In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of understanding and mastering our will. He quotes missionary Hudson Taylor, who said that God always gives His best to those who leave the choice to Him. However, leaving the choice to God is not always easy. The speaker highlights the power of our will and how it can either devastate or bless our lives. He also discusses the three virtues that parents should impart to their children: obedience, discipline, and self-control. The sermon emphasizes the consequences of not yielding our will and the importance of teaching children to be obedient and under control.

Isaiah chapter 7, verses 13 through 16, one phrase, when we get done, I'll point out. And he said, Hear ye now, O house of David, is it a small thing for you to weary men? But will you weary my God also? Therefore, the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Emmanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings. I want you to notice in verse 15, the phrase that says, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. We're going to focus on that for a few minutes this morning. That he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this special day. As we have dedicated this day for your glory and honor, and as Mark and Sherry are going to dedicate Hudson Taylor this morning. Hudson Taylor Thompson, to your glory and to your honor. And as a church, as we focus in on this whole time, I pray that in these next few minutes, that the spirit of God would just move amongst us. That our hearts would be challenged. That we'd be blessed by your presence. We thank you now in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. As I thought about what I was going to share, and Mark's going to come up in a few minutes. The Papa's going to come up and share a little bit. Give us a little teaching lesson on this. But as I sought the Lord, it's like the Lord was saying, a gift, a gift. And as I meditated and thought on this, I thought about what's one of the greatest gifts that a parent can give to his child. And that's what we're going to focus on. I think one of the greatest gifts that we can give our children is the area of understanding their will and having control over their will. This area can devastate a life and cripple a life if the will is not understood and not mastered. And that's what raising children is about. Hudson Taylor, the missionary Hudson Taylor, and this one may be a missionary too, a missionary on the making. But the missionary Hudson Taylor said, God always gives His best to those who leave the choice to Him. And I've used that statement many times and thought about it. God always gives His best to those who leave the choice to Him. But leaving that choice to Him is not always easy. Of all the things that God has given us, the gift of our will is one of the most powerful. That God gives us actually being made in His image. I think this is where it's put together. The ability to refuse and to choose. The ability to refuse and choose. And we know Adam and Eve, they were given that ability in Genesis 2, I think it was. He said, but, they had a choice. But, if I mark that, I was going to read you what God said specifically. In 16, the Lord God commanded the man saying, Of every tree of the garden that thou mayest freely eat, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. For in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Now, God loved them and He loved us. But He gives us that ability, that choice. When the prodigal son, and he wasn't, you know, when we get to heaven, he may not like being called that. All the way through eternity. So, he may want to correct us on that. But when he came to his father, when the son came to his father, he was making a choice that would appear to be an evil choice, right? He was raised, I believe, not to make that choice. But he made a wrong choice. And we make wrong choices too. And when he came back, he had a soft heart. I was studying about him from a little book I have, Thomas Watson, On Repentance. He came back, he had a soft heart. But guess who had the hard heart? And if you think about which one of those two sons was the godly son? It was the one with the soft heart. And the circumstances of that son coming back with his soft heart showed the heart of the other son and these things. But that father had two sons. And one chose evil. And then he repented and he came back. There are three. Jana made me a cord. We went to the Smithsonian. I think it was the history area where they had hands-on history. She's a hands-on kid. And she, this morning, whipped me up a cord, a rope. She made one there, didn't you? And we couldn't find it. So, she made me one. Is this a new one? She made me a new one. It's a three-fold cord. And, of course, we know the more cords there are to a rope. We had one in here a few weeks ago. The stronger it is. So, I'm going to share with you three parts of the cord. Three things, I believe, that God wants us as parents to impart to our children. And as we dedicate this time this morning, this is nothing fancy or anything like that. But I believe one of the first things, one of the first cords on the rope that God gives to us. He's given us our will. The little babies that God gives to us, they come fresh into this world. They're a lot of fun. But, right away, we've got this thing, who's going to be in charge of my life? I'm going to do what I want to do. And Mom and Dad said, well, no, you just can't always do what you want to do. I'm going to sleep when I want to sleep. I'm going to eat when I want to eat. And it'll go all the way through their life. That if they get everything that they want when they want it, they'll