What is a Family Integrated Church: A Preemptive Reformation

(The following is one of a series of articles written for another occasion but I thought it might be profitable to post them here as there seems to be a great deal of controversy and misunderstanding of the subject of family-integrated churches.)

What is a Family Integrated Church: A Preemptive Reformation

The world changes when families get right with the Lord!

When parents quit transferring their responsibilities to daycare providers, school teachers, youth group leaders, Sunday school teachers and pastors.

When fathers embrace their roles as fathers, husbands, family worship leaders and family youth group pastors.

When mothers embrace their roles as wives and helpmeets to their own husbands and mothers to their children.

When children learn to love their parents, love to spend time with their parents and obey and honor their parents.

When churches start taking care of orphans and widows, teaching families how to be families and stop splintering the congregations into age segregated, peer oriented, special interest groups as if the Bible doesn’t address our methods of worship, education and discipleship.

And when pastors become pro-active in trying to avoid the development of the many family problems that plague our churches and society rather than re-active and trying to clean up the messes that have already been made.

Family Integration is our attempt to go back to the Scriptures as our sole rule of faith and practice. We do not believe that it will help matters to go back to the same old failed humanistic methodologies that have gotten us to this point in the first place. Simply trying harder will not work; we need to try harder with Scriptural methods by the Spirits power.

It is our belief that the Church has been called to do much more than share the gospel and teach the people a few doctrinal propositions, it is to show the people how to apply and obey the truth by the Spirits enabling power (Matthew 28:20). There is no other solution to the cultural and moral decay we see all around us.

Brethren, we have brought innumerable problems upon ourselves by ignoring much of the Word of God and following after the wisdom and traditions of men. Continuing as we have been and putting bandages on these problems after they arise will simply not work; we need to be proactive and preemptive in order to begin to turn things around and continue the Reformation of the church of Jesus Christ.

What’s really fair?

As I was corresponding with a brother in Christ via email, this brother mentioned that he struggled with the Calvinistic idea that God does not give everyone the chance to be saved.

I must say I can completely understand this struggle. Before I had ever heard of Calvinism or knew anything about it whatsoever I was reading through Romans 9 when I came across verses 10-23 which read as follows:

“And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac;(For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;) It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.

What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy. For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.

Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory…”

My first thought was “That’s not fair! How could a loving God do such a thing?” My second thought was “Who would want to worship a God like that anyhow?”

But after some further study I found my objection to be completely faulty because I hadn’t taken into consideration the guilt of the human race.

When God chose to save some of mankind from their sins He was not dealing with a neutral group of people. He was not dealing with a group of people whop knew nothing about Him and just might believe the gospel if only they had the chance to hear it. The truth of the matter was that God was dealing with willful rebels who were sinners both by nature and by choice. He didn’t have to save any of them! And if we’re gonna go around demanding He be fair then all of us, everyone of us without exception, aught to go straight to hell; that would be fair. That is what we all deserve.

When our first parents sinned they could no longer produce “clean” children. Their sin was passed on to us and now we are all born with a sinful nature. As psalm 51:5 puts it “in sin did my mother conceive me.” All of us are “…estranged from the womb: (we) go astray as soon as (we) are born, speaking lies…” (Psalm 58:3)

And as we grow up we express this sinful nature by sinning. “There is none righteous, no, not one. There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.” (Romans 3:10-12) None of us are neutral towards God, we are all at enmity with Him (Romans 8:7) and are “by nature the children of wrath.” (Ephesians 2:3)

We know God exists through what He has made (Romans 1:19, 20) and as part of His creation ourselves we are a testimony to ourselves of His wisdom, power and Godhead. We don’t even have to open our eyes to see it.

Not only do we know God through what He has made but we have the remnants of His law written in our very being. (Romans 2:14, 15) We know much of what He requires of us and that we are guilty of breaking His law. We are willfully rebellious, we don’t want anything to do with Him (Romans 3:11) and we suppress this truth in unrighteousness (Romans 1:18).

