The Book of Hebrews - Ages & Stages - Genesis 2:24

Well, good morning. We have a rather lengthy handout here. And with this handout, it's Biblical Guidance on Life Stages. I'm calling it in short Ages and Stages. While we're doing this series on parenting, I think this is going to be useful, but it'll have something for everybody, not just the parents. Nancy and I ordinarily use this every time in premarital counseling. We also use it in marriage counseling, but I think it's also helpful for parents to have a perspective on the various ages and stages of life as they go about their parenting, and also to present these things to their kids as their kids grow up over time to the extent that they can absorb this.

So what we'll do is we'll go through what you see on the screen on the front page of your handout a little bit at a time. Life has its ages and stages and the Bible reveals God's intent, purposes, and the insights for all of life and his purposes for those things on into eternity. We're going to cover all of life. Your life is going to flash before your eyes slowly.

Because these are critical issues in parenting. All of us have parents. I'm pretty sure we all do. Many of us will be parents or are or were parents. So this parenting thing is big. But the ages and stages is an important big picture set of principles for us to draw from here. We're going to cover four aspects of these ages and stages of life. One is the cycles of birth, cycles of child rearing, marriage, support of parents, and death, and everything in between.

Next, honoring parents means three things. Obedience, respect, and responsibility. Those three things. So honoring your parents isn't just something for when kids are under your roof and in your household, but it's something lifelong. Lifelong. Headship and the transfer of headship in the home is the next one. So we'll be looking at that one. And the priority of responsibility. Who has responsibility for caring for the older ones in the church and in the family. So we will be looking at that.

Now, we show what is the typical case, but atypical cases happen a lot. They occur often. So what we have shown here is maybe typical, and I would say over time it's getting to be less and less typical of our culture because our culture is losing and leaving some of these things. Early death, disability, divorce, desertion, being single, remarriage, or other events can change things from what we have here shown on the chart.

So understand the chart isn't some sort of a locked-in model, but it's intended to show typical and usual circumstances. We may have some control over some of these events, but the reality is there are a lot of things we don't have control over, and a lot of things we could say, that's God's call.

God can adjust things from the usual because He determines that that's the best. A principle is either a fundamental truth, or the way things work, or sometimes both. And so when we use this word principle, that's what we're indicating. It's the way things work, or it is a fundamental truth, or both. We bring up these topics because God's word reveals critical insight into important principles, fundamental truths, and the way things work.

You'll notice Bible references under all these categories. The listing is not exhaustive. We've given them as these are some typical Bible verses about that topic, but there may be many more. So don't think of it as this is all the Bible has to say. The Bible also offers good and bad examples and other key insights. For example, we have historical accounts of this is a good or a bad example of what this king did, what this patriarch did, what this disciple did, etc. So we have, in addition to those passages we've listed, we also have historical accounts that serve as good examples in addition to that. Now, so here we have the biblical guidance on life stages. And we'll first go through this top one here, going from birth through cycles of marriage, raising children, assistance from children, and death.

We'll next go through the one honoring parents. Remember the three things, obedience, respect, and responsibility. We'll next go through headship in the home and talk about that. And then we'll talk about the priority of responsibility. Frequently, people think, well, the church needs to do this and the church needs to do that. And actually, as we read the New Testament, there are protections, efforts to avoid burdening the church.

So that's something we'll address. So let's start here with the first one, going from birth to death. So birth, there are four ways in which people have come into this world. Four. Adam was made from the dust of the earth, that's one. So that only happened how many times? Once. Eve was made from Adam's rib, and that happened how many times? Once. Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary as an act of the Holy Spirit, and that happened once. All the rest of us, I'm assuming, unless somebody's got any exceptions here they want to bring up, came in the world in the usual way, having an earthly mother and father.

