God's Purpose in Our Parenting - Psalm 127 - Mercy Hill

Praise God across all of our locations. Man, we just had, y'all, an incredible Kids' Week.

I don't know. I hope you had a chance to participate, but so many of us did. And it was just one of the best Kids' Week I've ever seen. Guys, it was the worst week of weather we've ever had in the world, okay, in the history of the world.

Verified, all right? So it was – I said, man, we should have themed the thing Noah's Ark. It just would have been the greatest object lesson, like, of all time. But man, resiliency, guys, with all of that going on, man, we did not skip a beat. Man, the volunteer teams of this church, unbelievable, rock solid. You guys put on an incredible program for so many kids, and the stories are rolling in. Guys, we saw different kids – we saw many kids place faith in Christ. We saw one where the seeds were planted last year, and as God would have it, it was the same leader that got a chance to talk to her again this year, and that child put her faith in Christ this year. We had – this was cool – we had one situation where we had three generations of the same family serving at one of the campuses, grandparents, parents, and kids all serving together. We had one story come in of an adopted child in our church, young child with Down syndrome, not my child, okay, there's a different adopted child with Down, and, you know, she's not very verbal, and she's just kind of learning sign language, which I understand that very well, and after the second day of Kids Week, they say, how is it going, and she signs music – I'm going to cry – music, hat, good. Okay, and I mean, I just like, I mean, for me, and what we, you know, and what we face, and what Faith Ann faces, that was just a story that blessed my heart. Guys, gospel seeds were planted, and children were saved. We had one kid, we had one child save up all of their money from Christmas till now to give to the missionary family, that we had no one that was coming at Kids Week. Now, whether that was because of the mission field or because they wanted to see the other leader get slimed, like you saw in the video, I'm not totally sure, but I think it probably is because God's getting a hold of their heart, and it's the mission endeavor. Hey, over 600 people served, over 900 kids attended, so let's praise God for that. Hey, it was the highest attendance we've ever had.

So many people stepped off the sideline on the front line. I could talk about it for days, and we will continue to talk about it, but just an unbelievable week that we have had together. If you have a copy of Scripture, I want to invite you to take it out and turn with me to Psalm 127, all right? And here's the deal. I look back over my notes. This is a sermon that I'm just going to do like every three or four years, okay?

This is just going to have to be one. It's going to have to be a passage that we do, and I was looking back, and it's funny because every three or four years, it feels like some of these passages that shape our ministry so much, I just get a huge burden for, and a fire begins to burn in me, and I'm like, man, we've got to talk about this stuff again. There are passages that shape the ministry philosophy of this church, and I know that some of you guys might be brand new.

You might say, man, I don't even know what that is. Let me tell you what that means, okay? The Bible is equally inspired. Every bit of it is inspired by God, we believe, okay? But that doesn't mean that every single line of it shapes the ministry philosophy of the church.

If you want to check me on that, just go randomly read through the book of Leviticus, okay? It's like, man, how is that, you know, it's inspired by God, it's useful, it shows us things about Christ, but there are passages that we understand are for the shaping of the way that we will go about ministry. All right, so like for example, at Mercy Hill, you're going to hear us say a lot of things about dreaming big for the kingdom. That's because Ephesians 3.20 tells us that God is able to do more than we can ask or imagine.

We say that a lot around here. We talk about serving. Man, Jesus didn't die to create spectators, okay? He died to create servants not spectators, workers not watchers. So we'll reference Romans 12.6 a lot, having gifts that differ, use them. We'll talk a lot about Revelation 5.9 or Revelation 7. Man, at this church, it's all tribes, tongues, nations, or busts. If it's about gathering some big thing, no, no, it's about the peoples of the earth and us sending out our best in order to reach them. There are passages, in other words, that shape the ministry philosophy of our church, and one of those passages is Psalm 127. And Psalm 127 begins by telling us the interplay between our work and God's work, which is one of the ways that I talk to our staff about this, that we work hard, but God is always the one that is working. We watch, but God is always the one that is watching. But the context of Psalm 127 is in building the home. It's in building children.

And here's what I want to talk about this weekend. God has a purpose in our parenting for His glory. Parents are arrow shapers. That's what we do. We shape arrows that are meant to be loosed for the kingdom of God, for the glory of God, for the mission of God.

You know, if you go to the store and you read a bunch of parenting books, I promise you what you're going to find is you're going to find books that will line the wall, and every one of them, listen to me, is telling you how to raise a kid. We have to start with a better question. Why are we raising them?

