Or, When Doubt Isn't a Benefit
Scripture: Selected Scripture
Date: March 4, 2012
Speaker: Sean Higgins
We are in a battle, as is every generation, to bring up the next generation in such a way that they are equipped to do the same. In the family, we speak about the parenting task and, as I defined a few weeks ago, the task of Christian parenting is to raise Christian parents. Our mission as Christian parents is to raise a generation of Christian parents who hope in God as a witness to the world. We are doing something much bigger than feeding, clothing, cleaning, and spanking so that eventually our kids will leave the house, pay for themselves, stay out of jail, and eat vegetables without threats. We are endeavoring to keep them safe, to give them good things, and to equip them to live a certain sort of identified life.
In the church, we speak about the discipling task and the two tasks (parenting and discipling) have much overlap. Disciple-makers, like parents, desire more for their disciples than deliverance from hell, as eternally crucial as that is. Being a disciple is an ongoing process of growth, a following and imitating of Christ so that we obey all that He commands. Our mission as Christian disciples is to make disciples who love God in all nations. In other words, we are endeavoring to keep their souls safe, to give them good things, and to equip them to live a certain sort of identifiable life.
There are any number of ways to identify this identifiable life, but one way we’ve been considering as a congregation is that we are identified by our worship. Men are known, they are defined by their worship.
Broken living always grows from broken worshipping; worship is like the wheels on a shopping cart, if the wheel is broken it’s just a matter of time before the cart crashes. Like the woman at the well in John 4, when a person’s worship is broken, her life will inevitably be broken as well.
So one of the things parents and disciplers and pastors need to think about is passing on a way of worship. I don’t mean only liturgy, when to stand and sit, or the inspired list of classic hymns, though those things are included. We are bringing up worshippers of the one true God. That is what He requires. That is what we’re made for. Another way to say it is, we are enculturating our kids (disciples) in worship. We are bringing them up in a way of life. That way of life involves a community. That community lives in a culture of worship.
As a side note, yes, all of life is worship. But there is something special about the assembly’s corporate gathering, when God serves us by cleansing us and consecrating us and communing with us. If we become like what/Who we behold, then we cannot bring up our kids to be faithful image-bearers without constant exposure (worship) to Him in whose image we’re created.
There are a few Christian cultural mountains that our “fathers” (previous generations) have intentionally, or unintentionally in some cases, let build that we need to climb over or level.
We have been trained to fear forcing our faith on our children. Our non-believing culture aggressively calls it abuse to indoctrinate one’s kids; that’s not tolerant. Stated more passively, we might hear a Christian parent say, “I don’t want my kids to have my faith. I want them to make it their own.” Now, sure, we understand that no one gets into heaven by being born into a particular family, having a certain last name, or attending a specific church, no matter how many star stickers are on their attendance chart. We are saved one by one. It does not follow, however, that we ought to leave each other alone to figure it out, every man, woman, and child for himself.
”I don’t want them to have my faith” is a naive slogan and a bad parenting plan. I pray that my kids would have my faith, my life, my worship, my Christianity. I want them to believe what I believe, and I want them to believe like me, and then go beyond me in understanding, maturity, and fruitfulness.
Giving our kids an explanation of faith and examples of faith doesn’t require us to hide false worship from them. It does prohibit us from saying, “Here are a bunch of worship options, your mom and I worship like this, but you need to make your own decision.” I don’t say that as a preacher, why would I say that as a parent? The one, true God does not say, “Decide however you want.” He says, “You shall have no other gods before me.”
It’s only been in the last couple years that the subtle significance of Ephesians 6:4 struck me.
Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:4)
Christian parents, Christian dads in particular, are responsible to bring up children in a way of life under Christ’s lordship. But when do dads do that? Right after their kids professes faith? We are always pointing them to God through Christ and teaching them how to live and worship in His kingdom. We are passing on a culture of following and honoring Him.
This doesn’t mean that kids in a Christian home with dads doing this faithfully are automatically Christians. But it will not be long before we’re teaching them about their need for Him and responsibility to Him. A house that holds Christian standards needs Christ to pursue those standards and fix things when the standards are broken.
