Transcript

All right, this morning we will conclude our series on dating and discipleship. There’s not a main text I’m going to turn to. That’s very unusual, I know, but we will look at a lot of Scripture, and I have a lot of points and sub-points. I would encourage you maybe not to worry about taking notes, all right, because all of this is going to be on the website in a couple of weeks in a revised and edited way to help you uh use in your home with your fellas and girls, and uh particularly this last session, all right?

Now, we talked about, we began with a session on being a true disciple of Christ. That’s the foundation stone, that’s the centerpiece of everything. Nothing else I teach is going to matter if that’s not settled. Now I’m not suggesting, moms and dads, we do not teach these principles until our children are converted. I’m not saying that. I’m just saying that a child cannot begin to embrace them apart from the help of the Spirit of God and if the Spirit of God does not live in them and their hearts have not been regenerated, it’s just a bunch of rules. Now, it is true the old fallen flesh loves rules, loves legalism. That is not what we are about. We’re not talking about uniformity to every jot and tittle. You don’t have to do it just the way the Noblit family did it. But we do want unity on principles. We must agree with the clear biblical principles but then there are practical things that maybe my family did or your family will do that will help others. So that’s why I’m giving you a lot of practical ideas as we go through and then you take the biblical principles, the practical things that fit you and you take it further, all right? But being a true disciple of Christ is the foundation stone.

Then the second session was, the detour of modern dating. Remember, God has a path for every area of our lives. The Scripture speaks to the totality of our lives but Satan has a detour for every path God has. I I don’t know of any area where I think professing Christians have dropped the ball more, and that is in training our children concerning their relationship with the opposite sex, Christian guy-girl relationships, Christian courtship, and then Christian engagement and marriage. We just need to do a better job.

Uh I found through the years there’s some basic areas of Christian discipleship that we seem to leak out more quickly than other areas. One of those would be stewardship. People just seem to need a constant exhortation and a reminder to honor God with the first of your increase. I guess it’s because money is such so easily uh uh becomes an idol to us. I don’t know what it is. That’s just an area, it seems like if you’re a pastor, you want to keep bringing before the people. I need it myself and certainly it helps me if I exhort you, I’ve got to be doing it myself or I’m a hypocrite and I’ve never asked you to do anything in those areas that I wasn’t first purposing and actually doing myself.

Another area is sharing your faith. It just seems like we can get lax and lazy about bringing the gospel forward and sharing with people in our lives unless we get exhorted about that and reminded about that. I know our small groups are trying to put a a new and strong emphasis on enrollment. Uh the small group is like the Gentile court, it’s where we bring people in to introduce them to the things of the Lord. So we need to be reminded about sharing our faith. I was able to share something of my testimony this last week with a workman at my house, and I hope I get to follow up on that, and it reminded me afresh, am I sharing like I need to? Well, this is another area that, quite honestly, we just kinda went with the world, where where the world went, that’s where we went. We do not have that option, brothers and sisters. We function by superior principles. We have higher truth. Well, we have the truth. We have higher principles, higher values, so that we can be blessed and God can be glorified. None of this is to hurt you, it’s to help you. When God gives us his law that says “thou shalt not,” he’s saying don’t hurt yourself, and when God says “thou shalt,” he’s saying help yourself, bless yourself.

So we looked at the detour of modern dating, we looked at true discipleship, and then last time we looked at the principles of a Christian guy-girl relationship, which is what I would call it. I would not I would encourage you not to do this silly thing of uh letting your children have a boyfriend or a girlfriend. They don’t have any business having boyfriends or girlfriends until they get to that age where they can seriously have a relationship, looking toward courtship, engagement, and marriage. You’re just kind of throwing a temptation and a a thing out there. You know and first of all, my boyfriend or my girlfriend doesn’t fit because they’re not yours. You can’t make a commitment to them when you’re small, a child, whatever, junior high, whatever it is. I know some moms think that’s cute and that’s fun, but it’s really not. So am I gonna run you down if I hear you’re doing that? No, I’m not gonna say anything, okay, but I would say it’s not wise to view things that way. Christian guy-girl relationships and Christian courtship leading to Christian engagement, we looked at that, excuse me, last time.

Now, let me remind you that on December the 22nd of 2001, my oldest daughter, Katie Lee, turned 13, and on that night, she went out on her first date. And then on November the 11th, 2005, my middle daughter, Taylor Beth, turned 13, and that night she went out on her first date. And then on March 21st, 2009, my youngest daughter, Anna Claire, turned 13, and she went out on her first date. And all three of them went on their first date with their dad. That would be me. And what I’m preaching to you tonight is the material we covered on that day. They got new dresses and uh put on a little, little bitty bit of makeup. Uh got all fixed up, went out to a very nice restaurant and I shared some things with them and I shared this message with them and gave them a purity ring or a promise ring and you’ll understand how that works in just a moment, all right?

