This sermon emphasizes the importance of marriage, raising godly children, and the role of humility in parenting. It highlights God's design for marriage, the responsibility of parents to bring up children in a godly way, and the significance of humility in receiving grace from God. The speaker addresses the need for parents to instill biblical principles in their children, focusing on humility, faith, love, holiness, and self-control.

When God created man, first thing he said was it's not good for man to be alone. He didn't want man to be alone and he made a help meet for him. This is way back in the beginning before sin came into the world and we see there God's perfect will for man that he wanted man to be married. The man could not accomplish all that God wanted him to do without a help meet. And then once he had created both of them, he said something to both of them together and that was he said in Genesis 1 and verse 28, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. So that's the next thing where God wanted man to be married and then he wanted man to have children. And when you come to the last, that's the first book of the Old Testament, well man did, men married for thousands of years and they had children but they didn't accomplish what God wanted. And so when you come to the last book of the Old Testament, it's the book of Malachi. He speaks about people who are unfaithful to their wives who Malachi in chapter 2 and verse 14, the Lord has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth whom you married when you were a young man and you have dealt treacherously with her even though I gave her to be your companion by a covenant. It's a very serious thing when a man deals treacherously with his wife because she's a weaker vessel and wherever that has happened, there's a great need for repentance, repentance and turning to God. And then he goes on to say why did God, but someone who, anyone who has a little bit of the Holy Spirit, it says in verse 15 doesn't do that. And what was he doing when he united you his husband and wife? He was seeking a godly offspring, verse 15. And there we read God doesn't want just children, any idiot can produce children, but to produce godly children that requires a lot of the fear of God, a lot of humility to get grace from God. I mean there's no way to bring up children in today's world, I'll tell you, in a godly way without grace. Number one statement. There is absolutely no way in today's world to bring up godly boys and girls without grace from God. That's statement number one. And statement number two is there's absolutely no way to get grace from God if you are not a humble person. Now all of us may think we are pretty humble, but if you are, you'll bring up godly children, which proves you're not humble. If your children are not godly, whatever you may think about yourself, you have not received grace from God. And the sooner you acknowledge that, instead of saying well children are different and the world is so bad, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It says where sin abounded, grace abounded even more. And it's because of our arrogance and pride that we put the blame on so many factors instead of ourselves. I believe many, many children who have turned away from the Lord would come to the Lord if the parents will humble themselves and take the blame themselves. I said that to my boys when they left home for college. I said I've had you, each of my boys left home for college when they were 18 years old. And I said to them, I've had you 18 years in my home and I was born again when you were born. I was a child of God. And if you go astray, I will not blame you. I will blame myself. I said I failed God in the 18 years he gave them to me at home. I just say that because I've discovered through the years that there's far more arrogance and pride in many believers than they realize. That's the reason they don't have godly offspring and that's the reason they don't overcome sin in their personal life. And that's why they spend so many years, husband and wife, still getting angry with each other. Why would, why don't they humble themselves and say, we have not getting grace in our home. Why always say it is because of this circumstance, pressure of work and this thing and that thing, that thing. No, you are not humble. The day you acknowledge that, I tell you things will change in your home. Your relationship with your wife, the way you speak to your husband and wife will change. Your children will change and it's a wonderful thing to know that when your children are babies, instead of discovering that after your children have gone astray. Isn't it good to know right from the time they're babies how to bring them up? Only by the grace of God and by following the order God has placed in society. God has placed a certain order in society and that is the woman must be subject to the man as the head of the home. Now I know that's not popular in the world and unfortunately that's not popular in many churches. But we stick to the old-fashioned Christianity that has come down from the first century. And that's not Paul's idea. It's the Holy Spirit teaching that a man is the head of the home and he must love his wife as Christ loved the church. And a woman must be subject to her husband as the church is to Christ. And where a woman tells her husband, you don't love me like Christ loved the church, why should I be subject to you like the church is to Christ? There you can see the spirit of Satan. Rebellion. It's like saying, if you don't obey God, why should I obey God? Imagine if we all said that. We went around the world telling people, you don't obey God, I'm not going to obey God. In other words, your neighbor, you tell your neighbor, you're serving Satan, I'll serve Satan too. Have you heard of anything so stupid to tell your husband that you serve the devil, I'll serve the devil too. But if you