Return to Domestic Piety

Introduction: The Vision for These Days and the Need for Domestic Piety

0:01 The following message was delivered at the 1994 Trinity Baptist Church Pastors' Conference. Now let us once again seek the face of God in prayer, as God has been gracious in past years to grant us special seasons of His nearness in these sessions together. We have reason to believe He has not exhausted His infinite grace and kindness, and yet there is that fear, I'm sure, in the heart of every perceptive Christian. What would it be to be left at the mercy of our own resources?

0:45 Let us cry that God will indeed graciously meet with us.

0:52 Our Father, we are mindful of Your Word, which tells us, Cursed is the man who trusts in man, and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart departs from him. You have said that such a one shall be like a heath in the desert. He shall inhabit a parched place in a wilderness where no water is. And our Father, we know, many of us who are Your children, what it is to inhabit the parched places that have come as the fruit of our own creature confidence.

1:30 And we would solemnly repudiate all confidence, and all our own ability to understand Your Word, much less to minister that Word to others. Come then, we pray, by the power of Your grace and of Your Spirit, and so work in the mind and heart of every listener, and in the mind and heart and tongue of Your servant who attempts to speak Your truth, that together we may all be made very conscious that You have fulfilled Your promise. You have fulfilled Your promise to those who trust in You. You have promised to make them like a well-watered garden.

2:15 O God, do that for us, we pray, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Now, for those of you who are aware of the schedule and the announced subjects for this conference, you know that the subject announced for tonight's meeting is our vision for the these days. In October of 1988, this was the subject announced for the Monday night session of the conference in that year.

2:55 And since then, each year, the elders have directed me to continue with that theme. And there has been, with but one exception, this Monday night emphasis upon our vision for these days. And each time, as we speak, we are going to be talking about the subject of the Monday night session. And there has been, with but one exception, this Monday night emphasis upon our vision for these days.

3:13 And since then, as I have begun to preach on a specific aspect of that theme, I have first of all given a word of explanation, explaining that the words, our vision for these days, are simply used to express our perception of the most critical areas of need for the people of God and for our own generation, and what we, as the servants of God and the people of God, ought to seek to do in the strength of God to respond to that perceived need.

3:53 Our use of the term, our vision for these days, is but an application of what we read in 1 Chronicles 12 and verse 32 concerning the men of Issachar who had understanding of the times that they might know what Israel ought to do. Or, in the language of the passage read in our hearing, it is our effort to respond in obedience to the injunction of the Apostle in Ephesians 5, 15 and following, Look therefore carefully how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise, redeeming the time,

4:35 because the days are evil. Wherefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And so, in the use of this title, our vision for these days, we are simply seeking to capture our perception, our understanding, of those aspects of God's truth which are most desperately needed by our generation. And then I have always begun not only with a word of explanation, but with a word of disclaimer.

5:10 We, as a group of churches represented by the men who are here, and certainly the eldership ofizado by the men who are here, and certainly the eldership of this assembly, claim no extraordinary commission from God with respect to these matters, nor do we claim to have an exclusive commission with reference to these matters. We have no individual or corporate messianic complex.Nor do we claim to have an exclusive commision with reference to these matters. We have no individual or corporate messianic complex, but we are seeking to enhance the membership of the church.

5:35 Certainly the fact that we consider the served as to the people that we worship conformingly in the government's spirit that wehakab to them in the Lord, , and that as the staffs that we worship we решeth these matters in the name e chicos on the Gospel. Or, certainly, , as someone who co tripped they do in times when they but we are seeking to act as responsible men ministering to the peculiar needs of our own generation. Now, in the previous messages, we have addressed the subject, our vision for these days, and have focused upon five areas of concern. Our vision for these days is one that desperately desires to see a recovery of the biblical gospel, secondly, a renewal of biblical holiness, thirdly, a return to biblical churchmanship,

6:18 fourth, a restoration of biblical preaching, and in our study together last year, a recognition of the watchman identity and function of the biblical gospel. Now, tonight, I wish to address the sixth area of crucial concern, which does indeed constitute a vital part of our vision for these days. And I've stated it this way, it is the re-establishment of godly family life, or in the more antiquated terminology, the return to domestic life, or the re-establishment of domestic piety.

7:02 What we would call, in current parlance, godly family life, our forefathers designated as domestic piety. And I must confess, there is something in me that has an affinity for the older terminology. But realizing that others may not quite be as skewed as I am somewhere in the deep depths of my psyche, that I feel a stronger affinity to the term domestic piety, I will work with the terminology, the re-establishment of godly family life.

7:41 Now, that this issue has been and remains a matter of deep concern within the ranks of those of you present in this place tonight, is evident to anyone who has any connection with those who are here tonight. The theme of this series is the creation of divine life. The themes again and again in the various family conferences have directed our attention to various aspects of godly family life or of domestic piety. The subjects that have been assigned to some of you and some of us who have preached at the various men's and women's retreats held by many of our churches,

8:25 those subjects indicate that indeed this has been a matter of deep and pervasive concern amongst us. Furthermore, if you are in any way aware of the rather lengthy series of sermons and adult Sunday school lessons taught in our respective churches, you will find that there have been repeated and often lengthy series of sermons dealing with various aspects of the people, teaching of the word of God concerning godly family life.

9:00 And so for me to say that our vision for these days and to include in the hour those of us represented here is not an overstatement. Indeed, there is abundant evidence that our vision for these days is indeed one that involves the reestablishment of godliness, godliness and the life of the church.

9:28 Furthermore, the legitimacy of taking up a concern well worked by the brethren sitting here tonight is obvious in terms of the glut of statistics that continue to pour forth both from Christian and non-Christian sources relative to the breakup of the so-called nuclear family. The frightening, the frightening, proliferation of illegitimacy in our country and in the UK as well. The horrible tragedy of divorce that disrupts the family structure and leaves children vulnerable to all kinds of abnormalities.

