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Pastor Colin Smith: Think of how you stand in the place of God with regards to your child. You are the guardian. You are the provider. You are the shepherd. You are the intercessor. You are the teacher. You are the example. And the greatest question that I face as a parent is: how am I representing God to this child?

Steve Hiller: Welcome to Open the Bible Weekend with Pastor Colin Smith. And Colin, for anyone who is a parent, that's a sobering question right there. How will I represent God to this child?

Pastor Colin Smith: Yeah, and that is the high calling of parenting, isn't it? And to remember that this is a high calling and a holy calling and something that God has given me to do. For every mother who is caring for a child today, the work that you are doing is of huge importance. For every father who has been entrusted with a child, your modeling of what it is to be a godly man is of huge importance. So never underestimate the value of what God has called you to do.

Steve Hiller: Well, as we today continue a message that we began last time, "Your Struggle with Authority," and looking at that Fifth Commandment of honoring your father and mother, we begin today by looking at how we use that authority. We've kind of talked about that, but I know that there are a lot of people listening today who are going to say, "Honor my father and mother? You don't know my mother. You don't know my father. You don't know the house I grew up in. You don't know the abuse that I went through. You don't know how I suffered at the hands of my mother or father. Honor them?"

Pastor Colin Smith: I think that is a huge question for so many folks. And as you listen today, that may be immediately what is on your mind. And we're going to look at that directly in the message from the Bible today because did you know that God speaks to you exactly about your situation? Did you know, for example, that in the Bible we're told the story of Jonathan in the Old Testament? Steve, Jonathan's father Saul threw a javelin at him. What kind of father throws a javelin at his son?

The Bible's not speaking about some other world. The Bible's speaking right into our world. And it speaks into the brokenness of some very, very dysfunctional family relationships. One of the things we're going to see today is that it really helps when someone who has not been able to love well—a father or a mother—to see that they were not able to do this. And to ask God to give you compassion for a father or a mother who was not able to love well.

And to look up into the face of the Father and to find there the love that you did not find in your father. That's the only place there's going to be hope, and to begin to find grace and healing in His hand and by His grace. And I know some wonderful stories of people who have found that because God's grace is very wonderful indeed.

Steve Hiller: Well, we can be grateful for that. And we're going to continue to look at what it means to honor father and mother, our struggle with authority in today's message. If you can, join us in Exodus chapter 20 as we continue the message "Your Struggle with Authority." Here's Pastor Colin.

Pastor Colin Smith: Now, nobody wants to be a bad parent. Nobody wants to be a bad leader. And so I want to suggest to you that there are three qualities that we especially need in order to use authority well. They are wisdom, sufficiency, and love. These are the boundaries within which God calls you to exercise whatever authority is given to you. And abuse begins when authority is exercised outside one of these three boundaries.

Let's take a moment to consider them together. First, wisdom. Use the authority that God has given to you, whether it be in business, whether it be in the family, whether it be in the church, wherever it is, use the authority that God has given to you with wisdom. Probably the best-known verse in the Bible on parenting is in Proverbs 22:6. We all know this one: "Train up a child in the way that he should go, and when he is old," can we finish it? "When he is old, he will not depart from it." Know that verse so well.

I am always grateful to the pastor who pointed out to me that that verse is singular. "Train up a child in the way he should go." So that while we teach the same moral principles to all children, the wise parent will remember that no two children are the same. So guide them with wisdom. I'm thankful for the mentor who encouraged me to try and distinguish between the cosmetic and the corrupting. I found that so helpful. Don't make a big deal over a thing that has little consequence, but be sure that you don't turn a blind eye to that which will corrupt.

Look at the wisdom of God. He knows how to handle every one of His children in every situation of life. And if you look at the pictures that God uses to describe His own children in the Old Testament, it's absolutely fascinating. In one place, Hosea chapter 8 and verse 9, God describes His own children as being like a wild donkey. Maybe your kids are like wild donkeys sometimes. In another place, God describes His own children as a bruised reed.