All right, now, first of all, when I designed what I call the “Seven Stone Ring,” and that’s basically the title of this message, “The Seven Stone Ring, or a Covenant Between Parents and their Children,” I designed that ring to symbolize some very important things. So I set them down, and I said, “I want you to look at that ring, because the middle of that ring has a pearl in it and the pearl is you.” Pearl, the pearl represents my daughter because a pearl from time immemorial has always been about representing something of great value. In Matthew 13:46, upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it. Of course, that’s referring to Christ in the gospel. That’s the greatest value that there could possibly be. But a pearl can represent anyone or anything also. So I said, “This pearl represents you because you are one of great value to your mom and I. We love you with all of our hearts.”

Uh they tell us that uh a little grain of sand, for example, will get in an oyster, and the nacre, it’s a solution the oyster produces, will put layer upon layer upon layer of this nacre over that little uh grain of sand, and there’s crystals in the nacre, and you you end up with this iridescent rainbow whiteness that comes out of that pearl. It’s like nothing else on earth and that’s what makes it of such great value. I’ll say, “Sweetheart, you’re like that pearl. You are special. You are of great value.”

But not only does a pearl from time immemorial represent great value, it also represents great uh purity. Great purity. For example, in Revelation 21:21, “And the 12 gates were 12 pearls. Each one of the gates was a single pearl. Can you imagine that? A massive city gate made out of one pearl and the streets of the city was pure gold like transparent glass. Well, the the gates of of heaven are are one single pearl because the gates of heaven are priceless and they represent purity. “Sweetheart, you represent purity and that’s what I want you to be until the day you’re married and that’s why I’ve chosen this pearl to represent you.

“That’s the middle stone in this seven stone ring that I’m giving you. Now, there are six diamonds around the pearl in the middle and I want you to look at that first diamond, the first diamond represents God because He’s to be first place in everything, and He’s to be first place in your life, and He’s to be first place in my life.” First of all, he’s first place, he’s the first diamond because he owns me. You know, God owns every one of us. He owns us by creation. We are creatures and he is the Creator. The Bible says in Psalm 139:13, “For thou didst form my inward parts and thou didst weave me in my mother’s womb.” “It is God who made you, sweetheart. It is God who made you special and He owns you because He is your Creator. He’s first.”

Not only by creation, but he owns you also by recreation, or the new creation when you’re born again and become a Christian. Ephesians 2:10 says, “for we are His workmanship.” Really, in the text, the way it flows uh the Greek means to say, “His workmanship we are.” It’s a crescendo, a climactic conclusion to all the glorious truths of salvation that lead up to Ephesians 2:10. His workmanship we are. God made us special in Christ Jesus. And then 1 Corinthians um 6 verse 20, “for you have been bought with a price.”

So God owns you by creation and God owns you by recreation and also he’s made your life and your body for his own glory, and that’s not God interfering on you or getting in on your rights. He has every right to claim you and your physical body for his purposes and for his glory. Listen to Romans 6, verses 12 and 13, ” Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts.” In other words, your body is not to be ruled by fallen base-level lust that this world makes so much of today. Verse 13, “and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.”

So our life and our bodies are for his glory. “Baby, that’s what that first diamond represents, God.” Also, our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 6:19, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?” Young people, the next time you’re tempted to be immoral or some boy, some girl says you ought to do these things with me or those things with you, you gotta remember, my body’s not my own. I don’t get to do with my body what I please. It’s the temple, it belongs to, it’s the dwelling place of the Holy, notice, the Holy Spirit, of God, and God designed us, all of us, to be a one-man woman or a one-woman man. That’s why he simply says you shall not commit adultery in the Ten Commandments. Why? Because God made you for one, not for many, but for one. And he created us, he made us, his recreation also we’re to honor him with these things.

Uh 1 Corinthians 6:15 through 20. “Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? May it never be!” God forbid, it means. “Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a harlot is one body with her? For He says, ‘The two shall become one flesh.’ But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.” That is, sins against the purpose the Creator made for your body. And when he made it a certain way, you can’t violate his intention or his plan without damaging yourself and of course, dishonoring him. Verse 19, 1 Corinthians 6, “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.”

2 Timothy 2:22, “Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” In other words, this is the way one who follows the Lord looks like, he is one who is pursuing righteousness, faith, love, and peace.

