Train them Young

The speaker welcomes listeners to the CCI Fellowship podcast and emphasizes the importance of prayer for the nation. They believe that God will make Honduras a praise among the nations. The speaker encourages listeners to attend a prayer service to lift up Honduras and mentions the impact of prayer in the fall of the Soviet Union. They then shift to talking about the importance of instilling faith in children from a young age and the role of the Holy Spirit in their lives. The speaker urges parents to teach their children about God and to seek His guidance in their lives. They highlight the example of John the Baptist's relationship with God from the womb and emphasize that God can do the same for all children. Welcome to CCI Fellowship's podcast. Thank you for joining us. At CCI Fellowship, we are reaching God, reaching each other, and reaching our community. We pray that this week's message challenges you in your walk with the Lord, causes you to grow in your faith, and encourages you in your love for the Word of God. Praise God. I want to strongly emphasize the prayer service on Friday. It's of vital importance to continue to pray for the nation in general, but just in how much things have become tumultuous over the past week or two. Viewing what is to come in the nation, we don't want to be found sleeping. We want to be found awake, vigilant, at work, at prayer, not on the sidelines whenever God wants to use us in something to put a burden on our hearts for something. In Isaiah 62, verse 7, it says, do not let him rest until he makes Jerusalem a praise among the nations. As we've talked about before that chapter, Isaiah 62 is one that God has spoken and showed me that that refers to Honduras as well. You would think it's something very audacious to not let God rest until he does something, but that's exactly what the instruction is. It's not arrogant to follow that verse, because he's the one that spoke through Isaiah to say it. He's the one that gave the instruction. We believe that God is going to make Honduras a praise among the nations, take it out of the reputation that it has, and turn it into a place that is an impact on the world. I want to encourage you to come on Friday and be a part of this prayer service and lift up Honduras in one voice before the Lord and see what God does. It's interesting that in Russia when communism was so prevalent that the Soviet Union was still put together and the whole thing about tearing down the wall between East Germany and West Berlin, a missionary from a ministry called Open Doors Ministries, his name was Brother Andrew. He was known as the Bible smuggler, because he took thousands and thousands of Bibles into communist Russia. He was asked afterward about the wall coming down, and he brought reference to, in Revelation, it says that the bowls of incense in heaven are filled with the prayers of the saints, and that the Soviet Union's demise, its fall, came when the prayers of the saints finally overflowed the bowls in heaven. We cannot pray often enough that God will do the same in this nation to complete what he said he's going to do in Honduras. So come Friday, and let's keep filling that bowl labeled Honduras. Amen? Open your Bibles to 2 Timothy chapter 3. I'm going to take a pause from our series on 1 Corinthians on this day of the child and talk to us about ... Maybe I should get to the version of this message that's in English. There we go. I have my notes from this morning. When I'm young, the importance of creating faith in our children. In our family, we have fond memories of Day of the Child, because our son was born in the States. He was, what, a year and a half when we moved here. Catherine was born here six months after arriving, and when they were little, it came around as a Day of the Child. Catherine, always loving to pick on her brother, said, This is my holiday. It's not yours. My son, being my son, he says, No, but it's Day of the Child, and she goes, No, it's Day of the Honduran Child, and you're not Honduran. I am. She got him going for a while, and finally Adriana said, No, it's Day of the Child of all children, but she's very proud of her Honduran citizenship, and this is her holiday, just in case you were wondering. When we look at our kids, we have to look at them from the potential that is there, and sometimes with our kids, we need to create the potential in them, and when it comes to faith and when it comes to belief in God, we can never start too early to sow into them a fear of God, to sow into them the need to serve God, to sow into them a faith that later on in life, when the struggles get really real, they won't be shaken, and they'll know where to go to to find help and to find comfort, so in celebrating the children of Honduras and celebrating Day of the Child, let us sincerely and enthusiastically... How many parents know it's hard some days to be a parent enthusiastically? I mean, most of you know my opinion on kids. I love my kids. I love your kids, too, from a distance. That's a joke. The older I get, the more kids, for whatever reason, come around me, and I have no idea why, but I may or may not have held a baby today, so there's that. God changes people. Let us sincerely and enthusiastically affirm the commitment to teach our children the ways of God, to establish in them from a young age a firm faith that will not be intimidated later by the circumstances of life and the situations present in society. Let's pray. Father, we glorify you, and we magnify you. We thank you for the opportunity to be here today. We pray, Lord God, that you would speak to us, that we would have ears to hear and eyes to see, our hearts ready to receive what you would implant to them. I pray, Father God, that as we hear this message, we would take it as a community as a whole, that we would receive, Lord God, the part that we have to play as parents, but the part that we have to play in the lives of the children of this congregation. Lord, whether they are