Because if we don't know why, the how doesn't matter. If you said to me, Andrew, I want you to build a vehicle, I would have to say, well, what's it going to do? Well, what is it? No, no, just build a vehicle. Well, what do you want it to do? Do you want it to fly? Do you want it to climb mountains?

Do you want it to go really fast? Like the why shapes everything about the how and the what. And Psalm 127 shows us the why. Parents, we are raising children to be mature disciples who are useful for God and His mission and His glory. We are raising worshippers. We are raising givers. We are raising goers. That's what arrow shaping is all about.

This is what it's about for us. You know, I understand this from the world, you know, because the world's perspective, I guarantee you the world's perspective around Christians is like, man, why are you guys so uptight about the kids and why is it so much, you know, it almost feels a little bit like indoctrination. I could see somebody saying, man, you guys indoctrinate your kids. Well, yeah.

Okay. I mean, the world is trying to indoctrinate them. Man, every child here is being shaped by a worldly philosophy. Of course, we want to train them in godliness. We raise kids.

We train kids. Here's why we're so uptight. And if you're not a believer, I hope you'll hear this with grace for me, but I'm going to tell you, if you're looking in from the outside and you're like, man, why are you all so uptight about the way you think about raising kids and the intentionality that you bring to it? I'm going to tell you why. Because we have seen from the scripture that we are raising them for more than the American dream.

That's why. Nice kids with a nice job that have nice kids that have nice jobs is too low of a bar. We're not raising kids to attain a nice life. We're raising kids who will one day consciously decide to give their lives away. And if you're going to do that, it don't happen by accident.

If you're going to raise that type of child, it doesn't happen by accident. It happens by an immense amount of intentionality as we swing the hammer and God is working behind us as we work and God works. It's the only way that we, you know, that's the way that we are called to do it.

It's the way that we are called to see it happen. You know, I was thinking about this the other day. I read this story about, you know, samurai, samurai swords, samurai warriors, this kind of thing. You know, the samurai defended Japan for a thousand years or whatever it was.

Okay. I don't know all the history of it, but here's what I know. The sword was defending the nation. The sword was the greatest tool in the nation. The sword was their life.

The sword was all this stuff. Do you know in modern day terms, it takes 15 men six months of full-time work to make one samurai sword? If you want to make it the right way, listen to me. If you want to make one that just hangs on the wall, mass produce it, you can buy it at any flea market. In fact, I could take you to the booth. Okay. If you want just one that you're going to hang up, that you can just do, you know, it's just for show or whatever, mass produce it, doesn't matter. If you want to make one that the nation, the balance of the nation is going to hang on the edge of that sword, 15 guys six months of full-time work. That's how serious it is. Here's why. The why determines the how.

What its purpose is going to be. The reason that it's here determines how much intentionality is going to take to shape. And so for us, if we realize together today in Psalm 127, man, that God has given us these kids, man, not for our ego, not to create great little ball players.

Okay. Not that they would be liked or that we would be like. God has given us these kids in order to raise for his mission.

I mean, 15 people, six months of work for one sword. What kind of intentionality should we be talking about for our children in our home and the children of this church? Listen. And I know a lot of us in here are like, man, I don't have kids. Well, we are a family, the family of God. There were 900 there over, over well over 900 kids that came to kids week this week.

Many of them might come back for the very first time. Like we have a responsibility. Every single one of us has a responsibility to think about the church as a family. How can we pour into raising up these little arrows that are in our midst? Psalm 127.

Here's what it says. Song of a sense of Solomon, but here's the scripture part. Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.

Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest eating the bread of anxious toil for he gives to his beloved sleep. Now let me just talk about a few things as we go through here that is all going to kind of push us to understand something I think about godly parenting and raising kids on the heels of kids week.

Alright. Here's the first thing that I think that we see in this. Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. So what it means is, this is the interplay, that God is building and we are building.

Did you catch that? He's got to build it, but those who are building it will labor in vain if he's not building it. This is an interplay that Christians have got to understand in many areas of their life, and here's a good way to say it. We swing the hammer, but God builds the house. We swing the hammer, but God builds the house. One of the things I think for parenting or for other things we can get into here, and I'm not a motivational speaker, I've never tried my hand out, although I might like to at some point in my life, okay?

Never tried it. This is a bit of a motivational speech, is what I think that we need here when we understand, wait a minute, God builds the house, but we are swinging the hammer. My question is, in different areas of your life, this is an easy question, but I mean it's hard to answer, but it's pretty straightforward. Like, are we getting after it? Like, yes in parenting, I understand that. But I also just mean in building, in our labor. Man, are we getting after what God has for us in this life? I think Christians work from a different perspective than the rest of the world, and it should show up in the way that we work. Man, Christians should be the hardest working people. Why? Because we work from a better motivation.