10:13 Surely these things are a loud cry that whatever emphasis we have placed upon this subject, we have far from even begun to win the field in this area of godly family life. So in taking up the subject, I know it is a subject for which there is great, I trust, universal sympathy in those who sit before me this evening. And what can I do in the time allotted to me when I've already said that there are representatives...

10:50 by the men here, literally hundreds if not thousands of hours of solid biblical exposition and application and practical directives and exhortations just within this group. Well, obviously all I can hope to do in this one session is to attempt to encapsulate this vision and hopefully to issue a call to each one of us to a fresh commitment to a fresh commitment to a fresh commitment to the realization of this vision under the blessing of the Spirit of God and by the enablement of God's grace. So then, our vision for these days

Godly Family Life Begins with Godly Marriages

11:34 is the reestablishment of godly family life. I want to address the subject under four headings. And the first is this. The reestablishment of godly family life, ideally begins with the contracting of godly marriages.

12:00 The reestablishment of godly family life, ideally begins with the contracting of godly marriages. Now I have said ideally because I recognize that according to the scriptures and in keeping with the experience of not only God, a few of you sitting here, though you now have by the grace of God what could be called a godly family life, it did not begin with the contracting of a godly marriage. It began perhaps with two starry-eyed kids running off and thinking that everything would turn out beautifully because you, quote,

12:43 loved one another. And after finding out that a marriage ring and marriage vows and a honeymoon, did not mean that you rode off to the sunset to live happily ever after. Perhaps it was the very beginnings of the disintegration of the relationship that made you accessible to the gospel. And God may have brought some of you to repentance and faith at relatively at the same time.

13:11 Others may have borne the burden of a divided marriage such as we read about in 1 Corinthians 7. Some of you may sit here this day, bearing that burden. And I am not insensitive to those realities, but in seeking to issue a clarion call with respect to our vision, I am stating that the reestablishment of godly family life ideally begins with the contracting of godly marriages. Now, if we are to see godly marriages contracted in the ranks, of our churches and within the orbit of our influence,

13:56 what is it that we must seek to maintain in our own thinking and impart to the thinking and the actions of our children? Let me answer in three categories. Number 1. By maintaining biblical standards for the selection of a marriage partner.

14:20 By maintaining standards for the selection of a marriage partner. It is not without reason that when God begins to describe the circumstances in society at large, which ultimately led to God inundating the ancient earth with the judgment of the flood, that the emphasis in Genesis 6 falls upon a practice in which men and women no longer maintained what we today would call biblical standards for the

14:59 selection of their marriage partners. Look at the text in Genesis 6.1. And it came to pass when men began to multiply on the face of the ground, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God, those of the godly line of Seth, saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and they took wives of all that they chose.

15:30 We are introduced in this chapter in the first statement that leads to the ultimate destruction of the old world by a situation in which the concerns of godliness no longer dominated in the selection of a marriage partner. We are introduced in this chapter in the first statement that leads to the ultimate destruction of the old world by a situation in which the concerns of marriage partners. Rather, it was beauty of face and of form. The sons of God saw what? Not the

16:03 character of godliness, but they saw that the daughters of men were fair. They married on the basis of what could be known by one long gaze upon the face and upon the body. There was no concern with respect to what lay beneath the surface of the fair face and the shapely form. And the concerns of godliness, the concern that the sons of God would marry the daughters of God, and that together they would be committed to the rearing of a godly seed, gave way to the philosophy that

16:47 if it looks good, grab it. And if we are in any way in which the sons of God would marry the daughters of God, we are in any way to see in our day the reestablishment of godly family life. We must use every means at our disposal to pass on to our children, and hear me parents, and to regulate our assessment of those whom they may begin to be interested in, in terms of godly standards, not karma.

17:25 We must have eternal standards, personal taste, personal ambition, social standing, or our own unmortified pride. Are you prepared, mom and dad, to introduce to anyone in the circle of your influence a relatively plain Jane, whom your handsome son has set his eye upon, because he has seen through her relatively plain eyes, that she is a woman of God. She is a woman of God. She is a

17:57 plain face, and less than beauty queen figure. The graces of a thirst after God, and a love for Christ, and the adornment of a meek and a quiet spirit, and a selfless commitment to serve others, and a passion to know God, and walk with God, and to be a woman of whom there is no explanation, but that she is full of the spirit of God. You see, mom and dad, your own stinking pride's got to be

18:37 mortified. Are you prepared? Should your daughter find her heart beginning to be drawn with romantic interest, the thought of a potential marriage partner, someone who in terms of his background in training and natural endowments, was never cut out to make his way up the corporate ladder, never cut out to make his way up the corporate ladder, never cut out to make his way up the

19:05 corporate ladder, never cut out to be a quote, white collar executive. He may have gnarled and scarred hands from his manual labor. The cut of his suit may not quite be the kind of thing you'd expect in a Fortune 500 company office, but what she has seen in that man is the assertiveness of a man who knows his identity as a man, and who has a heart after God.

19:38 who has a heart after God, who is committed to a life of universal holiness, who is prepared to bear the burden of godly manhood as the leader of his home and provider for his family, and woven through the texture of that male strength is the tenderness and the sensitivity which Paul describes as the meekness and the gentleness of Christ. And she sees beyond. What society would call his blue collar second class position, as far as his occupation.

20:19 And beyond perhaps the absence of some of the refined, polished social graces that others may have. And she said, that's the kind of man I want my sons to become, and I want my daughters to identify with as godly manhood, that the characteristics I see in him. I want them. I want them to see and look for in their potential mates.

20:44 How about you, mom? You ready to introduce him proudly to your friends?

20:52 You see, it's not only an issue for you singles to come to grips with, it's an issue for you parents to come to grips with. And if we are to see a reestablishment of godly family life, that ideally begins with contracting godly marriages, all of us together. Singles.