And wisdom can tell when your child's being a wild donkey and when he's a bruised reed. And discerning the difference, you will know how to use your strength. That's wisdom. Second, sufficiency. I've chosen this word carefully from the conviction that the greatest hindrance to parenting with honor may come for some when a father or mother tries to use a child to fulfill their own unmet needs.

Most obvious example, of course: a father or a mother who's not felt loved, perhaps doesn't even feel fulfilled within the marriage, and tries to find what is lacking from the child. And it creates a kind of a dependency. And of course, a parent who's to wisely exercise authority at some points will need to make an unpopular choice. And if you have become emotionally dependent on your child, you simply won't be able to do that.

It was a wise father who said to his son, "If I ever have to choose," notice that phrase, "if I ever have to choose between being your father and your friend, I hope that God will always give me the grace to choose to be your father, because you have many friends. You have one father." And sometimes you do have to choose, make an unpopular choice. Or a father and a mother who have their own unfulfilled hopes and dreams, and they desperately, desperately want their son or their daughter to do or to be what they did not accomplish.

And so what happens is that you push and push and push and push and push, because you want them to be something that you would have wanted to be and you missed. And you're trying to live it out vicariously through them. Or a father or a mother who so needs to be needed that when the time for the child to go comes and establish his or her independence, you just won't let go. Now, you see, all of these things are traced back to some kind of insufficiency within ourselves.

And the Bible speaks so plainly about this: "Our sufficiency is of God." My sufficiency daren't be my children. That, of course, would be to put them in the place of God, and you're back to the First Commandment again. Using your children to fulfill your own unmet needs always, in the end, will bring damage both to you and to them. And of course, it's the same in any job. How many of us are tempted to use our job and the authority that we have there to fulfill unmet needs within ourselves?

And it causes damage to you, and it causes damage to those who are around you. Damage will come from anything that you try to stuff into the space that only God can fill. Sufficiency. And the last thing here is love. Authority without love, you see, authority that moves outside of this boundary of love will always be destructive. Love woos, but it never forces. I found that a very, very helpful distinction and a very obvious one once you see it. Love woos, but it never forces.

And this is so important, it seems to me, for all of us who have this high calling of Christian parenting. Sometimes we long so deeply and passionately for our children to follow Christ that we run the risk of manipulation. And as parents, and as pastors, and as Sunday school teachers, we need to remember that we have the power to lead a child to do almost anything, and therefore we daren't abuse it. A compliant child will say a prayer that you want him or her to say if you approach it in that kind of a way that persuades them.

And that is precisely what you must not do. Here's the danger: that in my enthusiasm to see my children follow Christ, I push them towards a decision that they have not yet truly made in and of their own souls. That I therefore tell them that they have come to Christ when in fact they have not. And they conclude five years down the line that coming to Christ is nothing at all, because it was nothing at all except what I said to them. Let's be very, very, very careful about putting pressure on our kids to be baptized.

Pressure on our kids to profess faith. I will never forget the wisdom of a lecture by Elizabeth Catherwood, the daughter of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, a great Christian leader. And she told a story that she'd learned in later life from her mother. She was in her early teens, and a pastor who was a friend of the Lloyd-Jones family came and was visiting and had said to Lloyd-Jones, "Now Elizabeth, your daughter, she's 14 and she hasn't professed faith yet. Don't you think it's time you had a talk with her?"

Lloyd-Jones was a powerful man. And his friend meant by that comment that he should make at this point a direct attempt to lead her to a decision for Christ. And Lloyd-Jones just said this: "She will come when she is ready." When I went to my first church, I found that in the Sunday school they had adopted this habit with young children of bringing the children forward when it was their birthday. And the Sunday school leader would say, "Now Johnny, do you have a second birthday?"