follow God's order, then that order will come down in the way your children also grow up to respect God. So let me show you 1 Timothy in chapter 2 and verse 12. I don't allow, and remember, this is the Holy Spirit speaking. If you believe the Bible is God's word and not Paul's word. I mean, those of you who believe the Bible is Paul's word, you don't have to listen, but those of you who believe this is the Holy Spirit, it's God's word, listen. I don't allow, imagine God telling you, God says, I don't allow a woman to teach a man or to exercise authority over a man. You won't hear that in many churches nowadays, but we preach it here. The old-fashioned Christianity of the first century. But to remain quiet, that means submissive. There's a reason given to it. Normally, God doesn't have to give any reasons. When you tell your three-year-old child to obey, you don't give 10 reasons why he should obey. You say, daddy said it, that's enough. But God treats us in the new covenant as mature people. You know, you're older children, you give a reason, son, this is why I'm telling you to do this, because there's a reason. So he gives us a reason. The reason is Adam was created first and where a woman becomes the head of the home, she's reversing the Bible and saying Eve was created first and Adam was created to be her helper. That's a lie. It's a lie of the devil. Adam was created first and God did not make a mistake. Then he created Eve. This is God's word. And it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman was deceived first. So two reasons why a woman cannot teach, because she can be easily deceived and because she was created second. And therefore, it's a man who's called to have the teaching ministry in the church, then a woman says, what am I supposed to do? A very important ministry. He tells us the woman's ministry next. The woman will be preserved through bearing children, bringing them up. You think that's not an important ministry? Sometimes it can be more important than a teaching ministry. If those mothers will continue in faith and love and holiness with self-control. So those are qualities for a mother. The reason a mother is mentioned because she spends a lot more time with the children at home than the father. The father is away nowadays. Many working men are away from the home for 10-11 hours of the day. Who's with the children those 10-11 hours? The mother. The world has become so busy. The father spends so little time now because of work. They have to earn their living. And that's why when the fathers do come home, they need to have quality time with their children and not bury themselves in a lot of other work. Many children go astray because the fathers don't have quality time with their children when they come home from work. But the mothers must remember their primary responsibility is to bring up children at home. There's no verse in the Bible that says a woman should not go to work. And I'll tell you why there's no such verse. Because there could be situations where a woman has to go to work. If the husband dies and she's a widow or the husband is paralyzed and sick at home and can't work, she has to work. So if there was a command saying women should not work, what could she do? But God is wise. He's never put a verse like that in the Bible. And when there's no verse like that in the Bible, we don't teach it either in this church. We have never taught it. Even though people who come to CFC and don't care to listen carefully think we teach it. A lot of people think we teach a lot of things which we have never taught. That's because they have a problem between their ears and their mind. Some disconnect. They don't exactly understand what they hear. But what we do say is this, that a woman's primary ministry, even if she does go to work, is her home. And God will give grace to widows. And God will give grace to women whose husbands are unable to work. But where God sees that a woman is just interested in living in a higher standard of living or to make more money, you won't get that grace. There's a difference. It all depends on motive. God sees the motive. In everything, God sees the motive. So I want to say to you, my dear brothers and sisters, it's a great responsibility to have children. To have children is easy. To bring them up to be godly requires number one, like you've often heard me say, three secrets of Christian life. Humility, humility, humility. By the way, I decided to expand it to ten secrets of the Christian life. And you know what they are. One to ten, humility. I'm absolutely convinced about this. That's why I emphasize it. Because there's nothing we can accomplish for God without grace. That's why we put up that verse over there. God gives his grace only to the humble. And if you didn't get it, you know the reason. And you find somebody else got it, you know the reason. It's one thing to be humble for a certain period of time, but to preserve yourself. And I want to say one more thing. There is one secret of remaining humble continuously. And I'll tell you also how to become proud. The way to become humble is to always look at Jesus. Looking unto Jesus, we run this race. In other words, you don't take your eyes off him. You know what happened to Peter when he was walking on the water. He took his eyes off Jesus. And that moment he sank. And that's when we sink into pride and sin and 101 other things. You've all woken up? Okay. Humility. It is impossible not to get grace from God if you are humble. You don't even have to ask for it. God gives it. It's like water flows to the lowest place first. And if there is a low place there, you don't have to invite the water to come down. It'll come down straight away. So let me urge you, parents, pursue the path of humility to get grace from God so that in this evil world you can bring up your children aright so that there will be another generation that is carrying on the witness