our children or not, may we be willing to be used by you to influence them and to teach them in the ways of you. May we have, Lord God, a strong generation as we grow in you and as you desire to use them for your honor and for your glory. In Jesus' name, amen. Whenever we do a dedication for a baby, one of the questions that we ask is, as parents, do you promise that you will raise and train your kids in the fear and admonition of the Lord and at the earliest possible age lead them to salvation in Christ? Why do we ask that? For many people, or for a long time, the reason that is asked is in our minister's handbook. That's just the protocol question to ask. I'm not big on protocol, but I ask the question from a deeper meaning. It's not just to say yes and go through the ceremony. It's not just so that as soon as we get our kids saved, then OK, we can relax. Eternity is secure. We get them saved because they need God in this life. Yes, we're all looking towards heaven. We're all looking forward to eternity. We're all looking forward to that day when we pass from this life of struggles and trials and difficulties into a life where there is no difficulty, where there's no tears, where there's no struggles, no failings, no fights in front of us. It's eternal rest and celebration in God's presence. We're all looking for that. That's the hope that lies within us, but to have God here and now. If you think to our series on 1 Corinthians, what is the point of our series? Why are we going through those chapters? We're going through them to talk about the importance of the Holy Spirit's role in our lives here and now. The Holy Spirit hasn't just come to help us. He's come to live his life through us. The sooner we learn that, the younger we can capture that, the longer we get to experience that in our lives. The longer we get to be used by God, and the better it is when we face the trials, when we face the struggles, when we face the difficulties of life, to know I have somebody living inside of me that can help me with this. In our family growing up, my parents, we would come to them with a problem or come to them with a big decision that we had to make. Really we just wanted them to tell us what to do. It's so much easier if they just say, here's the decision, just go. They would always finish the time of conversing that help us talk it through and go through different details, different options, but they would always end with this. What did God say? They would always take us to being led by the Holy Spirit and recognizing his voice. They started doing that when we were really young. They didn't wait until we were teenagers. They didn't wait until they thought that we could understand. They began to instill that in us at a very young age. As parents, we need to take that understanding. We need to take upon us that responsibility that we can put into our kids, the seeds of faith and the seeds of relationship with God, even before we think they can understand it, and it's the Holy Spirit that brings revelation even before children can talk. He speaks to them. We even have the example of John the Baptist while he was still in the womb. When Mary came to the house to see her cousin, there was a recognition of God's presence even at that point in time. When God spoke about John, Scripture says that he will be filled with the Spirit even from the womb, before he was even born, that the Spirit of God would be upon him. If that's the case, then I believe that God can do the same for our kids, no matter how young they are. He was special. He was John the Baptist. He had a calling on his life, but just as God was able to speak to him and fill him from the place of the womb, he is also able to do that. It's not like God goes, oh, sorry, that was a one-off. I'd only do that for him, nobody else. I can't do that anymore. It's God's desire. We know Scripture says, don't prevent the kids from coming to me, because theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Why do we do it? I'm going to get to 2 Timothy here. Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Why do we prevent our kids from getting close to God in our lack of faith? Timothy, let no one despise your youth. So obviously he was pretty young when he went to Ephesus to name leadership. And I'm sure some of them looked at him with that same look of, why should I listen to you? What do you think you're going to teach me? You're still in diapers, you child. And Paul said, don't let anyone despise your youth. I remember when we first came to Honduras and I was doing pastoral training. I had never been a pastor before, and I got that same look. What do you think you're going to teach us? I've been pastoring for 15, 20 years, and you're going to come in here and teach me something? I can relate to that verse because I've experienced it. But it wasn't about me. It was about the Holy Spirit and what the Holy Spirit wanted to teach them. Your kids, if you would instill in them faith in God, you would be amazed at the things that you yourselves as parents would learn, listening to them. Whenever we put the kids in pinares to enroll them, there wasn't money for the first payment. But we knew what God had said, and we got the kids together and said, well, we're a family that obeys God, and this is what God has said. So we don't know where it's going to come from. We just know that this is the step that we have to take. We know he'll provide. And my son, in one of those moments of inspiration, said, well, Mom and Dad, you guys have had many miracles in your life. It's our turn to experience a miracle. And in that moment, our son was functioning in faith more than the two of us put together. Teach them while they're young. Timothy was taught by his grandmother and his mother. In chapter 3, verse 14 and 15, it says, But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood, from childhood, you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith, which is in Christ. Able to make you wise. Chapter 