So that's the typical. We have Psalm 127, 3-5 as a valuing of having children. So that's, I think, a good perspective. Scripture says that having children is valuable. It's not necessary, but it's valuable. So it says, Behold, children are a gift of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them! Question, do we all have the same size quiver? No. So your quiver may be full with less than somebody else.

I can recall a day when Nancy asked me, in your heart of hearts, how many kids would you like? And I said six, and she never asked again. So she comes up with this kind of workaround solution. Well, they each married someone, so anyway, that doesn't count. The next one is marriage and leave home. Raising of the children born will be addressed shortly.

The classical passage on leaving, which is the one Courtney read for us here, leaving home for marriage is Genesis 2.24. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh." So when Becky got married, I gave her to Kurt. And I have no idea why Becky's smiling, Nancy's smiling, but I look somber as can be. Anyway.

Matthew and Mark and 1 Corinthians and Ephesians all quote Genesis 2.24 in whole or in part.

So that is a significant verse on into the New Testament Right now we go to children born and raised Now one of the questions that comes up is does the child you're raising have the gift of singleness or the gift of marriage? Significant question we present this in our single seminar both Jesus and the Apostle Paul taught that both both singleness and Marriage were gifts from God, right?

It's not the same as a spiritual gift, like gift of teaching, gift of help, gift of administration, etc. that you see listed. It's a different kind of giftedness. At different times, a believer may change from one gift to the other. And we can't take the time to go into detail on this. Our single seminar material, we talk about how to tell if one is gifted with singleness or with marriage.

And it's a helpful thing for parents to understand. as they're raising their kids, particularly as they get into their teen years. Okay? Particularly as they get into their teen years. Parents may be in a position to help their teens sort this out. Okay? Help them sort this out. So it's good for parents, especially parents of teens, to be able to provide guidance with.

So as much as we can say about that now. More on marriage and leaving home. Though we list marriage and leave home as one step, in reality, it might be more complex, happening at different times. Leaving home, but remaining single, going to college, joining the military. And if you want to do that, talk to Abe. He'll be glad to help you with that. Different things can happen. So we put it there as a summary statement, marriage and leave home, because that's what the Genesis 224 passage points out. The reality is getting married and leaving home may be quite varied, especially in our own culture today.

Whatever the outcome, parents are best off to aim their children toward adulthood at the right time to tell them that's what they're doing. We're aiming you towards adulthood, okay? So that they know where their parents are aiming. What are my parents shooting for? Because otherwise, what happens is the kids just seem, boy, mom and dad are doing all kinds of things. They tell me, no, I can't do this. And then they encourage that. Why? Well, that's why. And you let them know. So aiming, what do you mean by that?

Life happens, of course, one day at a time. For smaller children, those days seem immensely long. You ever notice that? Little kids see a day as just an immense period of time. I've gotten to the point as I count the days between Sundays, that tells me I'm getting older. When I first came to Holly Hills, there were four days between Sundays. Now, a little time has passed, I've been here almost 13 years, and now there's three days between Sundays. So I can tell I'm getting older here, and you probably can too.

Alright, at a time when your kids can comprehend it, and I would suggest probably junior high age is not a bad time, It is wise to tell them where you're aiming them. This is where we are headed. And when I say yes to this and no to that and encourage this and discourage that, then I'm not just being crazy. But this is where we're taking you. This is where we're going.

Let them know so that it begins at least to make some kind of sense. Aiming is towards the goal of adulthood and independently responsible adult in terms of immediate and extended family relationships, finances, emotions, skill development, etc. There's a lot of things that come into this definition of what's an adult besides just reaching a certain age. So to talk to them about that, this is where I'm aiming you in different areas. Let that be clear to them.

Now, spiritual aiming. Spiritual aiming has a few components, assuming that the child becomes a believer. And those three components are one. At adulthood, the child will know what it means to walk in fellowship with the Lord and to grow. At adulthood, they'll know what it means to walk in fellowship with the Lord and to grow.