which I hope you are faithfully fulfilling in your generation. It's so important. If you continue, mothers, in faith and love and holiness and self-control, you'll be able to have a great ministry just like a man who has a teaching ministry. There are examples of that. In the Bible itself, you read about Timothy who had a wonderful mother, Eunice, whose husband was obviously not much interested in spiritual things because he was a Greek. I don't know whether he even read the Bible. I don't think they had family prayer and things like that at home. But this mother, imagine if this mother had gone around teaching, studying the Bible and saying, I want to be a teacher in the church. She would not have accomplished one percent of what she accomplished by bringing up her child. Then by the time that boy was 20 years old, the Apostle Paul looked at him and said, I want him on my team. If you bring up a son and at the age of 20, the Apostle Paul says, I want him on my team, boy. You've done a great job. Or a daughter. Paul had sisters also who served in the churches. We read of one like that called Phoebe in Romans 16. So brothers and sisters, young men and young women, we have to raise them up in our home. It's not so much by Bible knowledge. Don't think that the more Bible knowledge you have, the more godly you are. It's not exactly true. More Bible knowledge, more godliness. No. And the greatest proof of that is Satan, who's got more Bible knowledge than all of us sitting here, more than me. But he's not the most godly. He's the most ungodly. Maximum Bible knowledge, maximum ungodliness. That's Satan. At the same time, Jesus knew the Bible thoroughly and he was godly. But Bible knowledge by itself will not make your home a godly home. So don't, we need to teach the Bible to our children. I did that with all my four boys. But along with that, we need to teach the principles which are in the Bible. The wise man is the man who heard and obeyed. When we sit around our dinner table, very often that's about the only meal the whole family can sit together with nowadays, the last meal of the day. What do you talk to your children about? I hope it's not the latest gossip. You know, there are principles that we can teach our children when we sit around the table. Things like being truthful. Why you, my girl, why should you dress so modestly compared to the other girls in the world? Why don't we allow you to dress like them? Why should we not cheat in school? Even if you can get more marks, better to fail than to cheat. These are principles we have to teach our children. If somebody fights with you, don't go back for a fight with them. Just avoid that person. Go somewhere else. Principles of teaching our children. Principles of God's word. And when they are young, if we can put these principles into their mind, how it'll go very well with them if they obey their parents. Put it into their head. Don't get so busy with your work and all that, that you don't have time to put these things into those little minds of those children. You will not regret it when they grow up. Train up a child in the way he should go. When he is old, he will not depart from it. All the pulls of the world will not allow him to depart from those values that you put into that little child's head when he was small. I mean even Moses' mother is a great example in the Old Testament. She had him only for a few years at home. Where was the father? Twelve hours at work as a slave. He probably went at six o'clock in the morning or seven o'clock in the morning, came back at seven o'clock at night. Hardly had any time with little Moses. But the mother had him the whole time. And she knew by the time this boy is seven or eight years old or maybe ten, I have to send him to Pharaoh's palace, the most wicked place on the face of the earth. Imagine if you had a boy, you think of it, you fathers and mothers. You have a little boy and you know that by the time that boy is ten, you got to send him into the most wicked home, the wealthiest, the most immoral home in the whole world. What would you do in those ten years? That's what Moses' mother knew. Not going to have this boy forever with me. Please remember parents, you're not going to have that little boy and girl in your home forever. You have them for a few years. Spend those years putting some godly values into their mind. Show them the values of the world are wrong and you've done a great job. Even if you couldn't buy so many clothes for them, even if you couldn't give them the most expensive education, you put godly values in them. That'll hold them, that'll hold them in better stead than all the other things you give them of this earth. And so Moses spent 30 years out there in the palace and at the end of 30 years he stood by what he had heard from his mother. I don't want the riches of Egypt. I don't want the pleasures of sin. I don't want the honor of being a next pharaoh. What a man. Says that in Hebrews 11. The three things that comprise the world he rejected. The honor of the world, the pleasures of sin, and the wealth of the world. 30 years in Pharaoh's palace did not erase the values his godly mother had put into his head in the first 10 years. And that's in the Old Testament. She didn't even have the Holy Spirit. Imagine what we can accomplish today. And when I look around the children of believers in so many places and I see their worldliness and some who are not worldly, their arrogance, their pride, I feel so sad. I say, what are these parents doing all these years? Sitting in a wonderful church and not caring for their children at home, just sending them to Sunday school. Sunday school will teach them. No. There was no Sunday school in the early days. It was parents who taught. So my dear brothers, all of you who are parents, who are lucky enough to hear these things when your children are still small, take heed to these words. We pray for these two children.