1, verse 5 says, I remember your genuine faith, for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother, Lois, and your mother, Eunice. And I know the same faith continues strong in you. You see, Timothy's father was Greek. Timothy grew up in a pagan culture. He grew up with a dad that was not a Jew. But his grandmother and his mother took upon them the task to instill in him Scripture. And as a result, he came to faith in Christ. As a result, he not only came to faith in Christ, but came to the place of being used by God in an incredible way. I use him as our example this morning, or this afternoon, sorry. I'm still in this morning, aren't I? It's never too early to start teaching kids to have faith in God. Angela, who is over our kids' ministry, has captured the vision, feels the same way, is in agreement, which is good, that kids' ministry is not just to entertain your kids while you're here listening to a message. Kids' ministry is not just to pass the time. It's not to keep them quiet because we don't want the noise in the main sanctuary. No, it's the opportunity to teach them on their level the things of God. Not just to tell them Bible stories, but to put in them faith. Not just to talk about the big stories of the Old Testament, but to tell them why it is a big story. Not just information, but to instill in them revelation, which comes from the Spirit. We pray every week, I pray every week, that God would speak to our kids and teach them about him. Every week I pray around the sanctuary. I start here, I pray for the worship team. I go to that back corner, I pray for the kids' ministry. In this corner I pray that all the technology works, which sometimes before you get here is not working. It's a constant prayer we have to pray. By the time I get to here, it's just asking God that he will do what he wants to do. We pray over your kids. Our desire is not that they are just here, but that they learn relationship with God. That we all learn relationship with God. I've talked to youth here in Honduras when we were first here. They would always tell me when I'd ask, what church are you going to? Or how long have you been walking with God? Or something about that. Their answer would be, well, I'm trying things out in the world right now. Well, why would you do that? Well, you know, I'm just seeing what's out there. Why? Have you not found what you needed in the church? So what does that say about the church? Which is why I encourage us tonight that we as a community, as a community, because you might be sitting there thinking, well, I don't got kids. Or my kids are grown. My task is already done. No, as a community, we are to raise and train our kids. The bulk of it, sure, falls on the parents. But we as a community are to be the examples of faith and steadfastness in Christ. And we are to be those that encourage our kids whenever they say, I want to sing. I want to do this or I want to do that. Give them the opportunity. What does that look like? Well, they'll fail. They don't know what they're doing. Teach them what to do. And live your life as an example before them so that whenever the tempter comes in those years, those critical years when most young people leave the church, they find themselves in a place of saying, no, I love my church. I love the family that's there. I love going and seeing my friends. I love how much I'm learning in Sunday school. I love these things. Teach them a steadfast faith in Christ. I remember being around 15 years of age and temptation was there. And my thought was, why would I go and do those things if I'm just going to have to come back to God and repent? And when I come back, I'm just going to be carrying a whole lot of luggage of hurt and regret. So why even do it in the first place? Somehow my parents got some smarts into me. But we need to do that for our kids. Stephen and Catherine, we've had conversations with them about things that they have faced. And their response has been the same, but why would I choose that way of life? This is the truth. They're never too young to understand. Let your ceiling be their floor. Aspire for your kids to succeed in greater ways than you have. You say, well, you know, I didn't have the opportunity to grow up in such a faith-filled background. I mean, in my family we have generations of people that have served God. My grandfather was a founding member of two different churches. When his family came over from Europe and he grew up, he was part of the founding member of one church. And then a group of them got filled with the Spirit and got kicked out of that church. So they went and started another church. We have Sunday school teachers. We have worship leaders. We have pastors in our background. Generations back, long heritage in Christ. But Adriana doesn't have the same story. In Adriana's family, her grandmother was the first one to accept Christ. But when her grandma got saved, she'd gotten, like, completely saved. And if you were to meet her and talk to her and say, yeah, I'm a believer, I've accepted Christ, you probably should say when. Give me the date, the time, and the hour, where you were, and what your experience was like. Because she doesn't take this whole, yeah, I'm a believer stuff. She wants to know that you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you have been saved. She could get a tree saved. She's 93 years old and still trying to evangelize to anybody that will listen. But because of that, she also took Adriana as a small kid, made sure that she was in church. There wasn't the heritage of it. But there was a decision by one generation to say we're not going to continue with the things of the past. We're going in a new direction. And so I encourage you that if it's not your past of a long heritage in Christ, break those chains of the things of the past and make a decision that you're going to push forward in teaching the generations after you for the Lord. As I was praying for this service, actually I had planned to continue in 1 