God does not need to “give us a chance”, we have refused Him already. The fact that He saves any of us is a testimony to His great love, mercy and kindness. The fact that He lets others go on in their willful rebellion and then condemns them for it is a testimony to His justice, righteousness and hatred of sin.

“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!” Romans 11:33

if you would train your children rightly

J.C. Ryle (1816-1900) From The Duties of Parents

"First, then, if you would train your children rightly, train them in the way they should go, and not in the way that they would. Remem­ber children are born with a decided bias towards evil. Therefore, if you let them choose for themselves, they are certain to choose wrong.

The mother cannot tell what her tender infant may grow up to be— tall or short, weak or strong, wise or foolish. He may be any of these things or not—it is all uncertain. But one thing the mother can say with certainty: he will have a corrupt and sinful heart. It is natural to us to do wrong. "Foolishness," says Solomon, "is bound in the heart of a child" (Pro 22:15). "A child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame" (Pro 29:15). Our hearts are like the earth on which we tread: let it alone, and it is sure to bear weeds.

If, then, you would deal wisely with your child, you must not leave him to the guidance of his own will. Think for him, judge for him, act for him, just as you would for one weak and blind. But for pity's sake, give him not up to his own wayward tastes and inclinations. It must not be his likings and wishes that are consulted. He knows not yet what is good for his mind and soul any more than what is good for his body. You do not let him decide what he shall eat, what he shall drink, and how he shall be clothed. Be consistent, and deal with his mind in like manner. Train him in the way that is Scriptural and right and not in the way that he fancies.

If you cannot make up your mind to this first principle of Chris­tian training, it is useless for you to read any further. Self-will is al­most the first thing that appears in a child's mind. It must be your first step to resist it."

Awake, Ye Inheritors of Glory

"If we complained less, and praised more, we should be happier, and God would be more glorified. Let us daily praise God for common mercies—common as we frequently call them, and yet so priceless, that when deprived of them we are ready to perish. Let us bless God for the eyes with which we behold the sun, for the health and strength to walk abroad, for the bread we eat, for the raiment we wear. Let us praise him that we are not cast out among the hopeless, or confined amongst the guilty; let us thank him for liberty, for friends, for family associations and comforts; let us praise him, in fact, for everything which we receive from his bounteous hand, for we deserve little, and yet are most plenteously endowed. But, beloved, the sweetest and the loudest note in our songs of praise should be of redeeming love. God's redeeming acts towards his chosen are for ever the favourite themes of their praise. If we know what redemption means, let us not withhold our sonnets of thanksgiving. We have been redeemed from the power of our corruptions, uplifted from the depth of sin in which we were naturally plunged. We have been led to the cross of Christ— our shackles of guilt have been broken off; we are no longer slaves, but children of the living God, and can antedate the period when we shall be presented before the throne without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. Even now by faith we wave the palm-branch and wrap ourselves about with the fair linen which is to be our everlasting array, and shall we not unceasingly give thanks to the Lord our Redeemer? Child of God, canst thou be silent? Awake, awake, ye inheritors of glory, and lead your captivity captive, as ye cry with David, "Bless the Lord, O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy name." Let the new month begin with new songs."

-Charles Spurgeon

Happy 20th Anniversary!

It was almost 25 years ago now and I was just 16 years old. I had been doing drugs almost all day long and I was incarcerated in a State institution as an “uncontrollable child.” I sat down in the living room of our cottage to watch T.V. when I met a new girl to the campus who had come over to visit someone else at my cottage. I fell in love (or something like it) almost immediately.

Soon we were going out and before we knew it we were living together. A few years later at age 20 we were married. Our marriage wasn’t very promising considering the life we were living but the Lord was very gracious to us and brought us both to salvation before long. I became a Christian just a few short weeks after our marriage and my wife followed suit a couple of years later.

