start there right this evening father thank you for this church and this
opportunity that we have to sing praises it's you Lord help us to sing loud and
sing with the understanding that you'd fill us with your Holy Spirit as well
Jesus name I pray for our next song if you would turn in your hymnals to him
number 202 my Redeemer in number 202 in number 202 we'll go ahead and start
there right on the first I will sing raise your hand and an utter will bring
you one do you have full memory verse of the week Galatians chapter number one
verse 14 keep working on that chapter on the inside you'll see our service times
are listed Sunday morning at 1030 a.m. Sunday evening at 430 and our Wednesday
evening Bible study through the book of Proverbs at 7 o'clock below that we have
our soul winning times scheduled there as well as our nursing home ministry and
below that you'll see our year-to-date statistics had some good salvations out
today had a couple weird experiences too ran into a guy that told me he was God
so that was interesting one of those situations where you're like alright
have a good day see you later I don't know what he was expecting out of that
one but yeah weird stuff upcoming events April 13th that's next Sunday is the
men's preaching night for the evening service so still time to sign up for
that if you do sign up please indicate your sermon topic on the paper doesn't
have to be necessarily your sermon title but at least what you're gonna be
preaching about please indicate that for me and then please remember that there's
a potluck right after that so if you could bring something to share next
Sunday evening that'd be appreciated April 19th that's our Easter soul
winning marathon coming up pretty soon and there's a sign up sheet for that as
well we're meeting at Frederick Douglas Park at 9 a.m. for coffee and donuts then
we'll have soul winning 10 through 12 lunch at noon and our second round of
soul winning at 2 o'clock on that day the next day is gonna be Easter and that
evening we're going to be taking the Lord's Supper hopefully everyone had a
chance to look at that document I sent for musicians and ushers taking part in
that and please like I said if you have any questions or need some clarification
let me know and I'll be happy to help you with that. May 16th through the 18th is
the King James Conference at Sher Foundation Baptist Church. May 31st is
the Durant Oklahoma soul winning marathon with Steadfast. June 28th is the Tinker
Airshow Fellowship Day and then on the 29th Brother Ben Naim is preaching for
us both Sunday morning and Sunday evening from Steadfast. August 27th through
the 31st Fire Breathing Baptist Fellowship and October 6th through the 11th
the Bahamas mission trip. Below that there's a QR code for visitors or people
who want to update their information and on the back is our prayer list. Please do
keep all these in prayer. Remember that's what this list is for and if you have
any requests do email us and we'd like to add that to our list for you. Below
that is some information about giving if you'd like to do that and that's gonna
be it for announcements this evening. We'll go and go to our third song.
Alright for our third song if you would take your hymnals and turn to hymn number
361. Did you think to pray? Hymn number 361 in your hymnals. Hymn number 361
we'll go ahead and start there right on the first. This evening as the offering
plates are being passed turn in your Bibles to Psalm chapter 127. 127. Good
evening Psalm 127 the Bible reads, "Except the Lord build the house, they labor in
vain that build it. Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.
It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows,
for so he giveth his beloved sleep. Lo, children are in heritage of the Lord,
and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty
man, so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of
them. They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate."
That's power heads forward to prayer. Father in heaven, we thank you for the
salvation this afternoon. Amen. All right, we are in Psalm 127 this evening, and the
title of my sermon this evening is this, "A Biblical View on Children." A biblical
view on children. There's a lot of propaganda and different ideas about
children out in the world, and we want to make sure that we approach the idea of
children from a biblical perspective. And number one, very simply this evening,
children are a blessing. Children are a blessing. Look at Psalm 127 verse 3. The
Bible says, "Lo, children are in heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is
his reward." So children are kind of like an inheritance that God gives his people.
It's a gift from the Lord, and it says that the fruit of the womb is his reward.
So the Bible speaks of having children as something that is positive, yet today there's
a lot of people that want to scoff and look down on having kids, and it's kind of becoming
popular in our day and age for people just to purposely not have children whatsoever.
I mean, I even had a family member who, upon marrying his wife, his condition on marrying
her was that she had to basically sterilize herself before the wedding, and it wasn't
like they just had health issues or just couldn't have kids for whatever reason.
They just like said, "Hey, if we're gonna get married, we're gonna make sure that we
don't have kids."