And if he said no, the leader would say, "Would you like to have a second birthday?" What kid doesn't want to have a second birthday? Then there was the line about being born again. The moment I heard about it, I asked and insisted that that be stopped. That is not evangelism; that is manipulation of a young child. And we daren't do it. It produces a bunch of kids that assume they're born again because the Sunday school teacher or the parent told them so, but have no experience of Christ.

It's the worst thing you could do. Some of us are still suffering from it. We think we're Christians, but the truth is we have no experience of Christ. In his book on the Christian family, Lloyd-Jones describes a children's meeting in which pressure is put on a child to make a decision. And I think the strength of his language is entirely appropriate. He says, "That should never be done. You are violating the personality of the child. In addition, of course, you are displaying a profound ignorance of the way of salvation."

"You can make a little child decide anything. You have the power and the ability to do so. It is wrong. It is un-Christian. It is unspiritual. We must therefore never attempt to be too direct in this matter, especially with a child. Never too emotional. If your child feels uncomfortable as you are talking to him about spiritual matters, or if you are talking to someone else's child and he feels uncomfortable, your method is obviously wrong. You are bringing pressure to bear. That is not the way to do this work."

See, the key here is don't attempt to do the work of the Holy Spirit. My work as a father is to teach—I must do that; to pray—I must do that; and to seek, to the best of my ability, to be a godly example—that's my work. Converting my children is the work of the Holy Spirit. And I need to have the faith to rest in God there. Otherwise, I'll use my strength to manipulate. And if I do that, I'm abusing authority, because love woos, but it never forces.

You're handling a life. You're handling a soul. So remember, when it comes to matters of faith, as you seek those particular opportunities that will come where there is openness to share, love woos, but it never forces. And the wise parent will always discern the difference. Now, of course, this leads to the question, where are we going to find this wisdom and this sufficiency and this love? You know, you think this is challenging? I had to write this stuff. I've been living with this all week.

Which of us as parents thinks, "My, we've just got this right"? But the answer is that you and I together will find what we need for parenting in God. God is our wisdom. God is our sufficiency. You see, that's the beautiful thing about God. He's not only wise, He's sufficient. "I am who I am." I don't need you. He's not using His people as some kind of emotional crutch. He's not dependent on us. That's why He's able to love us freely. He is love. That is His very nature.

Steve Hiller: You're listening to Open the Bible Weekend with Pastor Colin Smith and a message called "Your Struggle with Authority." Well, Open the Bible is able to be on this station, make the podcast, the app, and all the ministry tools available because of your generosity. And as you give a gift of any amount this month, we'd love to send you a copy of Martyn Lloyd-Jones's book called Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Its Cure. And Colin, who is Martyn Lloyd-Jones, and why should we read this book?

Pastor Colin Smith: Well, Martyn Lloyd-Jones is one of my favorite preachers and writers of all time. By wide consensus, he was one of the greatest preachers in the 20th century. He's with the Lord now, but we have the legacy of his writings that are certainly among my treasured possessions. Spiritual Depression is his best book. It's my favorite book of all the many that he wrote. I'm actually on my third copy of this now, Steve. I bought my first copy in 1976, the year I went to college.

And I'm on my third copy now because the first two are just about falling apart. And so I'm delighted that we're able to offer a new edition of Spiritual Depression. It really is a spiritual classic. Lloyd-Jones was a medical doctor in London, and a prestigious medical doctor, very successful in London, before he became a pastor. But he felt the calling of God into Christian ministry and became an expositor of the Word of God.

But you can see the way in which he uses his background as a medical doctor, applying skills of diagnosis and prescription. So the subtitle here, "The Causes and Cure of Spiritual Depression." And chapter after chapter, he just goes through one cause after another for darkness and discouragement that comes into the experience of a Christian believer. So I think folks will find as you read through this that sometimes you'll say, "Well, that's something I recognize, but it's not where I'm at now."