Disobedience is a problem why? Because of God’s law. Forgiveness and reconciliation are possible how? Because of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. Receiving that forgiveness happens how? By repenting and believing. In the future, avoiding temptation and obedience happens how? By union with Christ, instruction from the Word, and power from the Holy Spirit. We’re passing on a culture of gospel. The gospel is not only our message, not only the entrance to life, but the way of life. It’s the gospel that our weekly corporate liturgy represents. An evangelical house (a house with evangelical/gospel believing parents) needs the gospel numerous times a day.
We must not fear passing on our faith and worship in the gospel. That’s exactly what our faith requires us to do.
A second mountain of misrepresentation or misunderstanding that prohibits parental perspective is a Christian culture that loves to make converts rather than disciples. We focus more on when faith came (one’s spiritual birthday) than the following by faith now. We’re concerned with conversion, obsessed with it. Because of that, we assume that failure in practice results from an insufficient profession, rather than from our insufficient help and correction for practice after profession. In other words, you must be sinning because you’re not a Christian, not because I haven’t taught and modeled how to fight sin.
Scripture serious but short sighted pastors are probably to blame. Our churches, in particular the liturgy of most churches, teach people to doubt their salvation. What is the aim of a typical Sunday morning? What does the preacher drive the flock toward? He gets all the people to commit to Christ or confirm that they are still really committed. Week by week, invitation after altar call, non-Christians and Christians are exhorted to doubt first, then maybe come through the test with some level of assurance. Parents can’t help but apply the same sort of pressure, follow the same sort of procedure when disciplining disobedient kids.
Now, yes, okay, I know. We do not want to be guilty of providing false assurance to church-goers or our children. No doubt, false assurance is a deadly weapon that the enemy has used and will use to destroy many souls for eternity. Parents and disciplers are not charged to make people feel good about their profession of faith regardless. Those who are born of God cannot continue in sin. “No one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him” (1 John 3:6). Ongoing, especially hard hearted and unrepentant sinners ought not to have assurance of salvation. Loving parents must speak truth, even when it hurts.
But a couple questions. What environment enables false assurance to thrive? False assurance thrives in a conversion focused culture, not a disciple-making culture. In a conversion culture, you can respond to another person’s profession on a spectrum with two ends: believe their profession with no basis or doubt their profession no matter the basis. “Love” people tend to believe without basis. “Truth” people tend to doubt just in case (in case they would be guilty of giving false assurance). False assurance is starved in a discipleship culture where you don’t look back at a prayer, you look at your worship right now.
Another important question: What kind of person tends toward false assurance? A person who doesn’t struggle is usually one who doesn’t really care about sin today because he prayed a prayer yesterday. When we are laying the guilt on thick with our kids, we wrongly do it to the soft and struggling ones. It’s unlikely that they would be sensitive to sin and doubt if their soul was dead and hard. A heavy-hearted sinner who lacks assurance probably doesn’t need conversion, he needs discipleship. He needs to learn gospel sanctification, not receive gospel salvation.
We parents have been taught to live with weekly doubting of our own conversions more than we’ve been taught to live by faith and kill sin by faith as disciples. We teach our kids to examine if they really “meant it” rather than teaching them how worship grows faith, even if that faith is the size of a mustard seed.
One practical compromise that our conversion culture makes, at least those on the truth team, is to treat baptism as a confirmation of faith rather than a confession of faith. We treat it as a rite of demonstration rather than a rite of initiation. By “protecting” baptism we’re sending believers into the battle unprotected.
The Great Commission requires baptism at the beginning of discipleship. Baptism is a public identification with Christ followed with instruction for following Christ, how to submit to His lordship in every area of life.
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. (Matthew 28:19–20)
Baptism introduces one into the culture of worshipping Christ as King of kings. Baptism connects with one’s initial confession that Jesus is Lord (Romans 10:9-10), the sign of that commitment to Him coming in water. The order is not insignificant; we baptize and then instruct meaning that spiritual immaturity is not a reason not to baptize.
To correct that error (false assurances in empty baptisms in infants or those too young), some Christians—and they are fellow brothers and sisters—believe that the church corresponds to Israel, so baptism corresponds to circumcision. Therefore, kids in Christian families should be baptized into the covenant as infants. That sounds nice, but really doesn’t have sound biblical evidence.
Baptism is always connected to one’s confession, not to one’s birth (as with Israel). Without confession of sin and faith in Christ, baptism is unwarranted. Therefore, those who desire baptism should understand, should be able to communicate, who Christ is, why they need Him, what He has done, and their intention to follow Him as a devoted worshipper.