“So that first diamond, other than the pearl, the pearl represents you, the purity, the great value you have to us and to the Lord, but the first diamond represents God and I want you to remain pure for the for the Lord’s sake and to honor Him until your marriage day.” All right? “Not only is the first uh diamond God, the second diamond represents your parents, your mother and I.” We are your God-given authorities. Romans 13, verses 1 and 2. Let “Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities.” Now generally that’s talking about civic authorities but he broadens it out. “For there is no authority except from God, and those which are established or exist rather are established by God. Therefore whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God.” Young people, when you resist mom and dad’s leadership in your life, in courtship or whatever it might be, you’re not just resisting mom and dad, you’re resisting the ordinance of God, and so it is for us adults who are to honor the authority of our employers or the authority of government or whatever it may be. “And they who have opposed God-ordained authority,” the text continues on, “will receive condemnation upon themselves.”

Proverbs 1:8, “Hear, my son, your father’s instruction And do not forsake your mother’s teaching.” “So that second diamond represents your mom and dad, and we want you to remain pure and clean before the Lord until your marriage day.”

“And also, the Bible teaches us that your mom and dad are given to you for your protection.” As I said before, moms are able to see motives in young girls that boys can’t see, and dads can see motives that that girls can’t see, and you need that protection of mom and dad in your life for your courtship years and certainly going into those engagement days. That’s why the Bible says in Ephesians 6, verses 1 through 3, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise.” In other words, there’s something really in this for you, young people, really in this for you, “that it may be well with you, and you may live long on the earth.” There’s even a phrase in the Proverbs about the rebellious son, the the ravens of the valley will pick out his eyes. What does it mean when the Bible says the ravens will pick out your eyes? It means you’re dead. If a raven comes upon a corpse a carcass uh uh laying there on the ground, the first thing he’ll do is peck the eye to see if there’s any life there. The point is the odds are much higher if you live a life of rebelling against your parents that you will not live long on the earth.

“All right, the third diamond,” I’d say, “there on your seven stone ring, that third diamond represents your church family.” This is something I’ve been working on for decades to help us understand a church is not something you necessarily just join, a church is something you’re added to. A church is where you belong. There are mutual blessings and encouragements and love, but there are mutual duties and responsibilities and obligations to church family and one of those duties and one of those obligations is for you to be an encouragement to your brothers and sisters in Christ. So I want you to also remain pure that you’ll encourage others who are struggling, who’ve had weaknesses, maybe they’ve even even failed in this area and they’ve repented and they’ll stay on the right course for the future and you can be an encouragement by living before them a good example by honoring the principles of a Christian guy-girl relationship and Christian courtship and Christian engagement. You have a duty to those in your church family.

Uh Paul said in 1 Corinthians 9, 27, that he buffets his body, he he he boxes it, he makes it his slave so he’ll not be disqualified. In other words, I I can’t preach to you and then live in wanton compromise. I have a duty to you to be an example to you. Young people, can I ask you a question? In these areas, are you an example of how a Christian would approach young men or how a Christian would approach young women? Well, you have a duty to do that.

So that diamond, the third diamond, represents your church family and you, by the way, should welcome their accountability. Welcome the accountability of others in your church that are striving also to honor the Lord in these areas. The Bible says in Galatians 6:2, “Bear one another’s burdens, and thus fulfill the law of Christ.” If Christ comes into our lives, he places us in the covenant relationship of a local church family and we’re to go into that local church family with a commitment to bear one another’s burdens. Now that means a lot of things and the word burden there means a weight. It means you have brothers and sisters all around you who are carrying a weight that they need some help with. And could I say to you moms and dads and to all of us, there’s not a heavier weight, I think, in this modern age than young people purposing to be pure and honor of the Lord. That’s a heavy weight in this present culture. But when some of the young people will do it right, they help take the weight of temptation, the weight of the world’s uh seduction, if you will, off of themselves, and you’re helping them bear that burden.

Now listen to me, that’s a duty you have. You say, “Well man, pastor, I I thought joining a church is I just sort of belong and if I need y’all, I’ll let you know.” You don’t know what church is. That’s not what it is at all. I visited with a doctor one time, a physician one time. He he, this was decades ago. A nice fella, and I appreciate him. And uh he hadn’t been coming to the the meetings of the church at all and I just went, and I very humbly said, “Sir, we’d just love for you to have you be more faithful to the church.” And he said, “Well, look, I’m doing fine. If I need y’all, I’ll let you know.” I thought, he don’t have a clue. He’s got a graduate degree and a a doctorate by his name and he doesn’t have a clue. You have a duty to help those around you so that’s why this diamond represents your church family. You’re to be pure until your wedding day to be an encouragement to those around you.