And now, in the good providence of God, we are having our 20^th wedding anniversary today. How good the Lord has been to us to take a couple of hell deserving, sin loving, rebellious teenagers and totally turn our lives around and bless us so abundantly! Who would have thought that 20 years later we would still be married and trying to raise our four (so far) children in the fear and admonition of the Lord?

While we have had many troubles along the way because of our remaining sin I can truly say that our marriage is getting better all the time and that I have no closer friend than my wife.

“Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of the LORD.” –Proverbs 18:22

Happy Anniversary Melanie!

A Sunday Afternoon Adventure

A Sunday Afternoon Adventure on the Bike Trails.

A Propagator of Vision

(The following is one of a series of articles written for another occasion but I thought it might be profitable to post them here as there seems to be a great deal of controversy and misunderstanding of the subject of family-integrated churches.)

What is a Family-Integrated Church?: A Propagator of Vision

Many of you may have never heard the term "family-integrated" before and are wondering exactly what it refers to. Others may perhaps equate it with an idolatrous form of family worship that has invaded some sectors of the church in recent years. Still others may equate it with those who are "against" Sunday school and youth groups. Ignorance, misunderstanding and even hostility seem to surround the use of the label "family-integrated" and it is my desire to simply try to define what we mean when we call ourselves a family-integrated church.

Let me assure you that when we use the term family-integrated we are not speaking of an unbiblical exaltation of the family above doctrinal beliefs and practices. Neither are we being so shallow as to just be against Sunday school and youth groups. In our minds, family-integration is something much deeper, more profound and far reaching.

It doesn't take a brilliant mind to see that society is falling apart all around us. Society is falling apart because the families which make up our society have already fallen apart. And while many Christians sit by and bemoan the fact that the world is falling apart, family-integration is our attempt to actually do something about it. We believe it is time to quit cursing the darkness while trying to maintain the status quo. We need to start lighting some candles!

Historically, the Church has believed and the scriptures have clearly taught that God has established three governmental institutions upon this earth: 1) the family, 2) the State and 3) the Church. These three governmental institutions are intimately related, deeply dependant on each other and even overlapping in many areas. Yet they are still separate institutions each having their own God-given duties and spheres of authority. Each one accountable to their Creator and each created to help the others.

When these institutions fulfill their God-given roles, things will go well for society. But when these institutions depart from their God ordained duties, the State will become tyrannical, the Church apostate and the family an ungodly mess. Such a society must necessarily suffer dire consequences.

This is where we find ourselves in twenty-first century America. Things are so muddled up in our day that we don't even seem to know where to start looking for the answers. This is where the Church must step up!

The answer to all of our problems is found in the scriptures of the Old and New Testament (Isaiah 8:20; 2 Timothy 3:16, 17) and their application must begin with the "family" or "household” of the living God (Ephesians 2:19; 1 Timothy 3:15). Family-integration is our attempt to restore biblical order to the relationships of the Church, family and State. It is our belief that both the Church and the State have done a great many things to lead parents to abdicate their responsibilities as parents, to the extent that most do not even know what they are any longer.

But not only do we wish to restore the relationship of family, church and State to a biblical order but we wish to communicate this biblical vision to parents that they might communicate it to their children, and their children to their children and so on; a vision of family in which fathers begin to lead and teach their families with purpose, intention and foresight, where wives and mothers embrace their God given roles in relation to the home and their husband, and where the children are disciples of their parents.

It is our belief that this vision must be past on to the men and women of the Church by the Pastors/Elders as they are those who have been given the charge to communicate "the whole counsel of God" to the people of God in a special manner (Acts 20:27). Generally speaking, the members of a church will not rise its leaders. Family Integration is our attempt to ignite this vision in the hearts of the Church.

We are not teaching anything new here as some seem to think. This is how the Church functioned for over 1800 years. We simply want to return to the Scriptural methodologies that the modern Church has in large measure abandoned for more popular ideas based on the "wisdom" of man.