21:14 Young men and women, parents and pastors, along with them, we must maintain biblical standards for the selection of a marriage partner, but then secondly, we must maintain biblical standards for the goals of potential marriage partners. We must maintain biblical standards.

21:45 For the goals of potential marriage partners, as a relationship begins to blossom, and you as parents have input, pastors and friends, intimate associates, you begin to ask the young couple, what are your goals for this potential union? What is it that you are building in your mind as your dream castle? What is it to which you're prepared to give? What is it to which you're prepared to give yourselves in your marital life?

22:21 Well, unless we are hammering out for them those goals that ought to reflect sensitivity to biblical norms, the world will not be at all fastidious about impressing its standards and goals upon them. Should the goal be that they have this much and that much accumulated in terms of earthly possessions?

22:49 In the first five years of their marriage, and therefore, deliberately married, choosing not to even attempt to bear children for the first five years, so that they may accumulate this, that, and the other, and then make a half-hearted try at bearing children during the next five years, while they pursue this, that, and the other, and then, if it's convenient, maybe children will enter the picture after the tenth year. Are you allowing that perspective? Are you allowing that to take root among the young people in your assembly, among your own children, your own sons, and your own daughters?

23:28 Are you allowing them to conceive of a situation in which it is to be considered normal that both the father and the mother would be working outside of the home in separate careers? As long as the Word of God clearly says that the older women are to train...

23:52 And the word for train is not a standard word for teach. It literally means bring to sobriety. The older women are to help the younger women to think with biblical sobriety about their God-given role and task and place. And what is it, according to the Holy Ghost, through the Apostle Paul in Titus chapter 2?

24:15 Let's look at it. Titus chapter 2. The older women are to...

24:22 Train the younger women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sober-minded, chaste, and then a compound word in the Greek, the word worker and the word home. And it means exactly what it says. Workers at home.

24:51 Kind. In subjection to their own husbands. And look at the issue that's at stake. That the Word of God not be blasphemed.

25:03 How can the Word of God be blasphemed if a woman does not have as her primary orientation in her goals for marriage everything that relates to the domestic sphere? Love husband. Love children. Worker at home.

25:24 In subjection to her own husband. That the Word of God be not...

25:28 Blasphemed. Why? Because that God-assigned sphere of her primary commitment is so plainly taught in the Word of God that for anyone to claim to love the God of the book and be obeying the God of the book and living in any other sphere is to cause people to blaspheme.

25:53 And I say, if we are committed from the depths of our being to see a reestablishment of godly family life, then my brethren, my brothers, and sisters, not only must we maintain a biblical standard for the selection of marriage partners, but maintain biblical standards for the goals of potential marriage partners. Will they seek things and along the way, as is convenient, the kingdom of God? Or will they view their union as a means further to pursue in strict obedience? Matthew 6.

26:35 13. 33. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.

26:47 Are they marrying with a view to turning inward upon themselves, seeking to find in one another, by a selfish insulation from a life of service to others, that happiness that will always elude them, for he that would save his life shall lose it. He that would save his marriage by feeding all of the energies and interests inward will lose the very happiness that is sought. But that couple that loses its own self-centered life, as Jesus said the same, shall save it.

27:26 So if there is to be the reestablishment of godly family life, it will ideally begin with the contracting of godly marriages in brethren. It will not be a pattern among us. Unless we maintain biblical standards for the selection of marriage partners. Maintain biblical standards for the goals of potential marriage partners.

27:48 And thirdly, maintain biblical standards for the commitments of marriage partners. Maintain biblical standards for the commitments of marriage partners. And I do not stand here to be your instructor, only your reminder. When our Lord Jesus was questioned about the naughty issue of divorce, you remember what he did in Matthew 19?

28:17 He pointed them back to the beginning. From the beginning, it was not so. He who made them in the beginning, made them male and female, and said, for this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So that they are no more two, but one flesh.

28:43 What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. And it will not do to take the position that Dwight Harvey Small has taken in recent years and others with him. That if along the road in the marriage it becomes evident that the relationship is going sour, and the spark is gone and nothing can reach. We kindle it, or if the marriage is born the shock of some unusual area of disruption through unfaithfulness or through lack of fulfilling this or that commitment.

29:23 We just need to recognize this was a marriage God never made. And declare the death of something God never made. That's how he conveniently opts out of what therefore God hath joined together. What sophistry!

29:40 And yet it's, hailed by evangelical leaders on the book jacket as a marvelous re-statement and re-application and more realistic insight to the scriptures that meets the needs of our present day. So now the Bible must be twisted to a covenant breaking age.

30:03 If we're to see the reestablishment of godly family life brethren, we must maintain biblical standards for the commitments of marriage, and the sanctification of marriage. And if it becomes a living hell, you live in it, or lay hold of the grace of God to change it, but out of it you cannot jump. because things ain't all you dreamed they'd be.

30:46 Now granted, sexual infidelity does give legitimate warrant for the marriage to be dissolved. It is not a command.

30:59 And the desertion of an unbelieving partner that cannot be rectified. 1 Corinthians 7 But my brethren, my sisters, apart from those two except clauses in the scriptures, the commitments for keeps. And for some of us who had no premarital counseling, none whatsoever, we did have some of us perhaps some good examples of what a solid marriage was, but there were few, if any, books written from a Christian perspective. We just thought, if I love her and she loves me and we both love the Lord and we get married, it's all just going to work.

31:42 It just didn't work out just like that.

31:45 It just didn't work out just like that.

31:48 And I stand before you as one who can testify that the first two or three years of our marriage had lots of tears.

32:00 Lots of late nights sitting up with tears and an open Bible. But in wrestling through, how can we make this thing work? One thing we knew we could not do. And that was look back over our shoulder for a way out.

32:15 It was either through the difficulties and into it. It was either through a God-honoring marriage or suffer with all the unresolved areas of God. And in a day marked, I say, by covenant breaking, may God help us to pass on as a legacy to our young men and women, this biblical standard for the commitments that the marriage partners make one to another. So I lay before you that first heading in our vision, that we see the reestablishment of godly family life.

