A Godly Example // Building a Godly Family, Part 12

We parents try to do all the things we can to help our children to grow up. We advise. We admonish. We even end up preaching at them sometimes. But it’s not what we say, it’s what we do, how we live – what they see our life to be, that has the greatest impact in shaping them as they grow up.

I don't know how things are in your neck of the woods but one of the really hot topics around where I live is binge drinking amongst teenagers. Now I know that different people have different views on whether drinking of alcohol is a godly thing to do or not, wherever you sit on that issue. However you understand what God’s Word says about the responsible use of alcohol. Blind Freddy can see that the abuse of alcohol is so incredibly destructive.

I was listening to a Doctor, the head of the emergency ward at our local hospital; they were interviewing him on the radio recently. Some huge percentages of people are admitted to the emergency ward each week are there because of alcohol. I think, from memory, he was saying that something like 80% of the young people, the under 30's, that front up there every weekend are there because of something alcohol related – violence, injury, illness.

Pretty scary, and it begs the question, how does that happen? Where do young people get this from? How do you go from being this beautiful little baby in your mother’s arms and your parents and your grandparents are gooing and gaaing over you? How do you go from that to being a drunken, violent teenager vomiting in the gutter? It's worth thinking about.

To combat this teenage binge drinking thing, they've been running an ad on television – a bunch of Australian men in a backyard drinking beer over a barbeque and one of the dad's sends his young son to the fridge to get him another bottle of beer to drink. And the punch line of this ad is about making the point that our children are taking in our habits. They're watching us. They're taking it all in. They're picking up things that rub off from us.

You know something that makes a lot of sense. Whether it's drinking or child abuse or whatever negative, destructive thing you'd like to mention. The imprinting from parent to child is incredibly powerful. I mean parents are right up there. They're the authority figures and when you're growing up, the only reality that matters is your own reality. You grow up in that family and that's all you know. That's it, whether it's anger, violence, alcohol abuse, whatever it is, if that's a powerful part of your reality growing up, it's going to leave its imprint on your life.

Now our DNA determines who we naturally are but our personalities, our characters, our views of ourselves and others, our morals, our values, our patterns of behaviour. All of those things are hugely shaped by our environment, by the people around us, by our circumstances. Gods plan is for you and for me is to have a loving family. Not just our nuclear family but our wider family.

In the New Testament in the book called Titus in chapter 2, have a listen to what it says:

Tell the older men to be temperate, serious, prudent and sound in faith in love and endurance. And likewise, tell the older women to be reverent in their behaviour. Not to be slanderers or slaves to drink. They are to teach what is good so that they may encourage the younger women to love their husbands and to love their children. To be self controlled, chaste, good managers of the household, kind, being submissive to their husbands so that the word of God may not be discredited.

Likewise, urge the younger men to be self controlled. Show yourself, in all respects, a model of good works and in your teaching show integrity, gravity and sound speech that cannot be censured, then any opponent shall be put to shame having nothing evil to say of us.

You see what's going on here? Paul is writing to Titus and he's saying, 'look, you older men, you older women set the example so that the younger men and the younger women learn from you’. And so that needs to be handed down from the older men and women to the younger men and women and from the younger men and women down to their children. Because so much of our behaviour comes from the behaviour we learn and model from the older people in our lives, both as children and as adults.

That's why mentorship is so important. You may have heard me talk about a man, Graham, who was my business partner for 20 years. Now Graham's almost 20 years my senior and he taught me so many things. I watched his behaviour. He was so good and decent and affective in so many ways. I learned to become more than I could be by watching him and learning from him. Like a life's apprentice.

We've been talking over the last few weeks about building a godly family. And today I want to get really down to earth and practical. I believe, I truly believe, that the most important thing that you and I can do to build a godly family is to be a godly person and to live a godly life. So let me say that again. The most important and powerful thing that you and I can do to build a godly family is to be a godly person and to live a godly life.

Let me ask you, are you an older man or woman? Now, in some societies they respect their elders. Others, like mine, I'm not sure we're that good as we should be. Anything old is out of date. It's beyond it's use by date. Old is old fashioned. We take old people and stick them in nursing homes. I generalise but as a society and mine doesn't value old people as much as it should.

But whatever society you live in, if you are an older person you can be such a godly influence on your family because you've been around. You know some things. You should have the godly wisdom that comes from a life long faith in and walk with Jesus. You're not involved anymore, by and large, in the daily cut and thrust and pressures of bringing up the kids. What a godly influence you can be on your grandchildren; the gentle yet powerful faith; the glow, the radiance of God that shines out through your eyes and comes out of your mouth.

And you parents, what an incredibly godly influence you can be on one another and on your children by just the way you live and talk and behave to other people; husband and wife, by your behaviour, by your countenance, by your attitudes and deeds and encouragement. How you can support one another.

Let's say one of you is behaving badly. You're under pressure, you're tired. And the other one, instead of arguing and fighting, draws alongside and in love steers things down a different path. And then, see then what the kids see, instead of seeing a father and mother arguing and pulling in different directions, they see them trusting in God, supporting one another. What sort of a lifelong imprint do we think that is going to leave on our children?

Now, each of us has bad habits. Sin, anger, selfishness, low self-esteem, pride, dishonesty, whatever it is, those things are going to be handed down to our children unless we deal with them; unless we sacrifice them to God; unless we let Him into that space to change us. And the fruit of that change, the fruit will be unto our children and their children and their children's children to a thousand generations.

When the simple daily habits of our lives are godly, Christ-honouring and humble, this is going to be a powerful blessing. Now a friend of mine, Mark, has 9 children. He lives in the USA. I asked him to tell me what some of the most important things were in raising a Godly family. Listen to what he says. He quotes Luke chapter 6, verse 40:

Everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.

And he says, "While not usually thought of as a verse on parenting, the implications here are clear. We can't hope to produce something in our children that we ourselves don't possess. Our children, after all of our teaching – creative or not, intentional or not, verbal or not – our children will be like us. So, watch your own heart for it is the well spring of life and don't forget that first things must be dealt with first, including keeping our marriage the priority in our family."

That's from a father of nine children. You know something, I think them’s pretty wise words, don't you?