"I love you too much ...

to let you behave like that."  Here is my sermon soap box!  I am always blessed by the message from church, but today I felt the holy Spirit totally open up my heart and ears to receive the messages from His workers.  This morning during Sunday school, one of our past youth gals (she is now at Wheaten College in Chicago playing softball) came and spoke to the youth group.  Her message started out talking about how her transition from high school to college had been a challenge with balancing time.  This is something I know we all struggle with and making God our first priority.  Anyhow, long story short, she hadn't been having quality prayer time and she was struggling with what she wanted to do after she graduated.  She has always wanted to be a dentist, however, Chemistry class was KILLING her!  She felt the Lord calling on her heart, so she stopped then and there and starting putting time back into her life for prayer.  She was stricken by a quote from C.S. Lewis during chapel the next week; "I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside" -- CS Lewis  Let those words pierce your hearts like they did hers and mine: The doors of hell are locked on the inside.  She had 2 pieces of paper for us, one blue and one red.  She played some beautiful instrumental music for us and asked us to write our names on the blue paper and to imagine Heaven.  All that we had ever heard about Heaven and to just close our eyes and imagine meeting our Savior.  She then turned on some scary music and had us write names of people we knew that (or that we thought) weren't saved and would be locked in hell's gates forever.  Wow.  Talk about moving.  She spoke to me for certain.  She said she knows God is calling her to minister, what she will do is not certain yet, but because she was brought to tears at the thought of humans being trapped in hell for all eternity, she knew He was calling her to ministry in some way.  We then discussed with our classes some questions about the selfishness of not sharing Christ with others.  You know, it's like this secret and it's wonderful and it needs to be shouted off our roof tops!  This really encouraged me to be more faithful and obedient to the great commission (Matt. 28:16-20).  Not to complete strangers, because I already do that.  I am more willing to go out and share the gospel with people I meet than I am with my own family.  What is wrong with that picture?  Hello!!
Then in church Bill preached on Parenting with God's Help.  Bill is doing a serious on family over the next few weeks.  You can go to www.rhbc.cc to download the messages and I highly recommend that you do.  He said something that made so much sense to me, "Our nation is only as strong as our families."  As someone who has recently been immersed with todays' teenagers, I see this shouting loud and clear.  The reason our nation is the way it is today, is because our families are not raising their children with God's help.  I am going to do this in a nutshell:
Everything that he preached on must be done early in life.  Beginning at about 18 months of age.

1. We are responsible to direct our children spiritually.  Read them Bible stories, take them to church, pray with them, let them hear you pray for their salvation, let them see you doing quiet time, let them see you going to church (not just dropping them off), explain to them what is going on, etc. 
2. We are responsible to correct our children.  Probably one of the most well known verses in the Bible for parents is Prov. 13:24 "He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him properly."  Just like an arrow, you want it to go straight to your target.  Sometimes you have to sharpen the point or straighten the feathers to get there.  Start early with discipline, and you should not have to go past about age 6 with a spanking.  Spankings are not reactions, but planned actions.  You should not spank until the line has been drawn and deliberately crossed.  You don't spank because they made a mistake, you spank when they blantently disobeyed you.  Brother Bill said something that he warned may offend some, but he said it was the truth and he could back it up Biblically.  He said, "It is better to not have children at all, then to have children and not direct them spiritually throughout their life."  When you have to use the rod, do so in private, never publicly humiliating.  Spank out of love, not with intentions to cause harm to the child.
3. We are responsible to guard your children's environment.  You are to mold and shape your children.  Cultivate them like a garden, don't just "let them grow and see what they become or what they want to do".  Help them make decisions, pray with them about decisions early on in life, and most importantly remember that there is not substitute for you or your time.

As I started this blog out with, remember that you should love your children so much that you will not allow them to misbehave.  Bill said, "If you don't mind that your children don't mind, your children won't mind to not mind."  I wanted to put a speaker out on 624 for all the world to hear this message this morning. 

"Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; the rod of correction will drive it far from him."  Proverbs 22:15