The family is the nursery, or infancy, of the Church and State, as our Puritan forefathers put it. And when this biblical vision is not passed on from pastors to the parents and from the parents to their children, all three institutions must suffer the consequences; the latter generations suffering the accumulated effect of the prior generations’ delinquencies.

Brethren, if we don't summon up the courage to change things, what are we but cowards who are leaving the mess to our posterity to deal with?

Pre-Tribulationism Part 2

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Eschatology
Dispensationalism
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• Eschatology #40 Pre-Tribulationism Part 2
  Sam E. Waldron
  

A Little Cement Work

We've been watching one square of our sidewalk slowly dissolve into a treacherous pit of death over the last couple of years and we finally decided to fix it before someone got hurt.

After a few minutes of breaking up the remaining part of the square my youngest son said quote: "I should do this for a living, its kinda fun to break stuff!" Needless to say the thrill wore off just a few minutes later and he decided to go back to Architecture, but we still had some fun and some good hard work.

And, of coarse, we left some hand prints for future generations.

Bringing Up Children for God

A good word from Edward Payson (1783-1827) on bringing up children.

"Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy -wages." —Exodus 2:9

THESE words were addressed by Pharaoh's daughter to the mother of Moses. Of the circumstances that occasioned them, it can scarcely be necessary to inform you. You need not be told that soon after the birth of this future leader of Israel his parents were compelled by the cruelty of the Egyptian king to expose him in an ark of bulrushes on the banks of the Nile. In this situation, he was found by the daughter of Pharaoh. So powerfully did his infantile cries excite her compassion that she determined not only to rescue him from a watery grave, but to adopt and educate him as her own. His sister Miriam, who at a distance had watched his fate unseen, now came forward like a person entirely unacquainted with the cir­cumstances of his exposure and, on hearing of the princess' determi­nation, offered to procure a Hebrew woman to take the care of him until he should be of sufficient age to appear at her father's court. This offer being accepted, she immediately went and called the child's mother to whose care he was committed by the princess in the words of our text—"Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages."

In similar language, my friends, does God address parents. To eve­ryone on whom He bestows the blessing of children, He says in His Word and by the voice of His Providence, "Take this child and edu­cate it for Me, and I will give thee thy wages." From this passage, therefore, we may take occasion to show what is implied in educating children for God.

The first thing implied in educating children for God is a realiz­ing, heartfelt conviction that they are His property, His children, rather than ours. He commits them for a time to our care, merely for the purpose of education, as we place children under the care of hu­man instructors for the same purpose. However carefully we may educate children, yet we cannot be said to educate them for God unless we [believe] that they are His; for if we [believe] that they are ours exclusively, we shalt and must educate them for ourselves and not for Him. To know that they are His is to feel a cordial, operative conviction that He has a sovereign right to dispose of them as He pleases and to take them from us whenever He thinks fit. That they are His and that He possesses this right is evident from innumerable passages in the inspired writings. We are there told that God is the former of our bodies and the Father of our spirits, that we are all His offspring, and that consequently we are not our own but His. We are also assured that as the soul of the parent, so also the souls of the children are His. God once and again severely reproves and threatens the Jews because they sacrificed His children in the fire to Moloch (Eze 16:20-21). Yet plain and explicit as these passages are, how few parents appear to feel their force. How few appear to feel and act as if conscious that they and theirs were the absolute properly of God, that they were merely the foster parents of their children, and that, in all which they do for them, they are or ought to be acting for God. But it is evident that they must feel this before they can bring up their chil­dren for Him; for how can they educate their children for a being whose existence they do not realize, whose right to them they do not acknowledge, and whose character they do not love?

Pre-Tribulationism Part 1

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Eschatology
Dispensationalism
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• Eschatology #39 Pre-Tribulationism Part 1
  Sam E. Waldron
  
  

Some John Calvin on Apologetics

Here is a good quote on the subject of apologetics by John Calvin. His point is this: Our faith in the veracity of Scripture must ultimately lie in the Testimony of the Scriptures themselves alone. If we appeal to facts and truths outside of the Scriptures as proof of the veracity of Scripture, we have then devised an authority or standard higher than that of God himself and to do such a thing is a sin. If we can't appeal to and trust the Scriptures in matters of what they say about themselves, why should we trust and appeal to them in any other matters?