And this is a common mentality where people will speak very poorly of children.
They'll say if you find out that someone has a lot of kids, they'll say that they're sorry
for you.
"Oh, that's too bad.
Oh, that's awful."
But the Bible says that this is a gift.
This is something that is a blessing, and we should not look at the idea of having kids
as being only a burden.
Now, of course, having kids is a burden, right?
And especially when they're young, that's probably the most burdensome they're going
to be.
But the cool thing about having kids is it's probably one of those investments that as
time goes on, it probably becomes even more and more of a blessing as they get older.
You know, especially if they grow up and walk in truth, that's going to be something that
brings a lot of joy to your heart.
But look at verse number four.
It says, "As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, so are children of the youth."
So the Bible kind of gives us a picture here of a mighty man.
You're thinking of a man that's going out to war.
And when you're going out to war, do you want to have a little bit of ammunition or a lot?
You want to have a lot.
And so it's making this comparison here that having a lot of kids, it's like a mighty man
that has his quiver full of arrows.
It's a blessing.
It's something that's positive verse five, it says happy is the man that hath his quiver
full of them.
They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.
You know, that's an important verse there that it says happy is the man that has these
things because the world's constantly going to want to paint the picture of a family that
has lots of children as never being happy, right?
They have no joy in their life.
They have no rest.
They're just super stressed out and strung out and there's no blessing involved and there's
nothing good about their lives.
But the Bible is saying here that you're actually going to be happy when you have your quiver
full.
And it's interesting like I used to be a part of the nursing home ministry at Sure Foundation
Baptist Church.
We have lots of people that do that here at this church.
It's a great work.
It's a great way to learn preaching and get to do these things, minister to people.
But often when I would speak to people who are in the nursing home, they would often
talk about how they wish that they had more children.
Because a lot of the times, not every time, but a lot of the times, the reason people
end up in that situation is either because they didn't have kids, no one's left to take
care of them, or they had so few that they can't even financially do it, right?
No one's coming and visiting them.
They're sad.
You know, at the end of people's lives, they're thinking, "I wish I would have had more kids,"
not, "I wish I would have had less."
And you know, it's really sad and selfish when people make the conscious, purposeful
decision to not have children.
You know, that's not a Christian attitude.
That's not something that we should be doing as Christians, just deciding, "Well, we're
just not going to have kids because we don't want to deal with the struggle.
We don't want to deal with the heartache."
It's like part of the whole reason of marriage is that God is seeking a godly seed today.
He wants Christians to reproduce.
Let's look at that in Genesis chapter number one, Genesis chapter number one.
And you know, it's really sad when false religions beat us out on this.
When false religions are having lots of children, having big families, and Christians often
aren't.
Genesis one verse 26, the Bible says, "And God said, 'Let us make man in our image after
our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of
the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that
creepeth upon the earth.'
So God created man in his own image.
In the image of God created he him, male and female created he them.
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, 'Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish
the earth, and subdue it.'
So here we have what I believe to be God's first commandment to man, to be fruitful and
multiply.
You know, I've heard some people make a big deal about this saying that this isn't a commandment,
but this is an imperative statement in your Bible.
And you can, you know, people are like, 'Oh, that's not the first commandment.
The first commandment was let there be light.'
Okay, the first commandment to man, how about that?
The first commandment to man here is to be fruitful and multiply and to replenish the
earth.
God wants us to multiply.
Go to, if you would, while I, I'm going to read some stuff for you from an article here,
but go to Psalm 128.
So I looked up what the fertility rate is right now in 2025, and I found that in 2025,
the fertility rate for women in the United States is 1.78.
So think about it, you got man, wife, that's two people, and basically the average number
of kids that a American woman is having in her life is less than two.
So that means that our population is replacing itself at a lower rate than exists right now.
You understand what I'm saying?
We have a lower than two fertility rate, which means that we as a nation are not even replacing
our population.
Now, the population is growing every year, and that's because of this thing called the
Mexican border.
Okay, but it's not happening because of natural births, because the fertility rate is literally
below replacement.
That is a problem for a nation.
You realize that our nation, without all this craziness going on, people would literally
die off with a rate below two.
That's a serious problem that's not good.
Total fertility rate is the average number of births a woman would have over her lifetime,
based on current birth rates across all age groups.