Well, the fourth diamond in that seven stone ring, I would tell my daughters, represents your siblings, your sisters, or maybe in your case, your brothers and sisters. Andrew had this spirit in John 1, verses 41 and 42, where he first found his own brother, Simon, and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which translated means Christ). He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, ‘You are Simon the son of John; you shall be called Cephas’ (which is translated Peter).” So Andrew said, first thing I wanna do is make sure my my siblings get in on this. I I just can’t tell you, if you if you’re the oldest child in the family, if you’ll live right, you make it immensely uh easier for your younger siblings to honor the Lord and live right. So I want you to be pure, I would say, and this diamond represents your siblings, so that you will be an encouragement to them.

Well, the fifth diamond in the seven stone ring, I would say, represents your future spouse, in our case, your future husband. You want to be pure for him, and you want him to be striving to be pure for you. God’s highest design, God’s best design, is one man with one woman for one lifetime. Now we know in grace, God forgives and there can be new starts. Praise the Lord for that, amen? But that didn’t mean we should plan on that. I believe too many Christians, they kind of say, keep it in the back of their mind, “I I can check out and get forgiveness and go with somebody else.” No, no, no, no, no, no. God’s highest design is one man with one woman for one lifetime.

In Genesis chapter 2, verses 18 through 25, listen to the Lord’s original intent. “Then the LORD God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.'” You see, he made Adam special in his own image and he deserved a special helper, not just any helper. “Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. The man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones, And flesh of my flesh; She shall be called Woman, Because she was taken out of Man.’ For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife,” singular, “and they shall uh become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.” You see, it glorifies God when you can present yourself to your spouse on that wedding day, pure. This diamond represents also that future spouse.

Hebrews 13:4 is an interesting verse. Hebrews 13:4 reminds us, let “Marriage be held in honor among all.” The idea there is we’re to have an honorable view, a high view of marriage. Marriage is the design of God. It’s the ordinance of God. And in this day, there was some people kind of minimizing marriage or maybe saying, well, that’s optional for a Christian because we’re to devote ourselves to serve the Lord and we’ll just stay single. The Corinthian church did some of that. And they were just, misunderstood in their immaturity. And God God says, no, marriage is is is of a great, wondrous, and glorious institution that God has given you to be a blessing. So have a high and honorable view of marriage. And then he continues on, Hebrews 13:4, let the let “Marriage be held in honor among all and the marriage bed be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge.” In other words, before marriage and during marriage, keep yourself for one person. So up until that time that God gives you that one person, this diamond, this fifth diamond represents that future spouse.

Let me just read this text to show you the blessedness of sexual intimacies within marriage that you’re saving yourself for. 1 Corinthians 7:1 through 6, “Now concerning the things about which you wrote, it is good for a man not to touch a woman.” In other words, it’s good if a man has the gift of singleness and he doesn’t need to be married, he doesn’t need to be involved involved in physical intimacies. Then verse 2 continues, “But because of immoralities, let each man is to have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. Let the husband must fulfill his duty to his wife, and likewise also the wife to her husband.” Now listen to this, “The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does; and likewise also the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.” So after the marriage day, things are radically turned around. God so encourages the physical intimacies of marriage that he tells the husband, “Your body doesn’t belong to you, it belongs to your wife.” And he tells the wife, “Your body doesn’t belong to you, it belongs to your husband.” Now this was radical in this day that God put the husband and the wife on a level plane. Uh that was just not in their thinking. Women were more or less, even the Greek and and Roman culture, and to too much of a degree in the Jewish culture, just more of a piece of property and Christ absolutely obliterated that, and he did it in one way by saying in the marriage relationship, “Men, your body belongs to your wife, and you be there for her, for all of her needs. And wives, your body didn’t belong to you, it belongs to your husband, and you be there for all of his needs.” “But sweetheart, that’s why God wants you to remain pure now, because He has a glorious, blessed relationship for you in the future, when you get married.”

And then lastly, in the seven stone ring, the sixth diamond represents your future children. Your future children. Well, how wonderful it would be for you to say, “You know what, I strove, I was striving as a young person to honor the Lord and keep myself pure, and I want you, my daughter, you, my son, to do that very same thing.” You know, and there’s a place for saying, “I wasn’t all that I should have been and I’ve sought the Lord in repentance and faith, but I want to help you become all you can be and honor the Lord by remaining pure until your wedding day.”