While anyone listening will immediately accuse such a person of “circular reasoning” for defending the reliability of the Scripture from the Scripture, this is the nature of Christianity and such circular reasoning is entirely Biblical. The unbeliever must be confronted with the authority of the word of God and his sin in not submitting to it. God’s Word must be the final and ultimate authority in everything.

"The nature of faith is acceptance on the basis of testimony, and the ground of faith is therefore testimony or evidence. In this matter it is the evidence God has provided, and God provides the evidence in his Word, the Bible. This means simply that the basis of faith in the Bible is the witness the Bible itself bears to the fact that it is God's Word, and our faith that it is infallible must rest upon no other basis than the witness the Bible bears to this fact. If the Bible does not witness to its own infallibility, then we have no right to believe that it is infallible. If it does bear witness to its infallibility then our faith in it must rest upon that witness, however much difficulty may be en­tertained with this belief. If this position with respect to the ground of faith in Scripture is abandoned, then appeal to the Bible for the ground of faith in any other doctrine must also be abandoned."

-John Calvin Institutes of the Christian Religion

Cornelius Van Til on Apologetics

"The Romanist-evangelical method of defending Christianity … has to compromise Christianity while defending it. If the demands of "reason" as the non-Christian thinks of it are assumed to be legitimate, then Christianity will be able to prove itself true only by destroying itself. As it cannot clearly show the difference be­tween the Christian and the non-Christian view of things, so it cannot present any clear-cut reason why the non-Christian should forsake his position.

The Reformed method of apologetics seeks to escape this neme­sis. It begins frankly "from above." It would "presuppose" God. But in presupposing God it cannot place itself at any point on a neutral basis with the non-Christian. Before seeking to prove that Chris­tianity is in accord with reason and in accord with fact, it would ask what is meant by "reason" and what is meant by "fact." It would argue that unless reason and fact are themselves interpreted in terms of God they are unintelligible. If God is not presupposed, reason is a pure abstraction that has no contact with fact, and fact is a pure abstraction that has no contact with reason. Reason and fact cannot be brought into fruitful union with one another except upon the pre­supposition of the existence of God and his control over the universe.

Since on the Reformed basis there is no area of neutrality be­tween the believer and the unbeliever, the argument between them must be indirect. Christians cannot allow the legitimacy of the as­sumptions that underlie the non-Christian methodology. But they can place themselves upon the position of those whom they are seek­ing to win to a belief in Christianity for the sake of the argument. And the non-Christian, though not granting the presuppositions from which the Christian works, can nevertheless place himself upon the position of the Christian for the sake of the argument.

The Christian knows the truth about the non-Christian. He knows this because he is himself what he is by grace alone. He has been saved from the blindness of mind and the hardness of heart that marks the "natural man." The Christian has the "doctor's book." The Scriptures tell him of the origin and of the nature of sin. Man is dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1). He hates God. His inability to see the facts as they are and to reason about them as he ought to reason about them is, at bottom, a matter of sin. He has the God-created ability of reasoning within him. He is made in the image of God. God's revelation is before him and within him. He is in his own constitution a manifestation of the revelation and therefore of the requirement of God. God made a covenant with him through Adam (Rom. 5:12). He is therefore now, in Adam, a cove­nant-breaker. He is also against God and therefore against the rev­elation of God (Rom. 8:6-8). This revelation of God constantly and inescapably reminds him of his creatural responsibility. As a sinner he has, in Adam, declared himself autonomous.

