Fearlessly Courageous
Desk of Dennis Piller
5/4/2022
The Reversing of Morality Part III Family
The second restraint that God has created to hold back the sins of mankind is family; While conscience is a personal restraint, family is a relational restraint. Family is the building block of society. Family is the building block of civilization. God has established the family to be a loving, truthful, exemplary place that restrains evil in the next generation.
An animal is born and it’s on its own in minutes or hours or a few days. Humans are born and they can’t even walk for a year or more. They’ve got to be carried around. It’s so important that they have strong relationships, bonds, love, and support. And then they don’t leave home until maybe late teenage years.
When a horse is born, it’s on its own right away. Why does God keep them embedded in a family for so long? Because they need to learn to be restrained because what has been born into that family is a new sinner that society has to deal with; a new-fallen creature that society has to deal with; a new heart that is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? That must be mitigated. That must be restrained. Barriers have to be set up.
I know that is a hard pill to swallow for the world at large. A baby? This innocent, defenseless infant. Sinful. A heart deceitful? (don't get hung up here). We must know this sin was passed down and it is the responsibility of a family to teach and train them in the ways they should go.
God gave us the way.
So the family becomes the divinely-given institution for the formation of restrained sinners…who by multi-generational morality and wisdom… with instruction and discipline in love, developed into good citizens who benefit others, enjoy God’s creation, and are thankful to Him. And when we don’t take our job, our mission seriously, look at what we get. We get the reversing of morality.
What is God’s design for family? Genesis 2:24, here it is: “A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they two shall become one flesh,” one man, one woman in a union for life; for life.
And what is the responsibility they have? To be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. Have babies, and children to produce families. It’s so foundational that God said, “I hate divorce.” What God has joined together, don’t let any man put asunder or separate. Sure, he allowed it under some circumstances but he knows it devastates society and shatters the family
and you see where that has led us.
The children of Israel are about to enter the promised land and Moses says to the families; “Here’s what God commands you. You, your sons, and your grandsons are to fear the Lord, keep all His statutes and His commandments which I command you all the days of your life, and that your days may be prolonged.”
That’s what a family’s for. Parents teach sons and grandsons, daughters and granddaughters the law of God; and they teach them to be obedient to His statutes and His commandments so they can live long lives.
Vs 4 “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. These words which I am commanding you today shall be on your heart.” Love for God, love for His commandments, love for His statutes; that’s what parents are to teach their children. “You shall teach them diligently to your sons –” verse 7 “– and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up.”
In other words, the commands of God and loving God, those things are to be on your lips all the time – standing up, sitting down, lying down, and walking.
That’s your constant conversation.
“You bind them as a sign on your hand,” Deut 6:8 which means you apply the Word of God to your work, “and they shall be as frontlets on your forehead.” You apply the Word of God to your thinking.
So, it’s what you say; it’s what you do; it’s what you think.
I see that I have some skin in reversing morality today. I know I feel a bit convicted about my performance as a father and husband. I have too often gotten life out of order with what God has ordained. My last child is heading off to college and I wish…I wish I had done more. I feel the weight of having done less, but He has also called me not to drown in the weight of my less-than-stellar days but to make a change today. To start a new day today. To pray for them. To let them see a change in me.
If there is one thing we know as children of God, it's that we serve a God of a second chance. A God of mercy and grace who lives to lead his children back under the wings of the almighty himself. Lord help me today to let your words change me into a better child of God.
Tomorrow let's look at how God set up the critical piece of honoring our parents and how that dynamic explodes into today's society.
Rescue Story Zach William
https://awesomechristianmusic.com/zach-williams/rescue-story
Excerpts are taken from John MacArthur's "How God Restrains Evil in the World"