It's a synthetic measure, meaning it doesn't track an actual group of women over time,
but rather estimates this average by taking the sum of age-specific birth rates observed
in a given year.
So in the United States, the total fertility rate is 1.787.
That means that on average, a woman would have 1.7 children if the birth rates from
that year persisted throughout her reproductive years.
So that is not good for our country to be having numbers this low.
And I'm sure that there's lots of causes to it.
I'm not going to pretend to understand all the causes.
I'm sure some of it's health, I'm sure some of it's diet, I'm sure some of it's exercise.
But you know what a lot of it is?
Is people just deciding to not have kids.
People just deciding to not get married or people deciding to make sure that they have
lived their 20s out in full, have traveled the world, have gone to college, have started
their career, have saved up $200,000, and then they'll start trying for kids.
That's a bad idea too.
That's not what God wants, okay?
So let me read this for you.
The last time that the replacement rate was breaking even in the United States was 2009.
So our fertility rate has been below two every single year since 2009.
The last time that the fertility rate was at three or higher was in 1964 at 3.096.
I mean having three children is not that much.
Like that's not a big family.
That's never been a big family throughout history.
But America for some reason, the last time it was at that rate, 3.096 was 1964.
Here are some countries that are beating the United States in fertility rate right now.
New Zealand, Sweden, France, Bahrain, French Polynesia, Aruba, New Caledonia, who even
knows what that is, Antigua, Barbuda, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Argentina, Seychelles, again
I don't even know what that is, Panama, Oman, and Israel.
Israel's beating us folks.
That is a shame.
That is just insane that there's all these other countries that are beating us in fertility
rate and part of it I just think that Americans need to renew their mind with the word of
God and look at families again as being a blessing.
Look at children again as being a blessing, not something that you need to avoid, not
something that you need to abort when you get pregnant, not something that you need
to purposely prevent from having.
No, you should realize that children are a blessing and we shouldn't sit here and teach
the next generation of women to just put themselves on birth control from age 14 to 35.
I mean that's insane.
It's literally just destroying our country.
Psalm 128.
Look at Psalm 128 verse 1 it says, "Blessed is everyone that feareth the Lord, that walketh
in his ways, for thou shalt eat the labor of thine hands.
Happy shalt thou be, and it shall be well with thee."
Verse 3, "Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine by the sides of thine house, thy children
like olive plants round about thy table."
So when the Bible's talking about people that fear the Lord, and it's kind of listing some
blessings here, one of those is that your wife would be fruitful and that your children
would be around you like olive plants.
The Bible's saying like when this happens, you should recognize that this is a blessing,
not something that you should complain about or regret or discourage other people from
having kids.
Like that's what a lot of older people are doing now.
They're discouraging the young generation from having kids.
You've got this boomer mentality of you've got to make sure that you focus on your career
first and that you're financially independent first and you have to be able to afford to
have kids.
No one can afford to have kids.
No matter what you have, they'll just keep breaking it.
It's okay.
It doesn't matter.
It's not about affording having kids.
It's about doing what God says, being fruitful and multiplying and actually trusting God
to provide for you.
You know, not everything in life, are you just going to have this clear trajectory where
you could see how everything's going to work out?
Sometimes you just have to look at the Bible and just say, "Okay, God wants me to do this
and I'm just ready to follow him and I'm just trusting him to take care of us."
And you know, when I first got married, I was not making that much money.
It was difficult, right?
We were in a one-bedroom apartment, it was very hard.
We went to like the cheapest possible places ever, but here we are with four kids and we've
never starved, never been homeless.
You know what that is?
It's just God taking care of us, God providing for us, and you ought not to use finances
as an excuse to not have children, okay.
You ought to trust the Lord and realize that it is a blessing.
Go to Matthew chapter 18, Matthew 18, but you know, the Bible says that I have no greater
joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.
That's kind of why I say that, yes, we should acknowledge and admit that children are also
a burden.
Like I'm not going to sit here and pretend like that's not true, but we should realize
that while they're a burden, again, it's like an investment that over time gets sweeter
and sweeter is more and more of a blessing.
I really enjoy that some of my older kids are starting to understand sermons, and the
other day I asked Bethany what my sermon was about, and she said the wrath of God, and
she was right, and that was great, and Bethany called upon the name of the Lord a few weeks
ago, I believe that she's saved, tried to teach her about baptism.