Watch the world. The world's motivation for hard work and getting after it, getting up early, man, getting your day going, thinking about health, thinking about finances, trying to grow your own leadership, the way the world try to motivate us in that is from fear of failure, which works for a little while. Might work for some people for a long time. But if you also look around the world, what you're going to see is you keep motivating people with the fear of failure, and sometimes look around our culture, a lot of people just internalize that and decide that's who they are, that they've failed, that they're a failure. It's not the right motivation. The right motivation for us is not the fear of failure. This is counterintuitive. The right motivation for us is that the Lord builds the house, that while we are swinging the hammer and giving it everything we've got, ultimately, it's not actually on our shoulders.

That's countercultural to the world. What the world wants to say is, load it up and feel like it's all on you, and then you'll go really fast. Then you'll work really hard. I think what the Scripture's telling us in Psalm 127 is, no, no, no, no. If you can understand that you labor and yet God is the one who labors behind you, and He's got to blow upon the sails that you are lifting, He's got to fill the jars that you are building, then suddenly the pressure for me to succeed or fail is a little bit off, and now I'm actually free to run after things that God has put in my heart, because whether I succeed or fail is not going to change one bit of the way that He feels about me in Christ. It's not going to change the fact that I'm a son or daughter that is highly favored.

It's not going to change those things. So go for it. Right? So get after it. Man, let's get after it with our health.

Swing the hammer. You know, I think about, you know, I remember, I don't know when I saw this a couple years ago. I can't remember exactly the reference.

I don't know if it was a commercial or something. It caught my attention, though, because the concept was, imagine that you're 16 years old and your parents give you a brand new car for your 16th birthday. Okay? Didn't happen to me.

I got a 1992 two-door teal-colored little Chevy kind of thing. Okay? They bought for $700.

Okay? So, but I'm just saying, imagine that you, you know, you were able to, it was called a Cavalier. That's what it was. It couldn't come to me. You know, imagine you get a brand new car, but here's the catch. Somebody says to you, okay, you get this brand new car, right? But this is the only car you're ever going to have for your whole life. You never get to trade it in. You never get to change it. It's brand new.

It's nice. But this is the only one you got. Do you think you would ever miss an oil change?

You don't get to trade your body in. You get one, right? Man, are we getting after it with our help? Are we getting after it with our financial plans? Are we swinging the hammer? Are we going for it? Is our house in order? Man, in this church, we have had well over 300 people in the last few years go through Financial Peace University. That's actually who went through the class on our campus.

We've had hundreds and hundreds more sign up for Ramsey Plus. I'm not saying Financial Peace is the be-all, end-all of everything in finance. Please understand. Great principles, though, especially gives us a roadmap if we don't have one, right? So it's like, man, are we thinking, are we swinging the hammer? Sometimes I think Christians get the reputation of, well, the Lord builds the house, so it doesn't really rest on me. That's the wrong way to think about it.

The wrong way, the right way to think about it is, yes, the Lord builds the house. I don't have to feel fear of failure. I'm going to run hard. I'm going to go after it in all these areas of my life.

Man, I'm going to go as hard as I can. I think about this. Are you swinging the hammer to grow your own personal leadership in your home, in your business, on the floor of the hospital wing, among your team? Man, who is mentoring you?

What books are you reading? These are real questions to figure out. Man, are we trying to swing the hammer? I think sometimes Christians want to say, man, ambition is evil. Ambition is evil, really? David wanted to build the house of the Lord. Paul said, man, I make it my ambition to get to Rome. Man, the Bible is filled with ambitious people. What we need to think about is ambition to the glory of God.

Man, that creates a human that is absolutely on fire and unleashed for his kingdom, and I want that for us. I want it for my own kids. You know, I think about this in their life. I want to teach them to get after it. One of the ways I want to teach them that is when they see something in the world. So like if they see a house, this big mansion-like house or something like that, man, I don't want to say to them, well, that's for somebody else. What I want to say to them is, hey, man, the only thing standing between you and that is how hard you work and how you grow your personal leadership.

But then I say this, hey, but if you had a house like that, exactly how many city projects would you house, city project students would you house every summer? You know what I'm saying? They'll see a big truck or something like that. And me and Benaiah, we love to look at the big trucks on the road, okay? I'm talking Ford F-350, Chevy 3500, jacked up, dually, you know, smokestack rolling coal, okay?