32:57 It ideally begins with the contracting of godly marriages. And we will not see the contracting of godly marriages unless these three principles take root amongst us. Secondly, the reestablishment of godly family life is built upon the nurturing of a godly husband, wife, relationship. The reestablishment of godly family life is built upon the nurturing of godly husband-wife relationships.

Nurturing Godly Husband-Wife Relationships

33:40 God has so ordered it that he gives every couple at least nine months to work on being a good husband and a good wife before you have to begin to learn how to be a good mom and a good dad. Now, God could have made us that our gestation rate was the same as rabbits. He could have, but he didn't. He didn't.

34:08 And so in the very physiology of the way God has made us, he is making it abundantly clear to us. And in the creation order, he makes it clear that it is the establishment of a stable, godly husband-wife relationship that the godly family, finds its contours and its foundation. What is the essence of those roles in relationships? I'm not telling you anything new.

34:40 I know that. You came hoping to hear something profound. Might as well get up and go out. You're going to hear things now you've heard, some of you, many times.

34:50 But have you really heard them? For the husband, when we take what was read in our hearing from Ephesians 5, and we collate it with 1 Peter 3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38,

35:35 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 91,

36:19 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100,

37:04 to abuse his position of authority and headship, his native tendency to draw into his own little world and not communicate, his native tendency to judge his wife's actions and reactions in terms of his own male perspectives and not seek to know her, to get behind her eyeballs and under her psyche and under her skin and to think and to feel as she thinks and feels. He is to cultivate a loving, assertive, communicative, sensitive, nurturing headship over his wife.

37:46 You see, in all of the preaching that we do on Ephesians 5, there's something that is assumed in the passage. It's not directly and explicitly mentioned, but surely it's assumed. Husbands love as Christ loved the church and gave. He gave himself for it.

38:04 And how do you know he loved the church and gave himself for it? How do you know he nurtures and cherishes it? How do you know he's going to present it to himself, a glorious church? And how do you know what you must do in that process of ongoing purification?

38:21 It's because he's opened his heart and his mind in his word. He's communicated his heart. He is no mute Christ.

38:36 He expects us to somehow read the unspoken symbols of his love and of his nurturing care. I love the imagery one author in an excellent book on Christian manhood took from words used of a past president in our country. He said he was a man of steel and of velvet. With respect to the commitment to principle, a willingness to bear the burden of leadership, and all that goes with it, he was a man of steel.

39:13 But with respect to how he impacted others, there was the softness, the invitingness of velvet. Is not that very principle augmented to infinity seen in our blessed Lord Jesus Christ? Little children were not intimidated by him. When he needs one for an illustration, he could say, hey, sonny, come here, sit on my knee for a minute.

39:43 Little kid doesn't stand off in a corner cowering before. This austere figure, a woman taken in adultery, does not run away from him, but stands ashamed. Yes, but there was something so graciously inviting about his demeanor. And yet it's that same Christ who with manly courage and manly strength weaves his scourge of cords and goes into the temple and single-handedly dries out all the beasts, overturns the tables, cleanses his house.

40:22 Man of steel, the belt. My brethren, if we're going to see the reestablishment of godly family life, it will be built upon the nurturing of godly husband-wife relationships, which means that we men must first of all be committed to cultivating by every discipline and means of grace at our disposal a loving, assertive, communicative, selfless man. Sensitive, nurturing headship over our wives.

41:05 No wonder this instruction in Ephesians 5 follows hard upon the command, be not drunk with wine, but be filled with the spirit. And after giving us five participles, which show the, as we might call, the continuing conduits of a spirit-filled life, when he gets specific, he focuses upon the husband-wife relationship. First of all, for surely a man, every son of Adam, regardless of how God scrambled him up in his mother's womb with what we might call the inclinations to a more gentle, less volatile temperament, such a man will need to be full

41:49 of the spirit to cultivate the steel of holy assertiveness. Though he may not need anywhere near as much grace to be sensitive and nurturing and gentle, you see, at some point or other, in terms of the way we've been put together, every one of us as men will need to be filled with the spirit if we are to nurture our relationship to our wives along Biblical patterns. And for the wife, when we bring together Ephesians 5, Titus 2, 4, Genesis 2, 1 Corinthians 11, what's the basic picture we get

42:33 of that which the wife is to be in relationship to the husband? She is to cultivate a loving, yes, a loving, because Paul said the older women are to train the younger women to love their husbands. And though loving the husband is not mentioned in Ephesians 5, surely if the paradigm is the relationship of the church to Christ, what is it? What is it that constrains you to submit yourself to Christ?

43:01 Is it not the love for Christ that the Spirit of God implanted in your heart when he brought you to faith in Christ? And you have a faith that now, according to Galatians, works by what? Works by love? Though the duty to love is not explicitly mentioned in Ephesians 5, it's assumed in the whole thrust of the passage, but it's explicitly mentioned in Titus 2, 4, that women need to be trained how to love their husbands in a biblical way.

43:36 According to Genesis 2, the woman's identity is bound up in her being a helper, answering to her husband's need. You see, this is the real heart of the nub of aggressive, intelligent feminism, if I may call such madness intelligent, the thought that a woman's identity is in any way connected with a man. That is the thing that raises the red flag. The intelligent, the well-schooled, the articulate feminist is committed to this principle.

44:10 I am what I am as a woman, without any reference to men whatsoever, and to tell a woman, look, the very rationale for your existence, the way you exist, is you were designed to be a helper, answering to the man. You've thrown down the gauntlet, my brethren. No. God threw it down in Eden, and he ain't never picked it up.

