The Christian Home - Part 2 of 5

And I changed mine. She said, yes. I said, may I have milk, please? And Grace said, excuse me, please, may I have milk, too? Now, I see not wrong.

Little girls need milk. But I wouldn't say then, and my wife and all six of my daughters are evidence to it, that I never did say, I can drink what you can't drink. I can eat what you can't eat.

I can read what you can't read. I can say things you can't say. No, sir.

I said then, and I say it now. God intends a man to be an example to his family and lead the way. And what man is even to be the Bible teacher for his wife, if any woman would know anything, let her ask her husband at home, as Scripture says.

Ah, it's a wonderful thing, the place of a man, the place of leadership in the home. That's important, isn't it? Oh, is it strange that a man would not take responsibility for his family and home? I was in a revival campaign at Duke, Oklahoma, years ago. And we built a big tent.

We built a big tavern, I thought. And people talked about it. They said, well, Harry Sandler's show, when it comes to town, never has this big a crowd.

You'll never get this full. Everybody talked so much about it that we had the floor running over the first night. And two churches cooperated and went on preaching the great time.

One night I saw a man and his wife come in and sit back down at the back. And the glum-faced fellow. And the next night he liked that I was jumping on Christians, and he liked that.

He talked about Christians himself. And the next night he came on down and let his wife down and pushed her in here in the second seat or so. And the third night he was there, and I was preaching on the Christian home.

And I got down in the front seat to preach some. And I said, any man that leaves it to his wife, the burden of raising his children for God and getting them saved and teaching them to be Godly men and women, any man leaves that burden on his wife. I said, he's a slacker and a shirker and a quitter.

He's not fit to have a home. And I looked at this fellow, and he looks red-faced, and oh, he's dressed up like a Baptist deacon or Methodist steward. You'd have thought he was a tough nut, but I looked at him, and I said, isn't that so? I stood on the first seat, and he was on the second seat.

And I put my finger under his nose, and I said, isn't that so? He said, oh, I guess so. I said, you don't guess anything about it. You know that so, don't you? He said, yes, I know that so.

And the service went on and came to a close. The Methodist preacher came to me. He was wringing his hands.

I hope God will forgive me for all the preachers. I'm scared to death that they're going to strip the church and drive everybody away. And this Methodist preacher said, oh, Brother Ryan, what did you do that for? What did you do that for? I said, do what? He said, that old infidel.

He said, he goes up and down this country talking against preachers and religion and never goes to church. He said, you're the first time I ever heard him go over here in your preacher more than one time. So what do you do? You stick your finger under his nose and insult him, and he'll be so mad he'll never come back again.

I said, I bet he does. But I said, if he does not, if he does not, I said, he heard a proper gobbling that time. Next night he was back.

It was Saturday night. And this night I preached to the unsaved. And I came to the closed invitation, and I stood down in that front seat, and people would come to Christ, and they sang just as I am.

And so I leaned over and whispered to that man standing in the second row, and I said, you didn't hold your hand, you're a Christian. He said, good night, no, me a Christian. Oh, no, he said, I'm not anything but a Christian.

Well, I said, look here, your hair's gray. I said, you don't have much time to flirt with God before you go to hell. And he said, if I thought God would take a dirty old reprobate like me, I'd come in a minute.

I said, he said, though you said you'd be a scholar, think you'd be white as snow. He said, come now, let us reason together. He said, preacher, do you think he'd take me? I said, I know he would.

He said, you mean if I trust him right now and give up time, he'd take me and make me a Christian? I said, yes, sir, he would. And I said, will you do it? He said, yes, I will. All right, I said, you want to come out here and tell everybody about it? No, he said, preacher, if you don't mind, my wife's been going up to First Christian Church by herself for 20 years.

I've got a house full of boys. They don't go to church with her, I don't either. Every Sunday morning she gets up and picks dinner and so on, dresses up, ready for church.