That's what I'm talking about. And he'll see a truck like that and I say, hey, man, the only thing standing between you and that, how hard you work and how you grow your personal leadership. But let me ask you a question, dude.

You get a truck like that and somebody needs to borrow it to move, what are you going to do? Are you going to use it for the kingdom? Are you going to allow it to be used, the things that God is giving you? I want to push them to have an ambition to get after and even dream. Men have dreams. We're supposed to swing the hammer, but never forget that it is the Lord that is standing over us.

We don't work from a fear of failure. And this applies to parenting as well, guys, that's what we're going to get into here. Listen, it is in vain that you rise early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious soil, for he gives to his beloved sleep. Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord.

The fruit of the womb, a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver full of them.

He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies at the gate or in the gate. Y'all, we swing the hammer, but God builds the house. This is, I think, the implication of what it's saying in verse 2. So why would we worry about outcomes? Like if we swing, but it's really on God to build, if we watch but God is the one that is watching, then why would we worry? Trusting that God is at work relieves our, quote, anxious toil. Listen, I know there are physical components to that. I know that as good as anybody, okay? And I understand that there are spiritual components to this. I mean, the spiritual side of this is that we need to lean in to the idea of God's sovereignty. He is working.

He is watching. I don't need you to raise hands in here if I say, hey, how many of us are dealing with something now or have very shortly that are dealing with something that is very hard or making us worry or making us anxious? Like I don't have to ask you to raise your hand.

I mean, every one of us, if we're honest, would be like, man, I probably struggle with that in some way. I don't know what you might be dealing with. Man, are you dealing with a scary financial situation? How good is it to know today He is always watching, He is always working.

Man, you're dealing with something crazy with your health or your parents' health. He is always working. He is always watching. Maybe you're in the midst of loss.

Think about a miscarriage or I think about failed adoptions that have happened in our church and it's hard. But you know what? He's always working and He's always watching and it can help relieve the anxious toil that we have. Man, God has a good plan for us.

I don't know exactly what happens tomorrow, but I know what happens in the end and the game is rigged. He's always working. He's always watching. I thought about this at Kids' Week. I saw this picture. I don't know if you guys can see this picture. So the kids are outside doing water day.

I was like, guys, the whole thing is a water day with the rain. Anyway, now you can see these are the security team. And what are they doing? They're watching. I love our security team at Mercy Hill.

I mean, the bigger and burlier and bearded more the better. I love these guys. Security team, they never miss a leg day. They miss a few cardio days, okay? I'm going to be honest with you, all right?

But they don't miss a leg day, okay? But I think about that and I think, like, how good is it for those of you that are parents here? We had a few people comment on this that aren't part of our church. Some of them even from out of town or whatever. We had a few people comment on, man, it's like, hey, these guys are always walking around. They're watching. It's really, man, my kids feel safe and all of that.

And man, we work as hard as we can at that. I saw that picture and I thought, how good does it make me feel to know that these guys are watching the road, they're watching if anybody's walking around, they're making sure the kids are okay in the parking lot. Okay, well then how much better does it make us feel to know that God is watching them? He is watching them. He works, he watches.

And he's watching our prized possession. Look at verse 3. Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb, a reward.

Man, this is one of those things that sometimes, listen, if you're a mom, if you're a dad, you've got young kids, we've got people at this church that got three or four kids under five, six years old, some of these things you've got to take on faith, okay? They are a blessing, okay? They are a heritage.

And sometimes we're in the midst of something hard and it's like we've got to remember this and I want to lean into this here for just a minute, but it is. These children are a blessing, they're a heritage. Man, they are a legacy.

They are the ones that prolong and continue on with the things that we even start as a church family. It is going to be theirs. I mean, I think about, I mean, I'm going to move on, we're going to move on, all of us are going to move on.

What will be left? Man, these children are a blessing. They are a heritage. Now I want to say this because I understand. You start talking about kids being a blessing and a heritage, it brings some stuff up and it does. Man, in our church there is the agony of infertility, I know that. Man, there are people that have experienced, our family did, there's people that have experienced miscarriages, there's been failed adoptions. Man, there's people that are thinking, man, I thought marriage would have happened and all of that and it didn't and we don't have kids.

And man, in some ways I understand those things, some things I don't, but I can empathize the best that I can with it. I just want to say this, I know there is hurt around these things, but I also know that we can't stay in that hurt. We've got to realize there are kids in this church all over the place that we have an opportunity to shape. And I pray, and that doesn't mean we're giving up on a dream, it doesn't mean we're not begging God for the children to come into our home.