That makes me happy, and yes, there's challenges, yes, there's hard times, yes, there's times
where you write a sermon about children being a blessing, and they really want to test your
doctrine on that for some reason.
It just happens that way sometimes, but you know what?
It is a blessing.
Kids are a blessing, you should cherish them, you should thank God for those gifts and not
sit here and discourage other people from having kids.
That is a wicked attitude.
So when it comes to biblical view on children, number one, children are a blessing.
Number two, children are a great example of faith.
Children are a great example of faith.
Matthew chapter 18 verse 1, "At the same time came the disciples unto Jesus, saying, 'Who
is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?'
And Jesus called a little child unto him and set him in the midst of them, and said, 'Verily
I say unto you, accept ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter
into the kingdom of heaven.'"
I mean, what a beautiful story there that the question is asked, who's the greatest
in the kingdom of heaven?
And man's wisdom would obviously think of some person of great stature or wealth or
some, you know, fantastic preacher or something like that.
But Jesus just brings this little boy and I often wonder like what happened to this boy
later in the Bible doesn't talk about, but like this boy was brought to the Lord Jesus
Christ and was pointed at as an example of faith.
And he's saying, in fact, if you want to see the kingdom of heaven yourself, you're going
to have to be converted and be like a child.
And of course we know that the reason for that is that salvation is a free gift, right?
It's by faith alone and children, they're a hundred percent reliant upon their parents.
Your parents take care of everything for them, give everything that they need.
You know, kids aren't sitting here thinking about, all right, we've got the car payment.
We've got insurance.
We've got the mortgage.
All right.
We got this type of income coming in.
Where are we going to cut our spending?
They're just existing and just believing that mom and dad are going to take care of them.
And they're always taken care of by their parents.
That's what salvation is, is us trusting that, hey, Jesus paid it all.
He's got all the work that he did.
You know, we are getting to heaven simply by his grace, by trusting in him, believing
in him.
That is salvation.
Look at verse four.
It says, "Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is
greatest in the kingdom of heaven."
See, children are a great example of faith because most children are humble.
Most children are not going to sit here and think that, oh, you know, I've done so much
good in my life and I've built, you know, this business and I've done such great works
and I've repented of all my sins.
You know, children really haven't done anything in life yet.
And so they're great candidates for salvation because all they have to do is trust.
And oftentimes people who don't get saved, it's because they refuse to humble themselves
and realize that it's nothing about them that takes them to heaven.
You know, we ran out into a, we ran into a lady today, out soul winning, who her answer
of what does it take to get to heaven?
She says, you have to repent of all your sins.
And what is she saying?
She's saying, I have to stop doing X, Y and Z.
I have to make sure I'm living a good life, that I'm following the commandments, that
I'm doing what God wants me to do.
And what she's ultimately trusting in for her salvation is herself.
Now thank God this woman, she was humble enough to listen to the full gospel by brother Jeremiah.
He preached her the whole gospel.
He got her to repent of that belief and trust in Jesus Christ.
You know, thank God that she had that humility.
But you know, people who don't have humility are not going to get saved.
You have to have enough humility to realize, hey, I was wrong about whatever I was trusting
in before, and now I'm turning away from that belief and turning to trusting in Jesus Christ.
That is like being a child, being humble.
Go to First Samuel chapter number three, First Samuel chapter three, but not just in regards
to salvation.
Children are just a good example of faith in general, and we don't want to write off
children from serving God.
We don't want to act like serving God is for adults only.
That soul winning is for adults only, that paying attention in church is for adults only.
We want to realize like hey, Jesus said this is a good example of faith, a child, and we
should include them in the house of God, include them in the work of God.
Look at First Samuel chapter three, verse eight.
At this time Samuel is a little boy and it says, "And the Lord called Samuel again the
third time, and he arose and went to Eli and said, 'Here am I, for thou didst call me.'
And Eli perceived that the Lord had called the child."
So notice, God in this story is willing to communicate and have fellowship with a young
child.
So it's not like kids can't start developing a relationship with the Lord.
You know, they have to wait until they're teenagers or something like that.
I mean, here's God calling Samuel and Samuel is a little boy.
