Proverbs - Wisdom For Troubled Times

We're gonna have our reading now. That's from Proverbs chapter 22 verses 1 to 16. And then we'll have an additional verse in chapter 17 and verse 21. So probably chapter 22 verse 1.

A good name is more desirable than great riches. To be esteemed is better than silver or gold. Rich and poor have this in common. The lord is maker of them all. The prudent see danger and take refuge.

But the simple, keep going and pay the penalty. Humility is the fear of the lord. Its wages are riches and honor. And life. In the paths of the wicked are snares and pitfalls.

But those who would preserve their life stay far from them. Start children off on the way they should go. And even when they are old, they will not turn from it. The rich all over the poor and the borrower is slave to the lender. Whoever sows in justice reaps calamity and the rod they wield in fury will be broken.

The generous will themselves be blessed for they share their food with the poor. Drive out the mocker, and out goes strife, quarrels, and insults are ended. 1 who loves a pure heart and who speaks with grace will have the king for a friend. The eyes of the lord keep watch over knowledge. But he frustrates the words of the unfaithful.

The sluggard says, there's a lion outside. I'll be killed in the public square. The mouth of an adulterous woman is a deep pit. A man who is under the Lord's wrath falls into it. Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far away.

1 who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth and 1 who gives gifts to the rich Both come to poverty. And Proverbs chapter 17 and verse 21. To have a full for a child brings grief. There is no joy for the parents of a godless fool. Hi.

My name's Pete Woodcock, and 1 of the pastors of the church. We're going through proverbs, and we started that I'm not quite sure. Was it last year or this year or or whatever. But about 6 years ago, we looked at problems. I did a sermon called the world needs more bad parents.

And I I focused in on these 2 verses verse 6 of Proverbs 22, which says start, children off on the way they should go. And even when they are old, they will not turn from it. And verse 15, Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far away. So they were the 2 verses we looked at under the title how to how the world needs bad parents, and we're here again. So what I'm gonna do is the world needs more bad parents part 2.

So if you wanna know what I said in part 1, you have to go back 6 years and have a a listen to that. I'm gonna draw from that but I want to add other other things because there is so much to say and even with those 2 sermons together, obviously, it's not gonna deal with everything that we should know as parents. Talking to parents, but you'll notice halfway through that I'm not just talking to parents, I'm talking to all of us. Let's pray. For the help us now, as we look at these verses, help us to be challenged, encouraged to do that which is right in bringing up children.

We pray in your name, amen. Here's a letter. Have a listen to this letter about parenting. My parents were bad bad parents, very, very mean. While other children could eat what they liked and when they liked, I had to have boring meals that were very nutritious.

And evening meal I had to sit down at the table with my parents and talk to them while my mates watch the best TV and ate on their laps. I'm ashamed to admit but my parents were so bad they treated home like a sweatshop for underage workers. They must have broken the child labor laws. I was made to make my bed, learned to cook tidy up, put my own dirty clothes in the wash basket, and other sorts of cruel jobs. I'm sure they lay awake at night thinking of more cruel things for me to do.

These are bad parents I'm talking about here. Another thing, my friends would all get the latest toy and gadgets and designer clothes. Whereas if I wanted them, I had to save up my own money from the few pennies I got from child labor. There was always older people at our home, and I always had to talk to them and serve them, and I was never allowed to hide in my room and do what I wanted to do in my own home. Sundays were always at church.

And again, I had to respect the older people by talking to them. I was always told to tell the truth even when it got me into trouble. If I did anything wrong, I was punished Even if I said I did it wrong, my friends were only ever threatened with punishment. Anyway, That was long ago. I've left home now and I feel free, really, really free.

Free to be faithful to my wife. Free to follow God free to be generous with my time and money. Free not to have everything I want but to enjoy what I have. And now I have a child of my own, and I'm doing my best to be a bad parent. I say the world needs more bad parents, more mean parents.

Now, I think that's right. If that letter is a description of bad parents, then we do need more bad parents. And then maybe we'll have less selfish, self absorbed adults in the world. More bad parents would make better adults. To put it in terms of this bible book of prophecy, the word is fools.

We don't wanna bring up fools. The parents' job and parents, it is a job It's not just something that happens. It is a job and a full time job and it's hard work. Parents, you if you don't wanna raise fools, then you've got to put energy into your children. Proverbs 17 21 which we read says, to have a full for a child brings grief.

Who wants that? There is no joy for the parent of a godless fool. So this morning, I want to show you some of the things, can't show you everything obviously. Some of the things that the bible says that will help us in the wisdom literature that we're looking at to bring up children and not bring up fools. First thing is this, children need training.

Children need training. Now, it's obvious in many parts of the child's world potty training. Yeah? If you don't train your child, potty training, when they're an adult, they're gonna have a lot of difficulties. Weaning, which is training them to eat solid food.

If they grow up, unweaved when they're an adult, it's gonna be it's very weird indeed, and I think probably get arrested. Children need their muscles to work so that they can walk There's teaching and training so that they can write and speak properly and relate to people. All all of that so It's it's all sort of obvious. As I say, an adult that isn't potty trained is gonna be in big difficulty and an adult that isn't weaned is gonna be in big difficulty. But there's it seems to be less obvious what this wisdom book tells us that is important for bringing up children All of that training, we know.

You have to do that. But Proverbs sees children's education mainly in terms of character forming. Very big on that. Here's a child that doesn't just need lots of quantity of education so that they can regurgitate it in an exam and pass an exam. Proverbs never deals with that.

Doesn't see much interest in that at all. But it sees not just a quantity of information to pass exams and get on in life but actually a quality of life that they're living. So words like love, kindness, righteousness, faithfulness, discernment, wisdom, truthfulness. They're littered throughout the pages of proverbs. So that the child gets a moral background, not just understands the workings of the world and the work kings of mathematics or biology, but actually has a moral backbone.

The wholeness of education according to Proverbs is forming a character. Not a personality personalities are, you know, we all have different personalities. It's the character that he's actually needs to be for. And so how do we do that? Well, Proverbs says, look at verse 6.

Start children off on the way that they should go and even when they are old, they'll not turn from it. Now, let me just say this. This verse causes a lot of issues, and it causes a lot of issues and a lot of guilt with pyrrole. Because when your child is old and they they're not following the ways that you taught them, then this verse seems to say, well, you didn't do it very well. So it seems to be a verse that condemns parents, but actually I wanna show you it it isn't doing that.

Some translations put train a child in the way you should go so that when he is old, he will not depart from it. What the English translations have done is not very good. They've placed a word there that isn't there in the Hebrew, the original Hebrew. They've added the words in the way he should go, should go, or the right way. They've added that It literally is train a child in his way and he'll not depart from it.

The word right there and the word should there is not is not in the original language. So it is train a child in his way and when he is old he is not he will not depart from it. So instead of being a principle that if you train them right, that they will grow up right. It's the reverse. It's a warning.

If you don't correct them, if you allow them to go their own way, that in itself will train them. If you don't correct them, they will be trained in their way which they'll have when they're adults. So you could you could translate it like this. Let the child have their way when they're young and when they're old, they continue in sit to insist on having their way. That's really what it means.

Children left to their own devices will destroy themselves by their own devices. That's what it means. Now what is interesting here, and I think the thing I was thinking about this week is is the word train or the word start off. It's interesting in this context because train sort of gives the idea of of doing something over and over again of setting a pattern to be committed to it. You know, you train your muscles and you you do the same thing again and again to get those muscles built up.

Or start a kid off in the right way, it gives the impression of when you're teaching them to ride the bike, you know, and you you push them in the right direction and then they start peddling. But in the context, it's it's not you with hands on here. In the context, it's leaving the child. Now, this is the interesting thing and I hope you get this. Leave a child in his or her home his or her own way, and you allow them to do what you want they want, and that is training them.

See, lots of people hate the word training of children, but you always train them. You train them in 1 way by leaving them and their train themselves, or you train them by disciplining them, as we'll see in a minute, So it's a bit like a vine if you take a vine, you know, grapevine. You can plant it. You can manure it. You can train it by pulling the the the the vine this way and tapping a little nail in so that it grows in the right direction.

You prune it and cut it back and it will produce fruit. That's training. But here, this is a strange thing. If you just leave the vine to go wild so it doesn't even produce fruit. That's training.

There's always training involved. Look at verse 15 of Proverbs 22. Folly is bound up in the heart of a child. But the rod of discipline will drive it away. Children are not full of wisdom.

Despite what Disney preaches to us, despite what the world says to us, despite what the education theorists are pushing. Despite what people like Russo who are behind modern education who was as I've preached on Proverbs already, a disaster of a man when it came to children. Nevertheless, his theories of children being innocent is wrong. And if you go down that route, you'll be in big trouble. Folly is bound up in the heart of a child.

Children are not born with wisdom. They're not innocent little things. There's foolishness within the heart. They will do wrong things. They will move from what is right You don't need to teach a child to be selfish.

My mom never said, Pete darling, You're such a lovely little boy. Let me show you how to be selfish. No 1 taught me how to say no, actually. They usually were trying to get you to say, dad, yes, excitement, but they come out with no very quickly. No 1 teaches the child to rebel.

It's innate in them. It's the foolishness that the Bible says. That is bound up in a heart of a child. We don't have child groups that come together to how to run schools as as they were doing. Little political groups.

How are we going to run the school and the children have a little committee together? That's a disaster. Isn't it? Any parenting strategy that makes the assumption that children are born good and that all they need is nurture and love and self esteem backed up and actualizing their potential That's only half the picture. They do need those things.

But if you stop there you're in trouble, If you take a foolish child and you love them, they will start to believe that they're clever when they're fools, that they're wise and they'll end up monsters Do you love your children? Absolutely. I hope so. But loving them is to know them and to know them is to know that folly is bound up in the heart of a child. 1 of the reasons is that you are to discipline a child is because of that.

Look at verse 15 again, folly is bound up in the heart of a child. But the rod of discipline will drive it far from him. When God talks about folly in the heart, he he means wrong thinking and even more than that rebellious thinking and even more than that sinful thinking. And so we need to train them that that's wrong, that that's right, that that's sinful, that that's ungodly. Now, of course, children also need to know how to navigate through the world.

They need to know what the boundaries are You don't do that. You don't hit. If you act like that when you're an adult, you will be disciplined and it won't be be by me. It'll be by someone who doesn't love you. There's always discipline, there's always training going on.

So children, left of themselves then without instruction, without discipline will grow into full What they are at 2, they'll be at 22. What they are at 4, they'll be at 44. We can make a lot of excuses for bad behavior. Now don't get me wrong. I understand we're under we're we're to understand children.

But misbehavior sometimes is just put down to we say things like it's because they're tired. And that's true sometimes. And we have to give a give a lot to children. They get tired. So they get grumpy.

We all get grumpy when we're tired and hot and sweaty. Yeah? Or it's the other girls at school. They lead her astray, and there's truth in that. Or he's just a bit hyper and he is, or it's all the additives they put in children's food, or that's the way he is, or she misunderstood.

And all of those things may be true, but they're not the main reason for bad behavior. They're true and we need to bring them into consideration, but the meaning of bad behavior The main cause of bad behavior is a folly in the heart, sin in the heart. Listen to Jesus. So only Jesus understands people best. For it is from within out of a person's heart.

That evil thoughts come, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance, and folly. All these evils says Jesus come from inside and defile a person. Evil behavior comes from within from the hearts. Children misbehave not just because they're tired, but because they're sinful and their hearts are selfish and their rebels against God. Sort of all our action, both good and bad is the heart.

And that means that our job is about changing the heart. Even more than it is about controlling the behavior, This is why this is really important. Training is much more than just setting rules so that we have nice little obedient children that might turn into little terraces because they think they're better than everybody else. That isn't us, We we want to we we don't wanna bully our children into just doing the right thing. We want to motivate and change their hearts And so that's why we wanna talk to children and teach children.

And not just say this is the rule, you follow it. But why is that rule good? And why do I need to follow it? And why do I myself as an example need to say sorry because I break those rules too. Why do I need God in my life?

Why do I need the help of the Holy Spirit, teaching and training children is not just rules, it's rules to evangelize the heart. So children need training That's my first point. Got that. They need training. Your children need training.

If you don't train them, you're not a responsible parent. That's what I'll see in a minute. And it's hard work, and we need help, and we all fail. So, absolutely. Second date, What do bad parents need then to teach the heart of their children and their own heart?

Because parenting is not just teaching children, it's teaching your own heart. Kids are there to show you how angry you can get. They're there to show you how selfish you can be. We can we can play it. I mean, that's what people are for as far as I can see.

You know, I'm a perfect person on my own, and then someone comes into my life, and they're irritating. And suddenly I realize I'm not that patient. So what good parents need to teach the heart of their children and their own hearts? Now, in Part 1 of the world needs more bad parents. I dealt with a whole load of stuff.

I'm gonna deal with different stuff here, stuff that we see in this chapter. Verse 22. So we're gonna limit ourselves to verse chapter 22 of of proverbs. Here's the first thing. Verse 1 and 2.

This is what we need to teach ourselves and our kids. A good name is better than riches. A good name is better than riches. Look at verses 1 and 2. A good name is more desirable than great riches, to be esteemed is better than silver and gold.

Rich and poor have this in common. The Lord is the maker of them all. 1 of the things that children have to learn is that they can't have everything they want. Isn't that right? That's 1 of things.

The desire to pick up shiny things is innate, isn't it? But we're like magpies. There's a shiny glittery thing like a silver and gold thing, and we have to pick it up. And children need to learn that they can't have every shiny thing they see. It's extraordinary how bold children can be in the play group.

They can see a shiny thing for miles. They can see the little girl playing with a shiny thing right across the playground. Or the play group. And they can confidently march through all the kids pushing them out of the way whatever the consequence is to grab the shiny thing and make it their own. This is saying A good name is better than all the shiny things.

So 1 of the things we've got to teach children is that you can't do that. You can't you've gotta learn that if you go and grab someone else's shiny thing, you will get told off. And parents, if you don't teach that to your children when they're children, Someone else will teach it to them when they're an adult, and they'll be much less loving, and their discipline will be much harder So you need to train them. If you're a parent and you don't train them, you'll guarantee someone else will. The kid in the sun in the in the play group might and whack them around the head.

And then there's all tears everywhere. So discipline from a loving parent is a lot kinder than discipline from someone else. But there's a bigger philosophy here that we need to teach children. I think this is very important in our rich world. Silver and gold and all the shiny things are not the most desirable thing in life.

Now we have a sort of whole system that tries to point that out that silver and gold is the most desirable thing. If you have silver and gold, you'll be rich enough to do what you want to do. It makes you into a God Jesus preach very powerfully. What value is there in gaining the whole world, all the over and go to the world. What what value is there in gaining the whole world, but you lose your very soul.

Your very self You hollow out. The Old Testament in Psalm 1 talks about chaff and wheat of the corn, you know, if you get if you get a little bit of wheat, you have the chaff, the outside. The the kernel, the bit that's hard that hasn't got any life in it and that the world is like chaff and that you can have all the outward glitzy gold and stuff, but it doesn't really bring life to you. Even those people that go after gold and go after silver and don't care about their morality and how they get it, stepping on people. Not caring about the poor.

Even those people that have that money know that a good name is important because when friendships go wrong and people start taking the rich the court to get more shiny things from them. They start suing or counter suing or covering up and they'll pay millions, Andrew paid 3000000 to cover up a story. Prince Andrew. So even people with money know a good name is more important than gold and silver. Verse 1 men, a good name is more desirable than great riches, to be esteemed is better than silver and gold.

Rich and poor have this common. The Lord is the maker of them all. The vital truth is that both rich and poor, whichever 1 you are stand shoulder to shoulder before God. They're both made by God. Get an understanding of that into your children.

That whatever you are, rich and poor, the main thing is that you are made in the image of God. God is your maker, God is your maker. Rich and poor is neither here nor there. It's like the chaff, it's here for a moment and then gone. 1 of the things I love doing on holiday must I probably am weird.

I I don't know. And Anne's now loves it, I think, because she follows me around, is going around graveyards. Alright? It's a great holiday event. And I was on holiday, was it last week or whenever?

I I don't know how many graveyards I went around and tombs I looked at. The great thing is, it's a great leveller. You have Lord Farquhar over here who was completely rich and you have Fred here who is very poor, they're both the same, aren't they? There's no difference. A hundred years from now, you'll be the same as every rich person in the world.

They're dead. You can't take it with you. We need to teach children that a good name. What I look for, and the reason why I love going around those places is looking for good names. I look out for Christian brothers and sisters.

1 of the things I love doing. Wherever I go on holiday, I read up the history of Christianity in that area, I go to a to to the to the graveyard to try to find a brother and sister, and I speak to them and say, you're gonna be whizzing through the grave soon because Jesus is coming back and you want my brother and a good name, someone who's preached the gospel, who's loved the lost. That's a good name. Christian is a good name. Teach your children to be inspired by good people, gospel people, who have a good name, who will hear Jesus say, well done, my good and faithful servant, not, oh, you're gonna have to leave all those riches behind.

Teach kids this. Think about how to do it. Take them round grapes. Show them pictures of, you know, old people, you know, from people from years ago. It's amazing looking at those pictures.

They were exactly like you at 1 time. Look, there they are. All lined up playing cricket. Every 1 of them Jerusha Cole is dead. There's your lesson for today, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, and you will die.

Yeah? There's a rich bloke. Dead. There's a poor bloke. Dead.

Think about that. They may be famous because they were rich, but have they got a good name? That's the first thing to teach children. Here's the second thing in these verses, to teach children and ourselves. All are made by god verse 2.

Rich and poor have this in common. The Lord is the maker of them all. Treat people as made in the image of God, whether they're rich or poor, whether they influence you or you influence them. Whether they're well known or not known. The Lord is their maker You need to learn to understand that the famous aren't more important in God's eyes than the people around know.

The rich are not more important. The powerful are not more important. Don't think that if you get silver and gold, you'll be more important. You won't God makes all people. Therefore, don't exploit people.

In this life, you'd be better to be poor than a rich exploiter. Look at verse 7. The rich rule over the poor and the borrower is a slave to the lender. This world always exploits people and always exploits the poor. Why do you think betting shops are always in working class areas, poorer areas?

Verse 8, whoever sows in justice reaps calamity and the rod they wield in fury. Will be broken. Don't don't do injustice. Look at verse 16. The 1 who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth.

And the 1 who gives gifts to the riches both come to poverty. You slippery person giving gifts to the riches. So that so, oh, yes, they recognize you and understand and think and bring you into their into their culture of rich richness. And if you oppress the poor in the end, God will be against you. Teach that to your kids and yourself.

Look at verse 9, I love this verse. The generous will themselves be blessed. That means contented. The generous will be blessed. For they share their food with the poor.

Teach your children to be generous. Teach your children to give Be an example to them as you yourself give, teach them to be generous and not exploit other people? Why not ask them when they're having a birthday party? Why not ask your children? Who's the lonely kid in the class?

Who's the kid that no 1 ever likes at school? Who's the kid that always gets forgot Who is the 1 in your class that never gets invited to a party, you invite them. You invite fight them. Oh, but, ma, you invite them and you'll be blessed. Why not?

Why not do things like that? To teach them, teach them about the persecuted church, teach them about the poverty of Christians around the world, get them to save up their pennies, that they've earned in slave labor. Get them to save up their pennies and give. It's 1 of the things I I I I I guess we ought to get back into in encouraging our Sunday to bring a little offering, the kids bring some of their pocket money to give away. Paul says in 2 Corinthians, the Lord loves a cheerful giver, little kids wanting to give their money teach them to be generous.

Thirdly, look to the future, look at verse 3. The prudence see danger and take refuge. But the simple keep going and pay the penalty. Children don't see real danger very often. You know, why can't they eat all the sweets now?

Why can't they only live off McDonald's, you know, now? They don't why can't I run across the road? Yeah? The prudency danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going. And pay the penalty.

So part of parenting is to say my child is simple. Rusia and Carla, very simple, very simple people, and they need to be stopped running across the road. Or eating everything they want. They need to understand that behavior will bring penalties. Jordan Peterson, he's not a Christian, but he's a very interesting writer and a behavioral therapist.

And he writes in his book 12 rules, a chapter on parenting saying, I've forget what the chapter's called. It's it's it's something like, don't let your child be someone you dislike. It is nominally good chapter. It's the best chapter I've ever read on behavioral sort of understanding of children. And he writes about us being in parents or in proxy of the world, in other words we stand in for the world.

If we don't discipline the children, as I've already said, the world will. So if if you don't deal with it now, the prudence the danger and take refuge. If you don't deal with the danger now, then what will happen is the simple will keep going and they'll pay the penalty. So discipline to a child now from a loving parent is way better to someone that hates your kid. And he writes this.

Society doesn't care about your child nearly as much as you do. If you dislike your child at times, imagine how other people will react. Other people will swiftly judge and punish your child, mercilessly, mercilessly, lessly. With nowhere near the tolerance and patience that you will show your child. Listen to this.

In school, other children will reject a temperamental unsociable child. Teachers will run out of patience and focus attention on more pleasant children, causing learning difficulties. If these habits persist in chart in adulthood, employers will fire them. Relationships with partners will be rejected. So you you've got to look to the future, the prudency, the danger.

They take refuge. In other words, they deal with this now, but the simple keep going and they'll pay the penalty. If you allow your child to be self centered now, they'll pay the penalty later. And so therefore, we have to say no no, and mean it, no means no. I heard about 1 teacher talking about the parents at at the end of the year.

Parents would always come up to her and say, my little girl would never takes no for an answer, and the teacher would say, well, because you never say no. Because what happens is I have an ice cream? No. Can I have an ice cream? No.

Can I have an ice cream? No. Can I have an ice cream? Okay then. No means yes.

Just you gotta say the same thing lots of times. No means no. And it's hard as a parent. I remember I remember once 1 of my children. I won't say which 1.

But she was playing up. We we were going on a family day out. It was gonna be great fun and I stupidly over over did it. If you do that again, we're not going out. Now I wanted to go out and this 1 did it again.

That meant we couldn't go out. I was furious that I'd made that law. And it was probably over a lot, but but do you see? You know, it's got to mean no. The prudency danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and pay the penalty.

This verse is very very helpful for for parents, sorting things out now. Jordan Peterson talks in his book about 1 of his clients that came to him, that was caught that the kid was causing lots of, you know, trouble in the family and tension between him and him and his wife because the kid wouldn't go to sleep at night. It took 45 minutes to get the kids to sleep at night. 45 minutes. And Jordan Peterson says, you need to do some mathematics, and he added up what 45 minutes every day is 7 days a week.

And he worked out that it's actually 2 and a half months of working weeks 2 and a half months of working in 1 year just to get the kid to bed. And then there were other issues. So if only you could see work this out and it was causing tensions in the marriage, You needed to work it out. You needed to resolve this. You needed to sort it out because he said that no parent in the end could like a kid like that.

You start resenting your own child. So you need to sort it out. The prudent see the danger, you see. And do something about it and take refuge, but the simple just keep going. Then there's hours committed to just 1 thing that could be more valuable, a valuably you.

The prudency danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and pay the penalty. This is gospel truth to teach our children and ourselves. There are real dangers out there. There are real scary things in life. There are bullies and violent people and horrible people out there and we need to teach our child where the refuge is.

We've dealt with that in proverbs. The great tower of refuge. Remember that sermon? Go back and listen to that. We need to teach our children that Christ is the Lord of the universe, that refuge is there in him teach them the consequences of ignoring that refuge because if you carry on, there are eternal consequences to your actions.

We need to teach our children about eternity, fourthly, not proud and loud. We've just had that month, not proud and loud. Verse 4, look at it. Humility is the fear of the lord. Its wages are riches and honor and life, humility.

We need to teach our children humility, listening, not proud, not pushy, not so self absorbed. Everything is about them. Everything is about their feelings. Everything is about their demands. Everything is about the so their world is small.

It's me, myself, and I, and nothing bigger than me, myself, and I. Humility breaks us through that and sees other people and cares for other people. Jesus says blessed of the meek or blessed of the humble, blessed of the meek for they will inherit the earth. The meek, the humble inherit the not the proud and loud. What do we want?

We want it now. You'll get it now but you'll never have an inheritance. Fifthly, look at laziness, verse 13. The sluggard says there's a lion outside I'll be killed in the public square. See, it's not just the willful and the strong minded child that needs discipline and training.

It's the lazy child, and there are a lot of them around that will use all kinds of modern words to say they're not lazy when they are. The lazy are stubborn as far as I can see, don't allow your child to be lazy and make excuses for doing nothing. Verse 13, that the slug art says there is a lion outside. I'll be killed in the public square. Children with folly in their hearts will work and work and work really hard to be lazy.

It's extraordinary. You know what it is. They'll do your homework. It takes about 5 minutes to do, and the fighting is 3 hours. Why't you just do your homework?

Yeah? I remember with 1 of my children which will be nameless. Pick up the apples. Pick up the apples, chuck them in the bin because there are old old apples, it's all over the place. It'll take 5 minutes.

Yeah? Like a whole day. Why do you make me? You could have done it in 5 minutes, but you're gonna stay there until you do it. The amount of effort in being lazy is extraordinary, isn't it?

The slug of. They have no love for work. They have no love for life, they invent excuses in staying in their bedrooms. Lazy people, you you can't argue with them. They've always got an excuse.

But the trouble with the slug art is when they say there's a lion outside and there's danger outside so I can't go outside because it's danger They don't understand the danger that is within that is destroying them. The real danger. Proverbs 21 25 says the craving of a sluggard will be the death of him because his hands refused to work. The cravings of the sluggard to be lazy. Now, some children might really believe there is a lion out there.

There might be a lion out there, but staying in doesn't deal with it. You've gotta learn processes and help the child and love them. Let's go out together. Let's, you know, whatever it is takes to get them out and not just hide away. Jordan Peters and again, children are damaged when they're mercifully inattentive parents fail to make them sharp and observant and awake and leave them instead in an unconscious and undifferentiated state.

Children are damaged when those with their care afraid of any conflict or upset no longer dare to correct them and leave them without guidance. Such children are chronically ignored by their peers. This is because they're not fun to play with. They become unfun children because they don't go out because they might get hurt. Teach them the word of God.

I've got to hurry. I know. I understand. 6 thing, verse 11, to know the king, verse 11, The 1 who loves a pure heart and who speaks with grace will have the king for a friend. Teach them that.

Show them Jesus. He's the king You have a pure heart? Speak with grace? That's Jesus. He's the king.

The king loves that. King loves you when you do that. King loves you when you do good. King loves you when you're pure in heart. It shows us how to repent.

I'm not pure in her. I'm not either. But the king loves pure in heart, so sorry Lord. Sorry I wasn't pure in heart. Sorry I didn't speak grace.

Give examples to your children and yourself, you fail, folly is in your heart, teach your children by example. So that was my second point. Here's my third. Be a parent, but make sure you're a bad parent. Be a bad parent.

Those parents that abandoned their children to the indoctrination of the world and say that they can make up their own minds when they're ready, betray the wisdom of God. You are ungodly to say that. You you know better than God. Really, the only legacy that really matters is the knowledge of the living God. That your children come to know the Lord Jesus Christ.

If you push excellence in school and education, or excellence in sport over knowing the Lord Jesus Christ. You're abusing the responsibilities God's given you. It doesn't matter if they're rich or poor. It matters that they know that God is their maker. Jesus is the 1 that comes from the king.

He knows the king. He's pure and full of grace. Jesus was not lazy and full of excuses. He served and there were real lions Read Psalm 22 and you'll see the lions around him on the cross. Jesus wasn't proud and loud, he was the humble servant king.

Jesus looked to the future and said, that he'll endure these difficult things for the joy of his people being in heaven. Jesus is the good name. The name above all names for every knee will bow, teach your children about Jesus. Teach him about Jesus, the 1 from the king, the 1 who was not lazy, but gave his life as an offering. The 1 who wasn't loud and proud and look at me and I want this and I want that.

What was humble, servant, the king of heaven giving his life on the cross. The 1 that looked to the future and saw the souls of people whether they be in heaven or hell l, the good name of Jesus. See, our role is not plea behavior modification. So we have little pharisees that know what to say and when to say Our goal is transformation through Jesus. And Proverbs is very clear that discipline is evangelism.

Discipline is a rescue mission If you don't correct your children, they won't recognize sin If they don't recognize sin, they won't recognize they're held accountable for sin. If they don't understand that, they'll never turn to the same you. Why do you need to save you? So Perry Be parents, but be bad parents. Now, I understand that children are different, and some are hard, and our circumstances are different, Some of 1 parent families and for goodness sake, 1 parent family, it's really hard.

It's really hard you know, I'm not judging you if you're a 1 parent family. That's why God, the the the best way is 2 parents. Father and a mother. That's the best way. That's the way God made it.

And we're in a world that breaks all of that and but you 1 parent family, you need help Of course you do. The old saying it takes a village to bring up a child is actually right. It takes a church to bring up a child, and we're here to help. And we don't judge we wanna help And that's what church is about so that we can help be parents together to show people the Lord Jesus Christ that they may follow him and have a good name