I saw it this week. Y'all, we have a single woman that was a resident here at Mercy Hill years ago and I knew some of this story, she's in line. Single woman in her thirties, God called her off the sideline. Y'all, she has adopted three little girls, didn't have a home. She's adopted them and she's fostering another one now. And so, I mean, I'm single, I don't have a place. Maybe you do have a place. Man, there are foster kids in our community, especially ones that are a little bit older that would die to have a home. If you want to step off the sideline into that, I want to give you guys an email. Man, Travis heads up our chosen ministries.

I want to make sure that you have his email. At the very least, I also want to make sure that you are thinking about raising spiritual children. You know, whether you have kids or not, what are the spiritual children that you have? We have people in our church, man, maybe they're married, maybe they don't have kids, maybe they're even a little bit older. You know what they're doing?

They're pouring into Kids at Hope Academy. Man, they're thinking about how can I be one that serves in the pregnancy network? Because at the pregnancy network, you've got to understand what we're doing is not just saving kids from abortion, what we are trying desperately to do is link up with families and mentors.

This is the type of thing that we're trying to do, and walking with people through that pregnancy and after that pregnancy. Maybe you might want to do that. Again, you can email Travis, okay?

His email is about to come up a few times here, okay? So I think about that. Maybe you want to jump into one of the mentor situations that we have. I want you to understand, we're working with DSS so closely now with working with families who are either in danger of or who have lost children in the foster care system or trying to get them back. They're being paired up now with families from our church to mentor them.

Are you kidding me? Email Travis Suits again, okay? You guys can do that. Young married, adoption, is adoption a conversation in your home?

You guys can email him as well. Children are a blessing. Let's jump off the sideline. Every one of us, not just the ones of us that have kids in the church, like arrows in the hand of a mighty warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them.

Now, I have never seen a church take a passage of scripture more literally than this idea of a quiver full, okay? I see the vans and the kids are just piling out, all right, at Mercy Hill. It's awesome, okay? But you know, there's a bunch of them here and that's a ministry that has continued to steadily grow and we praise God for that. So here's what we've got to say. For all of us here, for the young parents, for those of us that are grandparenting to the glory of God, you are uncling and anting to the glory of God, okay? You're jumping in with kids ministry here to the glory of God. Here's what we've got to understand today. We have a culture that doesn't even want kids to play with bows and arrows and a Bible that calls them arrows.

Now, how do we square that? There has got to be a stark difference between the bubble wrapping of kids in a secular culture and the risk and resilience that has to be instilled in a child who is going to be a believer and follow Jesus in our cultural climate in our Babylon. There's got to be a difference in the way that we parent from the way the world parents.

And I see it in such a blessing form all the time. I think there is a difference. I'm seeing parents all over this church who are refusing to give in to kind of the cultural idea that these kids need to have helicopter, hovering, bubble wrap, never take risk. All that matters is their safety and their comfort and their happiness. Now, we're seeing, I think, a movement away from that to realize these kids need a backbone that's instilled early. They need discipline. They need the things that the Bible teaches in terms of wisdom. Listen, if all you're after is the American dream, nice kids with a decent amount of money that have nice kids, go for it.

Knock yourself out. There's probably a thousand ways to raise a kid like that. But if we're trying to raise kids that are willing to give their life away, it's a different thing.

There's going to need to be risk and resilience. I would say it like this. Christians should raise risky and resilient kids for God's mission.

And this is countercultural. It's a little bit hard. Listen, if we're going to pray for kids in this church, which I do regularly and I hope that you do, if we're going to see 500 missionaries sent from one church, many of them were attending, not serving at, Kids Week this week.

Okay, so just think about that. They were here. They were running the halls. They were causing trouble.

Okay? That, too, is going to end up being the ones that go. If we are praying for them to go to the mission field, we're going to have to be okay with them scraping their knees climbing mountains, right? If we're going to pray for them to be a light in the darkness, then we're going to have to be okay with them understanding how to navigate school and working through problems that they're having and working through situations and not having us swoop in every time and save them. I've been walking through that a little bit right now with our kids, like, man, trying not to just swoop in immediately, save them from consequences of things that they're doing.

Man, think about this. If we're going to pray that they share the gospel, then we're going to have to be upfront with them that Jesus saved them because they're a sinner. You understand what I mean? We're going to have to be real about the sin that they are committing and talk to them about that. We can't raise a child, little Johnny thinks he never made a mistake.