Thus, intellectual argument will not, as such, convince and con­vert the non-Christian. It takes the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit to do that. But as in the case of preaching, so in the case of apologetical reasoning, the Holy Spirit may use a mediate approach to the minds and hearts of men. The natural man is quite able intellectually to follow the argument that the Christian offers for the truth of his position. He can therefore see that the wisdom of this world has been made foolishness by God. Christianity can be shown to be, not "just as good as" or even "better than" the non-Chris­tian position, but the only position that does not make nonsense of human experience."

A snippet from A Christian Theory of Knowledge

Throwing Our Posterity Under the Bus

My 15 year old son and I were discussing economics recently (he's very interested in politics and economics) when the wickedness of what we are doing economically as a country really struck me.

We have created a economic situation in our country that is sure to do harm to our posterity if we don't do something about it. If we don't start taking drastic measures to change things, somewhere down the line our posterity will pay the price, yet we keep on doing the same old irresponsible things that started it all in the first place.

Because it hasn't had a very adverse effect on us yet we just go on our merry way. Because we're still fairly comfortable we're happy with the way things are. Working to solve the problem would be difficult and that might be uncomfortable, and why make ourselves uncomfortable when we can possibly avoid the consequences of our actions and leave them to another generation to deal with?

If you think about it we do the very same thing in numerous other ways. We put our children in government schools because its easy and the immediate consequences of our actions are hard to see. We elect the politicians who keep the status quo because we're comfortable with life the way it is right now. We make all sorts of compromises with sin because it makes our life easier at the moment. We don't share the gospel which could potentially change generations of a family because we fear the discomfort of possible rejection or persecution. We sit in bad churches because we're comfortable or our kids like it there, unconcerned about the long range effect it might have on them spiritually. We fail to train our children because right now it's easier not too. Or worse yet we just skip having the children because in the short term it's a lot less of a hassle.

We seem to be spiritually myopic and all too willing to throw our posterity under the bus, so to speak, in order to be comfortable now and avoid some difficult work.

The Sin of Homosexuality

Homosexuality
Audio Links

• The Sin of Homosexuality
  Mark Chanski

It's a what?

My sweet little four year old came to me early Sunday morning with this little scrap of paper with some doodles on it. "Here Daddy, I made this for you." she said with a great big cute smile on her face.

"Aww thats cute, what is it?" I asked

"It's an Atom Bomb." she said with a sparkle in her eye.

"It's a what?" I asked, not sure if I heard her correctly.

"It's an Atom Bomb" she said again slightly exasperated that I had to ask a second time. "With little people" she added.

Apparently the little people are blissfully unaware of whats about to happen to them.

Population Control

Now heres a couple of interesting stories:

Happy Mother's Day: Woman Pregnant With 18th Child

Ted Turner Calls for Population Control, Wants Limit of Two Children Per Family

Charles Bridges on Proverbs

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Commentaries

One of the best commentaries on the book of Proverbs in writing!

Proverbs, Geneva Commentary Series
By Charles Bridges / Banner Of Truth

In this 1846 writing, Charles Bridges asserts that Proverbs does not generally receive the esteem it should. Going verse by verse, Bridges gives homilectical and practical advice, rather than presenting a technical study. Charles Spurgeon referred to Bridge's commentary as the best on Proverbs, saying, "Whilst explaining the passage in hand, he sets other portions of the word in new lights."

A Great Blessing

Some Good Quotes
Motherhood

Matthew Henry on Proverbs 31:28

“She is a great blessing to her relations, v. 28. (1.) Her children grow up in her place, and they call her blessed. They give her their good word, they are themselves a commendation to her, and they are ready to give great commendations of her; they pray for her, and bless God that they had such a good mother. It is a debt which they owe her, a part of that honour which the fifth commandment requires to be paid to father and mother; and it is a double honour that is due to a good father and a good mother. (2.) Her husband thinks himself so happy in her that he takes all occasions to speak well of her, as one of the best of women. It is no indecency at all, but a laudable instance of conjugal love, for husbands and wives to give one another their due praises.”