be a mess. But if we will teach them to be disciplined and to be under control, then they are going to be a blessing. We have prisons full of people that have not learned these three lessons. The first one is this. Actually, these are virtues. The first virtue that a parent imparts to his child, he must learn obedience to his parent. Very basic, very simple. But that's the first virtue. If he doesn't learn that one. Adam and Eve were given a test to have obedience to their parent. And, of course, we know the lesson. They chose the evil and we are still reaping the results. And everybody that's born in this world will reap the result of that act. Just as you and I have made decisions in the past that affect our children that will have eternal effects. But the first one is obedience. How does he learn? Now listen to this. How does he learn? He learns by yielding his will. The child that has trouble yielding his will is the child that has the most trouble in life. Any of us want to give testimonies of the troubles that we brought upon ourselves because we would not yield our will? Mommy says, you should not touch that. You tell them they are not supposed to touch that. What's the next thing they want to do? Touch it. And then we go through the process. But by yielding their will, they become... Listen. By yielding their will, they become the master of their will. So, we teach them to have control over their will by yielding it. Doesn't that sound strange? You get something by giving it up. That's what the Lord says to us about salvation. We can get salvation if we will give up ourselves to Him. But if you refuse to give up yourself and say, I can get into heaven my way, you won't get in. But by giving up their will, they obtain control and master of their will. So, that's the first virtue that we impart to our children. And it's a continuing process. And the older they get, the more we see that they have not really broke over the big hump of just really surrendering and being compliant. The more concerned that we should be about that child. Because he's on the way to being a lifetime rebel. So, by yielding his will, he becomes the master of his will. To choose the good and to refuse the evil. He has that capacity to choose the good and refuse the evil. Because he has been blessed and given this gift of obedience. Learning to obey. Learning to obey. Mama says, supper time, come in Junior. Junior says, in just a minute. Mama hollers out again, supper time Junior, come on in. Just a minute. Junior is on the way to becoming a rebel. Right there. The second time. Children, the second time you're told. The second time shows that you were not obedient. Unless you didn't hear. God has trouble with us. Also in obeying Him. The second strand on this rope. The second virtue goes along with the other one. It's not only does a child learn to be obedient to his parent. But also he must learn to be obedient to the Word. He must learn to be obedient to the Word. I had a verse this morning. That was given to me by the Lord. And I didn't think about it until later. If I can get back over to Psalms 119. As I was meditating in Psalms 119. And verse 30 hit me. I have chosen the way of truth. And as I was thinking about this while, that's just where we're at. We are going to teach our children the way of truth. In this church, we're committed to teaching our children the way of truth. I have chosen the way of truth. Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet. And a light unto my path. Many of us have been blessed by being raised in church. And raised in Christian families. And some of us have not had that. And it affects us. It affects the path of our life, doesn't it? You were raised up maybe in darkness. Nobody took you to church. Nobody read the Bible to you. And then when you got light, it affected you. And then also it affected your decisions. So the will is affected by the Word. This is why we read the Word to our children. We teach them to meditate upon it. Because Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet. And a light unto my path. And then there's a third one. Third strand to this rope that is strong with these three. And of course we know if we were to get a big rope, if I was to bring one back out like I had here a few weeks ago that Mr. Hatfield made for me on his little rope machine. It was literally made of hundreds of little bitty fibers. All wound together and gave it the strength to hold thousands of pounds. But this third one goes along with the second one which went along with the first one. And it's this. They will obtain virtue and blessing in their life by being obedient to their conscience. Being obedient to their parents, yielding their will. Being obedient to the Word in their conscience. The Bible has several things to say about the conscience. It's our inner guidance system. God gives it to us to direct us. I wrote this down. The conscience is your inner friend to tell you to do the right. It can't make you do it. It just gives you that little voice inside. This is right. This is wrong. The will under the control and direction of the Word of God by the Spirit of God will give you that power. You know, I was thinking about this this morning. Judas must have had some proper training. He was a good Jewish boy probably growing up. But something happened along the way. We don't know. Maybe he was an idolater which is covetousness the Bible tells us. And he was never content with what he had. And so when he got into the position of being the treasurer in the group there with Jesus, he had a hard time of letting go. And when things seemed to be going the way that I don't really believe he intended on seeing