We've talked about five different tools that we have from scripture, and we've talked about examples. So ultimately six tools with the examples. The examples give validity and authenticity to the rest of the tools. I'm going to give you a couple of examples here just to give you an illustration. One is I found this last week. The thing that Donna Doyle remembers about growing up in her home is when she would get up in the morning she would always see her dad reading the Bible. She remembers that and that just stuck in her head today.

I'm going to read you an email that I got from my son Ed in November 2011. He said, I probably haven't thanked you for raising me in a Christian household before, and at times I probably was pretty ticked off for it. I am very thankful now that I'm raising kids of my own for the example that you laid out for me on how to raise my kids. I know that I was a pain in the tail all too often, but I am thankful that you love me through it. Thank you, Dad. for showing what a godly man and a godly father look like. I know that you weren't perfect. Yeah, he really knows that. Okay. And at times I focused on those imperfections.

But for the most part, I remember things like you coming home from work early and dealing with me lovingly, despite the fact that I just ruined your workday or disrespected the woman that you love and care for so deeply. I remember things like waking up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and opening the door to see you on your knees. before the Lord, giving Him the children that He had given you. These are moments that mattered. The times that I will never forget and that impacted me more than all the others.

The next one. At adulthood, the child will know what it means to be interdependently dependent on the Lord and in a growing church body. So this is not just adulthood singularly, but it's adulthood in terms of involvement with a church body, a growing church body. And I don't mean growing in numbers. I'm talking about spiritual growth as defined by God's Word.

When I was in my high school years, and this is the town probably a few years before I went to high school there, This is a town that I went to high school in, a little farm town. And there was a pastor in that town that said, I want my people in church every night.

You know, that's crazy. That's nuts. Because what's that going to do? It's going to undermine the opportunity for the families. Because they're in church every night instead of being a family. So that extreme is way off track. Way off track. That's not what God has in mind.

There is, on the other hand, this is a book written 10 years ago by Dr. William Bradford Wilcox. He's from the University of Virginia. He's a director of what's called the marriage project. He wrote a book called soft patriarchs and new men and it was studies of Christian men and It's fascinating book.

At least I thought thought it was So dr. Wilcox pointed out among numerous things the difference between those who are consistent in church attendance and those who are inconsistent in church attendance he noted that Christian husbands who commit domestic violence are more than twice as likely to do so if they're inconsistent in church attendance. Isn't that amazing? Also, the rate of divorce among those who are inconsistent in church attendance is 20% higher than those who are consistent.

So there's something about it. Now, those are statistics, but I think those are the symptom. I think those statistics are the symptom. Because the underlying issue is does the father, because remember God's word puts the emphasis on the father, does the father understand the need for himself and for his wife and for his children to be fed regularly and to be involved in the church body? Does that father understand the need of the church body to interact regularly and for people to see examples. One of the things we've said is if you're someone who has grown up with either a blank in some particular area, because dad wasn't around, or if you're someone who had bad examples, you need to see examples. The church body needs that. So these are just Symptoms they're not the real problem.

The real issue is is there a recognition of the need the need of the family? Is there a recognition of the need the need? of the church body The third one at adulthood the child will know unless he or she has the gift of singleness how to lead his wife and family or for her the daughter to know what that looks like and This is adulthood, not just are you a responsible adult, but do you really know how to lead a family? In raising children, to make that as a key goal or aim, that he knows how to lead a family. I blew it in lots of ways, but that's a part of what my son just wrote me about here, that I just read. that he knew how to lead a family.

Then there's career guidance, training, and education. In the middle to late teen years are also an opportune time for parents to help their teens to find their aptitudes, interests, and assist them in pursuing and developing them towards a career. A section in the Holy Hill's Bible Church biblical counseling material may be helpful to parents of teens or even later. in finding the wisest course of action for career training, education, and development. That's partly, you get it online. We also have it in paper versions if you'd like to see that. So, if you're looking at the series in biblical counseling under the archived series, if you want to look that up.

