In this sermon, Paul begins by explaining that in the first three chapters of the Bible, he discusses everything that God has done for us in Christ. He then transitions to chapter four, where he emphasizes that based on what God has done for us, we should live a certain way. In chapters five and six, Paul discusses the importance of family, slaves, and authority. He emphasizes that following Jesus means giving our lives to the cause of Christ and living for His glory in our respective callings.

First of all, I would like to say it is a tremendous privilege for me to be here with you tonight. It's especially wonderful to be here with my good friend Larry. It's so wonderful to see so many Chinese faces. A few months ago, I spent about 10 days with two people from the underground church in China. I think that Larry and I preached like 36 sermons in that time. And they were so hungry for the Word of God. And we pray that they take that Word of God back to China and spread the knowledge of God throughout the land. God is doing many things, as you know, in the land of China. And I'm sure He's doing a lot among you here. Now, you know there's a lot more freedom in the West than there is in mainland China. But I'm more afraid for you than I am the believers in China. Because there is something here that's far more dangerous. You need to understand that in many ways, the West is crumbling. And it's crumbling because it is immoral. And it is immoral because it has turned its back on God. And is under the judgment of God. When you came here, you probably thought there would be prosperity. And maybe there has been. But prosperity is not the goal in life. Rich and comfortable men die. People who have comfortable lives die. And then they stand before the living God. Many of you here tonight who are younger. Maybe you were born here. You've adopted many of the ways of the West. The clothing, the style, the attitude. Be very, very careful. What you're doing is extremely dangerous. You see, you need to understand. Not everything that glitters is gold. Not everything that appears good truly is good. By coming here, in some ways you have put yourself in danger. If you adopt our ways, you'll be destroyed with us. You must take hold of Christ. You must take hold of the Word of God. And you must live according to His commands. Because there is coming a day when there will be no place to hide. It will not be a government. But it will be God. For all will stand before the judgment throne of God. And everything that is not according to His will it will burn. Now there is a great danger, young person. Your parents maybe have come from China. They are Chinese. You are here. You know English. You know all the ways of the West. You have a little bit of the Chinese culture. And a little bit of the Western culture. You have a little bit of Christianity. Just enough to make you think you're okay. And you have a whole lot of the world. And you have one foot in the kingdom of heaven. You think. And you have one foot in the world. This is the most dangerous place to be. Before we begin to talk about the subject that we're going to talk about tonight, I want to read two passages out of the book of Zephaniah. I want to read two passages out of the book of Zephaniah. In Zephaniah chapter one, and in verse five it says this, And those who bow down on the housetops to the host of heaven, and those who bow down and swear to the Lord, and yet swear by Milcom, God is describing the nation of Israel, and their infidelity to God. But they weren't totally unfaithful. They would go to the temple and bow down and worship God. But then they would leave the temple and they would worship false gods. Now how does that apply to us today? We worship God. But we also worship the things of this world. We want to follow God. But we want to look just like the other teenagers and young people in the West. We want to act like them. Talk like them. Adapt to their ways. But are their ways according to the ways of God? Do you see this danger? Remember what Jesus said? You cannot serve God and money. What he's basically saying is this. You cannot serve God and anything else. That is why the prophet Elijah said this. How long will you be limping between two opinions? If Baal is God, then worship him. But if the Lord Jehovah is God, worship him. You must understand that you can't have both things. That you have to make a decision. Christ, Jesus, or the world. Serve Christ or serve the world. Conform your life to Christ or conform your life to this sinful, wicked world. Now in verse 8 he says something else. He says, Then it will come about on the day of the Lord's sacrifice that I will punish the princes, the king's sons, and all who clothe themselves with foreign garments. Do you see what's being said here? Israel was the people of God. But the king's sons the young people they wanted to clothe themselves in foreign garments. They wanted to look like the other nations around them. They didn't want anyone to see a difference. Do you see that this is what Christians do today? They say, I'm Christian. I have a Christian t-shirt on. I go to church. And I look just like the world. I act just like the world. I talk like the world. I dress like the world. I learn from the world. Isn't that amazing? When you look at Christian music you see most of the Christian groups are learning from the world and adapting it to Christianity. But you don't see any rock and roll groups learning from Christians. Why should they learn from us? We've gone to learn from them. And now the same thing happens with churches and pastors. Someone wants to build a big church. So what do they do? They go out and find what the world wants. The pastor will even look and see how the world's dressing. So he stands in the pulpit dressed just like them. Talks like them. Just like the world. In order to gain the world that goes against