-Matthew Henry as quoted in Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible

The Virtuous Mother

Some Good Quotes
Motherhood

Charles Bridges on Proverbs 31:28

“The virtuous woman is obviously subserving her own interest. For what greater earthly happiness could she know, than her reverence, and her husband's blessing? We may picture to ourselves "her condition—crowned with years; her children grown up; perhaps themselves surrounded with families, and endeavoring to train them, as themselves had been trained. Their mother is constantly before their eyes. Her tender guidance, her wise counsels, her loving disci­pline, her holy example, are vividly kept in remembrance. They cease not to call her Messed, and to bless the Lord for her, as his invalu­able gift! No less warmly does her husband praise her. His attach­ment to her is grounded, not on the deceitful and vain charms of beauty, but on the fear of the Lord. She is therefore in his eyes to the end, the stay of his declining years, the soother of his cares, the counselor of his perplexities, the comforter of his sorrows, the sunshine of his earthly joys. (Ecc. xxxvi. 23, 24.) Both children and husband combine in the grateful acknowledgment”

- Charles Bridges as Quoted in Proverbs, Geneva Commentary Series

swine, dunces, and blockheads

Some Good Quotes
Children
Marriage

"Most married people do not desire children; in fact, they dislike them and hold that it is better to live without them because they are poor and do not have the where­withal to support a family. This is true particularly of those who are given to idleness and laziness and flee from the sweat and labor of married life. But the purpose of marriage is not pleasure and ease but the procreation and education of children and the support of a family. This is truly an immense burden, full of great cares and labors. But that is why God created you: to be a husband or a wife and to learn to bear these moles­tations. People who do not like children are swine, dunces, and blockheads, not worthy to be called men and women, because they despise the blessing of God, the Creator and Author of marriage."

-Martin Luther as quoted in What Luther Says: A Practical In-Home Anthology for the Active Christian

John Calvin on Homemakers

• John Calvin on Women Rejoicing in Their Role as Homemakers
  Posted at Vision Forum
  

Dr. Pierce on the benefits of government education

"Every child in America who enters school at the age of five is mentally ill, because he comes to school with an allegiance toward our elected officials, toward our founding fathers, toward our
institutions, toward the preservation of this form of government that we have. Patriotism, nationalism, and sovereignty, all that proves that children are sick because a truly well individual is one who has rejected all of those things, and is truly the international child of the future."

-Dr. Chester M. Pierce, Professor of Education at Harvard

The Wrath of God Revealed

Eschatology
Audio Links

• Eschatology #11- The Wrath of God Revealed
  Sam E. Waldron

Be Cautious of Abusing God's Mercy

"We should be cautious of abusing God's mercy; let us beware that we suck not poison out of that sweet flower. To take encouragement to go on in sin, because of God's mercy, is the vilest instance of ingratitude, and justly exposes to an aggravated condemnation; abused mercy turns into enraged fury and vengeance. "If he bless himself, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk after the imagination of my heart, to add drunkenness to thirst; the Lord will not spare him, but the anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him." Deut. xxix. 19."

Gilbert Tennent (1703-1764) taken from The Divine Mecy

Striking the Root

I love apologetics! Personally I find it one of the most fascinating and important subjects of the Christian faith as it is concerned with evangelism and bringing everything under the lordship of Jesus Christ. Sadly though, we often seem to carry it out in an unchristian manner that undercuts its own objective.

By failing to challenge the non-Christians presupposition of autonomy we end up letting them of the hook and often fall short of the whole objective of our mission; their conversion.

Both the Christian and the non-Christian approach the subjects dealt with by apologetics with presuppositions. The Christian presupposition must be that God and His word are our ultimate authority and point of reference. The non-Christian presupposition is that man is the judge and man is the ultimate point of reference.

The fact of the matter is that God created everything and God must define it all. God depends on no one outside himself for knowledge and understanding; rather He is the source of it all. Man on the other hand is entirely dependent upon God and His revelation for proper knowledge and understanding. God alone is independent while man is dependent.