Corinthians and then later on in the week God said, well, I'll just tell you what really happened because I had to preach something on Day of the Child this morning in the 11 o'clock. And so I did. I mean, I don't know if many of you know, I'm not really a fan of special services and special topics of preaching. I feel like I'm really good at them in the first place, let alone something on kids. It's just the way it is. The Friday morning I was in my prayer time and the Holy Spirit, I love how the Holy Spirit talks because it takes us a long time to explain something, much longer to explain something than for the Holy Spirit to actually say it to us. Because he speaks in the form of revelation and you just know. And he said to me, why would you spend time teaching other parents and encouraging them and not do the same for your own congregation? I was like, well. So I emailed the media team and said, change of plans. And sat down and changed the sermon. But as I was praying about this morning's service, where this sermon came from, the Lord gave me a verse in Isaiah. And ironically, I feel like over the years that we have been here in Honduras and have been praying and interceding for the nation, that God does a lot of speaking out of the book of Isaiah concerning Honduras. And this one is Isaiah 58, verse 12. It says, Those from among you shall build the old waste places. You shall raise up the foundations of many generations, and you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to dwell in. The repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to dwell in. So what does that have to do with our kids? God's going to use the generations that our kids are in to change this nation. He's going to use them to rebuild what is breaking down or what has already broken down. He's going to use them to restore this nation. We cannot say just, Here I am, Lord, send me, which many of us have said, whether that's in some type of ministry or whether that's in the marketplace or in the schools. No matter where God places us, it's a place of ministry. So we can't just say, Here I am, God, send me. We have to add into that declaration, Here are my kids, God, send them. And show me how to teach them and prepare them so that they can say the same thing to you. Here I am, send me. We get going in the things that we have between us and God. And sometimes we allow the responsibility that we have to our kids. We allow it to go aside. We think sometimes, Oh, they're kids. They'll get it one day. Just let them be kids. Don't overload them with spiritual things. Let me tell you, if you don't do it in their foundational years, later on when you think it's going to happen, they have to break down the foundational things that they have come to learn and believe so that it can be replaced with what is Scripture. Why not do it from the moment the foundation is being built in the first place? Hoorah. This is a shouting message. I think we have a great responsibility and opportunity before us. Whether we have kids, don't have kids, our kids are grown. God is going to use this church in an incredible way in this nation, in this city. We have the opportunity to include our kids in this as a community, as a body, as a family. Our kids should echo what I've heard some of you say about fellowship. Well, why do you like to come to fellowship? I love the community that is there. Praise God for that. Praise God for the unity that he's given us. Praise God for what he has done in us as grownups. But let that be the testimony of our kids as well, that they love this community, that they love the church more than other things. They love the church as in the presence of God. Not just the installation, not just the institution, but because they at a young age have come to know him personally. Amen. Let us today, with more dedication and purpose, take up the responsibility to teach even the littlest ones in our congregation to fear God. Amen. Will you do that with me? I'm still not signing up to teach Sunday school. We've got to know our gifts. But at the same time, I still want to be a part of your kids' growing in grace and knowledge of God. Let us all be involved with each other to do that. Let's stand together. Father, we thank you that you have called us your children. You have made us your own. You've adopted us. You've given us the right to be called the children of God because we have believed in you and we have received the message of Christ. We have received his sacrifice. We have come to that saving knowledge. Father, may we endeavor to teach our children, to teach younger generations, Lord God, to pursue you even as young as they are, that they would end up being equipped, end up knowing you, end up fearing you, end up reverencing you, Lord God, end up being able to hear your voice as you guide them through the lives that you have destined them to live. May they walk even as we are learning to walk in the steps that you have ordained for us. Your word says that the steps of the righteous are ordered by you. Father, as we learn individually, may we pass that on to our closest disciples, our children. Father, help us as a congregation. As we do life together, may we do life in our kids together as well. Father, we thank you for this day of celebration. We thank you that children are a heritage from you. And we thank you, Lord God, that you will use these young generations to transform this nation into who you have called her to be. We love you, God. In Jesus' name, amen. Thank you for listening to this week's podcast. If you are ever in the Tegucigalpa area and looking for an English-speaking congregation, please join us on Sunday afternoon at 4 p.m. in the main auditorium of Iglesia CCI in Colonial Trevichi, just off Boulevard Suyapa, near Una. If you would like prayer or more information about our church, contact us at fellowship.cci at gmail.com. That's fellowship.cci at gmail.com. Or follow us on social media. We hope to see you or hear from you soon. Blessings.