This is credo baptism. Credo is the Latin word for “I believe” or “I confess.” When can a person make this confession? When they can comprehend and explain, which requires a minimum level of language development. When does this level occur? Isn’t it different for different people/kids?
We overcorrect, though, when we turn baptism into (sufficient to us) proof. In fact, this robs a young person of a key discipleship weapon.
In Romans 6, Paul instructs the believers how to think about their relationship to sin.
What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. (Romans 6:1–4)
He is describing the baptism of the Holy Spirit as symbolized by water. We undo the benefit. We cannot encourage kids or (possible) disciples to consider themselves dead to sin by the Spirit when we won’t encourage them to profess that reality in baptism. “You’re dead to sin. Serve righteousness. But just in case you’re not really dead to sin, let’s wait and see.”
Again, baptism represents the formal beginning of discipleship, of worshipping in a life of righteousness. By withholding baptism we keep them in a culture of doubt and wonder why so many of them walk away from the struggle later on.
So, if a child desires to be baptized and he
Then we want to consider baptizing them. More than likely, this young person will be at least age six. Since the parents are the primary disciplers with the most direct responsibility for their children, their wisdom is first to consider. Both kids and parents can talk with the elders. Wisdom is required throughout on a case by case basis.
Communion is another common culprit in the culture of doubt and fear rather than a key part of a culture of faith and fellowship. We have been taught, explicitly or through practice, that “communion” is confession, communion is the time to stir up fear, not the time to share peace with God. Paul did warn the Corinthians about unworthy participation. The Corinthians had some serious problems. They were first generation Christians and their time at the Lord’s Table got carried away in a selfish party for the well-to-do and neglected the sharing of the community. Paul urged them to examine themselves, to take the Table seriously. He was not, however, trying to keep them away from the blessing.
The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. (1 Corinthians 10:16–17)
Similar to the peace offering in the Old Testament, communion strengthens faith through fellowship with God and God’s people. Communion isn’t confirmation that we’re clean, it’s communion with God who cares for us and cleans us.
Because of the nature of the ordinances and what each one represents, participation in communion should come after baptism. We encourage parents to talk to their kids about the Lord’s Supper especially since our congregation does it every Lord’s day. But again, generally speaking, communion with Christ (in Spirit and at the Table) follows one’s confession (with lips and in baptism) of salvation in Christ.
Many Christian parents (and churches) refuse to give their kids the blessings of baptism (for fighting sin) and communion (for fighting doubt) while expecting their kids to live up to Christianity. “Once you’ve demonstrated that you’re dead to sin, then we’ll let you demonstrate that you’re dead to sin. Once you kill sin, then we’ll give you the weapon to kill sin.” Or, “Once you’re fat with faith, then we’ll let you eat for faith.” We cry about how wrong it is to judge other people and we save our severest judgment for our kids, because they have to take it.
We want to be wise and we want to pass on the faith, not the doubt. We want to pass on a culture of worship by showing our kids how to worship and explaining what it means as they mature. Culture isn’t transferred at the flip of a switch. It’s transferred over time, with growth, teaching, modeling, opportunity, correction, and commissioning. That’s discipleship. That’s parenting.
We have trouble with the parenting task because we’re afraid to parent the “whole way,” giving our faith to our kids. We’re not committed to victory and then frustrated when we fail. We also have trouble with the parenting task because we’re looking to confirm conversion rather than to encourage a life of discipleship and worship.
As Jim said in his message, parenting takes a lot of work. It requires a lot of time to build the relationship. It requires a lot of wisdom to know how to train them and when to let them fail. And it requires a lot of grace. Just like discipleship.
Finally, we have trouble with parenting because we are often joyless disciples and worshippers ourselves. Perhaps we struggle for joy because we’re trying to obey God’s instructions without faith.
We believe that we’re supposed to do Ephesians 6:4, we don’t believe that God will bless our obedience. We believe it’s important to worship, but we don’t think it makes a difference. So we do pass on a culture, one of tiring, tasteless duty-doing, doubting that God is for us. That’s not Christian parenting because that’s not Christian; the faith is in our own obedience rather than faith in God. It’s not gospel discipleship because there’s no gospel. Gospel-believing Christians (parents and disciplers) pass on a culture of faithful, tasty, satisfied, hoping and happy worship.