Now, children born and raised. Of course, we're going over the biblical principles regarding the raising of children, so we're not going to address that all here. However, aside from singles, there are married couples who have chosen not to have children. God is sovereign in such things. So, just so you know, the bringing up of those children is aimed toward them being adults in every respect, whether they marry, remain single, stay home, or leave home. Now, here in our biblical guidance on life stages, we'll look at children that marry and leave home. Now, the babies who grew up and got married had babies who grew up and got married by this time, right?

The original parents are empty nesters likely to become grandparents before long at this stage. Then we'll go to assistance from children. At some point it is likely or at least possible that the parents will get to a place where they will require assistance from their adult children.

The way it's worked out for Nancy and myself, her dad among the four parents was the first one to go home. He was 63 as I recall. Nancy's mom called me up very distraught. He had just put the lawnmower away and he was gone. Nancy's mom, on the other hand, needed assistance for some years to come until she was about 80.

And so it can vary in that. In my case, both my parents are still alive. Because of my dad particularly, lots of assistance has been required, especially in the last, say, year and a half. So this will mean that the children must step forward to offer and provide that assistance, and the parents ought to accept the help offered.

One of the biggest difficulties I see in carrying this out is that the parents don't recognize their need for help. Let me tell you something. If your kids are coming to you saying you need some help, you need some help. You need some help. Part of the problem is as they get to a certain stage, they don't recognize the need. A way to say it is they don't know what they don't know. And so if your kids are coming and offering help, it's because you need the help, whether you think you need it or not.

So Nancy and I have told our kids, now look, if you see something needs to be done, do it. Alright. Now, and this is the last stage, death. Death is the separation of a soul and spirit from a person from the physical body. I'll get there round about. This is a Sunday school class that my grandmother taught. She was a missionary to the cannibals in Fiji. They sold cow meat and pig meat and chicken meat and people meat in the capital city. My grandmother passed away at about age 87.

What happened? Her soul and spirit separated from her physical body. The principle throughout scripture is death is separation. And at physical death, that's the separation that takes place. For the believer, those on this earth may very well miss the person who went home. I don't feel bad for my grandmother. We just recently had a homegoing celebration for Phil's brother, Scott. What took place? It was the spirit and soul separated from the body.

For the believer who has gone home, it doesn't get any better than that. See, we don't need to worry about the person who's gone home. It's never better for them. They're not interested in coming back. Not at all. One other thing. We go out to the graveyard. That isn't their final resting place. As a matter of fact, nothing we do out in the graveyard is permanent. How about that? Nothing's permanent.

The Lord's taken them home. Dealing with what is left behind is the final part of honor your father and mother. Dealing with their physical remains, dealing with things that are left, that's the last part of honor your father and mother. Okay, so we look here at this top one. Next we'll look at honoring parents means obedience, respect, and responsibility. So honoring parents has the three stages. So when the child is under the parent's roof and authority, then honoring parents is about obedience.

That is, as we pointed out when studying Ephesians chapter 6, listening under, listening to what is said and placing oneself under it. That's what obedience is. It isn't begrudging, I guess I'll do it, right? It's listening, it's the child listening deliberately and then deliberately placing themselves under what is said. So they actually hear and listen, not just hear and go, right?

Not that. Then there's the time of respect of parents for the selfless gift of their time, energy, and resources given to their children. Respecting parents during that time. And the third one, there is the responsibility to aid parents until their death, even if they don't want it. Right? Okay. It's not just about children obeying their parents. This is key. It's not just a matter of children obeying their parents, it's a matter of children learning, including by example, and that is very important. By example, that for them to honor their parents also means the respect and responsibility parts.

One of the reasons why we bring this up in pre-marriage counseling is that in my deciding to marry Nancy, that includes supporting her support of her folks. and it came to reality with her mom. Lots of assistance was needed, and I needed to support her in that. That's part of being married. That does not mean that each situation, each family would be the same. It likely won't be. Just like with Nancy's mom and dad, it was different, and with my folks, it's different.

