Pornography, above all the other horrific damage that it inflicts, is a lie. All temptations are based upon lies. Temptations are lies that cannot deliver what they promise. Pornography is right at the top of the list of the lies Satan tells. This is what your middle-school aged children and your teenagers must realize about pornography – it is a lie. It is not necessary to explain all the graphic garbage about pornography to teach this truth to your children. Pornography is Satan’s attempt to bypass marriage in order to gain sexual pleasure. In Satan’s world pornography is the replacement for marriage. Just as Satan offered Eve and Christ alternatives to God’s command, he is offering your children an alternative […]
Ruling Desires
112 posts
Jehoshaphat and Peer Pressure – Part 2 God Blesses a Foolish & Stupid King The narrative of King Jehoshaphat and King Ahab in 2 Chronicles 18 provides insight into the dynamics of peer pressure. When you or your children yield to peer pressure you are, in effect, dividing your loyalties between God and man. This double-mindedness simply does not work. It results in decision making that is not sound. Many sins that young people become entangled with begin when they yield to peer pressure. The story of King Jehoshaphat demonstrates that young people are not the only ones susceptible to this problem. As we noted in the last post, Jehoshaphat should have realized that forming an alliance with […]
We are God’s: let us therefore look for him and die for him. We are God’s: let his wisdom and will therefore rule all our actions. We are God’s: let all the parts of our life accordingly strive toward him as our only lawful goal. O, how much has that man profited who, having been taught that he is not his own, has taken away the dominion and rule from his own reason that he may yield to God! For, as consulting our self interest is the pestilence that most effectively leads to our destruction, so the sole haven of salvation is to be wise in nothing and to will nothing through ourselves but to follow the leading of the […]
We are looking at 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 to gain a biblical perspective of what it means to love our children. After two statements about what love is come three statements that teach what love is not. Love does not envy. Love does not boast. Love is not proud. These have special implications for parents. Envy has a particularly nasty twist with regard to parenting. This occurs when you start looking around at other families and conclude that they are much better off than you are. Then you start thinking that you wish your children were like those in the other families that are doing soooo much better than your family. This leads to discouragement with your own children […]
“Millions of Christians suffer from depression and bipolar disorder. Unfortunately, many of them suffer in silence because of the stigma mental illness often carries in Christian circles. I’m tremendously grateful for Good Mood, Bad Mood, a book that compassionately offers medical and theological insights for those affected by mental disorders. Dr. Hodges is equally at home parsing the relevant biblical texts as he is dispensing medical advice. Throughout the book he intersperses stories of real people struggling to find freedom; this is a must-read book.” –Drew Dyck, Managing Editor, Leadership Journal Click on the image below for more information.
Americans are fascinated by fame, either for themselves or by watching others in hot pursuit of fame. This attraction can be fatal. There is a fundamental reason for this attention to fame – we were designed to worship greatness. We were designed to be consumed with the glory of God, to whom there is no equal. Then came the fall of man in garden. Satan successfully persuaded Adam to question God’s greatness. Ever since then, humans have looking for fame in all the wrong places. Romans teaches us that a great exchange has taken place. God’s truth has been exchanged for a lie. Man now worships and serves things which are created instead of the One who creates: […]
Imagine opening presents on Christmas morning. One person receives a number of gifts with delight. But then, upon opening the next gift he shouts, “…what a stupid gift”! He then proceeds to the trash can where he angrily deposits the gift. Such a show of ingratitude would be almost universally condemned. But, when it comes to the gifts that God has given to mankind, this sort of ingratitude is common. For example, take the gifts of marriage and sex. Modern culture has determined that sex is a gift that it wants to keep and marriage is a gift for the trash can. So with no regard for the giver of marriage our culture, our legislators, our educators […]
Proverbs 3:7-8 indicate that our bodies don’t do well when we rely on own understanding. Trusting God and purposely loving him in all that we do brings health. Trusting your own understanding will lead to a lack of health. This is not a magic formula. Loving God in every area of your life means an intentional awareness of loving him. Recall God’s instruction in Deuteronomy 6:5-6. A deep love for God is followed by God’s commands being woven into the heart. This is one example of acknowledging God in all of your ways. Merely reciting God’s word will not keep you from being wise in your own eyes. The book of Judges is full of apostasy, because everyone was wise […]
Instructing a Child’s Heart is one of my favorite books. The basics of biblical parenting are presented in clear and direct manner. Take notice of this short section on the human heart and its importance. Use this to help you look beyond the behavior of your children to understand what really drives what they think, say, and do.
One complaint that is shared by many fathers is that they are not respected by their families. Some of us, as fathers, tend to think that family life would be much better if our wife and children just showed a little more respect. But respect does not happen in a vacuum, or on demand. On the one hand, God’s people are commanded to respect the people that God has placed in authority over us. Fathers meet that qualification—see Ephesians 6:1-3. But there is also another component of giving respect. Respect can be won by action. Hear what Hebrews says about respecting fathers: