Raising Kids That Count | Part 1

Are you raising children for the cause of Christ?

Listen to Adrian Rogers. Now, may I ask you a question? How would you like to have a gifted child? Now, I know all of us think our children are gifted, especially our grandchildren, but how would you like to have a gifted child?

Well, that's a doable thing. You just make the gifts. I want to talk to you today about some gifts that you can give to your children. Welcome to Love Worth Finding, featuring profound truth, simply stated by pastor, teacher, and author Adrian Rogers. As parents, our chief desire for our children should be that they love God and honor Him with their lives. The book of Proverbs is full of wisdom for those who want to raise kids that count for the cause of Christ.

If you have your Bible, turn now to Proverbs chapter one. We'll begin in verse seven as Adrian Rogers begins part one of raising kids that count. We're talking today about raising kids that count. One of my life verses from the book of Psalms is this, the generation of the upright shall be blessed. And I've held God to that promise that God will bless my children. My chief desire for my kids is not that they be wealthy, not that they be famous, not that they always be praised or whatever, but that they will love the Lord Jesus Christ and count in His cause kids that will count for God.

Now, may I ask you a question? How would you like to have a gifted child? Now, I know all of us think our children are gifted, especially our grandchildren, but how would you like to have a gifted child?

Well, that's a doable thing. You just make the gifts. I want to talk to you today about some gifts that you can give to your children. The book of Proverbs tells us about these gifts, so let me mention seven of them if you'd like to have a gifted child, okay? If you'd like to have a kid that counts or kids that count that will amount to something, the first thing you ought to give them is you need to give them an example.

Give to them an example. Notice in Proverbs chapter 1, verses 7 through 9, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Now, if they don't learn to respect God, they're not going to have a modicum of genuine knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. My son, hear the instruction of thy father and forsake not the law of thy mother, for they shall be an ornament of grace under thy head and chains about thy neck. Now, kids, he's not talking about an iron chain to drag you around with.

He's talking about a gold chain. That would be something beautiful. And then Proverbs chapter 20 and verse 7, the just man walks in his integrity. His children are blessed after him. Now, I'm going to tell you something, folks. Your kids are going to learn more from your lifestyle than they're going to learn from your words. You need to give to them a godly example. Now, if that makes you nervous, let me tell you something. You don't have to pretend perfection. You know you're not perfect, and I've got news for you. They already know you're not perfect. And so if you try to pretend perfection, you're going to come across as a phony. Your kids don't want to know that you're perfect. They want to know that you're real. Your kids want to know that you are genuine. They're going to be watching you to see how you handle your mess-ups. Do you ever mess up?

Nod your head. And not a parent here doesn't mess up. I heard about a man one time who was going to rob a bank. He was an old farmer. He couldn't pay for his food and seed and everything else. His wife was sick. His kids needed tuition. He decided the only thing he could do is rob a bank.

He never robbed a bank, but he studied about it, thought he'd know what to do. So he got him a bag, got him a rusty old gun, wrote a note, wrote on there, don't mess with me. This is a stick-up.

Give me all your money. And he went to the teller and got all confused and handed the teller the gun, pointed the bag at her, and said, don't stick with me. This is a mess-up. Well, a lot of us just mess up. And our kids want to know, how do you handle your mess-ups? How do you handle your failures? How do you handle your problems?

That would be better to them than your phony perfectionism. Share with your kids. Give them an example. You know the problem with this, the real problem, it's about the time you're experienced being a parent, you're out of a job. Isn't that weird?

And so the two hardest times, I guess, of life are middle age and teenage, and somehow God puts them together. But give your kids an example. Your kids are going to learn more from your example than actually from your words. I found out when I was a grown man, I was mispronouncing a word over and over again. I had done it all of my life. Now, I know I mispronounce many words, and please don't write me notes about all of them that you've noticed. But this was one word that I just constantly mispronounced. Finally, somebody called my hand on it and said, why did you say that word that way? I said, what way? And they said, you said so and so. I said, no, I didn't. I said, so and so. They said, that's what I said you said.

I was hearing it one way in public, but I was saying it another way and thinking I was saying it the right way. And I said, did I really say that that way? I said, yes, you did.

Say it again. Listen to yourself carefully. And I said, that is amazing.

I am a grown man. I've been through seminary, and I have all of my life thought I was saying that word correctly. And I straightened it out. I made myself say it rightly. And then one time I was at home with my dear precious mother, and I listened to her, and she said the same word the wrong way. Now, I listened to my brother. He said the same word the wrong way. I listened to my sister. She said the same word the wrong way. And I realized my dear sainted old mother had infected us with a bad word, not an ugly word.

Just by being there and absorbing a word as a child, I heard her say this word that she mispronounced. Now, folks, we owe to our children an example. Did you know there are a lot of things that they can't learn any other way? They can't really learn in Sunday school. They can't learn in public school.

They've got to be demonstrated. Now, what are we interested in with our kids? Well, sports, grades, physical health, popularity, ability. But who is teaching them? Character.

Let me read some character traits to you. Contentment. Now, they're not going to go to school and learn contentment 101.

I mean, they don't get that in college. Courtesy. Discernment. Fairness. Friendliness. Generosity. Gentleness.

Helpfulness. Honesty. Humility. Kindness. Obedience.

Orderliness. Patience. Persistence. Self-control. Tact. Thankfulness.

Tidiness. Wisdom. Where are they going to learn these things?

These things are not so much taught as they are caught. We owe to our kids an example. Now, number two, not only give to them a godly example, but give to them unconditional love. Now, write these things down. I'm going to give you seven of them. You want to have a gifted child?

Give him unconditional love. Look in Proverbs chapter four, verses one through four. Hear ye, children, the instruction of a father, and attend to no understanding. For I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my law.

Yes, that's fine. Good doctrine teaching law, yes. But notice this. For I was my father's son, tender, and only beloved in the sight of my mother. He taught me also and said unto me, Let thine heart retain my words, keep my commandments, and live. Do you know, we need to give to our kids love that is absolutely, totally unconditional. I've noticed that men who had fathers who did not love them do not really know how to give love to the kids. They have to be taught. And we have to have a generation of men now who are going to mentor some other men who never had a father to actually give them love and to show them unconditional love.

We have to break that cycle. Now, unconditional love doesn't mean that you give to a child everything he wants. That's not really love at all. True love is not giving to someone what they wanted. It's giving to someone what they need. But there must be unconditional acceptance, regardless of the child's misbehavior.

I may not accept what you do, but I accept you. They need to know that enough so that when they are in trouble, when they do misbehave, they'll still come to you. They need to know misbehave, they'll still come to you. They won't be afraid to come to you.

Now, if they don't have a sense that my dad loves me no matter what I do, my mom loves me no matter what I do, they're not going to share their mess ups with you. There needs to be that unconditional love. And you know, that love needs not to be merely in words, but it has to have some physical attachments to it. We have to be constantly touching them and hugging them and holding them. Now, you're a big old teenage boy.

He'll act like he doesn't want that, but do it anyway. It's biblical. Luke chapter 15 and verse 20, when the prodigal son comes home, his father sees him, falls on his neck, hugs him, and kisses him. I saw a bumper sticker that said, kids need hugs, not drugs. They need somebody to physically teach them. We have a generation of kids today who associate physical touching with sexual intimacy.

They need to see beyond this. They need to be touched affectionately and supportively and tenderly. If they don't get that, they're not going to feel your sense of true love. Let them learn how to be touched. Charles Swindoll, whom we all love, wrote this.

I want you to listen to it. Many a young woman who opts for immoral sexual relationships does so because she can scarcely remember a time when her father so much as touched her, unaffectionate dads, without wishing to do so, can trigger a daughter's promiscuity. All of this leads me to write with a great deal of passion, dads, don't hold back your affection, demonstrate your feelings of love and affection to both sons and daughters, and don't stop once they reach adolescence. They long for your affirmation and appreciation. They will love you for it. More importantly, they will emulate your example when God gives them their own family. Love them unconditionally.

Show it by touching. Show it by sympathy when they have their problems. And, friend, they have their problems. Now, you may think that the problems that kids have are not big problems compared to your problems.

They're big to the kid, and that's what matters. Cry with them when they hurt, when their little grade school romances break up. Be concerned about them with all of these things.

When a pet dies, did you ever attend a funeral for a turtle or a dog? We've had some of those at our homes, and I know what it is to hold a grown daughter in my arms and literally cry with her as she cries. Show them sympathy. And the point I'm trying to make is this, that not only do you need to give them an example, you need to give to them unconditional love.

Okay, now, number three, you need to give to them constant encouragement, constant encouragement. Listen to verse 21. My son, let them not depart from thine eyes.

Keep sound wisdom and discretion. So shall they be life unto thy soul and grace to thy neck. Then shalt thou walk in thy way safely, and thy foot shall not stumble. Do you hear the encouragement here? When thou lies down, thou shalt not be afraid. Yea, thou shalt lie down, and thy sleep shall be sweet. Be not afraid of sudden fear, neither of the desolation of the wicked when it cometh, for the Lord shall be thy confidence and shall keep thy foot from being taken.

Now, here's the wisest man who lived, purely human, outside the Lord Jesus who was Solomon, and can you see the sense in which he's talking to his son and who is encouraging his son? You bless your children with encouragement. When you regularly encourage a child, what you're doing is giving to that child confidence, and confidence is so needed. What you're really doing is blessing the child. Over and over again, we ask our Heavenly Father what? What is the one thing we probably say more than anything else when we pray to our Heavenly Father? Oh, God bless me. God bless me. You want your Heavenly Father to bless you. I'm telling you, your child needs a blessing from his earthly father, and that blessing is encouragement.

Children need encouragement like a plant needs water. Somebody gave me a houseplant a while back. I put it in my study. It was beautiful for about a week and a half, and then I looked over at it, and it was doing this. I thought, what happened to my plant? I said, well, come to think of it, it had been two or three weeks, I hadn't put a drop of water on it.

I went and got a styrofoam cup and poured about three or four cups of water on it, and I'm telling you, in several hours, that plant was just like this. Encouragement is to a child what water is to a dehydrated plant. Encourage them.

Rather than trying to catch them doing something wrong, try to catch them doing something right. Let your speech not always be negative. Let it be positive.

Now, I want to tell you something. There is a difference between praise and encouragement. A lot of us think we're encouraging a child when we're praising a child, and we may really be discouraging a child by praise. Let me show you the difference between praise and encouragement. Praise said, Son, you've got all A's.

I'm proud of you. Our son, we would have lost the game had it not been for you. Son, you're really a great athlete, and you praise him.

What are you saying to that child, really? You're saying, you know, my dad is really proud of me because of what I do. Now, suppose sometimes he doesn't do so well. Suppose sometimes he does not achieve.

Suppose he doesn't make straight A's. Now, what does that say to his mind? You see, that's praise. What is encouragement?

Encouragement might be saying, Son, we didn't win the game, but, Son, I saw you were really trying. Thank you, Son, for that. Well, you didn't make straight A's. I'll tell you one thing you have done.

I saw your study. You did your homework, and I'm grateful for that. I really believe that you tried as best you know how. Do you see the difference?

It may be a subtle thing, but learn to encourage these kids. Encouragement says, I love you. I'm grateful for you, not necessarily because you achieved, but because of who you are. Bill Glass was a great football player in my generation, now is a prison evangelist and is a good friend. Bill Glass goes into prisons, and many times he'll ask those prisoners a question like this. How many of you had a father who said to you, you will never amount to anything?

One of these days you're going to end up in prison. Almost every one of them lifted his hand. Friend, give them an example. Give them unconditional love. Give them encouragement. Now it's time to give them wise instruction. Look in Proverbs 2, verses 1 through 7.

Here's the instruction. Listen to it. My son, if thou wilt receive my words and hide my commandments with thee, so that thou incline thine ear unto wisdom, and apply thine heart to understanding. Yea, if thou Christ after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding, if thou seekest her, that is knowledge, as silver and searchest for her, as for his treasures, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord giveth wisdom, and out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding. He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous, and he is a buckler to them that walk uprightly. And then the corresponding passage, Proverbs 22, verse 6, train up a child in the way that he should go, and when he is old, he'll not depart from it.

Now, we give them wise instruction, but wise instruction is always joined to training. By the way, when your children are little, it's always good to have family worship, to start the day with the Word of God. Now, my wife and I have tried all kinds of things with our kids for family worship. I want to give you one of the simplest, easiest forms of family worship. I don't know why I didn't discover it a long time ago.

It is such a blessing. We just let somebody choose a proverb. One of the little children old enough to read are our grown child. Choose a proverb. And they take the Bible and choose a proverb. They can do it at random, or like sometimes they do, a book of proverbs is basically the same as the number of days in the month. Choose a proverb from that particular day. If it's the seventh, choose from the seventh chapter of proverbs. And read a proverb, just one, and let that child explain what he thinks that proverb means.

Then everybody else, just talk about it for a few moments. It is so simple. But what you're doing when those children are learning those proverbs and having to think about what it means, that is distilled wisdom. That is something that's just a nugget of truth that they can carry with them to school and to work. But what I'm trying to say is give them wise instruction, but let that instruction be joined with training. Train up a child. Now, I used to play football. I'll guarantee you one thing, friend, nobody ever learned how to play football by merely reading a book about it, right? You have to train to play football. You have to train to learn particular things. You ever watch a man train a dog, a hunting dog?

That is an amazing thing. You have to train a dog. I saw a man the other day, downtown, he had a dog on a leash, a little stick, he had a bird on a thing. I thought, my goodness, I wonder if he has any kids. I wonder what he does with his kids. If a man would spend that much time with his kid as he does with his dog, I don't know.

But probably that man ties his dog up at night and lets his kids run wild. Train. Train. Give instruction. Line upon line, precept upon precept.

The prime educational institution is the home. Did you know, sadly, we have a generation of kids today who don't even know right from wrong? They really don't. Josh McDowell said this, and he's talking about church kids.

Listen to this. According to his research, 57% of our young people cannot even say that an objective standard of truth exists. That's church kids. More than half of them don't even believe that there's a fixed standard of right and wrong. And 85% of our kids are liable to reason like this. Just because it's wrong for you doesn't mean that it is wrong for me. Over half, 55%, agree with this statement.

Everything in life is negotiable. There's in their mind no distinction between a fixed standard of right and wrong as given in the Ten Commandments. Let me ask you a question. How many of you think it's a disgrace that the Ten Commandments have been taken from the walls of America's schools and some are trying to remove them from public places?

Most of us would agree with that. Second question. How many of you have the Ten Commandments posted in your home? Don't answer that. It would be too embarrassing.

Third question. How many of you parents who grouse about your kids not being able to read the Ten Commandments in school know the Ten Commandments? There's some of you, if I were to pull you out and bring you up here, you couldn't name the Ten Commandments in order if I gave you a Ferrari. That's right.

You couldn't do it. All our kids need to know. Our kids don't know the difference between right and wrong.

How are they going to learn it if we do not give them wise instruction and that instruction is joined with training? Coming up Monday, we'll hear part two of this important message. Maybe today you have questions about who Jesus is or what he means to you, how to receive the forgiveness he's offering you right now. Go to our Discover Jesus page at lwf.org slash radio.

You'll find resources and materials that will answer questions you may have about your faith. Again, go to lwf.org slash radio and click Discover Jesus. Now, if you'd like to order a copy of today's message, call us at 1-877-LOVEGOD. The message title is Raising Kids That Count. This lesson is also part of the insightful Fortifying Your Family series. For that complete collection, all six powerful messages, call 1-877-LOVEGOD or order online at lwf.org slash radio.

Or you can write us at Love Worth Finding, Box 38600, Memphis, Tennessee 38183. Adrian Rogers said your kids will learn more from your lifestyle than they'll ever learn from your words. Take that wisdom with you today. And remember, if you'd like to start receiving daily devotions and links to our daily message programs, sign up for our daily heartbeat emails at lwf.org slash radio. And join us Monday for part two of Raising Kids That Count, right here on Love Worth Finding. As a pastor, teacher and author, Adrian Rogers had two great passions, introducing people to Jesus and encouraging believers toward a deep abiding love for God's word. He taught that Christians who are saturated in scripture are unstoppable. That's why we are so excited to announce that this summer, the Adrian Rogers Legacy Bibles will be in stock. Now featuring large print and red lettering, this new King James Version Bible includes sermon notes and treasures from the Love Worth Finding archives, as well as Adrianism and quotes in Pastor Rogers' unique style. It's our prayerful desire at Love Worth Finding that this Bible will draw you nearer to Jesus Christ, bringing you great joy and bringing glory to His name. To purchase your own Legacy Bible, call 1-877-LOVEGOD or order online at lwf.org slash radio.