The non-Christian assumes independence in thought to begin with and this is a sin. He starts from the wrong starting point and must necessarily go wrong from there. The non-Christian has committed the same sin as our first parents; they have refused to submit themselves to the revelation of their maker. We can not meet the non-Christian on “common ground” and “go wherever the facts might lead us,” doing so is to take up their presupposition that man is the judge of the facts and the ultimate point of reference. Doing such a thing denies the fact that we are dependent creatures who desperately need the revelation of our maker in order to know properly. In taking such a position to defend Christianity we actually end up denying one of the foremost truths of Christianity. As Cornelius Van Til so frequently points out, we end up destroying the foundations of Christianity in our attempt to defend it. How can we expect the Spirit of God to really bless such an endeavor?

Brethren, maybe we would do better to expose the faulty foundations of the sinful thinking of our fellow man and pray for the Spirits work in convicting and converting them from their autonomous way of life. Perhaps if we strike at the roots of their sin, the rest of the sinful tree will fall on it’s own.

When Home Schoolers Get Bored

Boooorrrrriiiiing

My family and I went to visit a church and I asked the pastor if I could bring my children into the adult Sunday school class with my wife and I. After giving it a little thought, the pastor replied that it would not be a good idea because the children might get bored.

That's fine if a church doesn't want me to bring my children with me to class. I can skip the class or go somewhere else, but why does everyone fear boredom when it comes to Sunday school? Do you have any idea how many times I've heard this? "We have to segregate people according to their own ages and special interests or they might get bored on us!"

Is boredom really that bad? I've been bored thousands of times in my life, and as far as I can tell it hasn't hurt me yet. Do we really think that we can protect our children from boredom all of their lives? Some of the same people that think I am being overprotective by homeschooling and protecting my kids from drugs, pornography, humanist philosophy and sexual predators suddenly think I need to protect my children from boredom??? They're gonna get bored sooner or later, maybe we should teach them how to deal with it properly.

What's really funny is that I had heard this Pastor speak before and once or twice he had bored me. Should I have yanked my family out of there before someone else got bored? Should I have stopped him and warned him that he might be boring some of us? Should I never go back to that church because I might get bored again? Or what about work, what about the occasional business meeting? Some of them bore me to tears, should I look for a new job?

No wonder our kids can't sit still and pay attention to anything. We're so busy entertaining them all the time that they practically go into convulsions when we quit. Are we really doing them a favor by teaching them to fear and flee boredom?

Sorry for ranting a little bit but I had to let that out. Hope I haven't bored you.

The Kingdom in Parables

Eschatology
Audio Links

• Eschatology # 15- The Coming of the Kingdom Part 2
  The Kingdom in Parables
  Sam E. Waldron

Horace Mann on the benefits of government education

"We who are engaged in the sacred cause of education are entitled to look upon all parents as having given hostages to our cause."

-Horace Mann, father of the government school movement in America and apostate from Biblical Christianity.

"...for our flickering wicks"

Some Good Quotes

Fasting

"If he who was the Light of the world fought for his fire with fasting, is there something to be learned here for our flickering wicks?"

-John Piper from A Hunger for God

"The almost universal absence of regular fasting for the Lord's return is a witness to our satisfaction with the presence of the world and the absence of the Lord. This is not the way it should be."

-John Piper from A Hunger for God

"Surely, this hunger for Christ needs to be restored in the comfortable church of the prosperous West. The absence of fasting is indicative of our comfort with the way things are. No one fasts to express how content they are. People only fast out of dissatisfaction. "The attendants of the bridegroom cannot mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them, can they? But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast" (Matthew 15:9). The absence of fasting is the measure of our contentment with the absence of Christ."

-John Piper from A Hunger for God

The Certainty of the Parousia

Eschatology
Audio Links

• Eschatology #12- The Certainty of the Parousia
  2 Peter 3
  Sam E. Waldron