44:39 And so for you, dear women, it is to cultivate a loving, cooperative, respectful, let the wife see that she reverence her husband, responsive submission. I say cooperative because in this very passage, though the fathers are addressed explicitly in the nurture of the children. In verse 4, the children are commanded in verses 1 and 2 to obey father and mother, to honor father and mother, clearly indicating that the father and mother are cooperating

45:21 in giving directives, in giving counsel and guidance in the molding and in the nurturing of their children. The wife is to cultivate a loving, cooperative, respectful, let the wife see that she reverence her husband, responsive submission. The husband is to cultivate a loving, cooperative, respectful, responsive submission. Would we see the reestablishment of godly family life?

45:45 Then we will only see it as it is built upon the nurturing of godly husband-wife relationships. And the essence of those relationships is captured, if not exhaustively at least, in the broad strokes of Scripture. In what I've attempted to say. But in addition to this, the husband and wife are together to cultivate a sensitive, selfless, mutually satisfying, intimate life.

Cultivating a Sensitive, Selfless, Mutually Satisfying Intimate Life

46:23 They are to cultivate. It is not something that comes naturally for most people to copulate as a natural biological urge and function. But here the word comes. The word of God in 1 Corinthians 7 is good for a man not to touch a woman.

46:43 But because of fornications, let each man have his own wife and let each woman have her own husband. End of discussion. Any time a husband has urges that might tempt him to go elsewhere to have them released, let him be intimate with his wife and vice versa. Just do what comes naturally.

47:04 No, no, no. The passage does not stop there. Let the husband render unto the wife her due, and likewise also the wife unto the husband. Ah, here the feminist screams, the wife hath not power over her own body, but the husband.

47:30 And here all self-centered machoism also screams for what was good for the ganders, good for the genders. Good for the goose, likewise the husband hath not power over his own body, but the wife. In terms of this responsibility to cultivate a loving, cooperative, I'm sorry, a sensitive, selfless, mutually satisfying, intimate life, the husband and wife in this passage stand as equals under the Lordship of Christ. And under the principles that were set out in 1 Corinthians 7.

48:12 That were so clearly expounded to us last night by Pastor Lamar from 1 Corinthians 6, 12 to verse 20. Cultivate. Well, do you see what that means? It means that there's got to be a willingness to communicate verbally.

48:30 There has got to be a willingness to take time and cultivate openness. To bring the cross of Christ into this realm of our lives. And in its power we may slay on the one hand all prudery leading to an awkward silence. So that a husband does not know how to render to his wife her due because she's mute.

49:00 She was told that sex is dirty. Good girls don't think about these things less, much less talk about them. How can a man committed to obey Christ? Obey Christ!

49:14 Obey Christ! Obey Christ! Obey Christ! Obey Christ!

49:14 Obey Christ! Obey Christ! Obey Christ! Obey Christ!

49:14 Obey Christ! Obey Christ! Obey Christ! Obey Christ!

49:15 If the wife will not communicate and vice versa, it is the cross of Christ that enables us to slay prudery and all thinking concerning our intimate life that would keep us from obedience to this directive. So I ask you, as parents, are you preparing, wives especially, are you preparing your daughters chastely, wisely, by bits and pieces, not only in terms of your general life, but also in general attitude to your intimate life with your husband, but by explicit instruction

49:52 as age and readiness and circumstances demand, so that when they walk down that aisle and your husband gives that young woman, we hope, a pure virgin to that godly young man, mutually selecting one another on the basis of biblical standards and principles, she goes off on her honeymoon with realistic biblical expectations and solidly, biblically framed perspectives of her intimate life? And you fathers, are you doing this with your sons?

50:34 I have been appalled at times when I've spoken to young men just before their wedding. They've gone through the premarital counseling tapes, I may have given them certain literature a week or two before. Then when I've said now how much has your Dad spoken to you about these things? Pastors, keep hearing you tell me many times, Christian fathers, we have a responsibility, particularly in light of this text, to avoid sexual impurity because of fornications!

51:16 Let each man have. Let each woman have, and dear brethren in this age if we do not have as a sacred wall around us. In this sensitive area, a selfless, mutually satisfying, intimate life, we're going to be sitting ducks.

51:36 Scandalous impurity.

51:40 Involved in that, of course, is something some of us don't want to face. When God said to Ezekiel in chapter 24, verses 15 and 16 of Ezekiel's prophecy, strange words, God was going to have strange dealings with him. But he could say to the prophet, who was no spring chicken at the time, the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, behold, I take away from you the desire of your eyes with a stroke. You shall neither mourn, nor weep, nor tears run down.

52:17 Sigh, but not aloud. Make no mourning for the dead. Bind thy head-tire upon thee. Verse 18, I spoke unto the people in the morning, and at even my wife died.

52:31 God describes his wife. It's the only place I know in Scripture where God uses that terminology. He said, Ezekiel, I'm going to take away from you the desire of your eyes. Imagine if Ezekiel had turned and said, Lord, what in the world are you talking about?

52:46 She ceased to be the desire of my eyes long ago. She's become such a fat, slobby, dowdy old woman. It takes all the grace I can muster to look at her with any sense of delight. Ezekiel apparently didn't have to say that.

53:06 And whatever age had done to put a sag here and a droop there, she was still something to look at.

53:14 And furthermore, to show that he only had eyes for her when the Lord said, Today I take away the desire of thine eyes. Ezekiel didn't say, which one, Lord?

53:25 Which one?

53:27 There are four or five that I look upon from the pulpit, Sunday by Sunday, Sabbath by Sabbath, wishing that I had them in bed. No! When God said, the desire of thine eyes,

53:43 Ezekiel knew that his wife was that, and he knew there was only one who fit the description.

53:51 Now you dear wives, that's the challenge upon you, to continue to be the desire of your husband's eyes. And so to carry yourself and keep yourself, not to defy age and gravity and wrinkles and the loss of subcutaneous fat in the folds, of your face. No, no, none of that foolishness, nothing more stupid looking than a 70-year-old woman keeping her hair jet black and trying to rub out her wrinkles with pink mud.