everything that the Scriptures teach. The world is not going to think we're relevant because we look like the world. They're just going to laugh. You see, if you truly want to be Christian you must go to the only standard that we have. The Scriptures. And we must judge everything by the Scriptures. What does God want? What does God say? And that's what we must obey. The will of God. Now this is true with the individual. It's true with the church. And it's true with the family. Everything in our lives must be determined by God's written Word. Now tonight we're going to begin a study on the family. And if you're a young person you say, well I'm not married. You will be. And maybe some of the things that you learn here will help you. Now in talking about the family I'm going to primarily be talking to men. Now why is that? Because the man is the head of the home. Now all the men are going, that's right. I'm the head. Yes, that's right. And it means that God is going to judge you more severely on the day of judgment. Because it doesn't matter how godly your wife is. Her family will be hindered if you are not a godly man. So we're going to talk about family. Now one other thing. We need to understand this in our cultural context. You don't have to be in the West very long to see that families are totally and completely disintegrated. Not only that, but it seems that laws are passed in order to make the family disintegrate. And we listen to the world instead of listening to Scripture. A couple is married. And both of them work. Now I understand that sometimes that may be necessary. But that's not usually why both work. Both work because they want a big house. And find cars. And find clothing. And then a baby is born. And within a few weeks the baby is taken to some kindergarten or preschool. Because mom needs to go to work. Because you need a big house. You need cars. You're in North America now. You need to follow the American dream. Sacrifice your family that you might have things. And then your child goes to grade school. And the greatest influence in that child's life is not its mom or dad. It's not the church. It's eight to ten hours a day of secular education. And the most influential people in their lives are their friends. They're learning from other children who are just as dumb as they are. And then they go to high school. And their friends in class know more secrets about them than their own parents. And then they go on to college. And by then they've already denied any form of a belief in a sovereign God. Someone else, who did not believe what we believed, has raised our children. Our children's loyalties are no longer to their mother and father. And they're most certainly not to the God of their mother and father. Our children's loyalties are not even to each other as brother and sister. Their loyalties are out there, in the world, with their friends. All of this goes totally against the Scripture. So we're going to begin here and work our way through the Word of God. Let's start in the book of Ephesians. I want to read in chapter 5, verse 21-25. He says, And be subject to one another in the fear of Christ. Wives, be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her. One of the columns of society is the family. Without the family, culture ceases to be. It becomes animalistic and pagan. Violent and confused. With no loyalty and no direction. The family is essential to the survival of humanity. And the survival of the family is dependent upon the marriage. The man's relationship to his wife. And the foundation of that marriage, in a sense, is the man. The marriage depends upon him greatly. And the foundation of that man must be Christ. The things we are going to talk about tonight and tomorrow are absolutely impossible. I am going to tell you things that you cannot do unless God has transformed your heart unless the Spirit of God dwells in you. The things that I am going to share with you they are not natural things. They are supernatural things that no one can carry out apart from Christ and the power of Christ. Now, I want us to look at this passage for just a moment. When you look at verse 22, wives be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord. Now dear sister, when you hear this, you may start growing claws. Fangs. Big teeth. The hair may stand up on the back of your neck. You may be looking at me right now through the sights of a gun. Maybe you think I am some kind of social dinosaur. A person who lives in the dark ages who thinks women are lower than men. Well, before you shoot me with a gun, let me explain myself. It is very, very difficult to teach on this. Not just because we live in a culture that has been influenced by feminism. But because of wicked men. You see, there are some men who do not have authority anywhere. They do not have authority at their job. They are insecure. And they want somebody to rule over. And so they read this passage, and they see it as their one chance to be king. To bring everybody in the family into submission to them. But see, you are interpreting the Scriptures through the eyes of Caesar. You must interpret the Scriptures through the eyes of Jesus. The fact that we are head of our families means that we have been granted authority to lay down our lives in service to our wives and children. I want you also to think, ladies, for just a moment, about submission. The main argument is this. Well, he is saying I am less than my husband. He is saying that men are more important than women. Well, let me ask you a question. Do you believe in the Trinity? I do. God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Now let me ask you a question. Are they equal? The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? Absolutely. Now let me ask you another question. Did the Son submit to the Father? Yes, He did. They are equal. But they function with different roles. We do that