Ephesians 6:4 reminds us, “And fathers do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” And in this area of sexual purity and in the totality of being a young person who honors their pastors, honors the church, honors their moms and dads, what a great advantage that gives you in bringing your own children up later on in the discipline and in the instruction of the Lord. Make it a family tradition. Let’s get away from these generational curses and be the men and women of God God’s called us to be. The next generation does not have to follow and wallow in the filth of the previous generation.

What a family heritage this could be for us. I um I think this was my youngest daughter, I don’t remember, but she wrote me this note on Father’s Day when she was very small, and it just points out the importance, especially us dads taking the initiative in these areas. And I’ve given you a boatload of practical how-tos. You don’t have to follow mine exactly, that’s not what I’m saying, but it gives you a great place to work from, especially this this covenant meeting when they for us it was the age of 13, and going over these things together, and giving the your daughter that ring, and you may have some ideas for the guys. I I’ve never wanted to give a boy a seven stone ring. I just, you know, I don’t even like ice skating, men ice skating, it looks too effeminate. But anyway um if we could find something, maybe a knife or something, or you know, I don’t know, I don’t know what it would be, but um anyway, doing something special like that, how essential dads are.

Matter of fact, I heard this the other day, and it’s one of the most powerful little phrases I’ve heard in a long time, especially concerning the family. The world wants to talk quite a bit about parenting, but you know, that that concept, that phraseology is not really used in the Bible. A boy needs mothering and a boy needs fathering. A girl needs mothering and a girl needs fathering. And together you could call that parenting but too often we want this uh generic, uh fuzzy, just kind of parenting thing. No, no, no. Dads do things different do things differently than moms do and children need that from time to time.

And moms do things differently than dad does, and that helps the children survive dad from time to time, all right? But we, now listen to me, we really have a deficit of fathering in our culture. All these aggressive, dominant women gonna save the children from the masculinity of the fathers. They don’t need to be saved from it, they need to be taught how to be it. That’s what meekness means. Remember, meekness means having a sword, a great old, big, long, sharp, two-edged sword, but you keep it in the sheath until it’s righteous to use it. I agree with Jordan Peterson that that that that we need dangerous men. That means if if if the time comes, he can take care of things, but he knows how to keep that reserved and under control until it’s righteous to do so. Girls need a daddy like that, amen? I wanted the boys that came to my house to know that uh he might tear one of my arms off. I don’t know. You don’t deal with him. Don’t be a Caspar Milquetoast. Be a man’s man.

So anyway, getting back to my point, fathers need to really take the lead in this. Now, mom can be very involved, but fathers need to take the lead. Little boys, little girls needing dads. Anyway, this is the note that I believe it was Anna Claire wrote. One of them will tell me after church which one it was. She said in the note, “I love my daddy because he loves me. I love my daddy because he loves God. I love my daddy because he tells the truth. I love my daddy because he takes me four-wheeling.” See, every guy should have a four-wheeler. “I love my daddy because he takes me fishing. I love my daddy because he’s nice to me. I love my daddy because he finds time to play with me and I love my daddy because he’s nice to people and our animals. I love my daddy because he checks on people to see if they’re all right. I love my daddy because he takes care of me. I love my daddy because he and I have fun when we play basketball together.” That might be a clue. “I love my daddy because he teaches me how to cut grass. I love my daddy because he teaches me how to cook some things. I love my daddy because he helped build my house. But the best thing about my dad is he’s mine.” Little boys and little girls need daddies.

Well, let let’s strive to have some kind of covenant meeting, sit down with our fellas and girls at the appropriate age, and you got to start talking about these principles before and that’s why they’re going to be online, and we’re going to make it user-friendly. And we’re going to, Brother Nathan’s going to help us, Brother Luke, incorporate these in our children’s program. Just not not legalism, but just the principles. We’re going to revive them a little bit more maybe in our youth department. And moms and dads, have that time when you have a covenant meeting. You might be asking, where can I find a seven- stone ring? Well, I just had a local jeweler to make one, create one, and we’ll look into that, okay, and see if there might be somebody that could uh put that together, if that’s something you want to use, all right?

All right. God’s word is perfect. God’s word is good. It saves us from ourselves. Now, wherever you are, listen to me, wherever you are, wherever you’ve been, you can start again. Say, “God, I just want to wipe the slate clean. I didn’t do it right when I was a kid and now I’ve got kids.” That’s all right. It’s under the blood. Start afresh. Don’t you let Satan haunt you with guilt from the past. Remember, he’s the God of the second chance.

And the third chance. And the fourth chance. And the 100th chance. Because we’re all under grace.