So I want to, you know, impart to the kids here that you should start serving God as
young as possible.
You should start caring about the things of God and desiring to seek God's face as young
as you possibly can in your life.
Because I'm telling you, God actually wants to have a relationship with all people, even
children.
God's calling out to him here.
Look what it says in verse 9.
"Therefore, Eli said unto Samuel, Go lie down, and it shall be if he call thee, that thou
shalt say, Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth.
So Samuel went and lay down in his place, and the Lord came and stood and called as
at other times."
Samuel!
Then Samuel answered, Speak, for thy servant heareth.
Then Eli called Samuel and said, Samuel, my son, and he answered, Here am I.
And he said, What is the thing that the Lord hath said unto thee?
I pray thee, hide it not from me.
God do so to thee, and more also, if thou hide anything from me of all the things that
he said unto thee.
And notice verse 18, "And Samuel told him every wit, and hid nothing from him."
So not only is God speaking to a young child, but the young child is also speaking God's
Word to other people.
And you know, you should not just write off children and act like they can't do spiritual
things.
Look, I have seen children get children saved.
I've seen children become soul winners.
I've known of young teenagers who have read the Bible through cover to cover over 10 times
by the time that they're pre-teens.
Look, we should encourage that stuff and not act like, "Oh, no big deal.
You got to wait till you get older."
No, serve God now.
The Bible teaches that childhood and youth are vanity.
It's completely meaningless.
What actually matters is serving God.
And you know, I got saved pretty young.
I got saved at 16, but I wish I would have gotten saved when I was 6.
I wish I would have started soul winning when I was a little kid.
And you know, I look at my children and I just hope someday they understand how spiritually
spoiled they are, that all of my kids go out soul winning every week from the age of like
three and up, you know, and I think that's part of why children who grow up in church
get saved at a young age is because they're just hearing the gospel over and over and
over again.
It's going into their heart.
They're starting to soak these things in.
So, you know, encourage your children to participate in spiritual things.
Try to get your children as young of an age as possible to actually sit in church and
pay attention to the preaching of God's word.
Obviously, there's a time in a child's life where that's going to be hard for them to
sit through a whole service.
I get that.
And, you know, us as a church, we want to be gracious with families and not sit here
and be super harsh, you know, especially if you yourself don't have kids, have some grace
to those situations.
But at the same time, we shouldn't be just like enabling our kids with a crutch for as
long as possible.
It's like, bro, your six-year-old should be sitting through a service by now.
Your six-year-old should not need to be looking at a tablet all service.
Your six-year-old should not be needing to go to the bathroom every two minutes.
You know, there needs to be some training that's done.
And really what you're doing is you're not really showing your kid that spirituality
is important when you take them to church and it's just a tablet every service.
It's just a game or a toy every service.
You want to, yes, help young kids as they're developing, but as soon as possible, get them
involved in the things of God because God can commune with them as children.
God wants to have a relationship with them as kids.
They can do spiritual things as kids.
Go to First Samuel 17, First Samuel 17, you know, children should, I'm sorry, children
can do great feats for the Lord as well.
When we see that in this story, David is a child at this time.
Look what it says in verse 51 of First Samuel 17, "Therefore David ran and stood upon the
Philistine and took his sword and drew it out of the sheep thereof and slew him and
cut off his head therewith and when the Philistines saw their champion was dead, they fled."
So here you got David, who is described as a stripling, I'm not sure how you pronounce
that, but he's a young child basically, he's like a teenager and David is going out and
doing the work that a lot of the men refuse to do because if you remember in this story
Goliath, he goes and challenges Israel for like 40 days, constantly challenging someone
to fight him and Saul didn't take him up on it, the mighty men didn't take him up on it,
no one in the army took him up on it, but then all of a sudden here's this teenage boy David,
he's willing to actually come in the name of the Lord and he goes and he takes his head off.