Creating Godly Parent-Child Dynamics

54:37 Well, I need not say I trust any more on that, but I hope I've carried your conscience. Do we have a vision to see re-established godly family life? Then it will be re-established not only as we encourage the contracting of godly marriage, as we encourage the nurturing of godly husband-wife relationships, but thirdly, the re-establishment of godly family life is augmented by creating godly parent-child dynamics. The re-establishment of godly family life

55:17 is augmented by creating godly parent-child dynamics. And I didn't know what other word to use, and I didn't have enough time to use my Rodale synonym finder and root around to come up with a better one. But you know what I mean by dynamics? The basic chemistry, what kind of electricity flows between people, what drives, as it were, the relationships.

55:43 Let me ask you a question. I asked it of the two brethren in the car driving over tonight. When you walk into a home and you're there for about 15 minutes to half an hour, and the husband and wife are present, and children, from, say, from at least three years old onward, it's not fair to judge it below three in any given half-hour period. You may have a little one-year-old who's cutting certain molars, and a two-year-old that's just come off the whooping cough, and they're all out of their patterns, and you might totally misjudge the climate of that home.

56:16 So let's make a fair assessment. There's a structure where it's in the interest of charity. You can make a fair assessment. You walk into a home, and if you're in that home for half an hour, and you say, this is family life, the way it ought to be.

56:33 What are the things that usually stand out in bold relief as the primary characteristics of that kind of home that makes you respond that way?

56:48 Think for a minute. Think of the homes into which you've walked. I hope it's been true of many of the homes into which you men have gone this week. One of the reasons we open our homes to you pastors,

57:02 if what is true, if it's preached, it's not being validated in our homes, it's time we knew it, and faced up to it, and did something about it. But what are those major dynamics that without even analyzing it, you pick up on them and you say, this is family life the way it ought to be. May I suggest it will usually be at least these three things, many times more. But tell me if these do not carry your own conscience and answer to your own visceral sense of what makes a godly family.

57:37 First of all, there's a pervasive climate of principled love.

57:44 You're in that home for half an hour and you say, whatever the glue is that keeps this thing together, it's got written all over it, principled love. It isn't that everybody's going to everyone else every five minutes and stroking them and saying, oh, sweetie, honey, sweetie, honey, honey, sweetie, sweetie, honey.

58:04 Sacker and gush.

58:08 But when it's time for the husband to ask the wife when you're going to eat, you don't get the impression she's somehow the hired servant. She's his wife. The very way he asked her, honey, when will dinner be ready? You sense in his eyes, by the tone of his voice, she's a noble woman,

58:37 not the servant under his feet. And when she responds, you sense in her tone, you sense in her tone, oh, no irritation. Well, you know, honey, it'll be on when it's ready.

58:49 You sense in the way she responds that she's glad to give a sense of direction to the noble leader in that home who's seeking to orchestrate the next major activity for the household and for the guests. And her response is indicative of a principled love.

59:12 And when the dad tells the kids to wash their hands the way they respond, you sense in the way she responds you sense that their obedience is not the appeal of this daddy.

59:22 For fear they'll get caned 40 times in the shed if they come down with one spot of dirt. No, you sense their response was one of loving obedience.

59:34 Isn't that the thing that dominates in the dynamics of a home that when you go into it and you say, this is what a home ought to be, it's the presence. It is the activity. It is the oozing out of all of the interrelationships of the climate of principled love. And you know if you stayed long enough you'd be able to sit there with 1 Corinthians 13 and have it exegeted before your eyes.

60:05 You'd say, ah, there's love that's suffering long. Ah, there's love that's not quickly provoked. Ah, there's love that's believing all things, putting the best construction on things. You'd see 1 Corinthians 13 lived out before your eyes.

60:20 Secondly, the godly dynamics, pervasive climate of principled love, a pronounced atmosphere, hear me now, of mutual respect and appropriate submission. A pronounced atmosphere of mutual respect and appropriate submission.

60:46 We're in the realm now of manners and courtesy. No demeaning of the kids so that they hang, they hang their heads with an unnecessary embarrassment.

61:00 The little ones, and not so little ones, may have their part in helping get the table set. And when one of them is bringing out the plates, lo and behold, being conscious that visitors are present and a little bit awkward in their presence, he'd drop the stack of plates.

61:20 How did dad respond? You dummy!

61:24 Did he go over and say, son or sweetheart, daddy knows you didn't, I didn't mean to do that. Maybe the next time, you ought to just bring out two plates at a time. You sense that the father respects the dignity of the child as an image bearer of God. And though he's in authority, he treats the child with dignity.

61:50 And though he is head over his wife, treats her with dignity. That's the very thing that is captured in that word in 1 Timothy 3, 4, the requirement for an elder having his children in subjection with all semantatos, that is, with respectability, with dignity, a pronounced atmosphere, mutual respect, and appropriate submission. And then there's a third thing. Tell me if this doesn't answer to your viscera as well.

62:28 When you go into a home where you've been there a while and say, this is what a home ought to be, this is one of the other major dynamics you're picking up, there is a profound sense of distinct masculinity and femininity displayed throughout the structure of that family. There is a profound sense of distinct masculinity and femininity displayed throughout the whole structure of that family. Because the matters of masculinity and femininity are in the earliest years and all the way through fundamentally imitative

63:12 and assimilative. A boy understands what masculinity is by what he observes and absorbs from his dad. And long before dad can conceptually and biblically expound to him the biblical doctrine of masculinity, he is, as it were, impregnating the soul and the psyche of that boy with what masculinity is by the power of imitation and the power of assimilation. And likewise, a mother and a wife with femininity,

63:54 if she is dressed with that beautiful adornment that Peter says is a meek and a quiet spirit which in the sight of God is of great pride. God's not impressed with the external adornment that may cost much, that Macy's or Stern's, but when he sees that inner adornment of the meek and the quiet spirit, he says that is of great pride. That's there because my son died. That's there because on the grounds of the death of my son, I've imparted my spirit to that true daughter of Abraham.

