going to be in the
House of God. I don't want my children to ever
grow up in a home where they say this, Mom, dad, are we going to
church tomorrow? I want them to know if the doors
are open, we're going to church. That requires A sacrifice.
It does. But what are the end?
Results you're looking for. The end results I'm.
Looking for is this I want 1234 children to love Jesus when
they're not in my home anymore and I'm going to do everything
that I can to make sure that they look pointed in the right
way. So I teach them to observe those
things that they ought to now listen to this.
We're almost done. We're almost done because I have
to almost be done. Today.
Families will do whatever they need to do.
To give their children. Often times what they want.
Well, we want to want. Them in Little League with a
Little League is on Sunday. Well, we'll just do it this
time. Well, what will end up happening
is you've taught your children Little League is more important
than church. You say no, it's not that.
Severe. No, that's exactly what it is.
Well, hey, darling, how are you? Yes, I know.
I see you right there. Come on.
Right over there. There you go.
All right, you've, you've taught them it's more important.
Well, we've got these other things going on.
Listen, I know there's a lot of things going on.
I'm trying not to, I'm really trying.
I, I, I want to be compassionate about that.
I'm not trying to be hard nosed. But I want to say this, if
you're looking for the end result to be what it is, you got
to put something into the beginning.
Do you know why I? Don't have the physique?
Of someone. That has a bodybuilder.
I know some of you are surprised.
About this, but those kind of things.
Do you know why I don't have that?
There's a really good reason. I am put in the effort and I
can't imagine one day just say man, look, look, look, wow,
look. Look at that.
That's pretty. Good.
You know where they would have come from.
It would have appeared out of thin air because I didn't do a
thing about it. But eventually a day will come
where you'll look and say this. Where are they now?
And it'll be. Too late.
The kids won't go to the major leagues, they won't go to the
NBA, they won't go to do those things.
But you do want them to be believers now.
Let me give you 2. 2 examples from my 2 oldest children and
then I'll be done. Bethany came up to me some time
ago and to Diane and said that her, her, and I'm not saying
anything that hasn't been said here, just to be clear that her
desire was to go into the military.
This was when she was about. 16 years old, there's a part of a
dad's heart that's like serving the country.
You know, that's awesome. And, and I never served because,
well, you know, you know, anyway, you know, you can figure
out why. But our country is safer with me
not serving. But in my heart.
I said I don't know if this is what.
So we said, you know. Girl, we're going to whatever
God has for you. That's what we want and we're
going to pray. And God brought her through a a
situation or not brought her through a situation, brought her
through a process where she realized that God really wanted
her in the ministry. But here's what I told her.
This is the only reason I say that.
I told her this. I said, you know, my fear of you
going to the military is not that you go to some hot spot on
the planet and that you give your life or even or are injured
as. I know God will.
Have you where he needs you? I said.
My fear is this, that you come back unrecognizable as a
believer. I said because that would.
Do more to me than anything. I want you to be a believer so
you figure out where God wants you and we'll support you.
But you make sure of that. Kaylee several years ago, you
know, homeschooler. I don't know if, you know, she's
homeschool, but anyway, they all are homeschooled.
That was kind of a joke. That's all right.
But you know, those homeschoolers, you know, they
have no personality. You know, they were afraid of
people, all that stuff. Payne's a homeschooler, you
know, So that's why, that's why she's such a wallflower.
But anyway, you say, who did she talk to all day?
Us. And she don't.
Stop. That's why I work here, all
right. But anyway, don't record that,
let's delete that. But anyway.
Kaylee. A few years ago said something
to this. She, she, she want to get into
performing arts. And there was a, a Christian
place where she could go and, and do plays and those kind of
things. And it was over in Lexington, I
think, you know, somewhere around there.
And we looked at it. Christian organization.
All right, we'll do it. There's one problem.
There was a dress rehearsal on a Wednesday night now.
Listen, you're going to think I'm.
Extreme. That's OK.
Dress rehearsal, right? Just a dress rehearsal.
And I asked him, I said, you know, this is what we believe,
you're a Christian organization, can we get it or have the dress
rehearsal on Wednesday? I said no, you got to, you got
to be all in. And I get that.
That's their prerogative. But I made the.
Very hard decision and it was hard.
Tell Kayla. I said, you know what, we go to
church on Wednesday night, he said.
Well, Wednesday night's just Wednesday night, I.
Mean it's just Wednesday. Wednesday night, Pastor, what's
the matter with you? I'll be honest, there was even a
part of my heart. It was kind of, am I being too
tough through that? We ended up finding another,
better Christian organization. Of which she.
Met Casey Gaudette, who will now hopefully, well, maybe
hopefully, yeah, so be her husband here in a few months
that if I had said yes to that would she had missed out on
God's will for her life. Now God works all these things
out. But you understand what I'm
saying. I thought I was being.
Bad to her. I ended up doing the very.
Best thing for her? By just saying we're going to.
Hold the line here. Now.
Do you do it in love? You do it.
Don't be do it to be a jerk, but you do it because it's the right
thing. Listen, it's a heavy burden to
be a home missionary. It's serious.
Don't put more effort into your hobbies.
Don't put more efforts into your money.
Don't put more efforts into all those other things than you do
with your children. Your grandchildren.
Why? Because we know as we get older
that you would you would cut off your right arm.
To have your children be. Where they ought to be.
You would give all the money you accrued for your children to be
where they ought to be. So what do we do?
Let's be home missionaries and reach our children.
Thank you for listening. To the sermon from the pulpit of
Liberty Baptist Church. If this message was a blessing
to you, or if there's any way we can serve you, please let us
know by contacting us at info@mylibertybaptist.org.
Or you can visit us this Sunday at 800 Washington St. in Easton,
MA. May the Lord bless you as you
grow in His Word.