Look at verse number 18, or I'm sorry verse 54, it says, "And David took the head of the Philistine
and brought it to Jerusalem, but he put his armor in his tent. When Saul saw David go forth against
Philistine, he said unto Abner, the captain of the host, 'Abner, whose son is this?'" Notice, youth,
right? So he is a youth, he is probably a teenager, and yet he's going out and cutting off the head of
Goliath. So you know, we should encourage children, teenagers, to go out and learn to do spiritual
acts as soon as possible. Teach them to go soul winning. You know, they can get a lot of people
saved as children, as teenagers. And let me tell you something, teenagers and children have a special
weapon. It's called being innocent and being cute. Okay. And when someone opens the door and there's
a child that wants to preach them the Bible, most people are, their heart's going to be a little
stirred by that. They're going to be like, okay, you know, let's, let's hear this kid out. And
oftentimes a child having the boldness to do that can get lots of people saved. I knock on the door,
they're like, who's this ugly dude? Get away from me. Okay. You men probably the same thing,
but it's like a little child comes up. It's like, Hey, if you were to die today, are you a hundred
percent sure you're going to heaven? A lot of times people's heart just melts and they're just
ready to hear that. And so, you know what, take advantage of this time of your life where, and
start practicing, you know, those boldness muscles so that you, that could stay with you your whole
life so that you could be a soul winner and do great works for God your whole life. But I'm telling
you, don't let your childhood be a waste. Don't let your youth be a waste. Start doing great works for
God. Go to Second Timothy chapter three. Now, of course, we want to keep things proper and in order.
I'm not saying, hey, let's start ordaining kids as pastors. Okay, we're not going to have kids
preaching sermons. Kids are not welcome to participate in the men's preaching night. Okay,
it's the men's preaching night. We want men to be taking care of those things. But I do want to
encourage kids to start doing spiritual things as much as possible, right? I mean, just because in
Israel in ancient times, you have some examples of child kings. That doesn't mean like, hey, this is
the thing you should strive for. Let's start having kid pastors. No, that's too far. But we do want to
encourage kids to do spiritual things. Look what it says in second Timothy chapter number three,
verse 14, but continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of knowing
of whom thou hast learned them, verse 15, and that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures,
which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus. Hey,
don't underestimate the things that your kids can learn from the scriptures. The Bible talking to
Timothy here is saying from a child, you knew the holy scriptures. You know, Timothy, it wasn't just
like on the surface. He actually understood some of the Bible. You know, this is why we want even
kids to do the Bible memorization because kids can know the Bible. Go to Matthew chapter number 18,
Matthew chapter number 18. And you know, this is something that I'm a little concerned about
because myself, I am a, I consider myself a first generation Christian. I went to church like a
handful of times as a child. My parents were not saved when I was a child. I got saved. I got my
mom saved. My dad got saved watching Pastor Menes later in life. So I'm a first generation Christian
and what I've noticed amongst other first generation Christians is that they're often very
zealous, very fired up for the things of God, kind of because that they, you know, had to build
Christianity in a sense themselves, right? They had to learn why you go to church. They had to
learn why you go soul winning. They had to learn why you read the Bible and it was never something
that was forced on first-generation Christians. It's always been their own decision and anyone in
here else is a first-generation Christian, okay, a couple people. Now here's the thing, second,
third, fourth generation Christians, ideally that's what we want, right? Because we want people to get
saved and get their children saved, but sometimes there's a tendency in people that just grew up
around these things to not realize the gravity and the impact of the things of God and to realize how
important they are and to take serving God for granted. And oftentimes I've seen second generation
Christians that are just lukewarm, they don't care, and it's just because it seems like they
never made Christianity their own, like they never internalized these things. And they as a child,
maybe they went to church, but it was just mom and dad dragging them to church. They weren't in it in
their heart. And so I'm talking to you kids, you need to learn to have a relationship with God
yourself. You need to learn how to go soul-winning and want to go soul-winning and want to read the
Bible and want to pay attention in church. Because you know what? Being zealous, it's not something
that your parents can hand to you. I'm sure your parents want to hand that to you. I'm sure if we
could all push a button, we'd want all of our kids to be as zealous as us, more zealous than us.