You keep reading and then you get to a place where you say, "Oh, that's exactly where I am now. And he has diagnosed that precisely. Now what's he going to say about the cure?" It's a wonderfully, wonderfully encouraging book, and there's a reason why I've been going back to it for more than 40 years and will continue to do so.

Steve Hiller: Well, we want to send you a copy of this book, Spiritual Depression, as our way of saying thank you for your financial support this month. You can give online at openthebible.org or you can call 1-877-OPEN-365. That might be easier to remember as 1-877-673-6365, or visit the website openthebible.org. Let's get back to the message. Here's Pastor Colin.

Pastor Colin Smith: And so we have one more question to address briefly in these last moments, and that is to do with honoring the unworthy parent. We've asked the question, "How can I be a parent worthy of honor?" and we've sought to bring together some biblical counsel. And now very briefly, this question: how am I to go about honoring an unworthy parent? And let's just cut to the chase. There are some parents who are unworthy, who have misrepresented God and have done great damage.

Some parents are not worthy of honor. The Bible has plenty of examples. I think of Saul. Think of the father that Saul was to Jonathan. Read that story in 1 Samuel. The mood swings, the fits of rage, the irrational behavior. Saul is a study in abused authority. And you remember that at one point he threw a javelin at Jonathan. What kind of father throws a spear at his son? I say that because some of you have the idea that God and the Bible knows nothing about the pain of your experience. Open the Bible and you will find that this God knows what pain in the family is all about.

The Bible recognizes very clearly the pain of bad parenting, and God never asks you to pretend that bad parents were good or that neglectful parents are honorable. That's just a flight from truth. So the obvious question is, how do you honor an unworthy parent or a teacher or a boss or anyone else in a position of authority who you find it difficult to respect? Well, think of it this way. The unworthy parent is one who had authority but not wisdom, not sufficiency, and not love.

They did not have what only God can give. Some folks just don't know how to love. Some folks are crippled by their own unmet needs. Some folks haven't begun to know wisdom that begins from knowing God. And some of us have pain because there is alienation because your parents are still in that position. Ask God to give you compassion for them. Pray that God will give them what they desperately lack.

That's the spirit of Jesus. He has compassion, and compassion keeps the door to repentance open. And remember, as you think about this, that the healing for many deep wounds will begin when you look away from the failings of your parents and up into the face of God. If they misrepresented God to you, then thank God that He is not what they represented, right? That's the breakthrough that some of us have to make.

If they misrepresented God to you, then thank God that He is not what you feared. He is not the one that they misrepresented. Look to the God of the Bible, the God who hears the cries of His people. To Jesus as He gives Himself in compassion on the cross. The final authority in the universe—this is important every time we struggle with authority—the final authority in the universe belongs to the One who knows how to use it. He's altogether wise. He is completely self-sufficient. And His very nature is love. Rejoice. The Lord is King.

Steve Hiller: You're listening to Open the Bible Weekend with Pastor Colin Smith. And really some great food for thought today. You know, I'm really grateful that I grew up in a Christian family. And as I listen to today's broadcast, it really challenges me as a parent. As Pastor Colin said, the highest purpose of all parenting is for us to show what God is like. And that's why being a parent is the greatest incentive for knowing God. I mean, how can you do this job if you don't walk with God?

Well, today's message, "Your Struggle with Authority," is part of a larger series. It's called "The Ten Greatest Struggles of Your Life." As we're looking at the Ten Commandments and seeing how God knew the things that we would struggle with and He addresses them all the way back early in the Old Testament. If you ever miss a broadcast in this series, you can listen online at openthebible.org. You can listen through the Open the Bible app, which is free at your app store, or you can order a copy of the entire series on CD.

Ask about "The Ten Greatest Struggles of Your Life" when you call us at 1-877-OPEN-365, or you'll find ordering information at openthebible.org. For Pastor Colin Smith, I'm Steve Hiller. Thanks for listening and I hope you'll join us next time.

Open the Bible Weekend is a listener-supported production of Open the Bible.

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