in society all the time. I go to a church that has elders. They lead the church. I don't. And if they command me to do something or ask me to do something biblical, I do it. Does that make me less than them? All the elders in my church are younger than me. A lot of times I teach them. But they are my elders. And I honor them. Does that make me less? No. I want you to look at something that's very, very important. In Ephesians chapter 1, 2, and 3 we probably have the deepest theology in the entire Bible. It's extremely deep. But when Paul gets to chapter 4 he begins chapter 4 with the preposition, therefore. Basically Paul does this. In the first three chapters he explains this, everything God has done for us in Christ. When he gets to chapter 4 he says this is how we should live. Based on what God has done for us. This is how we should live. Now when he gets to chapters 5 and 6 he talks about the family. He talks about slaves. He talks about authority. And look what he says. The wife should submit to the husband. Now again, we're going to explain what that means. And then it says in chapter 6 the children should submit to their parents. Then later on it's going to say that employees should submit to their employers. In the book of Romans it tells us to submit to government officials. In the pastoral epistles it tells us to submit to elders. And here in chapter 5 verse 21 it tells us to submit to one another. So if you have a problem with submission you have a problem with Christianity. Now, I want to go back to something that I shared at the beginning. When we talk about headship we are not talking about Caesar. Who ruled the Roman Empire for his own glory and his own benefit. We're talking about Jesus Christ. He is our model. Knowing where he had come from and where he was going. Knowing that all authority had been given to him. He took off his tunic. He wrapped himself in a towel. And he took the place of the lowest servant. Being head of our homes is the same thing. I do lead my family. But not for my benefit. I do it for the glory of God. For the benefit and prosperity of my wife. For the benefit and prosperity of my children. And then I go to bed very, very tired every night. Now, before we get into Ephesians we're going to start in the Old Testament and work our way through to understand some things about being a man. Now, there are a lot of men here. And I'm sure a lot of you could probably beat me in a fight. But I want to say something to you. Did your dad teach you how to be a man? Most would have to say, no. Where did you learn to be a man? Did you go into the Scriptures and learn how to be a man? You see, most of us want to stick our chest out and pound it like a gorilla. We want to say, we're the man. But we don't even know what that means. Biblically, what does it mean? We're going to find that the answer is in the person of Jesus Christ. The man who is most a man. The man who is most a man. Is the one who is most conformed to the image of Jesus. Now, men, let's go back to the beginning. Let's go to chapter 1 and read verses 27 and 28. It says, God created man in His own image. In the image of God He created him. In male and female He created them. God blessed them and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth. Here we see the purpose of man and one of the purposes of marriage and what is that? To take dominion. Yes. That's why I want a bunch of little boys to get together. They want to fight and wrestle and do war. You do not squash their spirit. They want to be conquerors. They want to be explorers. They want to go out and do something. They want to take dominion. That's what we were made for. Now, what does that mean though? Does it mean to gather up a huge army and go attack another nation? Absolutely not. Adam and Eve were to take dominion under the will of God. They were to advance the kingdom of God upon the earth. They were to bring everything into subjection to the will of God. That the whole earth might be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God. Like the waters cover the sea. That's the purpose of man. To be an authority on the earth in submission to the one great authority in heaven to do his will upon this planet. Men, listen to me. You were not created just to make money. You were not created just to get a big education. You were created for one purpose to advance the will of God everywhere in the world. This is why men are so empty because they are not given to this one thing. If you are genuinely a Christian and you are empty you can pretty much go back to this. And you can discover that you've substituted something else for this purpose. Your purpose is to advance God's will. Young people, listen to me. You don't just go to college because that's what you're supposed to do. You go to college because God wants you to go to college. You study what God wants you to study. And you do it so that you might advance God's glory in the world. Whether it's being a doctor an engineer a construction worker a man who picks up garbage whatever it is that you do it for Him. And when you do it for Him it fills everything with meaning. Do you see what's so wrong with many churches today? This is what they're doing. They're saying you can have the American dream by following Jesus. If you follow Jesus He will give you the American dream. That's a lie. If you follow Jesus He'll give you eternal life and a cross upon which to die to self that you might become a useful servant to God to your wife to your children to the church to the world and when you die you die very tired. But there is great glory waiting you. Now think about this. You say, well, Brother Paul that was God's command to Adam. And Adam fell. The purpose was destroyed. Yes, that's true. And it was remade. It was remade by Jesus. The purpose. In a greater way than Adam could have ever known. Go ye therefore into all the nations