Well, why does he need the gospel? Right? Like, we're going to have to be serious about these things. In a culture that wants to bubble wrap kids, we've got to teach them to be thick-skinned, focused, driven, useful tools in the hand of a mighty warrior because that's what an arrow is. And sometimes that means we're going to have to let them take risk and pain and work things out.

And the small things and the big things, this is funny, the other day we're sitting around, a couple of us are sitting around at the barn by the fire and Benaiah comes running up to me and Benaiah's like, Dad, we got a problem. We got a yellow jacket's nest over there in the railroad tie and I don't want it to get faith in. Okay, what's your plan? Well, here's the plan.

Me and AP, we got it worked out. All right, we're going to go over there. We're going to flip up the railroad tie. I'm going to shake up a Coke can. We're going to throw it right on top and he's going to shoot it with the BB gun. Boom. He's like, man, what do you think? I said, man, that is an excellent plan. That is a great, great plan. I'm going to be honest with y'all, it didn't end well.

It didn't end well. But I thought about it and I'm like, man, these guys are taking some initiative. They're taking some effort.

They want to save their baby girl. I'm like, man, y'all go for it. Create a memory.

Make a story. I mean, you're going to have a few scars from it. But this is the idea. If we're going to raise arrows, you understand. Man, I just want us to see like, guys, we're going to have to raise the toughest kids in this generation of Christians.

I mean, if they're going to keep the faith, right? And so let's start blowing some of this down. Here's what I'm going to call you to do from Psalm 127. Parent for God's glory by shaping kids for His purpose. Okay, let's go all the way back to the intro.

What was the intro? The why shapes the how. Without the why, we don't really understand the how.

But here's the deal, and this is leadership 101. If you're not conscious of it, the how will gobble up the why in about two seconds. Why? Because how is easy. I mean, we can all write a book on how. It's like, well, do this, do this, do this, do this.

Here's 700 things about how, and boom. Well, the how will gobble up the why like that. The why is the deep stuff. The why is the hard things to fight through and to think about. But the why is as clear as day. Man, with a strong why, we can do anything. With a strong why, we can raise resilient kids.

And here's the why. God's purpose for us in raising kids is not small. It's not the American dream. It's not for them to be our best friends. It's not for them to be well accomplished. It's not for them to be well adjusted and to be like all good things, not the why. Man, it's not for them to be really good at a sport.

It's not for them to get great grades in their EOGs. What we say at Mercy Hill is this. Man, God has made us for more, right?

You've heard me say it a million times. God has made us for more than... He's made your kids for more than straight A's in soccer. He's made you for more than promotions and possessions. We are made for more than this. The why is deeper than that. This is the why, that they would be arrows in the hand of a mighty warrior, that we would be the ones to loose them into the world so that they would glorify God in every endeavor. And in so doing, they would further the mission with their life, that they would move the needle. That's the why.

It's different than what the world tells us. And I think that we should have an extreme motivation in this. Y'all, God is calling us to raise arrows that we will loose for His kingdom. Is that not, in a sense, what He has done for us, not in the raising part, but in the loosing part? I mean, did God not, did God the Father not knock the arrow of His Son and send Him into the world for you and I? I mean, in our sin, we were separated from God deserving of nothing but hellfire, but God stepped in for us, and what did He do? What does John 3.16 tell us? That He gave His only begotten Son, right? That's what He did for us.

I was reminded of the old song that I grew up on. God sent His Son. They called Him Jesus. He came to love, heal, and forgive. He lived and died to buy my pardon. An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives. And you guys know the refrain, some of you, if you grew up in this type of tradition, because He lives, I can face tomorrow.

I want to add another refrain to this, although it doesn't rhyme, okay? Because He lives, I can do for others what God did for me. I can send my sons and daughters out to reach others for God's mission.

Can we do that today? Listen, because that's what He did for me. What is the motivation here for us to raise them?

Why would we want to honor God with everything in our life, honor Him even with our children, our most prized possession? It is because that is exactly what He did for me. I needed someone to come for me. God sent His Son to take my sin, to die upon a cross is the penalty not for what He did, but for what I did. He took what I deserved. In His resurrection He offers me the newness of life. We can trust this God.

He sent His Son for us while we send our children for Him and His glory and His mission. Now, I want to give you two practical things, all right? And I've been trying hard to stay in my time for my sermon time and all that, but that is just a little bit out the window this weekend, okay? And I really don't care, all right?

Not that I do care in general, but not this weekend, all right? So the first thing I want to say is this, and I've already said it a few different ways. We shape arrows for a specific purpose. Now, I've said this a few different ways, but I'm going to try to summarize it a little bit here, okay? We got to start with the end in mind. Now, I don't know what you want to do with this, but I want you to think about parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles, if you can help with this, be involved with this, but here's what I want you to think about.

Parents of this church, man, what are you ... What type... What are going to be the marks of the child later that you look back on and you're like, man, that's what I was trying to do? Or is it just happening passively? I mean, I don't know if you guys have realized this or not, but virtually nothing really, really, really awesome in life happens passively. It's like, man, what are we trying to do? This is just... Listen, I've got a little culture doc, feeble. It's a feeble little culture thing for our family, okay? But my mind thinks like this. You may not think like this. This is not a guilt thing that you're supposed to go do something like this, okay? This is just me. But it's trying to get my little mind to remember what I'm trying to do with these kids. This is the way that I flesh out.

What does an arrow look like for me? Well, they know how to shake hands and look somebody in the eye. They exhibit the highest EQ that they are capable of. They're well read. They're politically competent. They're financially pretty smart. They're tough. They're physically and mentally as healthy as they can be. That's within their hands.

Man, they're biblically knowledgeable. They're passionate for the nations and they're heartbroken over fatherlessness. They don't make excuses. They're joyful and they're humorous. They're a head down hard worker. They're comfortable being outside and working hard.

Their family bonds are the tightest on earth and they dream big without putting limitations around what God can do through them and they look out for the weak. Now, listen, I have no idea what comes to your mind when you think arrow. That's just what comes to my mind. My point is, what if we put some work into thinking about for us, what are we trying to do? Let's start with the end in mind. Now, I think about this with my kids and trust me, I'm not there yet.

Not with them or me. Okay, like I'm not there yet. I know they're not there yet.

This is all a work in progress. How are we going to get there? We're going to get there through word taught life caught. We're going to get there through discipleship. We're going to get there through taking advantage of time in the car with stories and working out life issues with them. We're going to get there from reading scripture and pushing them to memorize key verses and we're going to get there by having key texts that they're going to read both that are Christian and just leadership and good wisdom from even worldly authors. We're going to have that built into them before they graduate high school. We're going to take them to see the nations. We're going to sit with them in tough situations. We're going to take them into things where they're a little bit fearful and don't understand. Last week I was at a conference in New Orleans.

It's June in New Orleans. Okay? And I'm like, man, we're taking the kids.

I want the older three. They've never been to a city like this. I want them to see it. I want them to understand it.

I mean, I got my kids out there walking down Berman Street in the daylight. Okay? But I want them to understand. And what am I doing? And man, I'm right in their ear the whole time talking about poverty, talking about gentrification, talking about what God actually desires from a city, talking about how culture flows downhill from cities.

Man, just talking about all of this stuff, talking about drug abuse, talking about alcoholism, talking about everything that they're seeing and experiencing and trying to get them to understand God's heart for the city and the people of big cities like this. Man, I'm just trying to give us some handles here. Okay? I'm not, man, I don't, there's a million things that I could be doing.

There's probably many of you that are doing it better. Okay? I'm just trying to give us some handles here to think about how we can try to raise and shape these arrows because this is what we are called to do. I got an illustration here. I've used this illustration a few different times.

I'll probably, again, it's one of those things that I want to use. Now I want to show you guys a picture of what happens instead of doing it. We tried to do it a different way last time. Here's the point of the illustration.

Some of you have seen this in business circles and all that. All right? If you take the little rocks of your life and you put those in first, they will crowd out the big rocks. Little rocks are baseball. They're vacations.

Some of you guys disagree with this. They're your kid's grades. Okay? Those are actually little rocks. Big rocks are walking with Jesus, discipleship, community.

I mean, if you're trying to raise an arrow, that is. Okay? Now, if you're letting all these little rocks go in first and this is what is actually consuming all the time, this is what you end up with. I'm going to show you guys a picture. That's what happens. The little rocks go in first and the big rocks, you can see, they don't have a place to go.

Now, if you start thinking instead the other way and you're like, hey, in our family, this is how we're going to shape arrows. Man, kid's week goes in first. And I don't mean even going.

My kids this year, I think, my two older kids, I think, honestly, before God, were more shaped by serving than they were attending. Just FYI. Okay? Student camp.

That's a big rock. You know? Hey, family discipleship, four times a week, once a day, 15 minutes. I don't know how to disciple my kids. Okay. Here, I'm going to tell you how. All right?