Jesus crucified. You know that? He had no intention of that ever happening. I went back and read the Scriptures on him this morning. And it said that then Judas which had betrayed him when he saw that he was condemned repented himself and brought again the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders. He wasn't against Jesus. But he had a real pricking in his heart. His conscience I believe spoke to him. You've done something wrong. Drastically wrong. And it hit him. And he said he repented of himself. So conscience is a gift that we teach our children to listen to. Now the conscience when they're born I believe, and I'm not doing a study on this, but I believe it's messed up. This is why you need to be born again and be saved. Because there are people in this country that under the guidance of their conscience they think it's their duty to get rid of say homeschoolers. There are some that think it's their conscience guide to get their political views over on this country which will actually destroy this country. And they're sincere and they think they're right. But they are sincerely misguided according to the dictates of the Word of God. Some think it's alright to kill babies in the womb. But when they will get saved their conscience will not let them do that. Now I'm saying this because there's a scripture that says that Hebrews 10.22 An evil conscience, there's an evil conscience. In Hebrews 10.22 I was looking at this one this morning. An evil conscience is only cleansed by the blood of the Lamb. It's only cleansed by the blood of the Lamb. Paul in writing this, and I believe Paul the Apostle Paul wrote this book. He said in 19. Having therefore brethren boldness to enter into the holiness by the blood of Jesus. Which brings us to the whole thing. All of this that we said this morning will not do the child any good if we do not bring the child under the blood of the Lamb. All of our training to be obedient to be obedient to the Word unless he comes to understand that he must receive Christ as his Savior. He must be born again. He must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. To enter into the holiness by the blood of Jesus. 20. By a new and living way which he has consecrated for us through the veil that is to say his flesh. And having a high priest over the house of God let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience. See we don't know. We don't understand. Many do not believe how depraved we are without a work of God in our heart to save us. This is why people will sincerely think that they are doing this world a favor to kill Christians. It's hard for us to grasp. Isn't it hard for you to grasp that? It's hard for me. But there are many people that think there have been people there have been professing religious people that thought God was pleased that they would kill Christians. The apostle Paul was one of them. But when he met Jesus his conscience was given light and he saw that he was wrong. So an evil conscience. Paul said he had a conscience void of offense. Void of offense toward God and toward men. What a wonderful thing. You know David. Here he was being pursued by King David. He was being pursued by Saul all over the hills. Up in the hills. Down in the hills. Around the hills. Through the valleys. Through the bushes. Through the swamps. Everywhere. The king is chasing David. And finally what happens? He gets him cornered in a cave. Was that it? In the cave? And he slipped in there and cut his robe. Was that in the cave? Or did he go out of the camp? But anyway, he had such a sensitive conscience towards God that God convicted him for doing damage to the king's coat. His robe. Whatever he's wearing. You know. That's how sensitive he was. And this man was trying to kill him. That's the type of conscience that God wants us to raise our children up to. To be that sensitive. To be obedient to their parents. To be obedient to the Word. To be obedient to their conscience. So this is a special time. There are two motives to master us. The good and the evil. God wants us to raise these children up to choose the good. To know the good. To refuse the evil. And we can see this picture. This is plain. Every day we make choices. And sometimes we like to maybe live on the border. We like to sneak through the caution lights. Just fudge up. I was thinking the other day. Maybe I ought to just form the habit of driving one mile below the speed limit. And not just right on it. So we teach our children not to push themselves to the limit and just live. Try the evil's right there. I'm going to live just as close to it. No. No. Stay way back away from it. Choose the good. And stay away from the evil. So of all the things that God has given to us, this gift of our will is the most powerful. So when we raise these children, when we raise these babies up, they grow into little children, into young adults. They will be powerful in the hands of God. Let's pray. Father, thank You for blessing us with all of these young ones. And now as we dedicate this time to You of bringing this new one before You for Your glory and Your honor to dedicate His life for Your glory and honor. We just thank You that You've given us all these babies here and all these young folks. And we thank You for the Word of God that gives us direction. Lord, how many of us parents here wished, but we see in Your providence You allowed it different. That we could have had, maybe, a better raising than we even did. Because we got into things that have affected us and hurt us in our life. And so we thank You that You've given us light, so we can, in turn, give more light to our children. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.