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Preparing the Next Generation to Know the Lord
Introduction: Each of us will have a legacy whether good or bad. What will you pass on to the next generation, not just to your children, but to your descendants that you will never know? Much of that will be determined by you. The generations following us usually multiply our flaws and weaknesses to something worse. Even if your faith is strong, a legacy of a strong spiritual life is not automatic. Much will depend on whether you work diligently at helping your children develop a strong faith. As with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, there is a strong tendency for faith to weaken in subsequent generations.
A Generation That Did Not Know the Lord (Judges 2:9-13)
We have long been reminded of the warning of this text. We are never more than one generation away from apostasy. That is all the more true today in America. Our younger generations are challenged by extreme wealth, endless pleasurable activities, and rising persecution and pressure against those who do not accept the compromised morals of abortion, homosexuality, and gender identity. And worse, parents who who can’t stomach telling their children “No.” Just as in the Roman Empire, you can say you believe in God as long as you accept the Empire’s standards and burn the obligatory pinch of incense to the bust of Caesar.
Notice what this “next generation did not know”:
They did not know the work the Lord had done for Israel. Certainly this generation knew something about their great grandparents being in Egypt, but there was no knowledge of the terrible bondage and the great deliverance. Therefore, they were no thankful to God and did not understand dependence on God.
Think of our younger generations who may have heard about their great grandparents going through the Great Depression and WWII. But they do not know the sacrifice and true story of what happened. Without that knowledge, there is no appreciation for our freedom. Every generation must learn the horror of bondage and therefore the great sacrifice of Jesus so that we can have liberty. To simply say, “Jesus died for your sins” can become a meaningless, repetitive statement when it isn’t tied to God’s whole story.
For example, did they know why the generation who came out of Egypt died in the wilderness? Did they know the goodness of the Lord and the wrath of the Lord?
It is the same with the phrase, “they did not know the Lord.” It isn’t that they had never heard of Yahweh. They had a superficial knowledge of God and of the things God had done, but they did not know God. The average person today has no idea what it means to know the Lord. Therefore, the goal of our legacy and therefore of our Bible study, and of our preaching and teaching is to see God, see his glory, and to know his story. There is no other way to know him and love him. We have missed this by our over-emphasis on God’s commandments without truly seeing him, knowing him, and loving him.
The key to this is balance in our teaching.
The Balance between Knowing the Lord and Knowing Commandments
Matthew 9:9-13
We typically do not appreciate the gravity of 1st century writers use of “sinners.” These are the same people we avoid today. We can sit in judgment on the Pharisees, but when a rank sinner steps into our company we have a similar reaction.
But there is an even larger consideration in the context of the 1st century. Community meals defined a social status and an acceptance into a group. The Jews would refer to this as “table fellowship.” It is exactly this table fellowship issue that tripped Peter up when he withdrew himself from eating with Gentile Christians in Galatians 2.
To help us relate even better, look at Luke’s narrative of the conversion of Cornelius. Note two quotations:
“You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate with or to visit anyone of another nation, but God has shown me that I should not call person common or unclean” (Acts 10:28).
“So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcision party criticized him say, ‘You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them” (Acts 11:2-3).
Let’s connect this to a present day application. In my growing up there was much preaching and teaching on the importance of avoiding the sinner. “Bad companions corrupt good morals” was a text constantly quoted. There was also a barrage of preaching against denominations and the religious false teaching around us and warnings of how evil, foolish, and dangerous these people were. But the one thing I rarely saw, was mercy – the mercy to understand how many of those people just didn’t know any better.
Let’s make clear, it is not that the Pharisees would have avoided preaching to these rank sinners, it is that they would have done so from a distance rather than associating with them intimately at table. Indeed, this has often been our practice with the excuse that we do not want to “leave the wrong impression.” Or, as some would say, “What if someone thought…” In fact, Jesus received that very accusation in this text. In Matt. 11:19, he was called “a friend of sinners.”
Consider Jesus’ quotation of Hosea 6:1-6.
Israel believed they could “return” to God by offering a few promises and sacrifices to appease him. But if they truly had the knowledge of God, they would have understood that the practices of worship were given to reflect and remind us of the character of God.
The message of what the Jews (and us) are to learn from Hosea is that a person who truly has the knowledge of God and understands the steadfast love of God, would then be able to relate to God’s heart and treat others the same way.