The children will likely learn to treat their parents, that's you, from what they see their own parents doing. So it's a matter of by example training them. We showed last week this by example pattern and the key one that shows up for this life stages is what's the definition of an adult son? How does an adult son relate to and treat his parents? How does an adult daughter relate to and treat her parents? So those questions then come into play.

Now, from there we look to headship in the home. So scripture makes it clear that a husband has headship in the home, and what happened in my case, I passed on the headship three times and don't have any left. The husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church. That's the example from Ephesians 5, 22 through 33. That's abundantly clear. As we've seen, the husband and father has the primary responsibility for discipline, instruction, exhorting, encouraging, and employing their children. The example tool is one I would say is equal, equal between the husband and the wife.

So passing on the headship, Genesis 2.24 tells us that the man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife. The two of them are establishing a new God-ordained entity.

And people ought to respect that. Nancy and I were friends with a couple in which both sets of parents didn't like who their child married. And very strange, it turned out that if they invited me and Nancy over, it seemed to calm down and placate the parents on a visit. So when parents are visiting, we would get the phone call because that seemed to get them calmed down. I don't know quite how that works. Don't rely on that solution, okay? Besides that, you can't keep calling us all the time for that. Alright.

The two of them are establishing a new entity. It is by God's design. Others ought to respect that. The son is now taking on headship in the home over his wife and over their children. And that headship is under God. It is not headship in which, I'm the boss and you're the bossed. Right? It's not headship in which, now I've got you under my thumb. Right? That's not what we're talking about here.

This is taking responsibility under God for the family. Stepping up to the plate, having courage. Now, let us talk about lettuce. Alright. Let us raise our sons so that by discipline, instruction, example, exhorting, encouraging and imploring, our six tools, they will know what godly headship is. Let us raise our daughters so that by these very same tools they will be brought up to know what godly headship looks like in a man and will look for it in the men they marry.

Oh, that's what it looks like. That's what it looks like. This is putting it by gender, sons and daughters here, that's the goal. This is what adulthood looks like. So they're not trying to figure out how you do this marriage thing, how do we have the relationship, but they've seen it, they know it.

Now let's look to the priority of responsibility, the last one here. Each one must take care of those of his own household, especially the husband and the father, his wife, and children. Primary responsibility there. Then those in direct lineage of the one in need are next responsible to offer and provide help and support. Then those in indirect lineage to the one in need are the next ones responsible to provide support.

Not that it's a Christian example, but Nancy and I some time ago had a neighbor in the apartment building whose name was Margot. She was a Jewish lady. She actually had been among the last ships out taking Jews out of the country when Hitler was taking power and gathering up Jews. She had no direct descendants, so it was a niece that stepped in to care for her. That would be an example here.

The church is actually at the last priority of responsibility. The Apostle Paul, when he talks about widows, says the widows must meet these criteria in order for the church to step up and help. And Paul himself did various things so as not to burden the church, and he actually talks about that repeatedly. So the church ought not to be the first place to go, but rather all these other parts of the family first must step up to the plate, and then the church.

The flip side of that is the responsibility to avoid being a burden. And the Apostle Paul did his tent making work in order to avoid being a burden. Each person's responsibility to avoid being a burden as well to the extent that such avoidance and prevention is possible. Examples, working to earn a living for oneself and for the family, maintaining health and fitness, saving for the future, learning to do things for oneself where possible.

These are things that ought to be done so that you avoid being a burden, and they're things that are underscored in the New Testament. Though others have a responsibility to care according to the biblical patterns, and we've talked about that, it is not wise, loving, or ethical to simply presume that others will take care of you. A sense of entitlement is the opposite of a sense of gratitude.