I sit around the stocking feet and read the newspaper and talk about preachers. And she goes to church by herself. I said, if it's all right, I'd like tomorrow morning to get up, like I've been doing all these years, to go with my wife to church.

And I said, okay. And I'll sing the Lord there, and I said, I believe that's all right. And so we went, and he got up the next morning and said, all right, boys, roll out.

Everybody's going to church today. Good night. What a show.

What in the world's happened to the old man? And then, who got my shirt? And then, oh, it got ready. Oh, it went the whole string. I went down to the church and sat on one seat together.

And the preacher of preaching gave the invitation, and he went forward and made a profession openly. And since it was a First Christian Church, they had him baptized before he got home. Because I'm concerned, the sooner you get baptized, the better.

Just so you got something to be baptized about. So he came to tell me later, he come back to tell me, I never was, I told him, I never was an infidel like I said I was. He said, he came to the Lord, oh, God, want men to go lead their family for God.

That's the way it ought to be. I was in Lewistown, Pennsylvania. Grace, you remember that? In Lewistown, Pennsylvania, a revival campaign, that's where she met her husband.

And I remember I preached on, send a man. One Sunday afternoon, had the house packed. And I said, a man's going to answer to God for his family.

You let your family go to hell, you sure going to have a time, part time, you pay Jesus Christ. I preached and closed the service, I went outside. And a man came out there, and he reached in his pocket a top coat.

And ice on the street, he reached the top coat pocket and took a can of Prince Albert tobacco. And sailed it out, skidding across the ice in that street and dipped the curb and down spitting tobacco down. He reached his arm up close to his eyes like this.

And went walking home, boy, he was tall. He's speaking, he's talking, walking about four feet a step. That's right, I said, something sure going to happen to that man's house.

Something going to happen to that man's house, sure is. So, the next thing you know, that man came and said, brother, I want you and your books. That's what it was.

You have to go home with me. I said, yes, I'm going to go home with you and Harry Clark and Dr. Grace and the secretary and the bank man. I'll go home with you.

And went. And when we left there, he gave me a picture. He took my picture with nine of his sons and sons-in-law that had been saved in the last week.

He just went home and got them. That's the way it ought to be. A man's going to have a family responsible to go up for it.

And God's place for a man in a home. But about a woman's place in a home, I wish I could turn to Proverbs chapter 31 and talk about that good woman. The heart of her husband, the faith, the trust in her.

That good woman works so hard to take care of things for her husband. And in her tongue's a little kindness. I can't take time for that.

I have better reason to know, I think, God's blessing on good women than nearly anybody. My wife and I, we've been married 58 years. It don't seem a bit more than 100 years.

And I say, I have these lovely daughters. I have some good women work for me, one four to five years, another more than 40 years. And I thank God for good women.

Good women who sing in the choir, take care of the nursery and teach the children and do their part. Like Priscilla McQuillan, she helped take care of Paul the Apostle. And Paul said, receive this woman from St. Chris.

She's been a sufferer or helper of many in me also. Thank God for good women. But what I'm talking about tonight is the home part.

The one main thing about a home is a wife is to be subject to her husband and be a mate for her husband. That's God's plan. That's God's plan.

In Ephesians chapter 5, verses 23, 24, 25, like what your wife did, subject your own husbands as unto the Lord. As what? As if he were the Lord Jesus. Is your husband like that? Could you say, obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, whose daughters you are.

And you should do that too. You should feel that way too. A wife is to subject her own husbands unto the Lord.

For the husband is the head of the wife, he is Christ, the head of the church, and he's the Savior of the body. Therefore as the church is subject to Christ in everything, so let the wives be in subjection to their own husbands in everything. You say, in everything? Yes.

Say, I don't believe that'll work. Well, see, what I'd do if I was you, you'd go home and get your scissors and cut that out of the Bible like any infidel would do. For Christians believe the Bible.

Yeah. Is that right? Yeah. All right.

That's God's plan. A wife is subject to her husband. Which is, I don't, I believe in a 50-50 proposition.

Do you?