teaching them baptizing them preaching the gospel to them transforming lives this is our task. If you're sitting here tonight and you're a man this is what you were made for to give your life to the cause of Christ according to the calling that He has laid upon your life. For me as a preacher for you it might be something else. Every sermon I preach must be for His glory. And everything you do in your calling is for His glory. For the advancement of His kingdom. Now let's look at Jesus. He's the perfect example of this. I want you to go to Matthew chapter 6 in verse 9 of Matthew 6 Pray then in this way Our Father who is in heaven hallowed be your name your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven Here we see the perfect man The one man that's supposed to be our example as men And here we can see his heart Look at his heart My Father who is in heaven hallowed be your name Basically what that means is this His great desire was that His Father's name would not be treated as common but absolutely and completely unique exalted above every name His heart beat with this desire that His Father be honored above all else And then He says your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven Christ came to this earth to do that And He has sent us forth to do the same thing How do you know when you're a mature man? When you're a man in God's eyes When your heart beats with this same passion When you say to yourself and it's true I don't care about prosperity I don't care about health I don't need a comfortable life I want one thing that God's name be magnified that He be treated as holy that His kingdom come that His will be done It beats in your heart It burns on your face It controls the way you live So much of what's called Christianity today in the West I hate it It is blasphemy Because basically what the preachers are telling you is this You can get everything the world wants through Jesus Do you want what the world wants? If you want what the world wants it's because you are of the world And you've got enough Christianity to damn your soul to hell We need men Your church needs men Your wife needs a man Your children need a man Who has a heart like Christ's heart Now let's just see how practical this is Let's say there's a godly woman She loves the Lord She's growing in her knowledge of Scripture She's only been a believer for a few years She comes to Ephesians 5 for the first time in her life It says, Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord And she looks over at her husband And she looks back at this Scripture Wives, submit to your husbands And she looks at her husband She looks at the Scripture And her heart becomes bitter Because when she looks at her husband She sees a boy Who is self-centered His whole life revolves around him All the decisions he makes are about him The promotion of him What he wants What he desires And maybe he's been in North America long enough To be like the rest of the men He's learned to like toys Real expensive toys He has hobbies He wants to buy cars And she looks at that She looks at the Scriptures And she says, Lord I have to submit to that A self-centered little boy Who never grew up A selfish man Who thinks only about his profession About his status Among other men Lord, if you command it, I'll do it You see how sad that is? Now, think about this She reads that passage Wives, be subject to your husbands And she looks over at her husband And burning in his eyes Hallowed be thy name, O God Thy kingdom come Thy will be done I lay my life on the altar of sacrifice And I do it for your glory I serve you Wife looks at that She goes, yeah, I could submit to a guy like that That would be a joy Now, let me stop here for a second Just in case there's some pastors in this room I'm going to show you, pastor, how we can really believe a lie And how we can destroy our wives and our families In the name of thy kingdom come In the name of thy kingdom come Many men will be called into the ministry And they'll take it seriously They will work day and night for the Lord And I've heard men like that say this I have sacrificed my family on the altar of the Lord's service I've got one thing to say about that That is heresy It's wrong Who is the faithful servant? Is it the man who works in the ministry 18 hours a day? You say yes I say no Unless he's single You see, when I was a single missionary in Peru I was free I could pray, study the Bible, and preach 18 hours a day 40 hours a day if I wanted to I could just preach and pray all day long Now, why could I do that? Because there were certain commandments in the scriptures that had nothing to do with me There are all kinds of commands about how a man should treat his wife I was free from those But then I took a wife It was God's will that I take a wife All those commandments that were dead to me became alive And now I can't live 18 hours a day in the service Because there are commands I have to obey You see, you're not a great servant because you work 18 hours a day preaching and praying You're a faithful servant because you obey the commands of the Lord And if He's given you commands with regard to your wife and children But you neglect those commands in the name of ministry You are not a faithful servant You're disobedient You may be patting yourself on the back Everyone else may say you're wonderful But God will say you're disobedient He will say I gave you commands with regard to the daughter I gave you You neglected her I gave you commands with regard to the children that I gave you You neglected to do them You are an unfaithful servant Do you see that? This is very, very important You see, the Bible says in Romans 12, verse 2 That the will of God is perfect So you don't have to disobey God's will over here to fulfill God's will over here He's given you enough time To do His commands Now pastors, here's a problem Pride We want to have a