64:33 And by the mighty operations of the Spirit given to her gratuitously on the grounds of the suffering and the bloodletting and the substitutionary curse bearing of the Son of God, I see the meek and the quiet spirit. It is of great pride. And so you sense when you go into that home that there's only one pair of pants and who wears them. You don't have to be there three days to find out who's calling the shots.

65:14 You're there a half an hour and you sense in this man there is this expression of sanctified but real, aggressive, hands-on directive in the ordering of the affairs of that home. And you sense in his wife that she is there almost as his shadow, an extension of his mind and will. And when you've worked this way for years, it's spooky at times. You seem to be able to pick up the vibes of each other's mind when you're in other rooms in the house.

65:49 My wife and I at times have said, something's going fishy here. I'll come down from the study and say, honey, she said yes, there's something I, I think I know what you're going to say to me. And sure enough she does. Why?

66:04 Because though the relationship is one of submission and headship, it is a relationship fundamentally of spiritual and in the truest sense, psychological intimacy, constantly nurtured by communication and self-disclosure. So there is not a totally ironclad predictability. At times my wife will still throw something at me way out of right field and I'll say, honey, I never would have thought that. And she gets a twinkle in her eye and says, well, I just want to keep you honest.

66:38 I just want to keep life interesting. But that notwithstanding, the principle you see is that in such a home it's, there's no question, given all due diversity of temperament, some women more bubbly, some more reserved, it's not a matter of temperament. It's a matter of a spiritual grace wrought in the texture of the soul by the Holy Ghost. And the children, it's very interesting.

67:06 You'll see the little boys trying to do what dad does. And if dad is the gentleman who pulls back the chair for mom, he proudly goes around to pull back the chair for his sister. Because that's what a man does. He treats a woman with the symbols of her dignity.

67:26 He doesn't demean her because she's the weaker vessel. He gives her honor because she's the weaker vessel. I just found out this week, never bothered to ask, but it's nice to know someone should ask me. We've had so many weddings here and I've given away my two daughters.

67:44 Do you know why? Do you know why the bride is always on the groom's left hand when they stand down there? Do you know why? I didn't know why.

67:55 Breeders' Digest helped me find out. In the days when warriors would at times take their brides by force in the towns that they conquered, taking them back to their own domiciles, they kept their right hand free in order to draw their sword and fend off the critters that might want to come and take the beautiful young woman they were taking out of town. That's supposedly given as the real reason. But whether that's so or not, brethren, in all seriousness, do you see the principle, the words, chivalry,

68:39 and the concepts of deference to women, honor to women, men standing when women enter a room, things that are looked upon as social anachronisms in our day? No! They were symbols of masculinity and femininity that had percolated down into what we call innocuous social customs. It's a tragedy.

69:08 They're well nigh gone because that which supported them and gave birth to them is gone. And if we are to have godly family life reestablished, brethren, sisters, we must have a profound sense of distinct masculinity and femininity displayed throughout the entire climate of our home. And that means the kind of clothing that we ordinarily have in our homes because an image is being assimilated and imitated.

Crowning Godly Family Life with Discipline and Instruction

69:49 Well then, my time has gone. Let me just touch very briefly on what again has been amplified in great measure by many of you men with your own people. As I say, in one sense, I would feel an element of embarrassment that I was insulting your spiritual intelligence by going back over such fundamental issues. Did not Peter do that when he said, I tell you these things not because you don't know them and not because you aren't practicing them, but he says, I think it meet to stir you up by way of remembrance.

70:27 If we are to have the reestablishment of godly family life, then we must see that such is crowned by the impartation of godly discipline and instruction. The godly family life that ideally begins with the contracting of godly marriages moves to the nurturing of godly husband-wife relationships is augmented by creating godly parent-child dynamics such godly family life is crowned by the impartation of godly discipline and instruction. And here, of course,

71:10 the watershed text was read in your hearing, Ephesians 6 and verse 4. And ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath, but nurture them, the totality of their god-given humanity, as image-bearers, fallen image-bearers, marred image-bearers, yes, but nurture them in the chastening and admonition of the Lord. And while the fathers have the primary administrative leadership in that impartation of godly discipline and instruction,

71:54 mothers are the well-informed, cooperative aides in the task as verses 1 and 2 clearly indicate. Children, obey your parents, assuming that the mother is involved in the giving of directives and of instruction and correction. Honor thy father and mother, which is the first commandment with promise. And here, my brethren, the materials available to us in our day are shamefully, profuse.

72:34 There is not an aspect of what it means to impart godly discipline and instruction that is not received more than adequate exegetical and applicatory treatment in whole series of sermons and books and seminars and conferences and retreats. You see, the problem with many of us now is not knowing. It's the problem that James had to address. It's being hearers only and not doers.

73:10 Because we know if we're to do what this text says to nurture them in the chastening and admonition of the Lord, we have got to make ourselves aware of what is involved in a full-orbed commitment to full-orbed character development in our sons and daughters. What is involved in reasonable physical culture. What is involved in mental discipline. What is involved in aesthetic cultivation.

73:41 The host of other things that are involved in nurturing them. All that God has made them with all of that potential. And this is not something to which we can give a little attention once in a while and hope everything will turn all right because we have family worship and go to a reformed baptist church and home school them or send them to a Christian school. It's a task that demands constant wearisome vigilance.

74:15 Constantly looking for the indications of character weaknesses and tendencies which you see if not corrected here at the point of the triangle there's only this much distance between a virtue and a vice in a given area but you see that out here twenty years later, how I thank God for a mother who was always looking from the point of the triangle down the road to a thirty, forty, fifty year old man and her words still ring in my ear and I'm tempted to cheat on that next dimension of pushing an issue to the point where I could with real certainty nail down the significance of that word or phrase

75:00 and I'm tempted to back off and her words ring in my ear son, the job, the job worth doing is worth doing well. Wrap the cloth around your finger and poke it in the corner when you scrub the floor. The scrub brush leaves that little bit unwashed and the floor is not scrubbed until the corner is clean. No time!