Should we be concerned with becoming “unclean” from a Leviticus point of view of being influenced by the sinfulness of the world? Certainly. But when we have the knowledge of God, we know that avoiding ceremonial uncleanness or following God’s worship laws were not intended to supersede the greater spiritual good of mankind or God’s eternal purpose of saving mankind. What God has asked us to do in “worship,” teaches us about the greater principles of the two great commandments.
Stated another way, to understand a commandment requires understanding and knowing God.
Let’s illustrate this further by Matthew 12:1-14.
First, Jesus is not suggesting that since the Jews excused David then they have to excuse Jesus. Neither David or Jesus sinned. Some look at the words, “not lawful to do on the Sabbath” and conclude that Jesus is saying David sinned. But in verse 5, Jesus also said that the “priests profane the Sabbath.” Thus we know that Jesus is speaking in a technical sense.
Jesus made a similar argument in verses 9-14. To pull a lamb out of a ditch was obviously work! Yet, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.” How could that be when the “work” is a good deed? Where in the Law are we given that exception?
Using David as an illustration is Jesus’ way of teaching that divine compassion and human need are not to be overturned by what Hosea refers to as “sacrifice.” In other words, when we have the knowledge of God we will understand and obey the Sabbath properly. When we carefully examine all that God commands in worship, we discover that the purpose of worship always illustrates God’s character. Therefore, worship commands can be misused to the extent that God’s character is profaned. Sabbath is a perfect example. The meaning of Sabbath is to point us to the mercy and compassion of God. Therefore, healing, saving people and animals, eating while journeying in service to the Lord, is “lawful on the Sabbath.”
We must be exceedingly careful about what God has called us to pass to our following generations. As an elderly woman complained to me many years ago over her sadness of her son’s departure from serving the Lord: “I just don’t understand; I raised him ‘Church of Christ.’” She did not understand that teaching her children to have a commitment to a “cause” or to an organization and a set of rules, is not the same as teaching them to know the Lord.
For example, the Pharisees thought they knew Leviticus and what it meant to be unclean, but they didn’t. They saw the rules and argued the rules and the application of the rules, but did not see God or his greater purpose. The Pharisees had no more than a “Sunday School” knowledge of the scriptures – do’s and don’t’s, right and wrong.
Think of it this way: the message of Leviticus is that God is a holy God who desires to dwell in the midst of his people. For this to happen, he provides a way for his people to be cleansed, live holy lives, and approach him through worship that is holy instead of common, idolatrous, manmade worship. When that is understood, does it make an ounce of sense to extrapolate the Sabbath command by forbidding eating to those who are serving the Lord or uncleanness to, “I can’t become a friend to a sinner in need of salvation?”
Consider another danger: their standard of righteousness of simply “being right” caused them to understand sin superficially and to be lifted up with pride. Cf. Luke 18:9-14: in the parable, Jesus exposed the simplistic way the Pharisees understood sin. This is the same reprimand Jesus gave in the Sermon on the Mount – “You have heard that it was said, but I say…” As in the parable, when we interpret righteousness as doing some “works” and avoiding the “bad sins,” we are more impressed with ourselves than with God. We and our children need to see the majesty and beauty of God and what he has done. Only in this way are we properly ashamed of our sins, overwhelmed by his great mercy, and moved to love him deeply.
This again illustrates the dangers we have faced. Just because we understand the reasons for baptism and the proper way to worship, does not mean we are exempt from dealing with our sinful condition or that we are better than others. Luke illustrates this danger when Jesus sits in the house of Simon the Pharisee (Luke 7:36-51). The one who “loves much” is not Simon who is a faithful “worshiper.” The one who loves much is the woman who recognizes the wonder of her forgiveness.
Thus when Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician,” and Mark records, “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners,” he was not suggesting that the Pharisees were righteous. He could not help them because they could not see their own sin. Therefore, if our children think they are acceptable to God simply because they believe the “right doctrines,” Jesus cannot save them. Their righteousness is self-righteousness.
Our children need to be impressed with the seriousness of our sin and their sin before the Lord so that when they are forgiven, they “love much” and are drawn to serve God with all their hearts. When we just produce a “worshiper,” we produce a person like Simon.
The Need for Intentional Teaching (Deut. 6:4-9)
How will the next generation know the Lord?
Fathers will love God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. This is first and foremost!
Fathers will have diligent, intentional times of teaching.
Fathers will speak of the Lord and remind their children of the Lord at every critical time of the day.
Fathers will always have the word before their children’s eyes.
Will the generations after you know the Lord?