successful ministry We want the church to grow We don't want to just have a little church But now you're not talking about advancing the kingdom Well, you are talking about advancing the kingdom Your kingdom The man of God Whether he's a pastor Or an engineer Or a school teacher Or a maintenance man He's a man of God Because he obeys God He obeys the commandments of God He doesn't neglect one in favor of another Now, we're running out of time here tonight And we didn't make much progress But I've got to make you see one important truth Your wife needs a new husband My wife needs a new husband Your children need a new dad My children need a new dad A new and improved dad One that is more like Christ Men, I know how tough it is I know work is hard But we've got to realize something We weren't put on this planet Just to work in order to buy nice things We weren't put on this planet To advance the kingdom of heaven And we do that by obeying the commands of God And we do that by obeying the commands of God With the people who are closest to us I want you to think about something Some of you came here tonight Because you heard I was preaching You saw me yelling at people on YouTube But you know what? You don't know me You don't know if I'm real I could be a fake A hypocrite Do you know who knows me? My wife Do you know who knows me? My son Ian My other son Evan And my little daughter Rowan They know me You see, it's easy to look like Some kind of a good Christian in front of you You don't see me in the morning at 6 o'clock Before I've had a cup of coffee It's easy to impress you But to live like Christ with the people Who are closest to me That's the goal And that's the true test Years ago I had this young guy come up to me He was just your plain old average Caucasian white guy And he came to me like this after a sermon He said I want to be a missionary He said okay He said I want to be a missionary to China I just love China I just love the Chinese people I want to be a missionary to China And this is what I said to him Do you know why you love Chinese people? He said no I said because you don't know any Now Why did I say that? Here's why I said it It's real easy to love somebody 10,000 miles away isn't it It's even easy to love you For a few nights Preaching here But to love my wife Day in and day out My children That's what's going to determine Whether or not I'm like Christ And you know what man Before I got married I thought I was really really spiritual I thought I was the Apostle Paul to the Andes mountains After a few weeks of being married I didn't even think I was saved anymore And marriage brought out All these things that were hidden Self centeredness Being selfish Realizing that maybe I loved my ministry more than I loved the kingdom of heaven I'm not telling you these things Because I do them perfectly I'm telling you these things Because they're true It's in the word of God Tomorrow when we come back here Tomorrow evening We're going to talk about the family some more But men you have to make a decision Are you going to be a man of the world Or are you going to be God's man And young men You think you want to get married That's a good thing But you should be preparing How do I prepare By becoming more and more like Jesus Christ Because you are going to be entrusted One day with one of God's daughters I have a daughter She's four years old She's the most beautiful girl in the world She looks like Dora the Explorer If you really want to become my enemy You just even think about hurting her You can beat me up all day I've been there, done that before It's not going to probably make me your enemy But you touch her You better make sure you're a Christian Because you're going to be seeing Jesus soon See the whole point is this You're married to God's daughter You need to be really afraid It's his daughter If I love my daughter this much How much does God love his How much does God love his daughter We must commit ourselves In the heart To one singular passion The glory of God The glory of his Christ Now if you're here tonight Maybe you think you're a Christian Maybe you're not Do you talk like a Christian Do you walk like a Christian Do you have the desires of a Christian If you don't It's probably because you're not a Christian Jesus Christ came And he died on a cross Why Because God is good Because God is just God can't simply forgive sin He must first satisfy his own justice There's two ways God can satisfy his justice By pouring out his wrath on you Or by becoming a man And suffering divine wrath in the place of you That's what God did on Calvary When Christ hung there He bore the sin of his people And he was crushed under the wrath of almighty God When he died He satisfied God's justice And now God can forgive All those who come to him By faith believing in his son How can you be saved Repent of your sins Acknowledge you are a sinner Ask yourself this Is there hatred in your heart For your sin Would you do anything to be different And to be free from it Are you ashamed of your sin Those are marks of repentance You lack one thing Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ Look to Christ Call upon him Until you know That he has saved you Because the spirit of God bears witness to it Not because some preacher told you were saved Because you repeated some prayer Well I believe we'll be seeing the young people here tomorrow And young people That means if you're I guess 120 and under All of you come back And we're going to be talking to the young people tomorrow In the morning and afternoon But it will apply to everyone Young people please come back Because we're going to talk about things That just may save your life Father I pray that you would use this for your glory That your people would be edified That sinners would come to know you Lord help us throughout this weekend Thank you for the great privilege of being here