You read a chapter of the Bible and you pray with them. That's it. Okay? So, I mean, in terms of like, man, in terms of a fan, that's not the end all be all for discipleship, but in terms of a devotion, that's really what it is.

Read the Bible, talk about what it means, pray, 15 minutes. Okay? So that's one. You guys understand, right? Man, taking your kid on a mission trip before they're out of high school so that they can see something other than what we see here.

These are the big rocks. Man, the weekend services. Ain't no reason to miss a sermon.

None. That don't mean you got to be there. If you're not, man, if you're on vacation or whatever, there's this little thing now called the internet and Google. Okay? And it's YouTube and all the stuff's on. I mean, we don't miss. We're going to hear. If these things go in first, then listen, it's fine. If you want to do all the baseball, all the baseball stuff, you know, all the things that we have going on in our life, these things then go in top. And what ends up happening is, I really believe this, that God ends up multiplying our time. Man, I see some of the highest capacity people that you could imagine in this church. And I really think the secret sauce is they put the big rocks in and then they put the little rocks in. And that's really all, in a lot of ways, that's all that comes to it.

Hey, the second thing I want to say is this in terms of practical. Guys, and this is directly for the parents, okay? Some of you are like, man, I'm not a parent. Maybe you will be or maybe you can help a parent with this in a community group because you probably sit with some of them.

We will not lose an arrow if we have not learned to lose other things first. Man, if we can't give our time, do you think we can give our kids? If we haven't practiced giving ourselves away financially, do you think when the time comes we'll give away our kids to the mission? Do you have any stories I've heard about people who have been deeply hurt because God called them into ministry and their parents reacted with anger because they were supposed to be this or that or make this amount of money or whatever?

They want to go on city project. They want to be in, you know, go on a mission trip for two years and the parents are just kind of, well, what is the deal? Well, I mean, I don't know, but if I had to guess, I'd be like, well, yeah, you just didn't practice losing other things in your life like God told you to. So now it comes to the one thing that you care about the most and you ain't got a prayer about this not being something. Do you know other parents, man, when their kids are like, hey, I want to go on this trip, it is like one of the deepest joys in their life.

What's the difference there? Man, they learn to lose other things. Y'all, we love our kids. Man, we don't trust anybody else with our kids the way that we do. I was thinking about this the other day, you know, the COVID is kind of over and now all of a sudden all the playplaces are back hopping again and Faith Ann's little enough so she's play place. Every single kid in the Chick-fil-A play place needs a spanking.

Okay, you know, is that not true? I mean, you could pick up any one of them and spank them and just say, this is either for what you were doing now or what you did a few minutes ago, okay? I mean, now, but, but we don't do that, right? Like you don't pick up somebody else's kid and why? Because you wouldn't want somebody picking your kid up, why? Because I don't trust somebody else with my kid. I don't trust them with discipline, I don't trust them with instilling vision.

I don't trust some school to teach them about sexuality for the first time. Like that's, you know, I mean, some of that's good, right? But then it comes to the Lord. How do, I mean, they, it's our best prized possession.

It's hard to even trust him with them. We practice that by our giving of our time and our talent and our treasure. So when the time comes, we can lose the arrow for the God given purpose and destiny and calling that he has put in every single one of their lives. So it's decision time, all right? And the decision before us is this, are we going to let the why drive the how? The why? And the why arrow God's glory, his mission.

Now I'm going to start building towards that. Christian, you're never more countercultural than when you parent with the end in mind because you know what you end up doing? Our culture's mantra is give them space to figure out who they are and then affirm that. That's not what the Bible says. The Bible says we train kids because in the heart of a child is bound up foolishness. What they need is to be trained in what God has for them and the path of wisdom.

And that's not for some dictator that's a long way away. It happens to be the plan from the God who created them. And if he created them and wants what's best for them then them following wisdom and being trained as an arrow to be shot out, it is the greatest thing in the world for them. Man, for their joy, for their relationship with God, for their fullness in this life, are we willing to sharpen them, shape them and send them as arrows that God has intended them to be? Let's pray. Father, we come before you right now and Lord, this is a heavy sermon. God, I know that and I just pray, Lord, that your grace will be on it and God, I pray that there will be some folks in our midst who will come to Decision Point today in terms of raising their kids on purpose for your mission and for your glory. And Lord, I pray that my family would be first among them, God, to take this wisdom and put it into our home. And God, I pray that you would just change the way that we parent and grandparent and uncle and aunt and serving kids and think about Hope Academy and the Pregnancy Network. God, teach us that these kids are a blessing and a heritage, that every one of us has a hand in shaping. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.