Colossians 3.15, let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, and that word means umpire, rule in your hearts to which indeed you were called in one body and be thankful. Thankfulness, gratitude, is the opposite of a sense of entitlement.

In 2 Thessalonians 3.10, there were some who said, oh, we've got this wonderful church and I don't have to work anymore. They'll take care of me. No, he says if anyone's not willing to work, then he is not to eat either. So this sense of this sense of, you know, I need to be responsible and avoid being a burden as much as possible.

Okay, you have this here in your handout. It is a sort of a degree of family relationships if you get in a situation that's complex. How closely related you are is really the principle. It's used by genealogists and sometimes people are trying to settle in a state. Sometimes state laws are patterned after something like this. In fact, the Colorado intestate succession law is there on the link on the bottom. Now, the other thing is, one of the things in caring for people that's critical in our culture, I put it on page six on your handout, for any adult with significant assets and or responsibility for children, you need to have these documents in place.

And it's a living will or living trust, and even a living trust, you have a pour over will. The living will says what medical procedures you should or should not be done if you cannot say so. And Nancy had to take advantage of that when she was caring for her mom. Her mom came out of the operating room, but the doctor says, she's got a clot. And if we don't go right back in and take care of that clot, we're going to have to amputate. Well, Nancy's mom had a living rule that says, I want no amputations. So Nancy had no problem having also health care power of attorney. She signed the thing. They wheeled her back in and took care of the clot right then. So it is useful and valuable.

It's not just theoretical. So you have a health care power of attorney and a financial power of attorney. Sometimes these things are combined. Advanced Medical Directive is one of the combinations. Caringinfo.org has that available. There's really good software, Willmaker Plus 2014. Nancy and I have used it some time ago and even more recently. You can also see Dave Demery or myself have this or other software. We can help you put it together. If your situation is complex, I'm not a lawyer. If you feel more comfortable, please see an attorney. That's another way to handle it.

But please do these and keep them up to date. One instance that can happen is, let's say for parents, is let's say something takes place and both parents die. Who do the kids go to? And if you have particular concerns about who your kids would go to or what family squabbles might come about, That's something to be settled, for parents particularly.

Now, we've covered an entire lifetime in less than an hour. You've had your life passed before your eyes. We've talked about individuals and families and extended families and marriage and singleness and all sorts of other things in between. We've covered significant events in the family life of a believer and key principles involved in each process and event, mostly with a focus on parents. But really, there's something in this for everybody, isn't there? Marriage and family are large matters to God because here's a part of what we're doing as Husbands and wives and mothers and fathers where we are illustrating things that are actually eternal principles Okay, so you're a walking illustration one of the things that I get really excited about is that Nancy and I get to live out day by day the eternal romance of Christ in the church and One of the things you'll notice here, and you may have seen this, and by the way I just changed this slightly, so modification if you've seen it before, but notice that the father and the son of the three persons of the Trinity, those are family relationships, aren't they? So what we're doing when you're talking about a father and a son is you're illustrating in life an eternal identity and relationship. Next.

God's word says that those who believe are his children. And by the way, God has no grandchildren. God has no grandchildren. We are his children. The word of God also says that the church is the bride of Christ forever. So what are we doing as parents, as husbands and wives, as people or part of a family? We are illustrating for our children eternal principles.

I saw in my father somebody that helps me to know who God the Father is. I saw somebody in my mom and dad that helps me to see the eternal romance between Christ and the church. God has revealed all of these things because he loves us. Living out the family relationships that we have here in biblical ways helps our children and everyone in the church body to learn about spiritual and eternal truths more readily.

It is a great teaching tool to see these things lived out biblically. A great teaching tool. It will impact generations to come. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for these great truths. We thank you for your amazing grace. Parenting is a daunting task and it is even more challenging at this time and in this generation than it was in generations past. And Lord, we do look to you to bring these truths home to our hearts, to teach us, and to show us the realities of these precious and great truths that you've presented in your word. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.