I ended an earlier blog post promising to address the necessity of a partnership between the church, the home, and the school. Allow me to do so by looking first at the home. As I do, know that I am “preaching to myself” as I consider the goings-on in the Dillon home – and I share this with you in hopes of encouraging and challenging you to take on the responsibility of the “home” with great seriousness.
The book of Deuteronomy has a wonderfully convicting charge to all of us.
Deu 6:4-9 “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. (5) You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. (6) And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. (7) You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. (8) You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. (9) You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
In his commentary on this passage, Matthew Henry calls this passage a “brief summary of religion.” He goes on to say that it provides us with the “means for maintaining and keeping up religion in our hearts and houses.” That is something that I want for myself, personally, and for those who live in my house. I want all of us to “maintain and keep up religion.” So, how do we do it? According to Henry, the four means spelled out above are: 1) meditation (words shall be on your heart), 2) religious education of children (PARENTS should teach these words to their children), 3) pious discourse (continue to talk about them as you live life), and 4) frequent reading of the Word (have the Word in front of you continually).
For those who don’t know me well, yet, allow me to share with you one of my favorite questions that comes out in many forms – SO WHAT? WHY? HOW COME? I hope that this does not sound hypocritical, but I think it is always a good practice to ask ourselves (and others) WHY they are doing what they are doing. What is the end goal? Well, if you ask this question of the passage above, you only need to look at the three verses leading up to this “brief summary of religion.”
Deu 6:1-3 “Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the LORD your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, (2) that you may fear the LORD your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. (3) Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
WHY are we to teach these statues and rules??? There are two reasons given. Verse 1 says “that you may do them.” Verse 2 says “that you may fear the LORD.” Those sound like good reasons to me! Don’t we all want our families to be “doing” what God commands and “fearing” Him – appropriately? I know that I do. I want that more than I want my family to be “happy.” That’s a hard thing to say (or write), but it is true. I have even told my kids out loud just this week that I would rather have them walking with the Lord than being “happy.” It’s not that I want them miserable. It’s that I know from experience that, as verse 3 says, we do and fear, SO THAT… “it may go well with you!” Society demands that we choose happiness over holiness (doing/fearing). But, God’s demands are greater – and they have a greater payoff in the end! As a matter of fact, the rest of Deuteronomy 6 reminds the hearers of God’s care of them in the past and of His promise to do so in the future.
My prayer for MY home is that those who live in it would know Him, do what He says, and fear Him SO THAT it would go well with them! My favorite portion of the passage above is actually in the middle of verse two that says that this is for YOU and YOUR SON and YOUR SON’S SON! What a great reminder of the generations that will be impacted by our obedience to this call to teach our children!