75:26 She didn't have an automatic washer and dryer, never had a day of paid help, bore eleven children, no time! No. No will. That's the problem.

75:43 No will! Yes, women. When if you're honest and if you're not honest I challenge you to be. Get a three by five card and put it by your telephone and when you get on that phone mark the time and when you get off mark it down and total up how much time you're yacking on the phone throughout the day and then total up how much time you've sat with your sons and daughters and then total up how much time you've sat with your sons and daughters and then total up how much time you've sat with your sons and daughters working on facets of character development and look the ugly reality square in the eye and then go down on your knees and cry to God for forgiveness.

76:27 You men, get honest about how much time is frittered away that could be spent pouring over the wonderful legacy of stuff that has been reprinted, taken up out of the rubble of indifference and brought forward in our day. The trilogy of books that our brother George McDiarmid has helped to see the light of day. The reprint of James James' book on female piety. My wife's been reading sections of it to me.

76:55 It's profound and moving in its insights. Spend the time absorbing these things and asking God for wisdom to know how to impart them to your sons and your daughters. Dear people, listen. If you think if the Lord tarries just because our kids sit under sound teaching and preaching and are catechized and home schooled and Christian schooled it's all going to turn out all right.

77:24 God have mercy if any of you will round long enough to see the fruit of what will happen in the next generation if we are not committed to pay the price to crown our godly family life with the kind of discipline and instruction that shows at least a measure of sensitivity to the full spectrum of concerns of the book of Proverbs where Solomon is concerned to instruct his son not just in a modicum of basic biblical principles about knowing God and hating sin but he instructs him in the full spectrum of the issues that he will face in life.

Call to Repentance and Spirit-Filled Living

78:08 He doesn't assume he'll just know how to do the right thing doing it. He's doing what comes naturally. Our vision for these days surely brethren you would agree with me it is that we would see the reestablishment of godly family life and I submit to you if we are to see that with the blessing of God and by the enablement of the Holy Spirit then we must come to grips with these principles and many more that I've sought to set before you tonight such family life that ideally begins with the contracting of godly marriages

78:53 is built upon the nurturing of godly husband-wife relationships is augmented by creating godly parent-child dynamics and is crowned with the impartation of godly discipline and instruction and when we hear those things we say who is sufficient for these things and we come back to Ephesians 5 be filled with spirit you can't be filled with the spirit unless you're indwelt by the spirit and you can't be indwelt by the spirit while you're yet an impenitent rebel against God and you who are parents and have the awesome privilege and frightening responsibility of the nurture of those lives if there were no other reason for you

79:38 to repent of living for yourself and loving your sin and going to Christ to become a Christian this were reason enough lest you betray the souls of your own precious children I urge you if you're not in Christ take the shortest route to get to him and if you're in him and I assume on good grounds I believe that the majority of you here tonight are then I urge you to be filled constantly filled with the spirit do not grieve him by unconfessed sin keep short accounts with God do not quench his influence by stiff arming the arrows of his truth that have found you even tonight but ask God to have mercy on you find a secret place

80:22 before you pillow your head and have dealings with God and if the climate of your home is not that climate that we describe with those dynamics gather the family and tell them God has shown me this is what our home is this is what it ought to be and daddy confesses his sin and daddy's committed to seeing a transformation I close with this one simple anecdote and a number of you will be able to relate to it it's been very humbling and encouraging to hear how many of you have taken the series on how not to foul up the training of your children have used it in various ways in your own assemblies and to meet people in conferences and the rest

81:06 who have indicated how God has used that and one of the strange ways God used it in our own assembly with a couple that I've had counseling with over a number of years on a number of occasions where there were some real birds in the relationship it wasn't open it wasn't scandalous but it was real to them real to the progeny in the home real to me but we'd reached an impasse and it sort of just put it on the back burner for God to take the situation in hand in his own way and time and lo and behold when I was in one of the opening studies speaking about the climate of the home that we ought

81:51 to seek to create one of love and warmth and acceptance and love tension and bitterness and rejection apparently God sent an arrow to the heart of that husband in a marriage that was several decades old went home and my understanding is said something like this honey that was a description of our home and it's not right and it's got to stop and by the grace of God it's going to stop and it has stopped somebody had to come to the place where they said enough's enough are you in that place here since the only requirement

82:35 in 1st Timothy 3 that is amplified is ruling well his own house if a man rule not well his own house how shall he take care of the church of God can you invite your people into your home and could they go away saying I don't know what it is but the dynamics of that home it's just what a home ought to be and could someone sit down with them and say let me help you was it that in that home you sensed a climate of principle love that's it was it that in that home you sensed that there was a climate of respect and submission to authority but with respect among all that's it that's it that's it

83:20 and was it that in that home you sensed the man was a man and the boys were boys and the woman was a woman and the girls that's it would they be able to say that of your home you answer before God would you help us that we his servants will never never think we can afford to coast but by the grace of God be standard bearers in the restoration of godly family life in our generation let us pray

84:00 our father we thank you once again that your word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our pathway and we pray that the principles and precepts of God your word that we have together considered this night may take deep root in all of our hearts and taking root downward oh God may it bear fruit upward may there be repentance where repentance is in order may there be renewed

84:45 encouragement where that is in order may there be confirmation where that is in order Lord use your word in all the ways that you know it is needed in the hearts of your people seal that word and may it bear fruit unto everlasting life thank you for this day thank you for one another thank you for your mercy thank you that we have been privileged to meet in the peace and safety of this building thank you for all of your mercies dismiss us now with your blessing and your grace resting upon us and working with us in the name of Jesus amen amen amen working mightily in us through Jesus Christ

85:29 our Lord amen