But I've just noticed that oftentimes it doesn't happen. Oftentimes the second generation is just
kind of lukewarm and doesn't care about the things of God. And you know, I don't know how to make you
care. You have to have that desire on your own. But I'm just telling you, you need to think about
these things and pray and try to have a relationship with God yourself. Number three, children are to be
protected. A biblical view on children realize that children are to be protected. Matthew 18 verse 5,
"And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me. But whoso shall offend one of
these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about
his neck and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe unto the world because of offenses,
for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." So Jesus,
he recognizes children as being precious, innocent, not deserving of harm or offense,
and he does not want harm to come upon them. He's saying woe unto anyone that would offend one of
these children. And because Jesus has that attitude, Jesus loves the little children,
like the song says, we should realize that we need to protect our children and we need to protect
children in general. Now this word that he uses, offend, there's a couple different definitions for
this word. And listen to what I found on the dictionary here. It says to irritate, annoy or anger,
cause resentful displeasure in, to affect disagreeably, to violate or transgress,
to hurt or cause pain to, or to cause, to fall into sinful ways. You know, I would say woe unto
the person that does any of those things to a child. Hurting a child in any way, harming a child in
any way, offending them in a sexual way, causing them to fall into a sinful way. You know, Jesus
says woe unto the person that would do any of those things. And we need to make sure that we
are protecting children, that we're having policies in place that are conducive to kids being safe,
not conducive to an environment where predators can thrive. And you know, unfortunately a lot
of Baptist churches, I'm sure a lot of them mean well, but the environment in a lot of Baptist
churches is just like a breeding ground for predators to thrive. And not just Baptist churches,
the Catholic church, a lot of churches, we need to make sure that we're having an environment where
children are protected. And I'm not going to talk about this soon, but of course we're family
integrated for one of those reasons. But go to Deuteronomy chapter six, Deuteronomy chapter six,
what are some ways that people are harming kids today? Wow, it comes through the public school.
Kids are definitely being harmed today in the public school and we need to be careful of these
things. You got ideas hurting them like the big bang theory and evolution, right? Causing children
to offend by turning them out of the way of Christianity and what the Bible teaches and
teaching kids all this nonsense that everything in the universe was created by nothing in a big bang.
And here's the thing, children are simple. Children will believe anything they hear.
So when a child hears "oh you know everything started from this tiny little dot that exploded
into everything" kids just accept that and they hear it in elementary school and in middle school
and in high school and then they get to college and they're now that super prideful entitled
atheist that would make fun of or mock the Bible, mock Christians and it's because they were offended
as children with lies. Let me tell you, lying to children is offending children and that is what the
public school is doing en masse today is lying to kids, teaching them the critical race theory,
taking little kids that are innocent that having done anything wrong and telling them you're bad
because you were born white and you should feel guilty about what maybe some of your ancestors
did, maybe maybe they weren't even your ancestors, you don't even know these people teaching this idea
are just saying like all white people are bad because their ancestors were slaveholders in the
south what if that's not even true like okay my great great grandfather came over from Norway in
the 1880s after the civil war so what's going to do with that where where's my slave owning ancestors
oh yeah didn't happen but even if it did even if i had slave owning ancestors you know what percentage
of that is my fault zero point zero zero why would we sit here and make people feel bad for being a
color that they were born that god created them to be it's like i thought that we were done with the
whole racist thing in the united states like i thought slavery was done all right we've had a
back black president but here we are in 2025 and public school is instructing children in the ideas
of racism telling you you're bad you should feel bad because you were born white that's a bunch of
trash and why do we even allow this stuff i mean it just blows my mind like thankfully my kids are
not in public school i don't plan on ever putting them in public school i believe in home school
but it's like if your kids are in the public school why are you allowing this stuff why are
parents not just in mass going to these parent teacher council meetings and demanding that this
crap ends because it's wicked it is evil to teach children these things then you got things even
worse gender dysphoria now you've got little children that are foolish that don't know anything
and if a girl likes playing with army toys or a boy likes playing with toys that are usually used
for girls all of a sudden now you got teachers telling the kids oh you're probably the wrong
gender you're probably you need to get a transition and you got places like the state of washington
where they passed laws where you are allowed as a child to get transitioned without the government
notifying your parents you could run away from home go to a clinic and the state of washington
will harbor you and it would it is not legal for them to tell on that kid to the parents they have
to keep that little runaway and it's just like kids are literally ruining their lives
not every kid who's doing this is a reprobate because a lot of these kids are being brainwashed
from their youth with this communist crap and i'm telling you the public school today is offending
children and you should at all costs get your kids out of the public school it is a dangerous place
it is a harmful place and let me tell you even in a conservative area don't think that oh it's okay
i'm in oklahoma okay i was educated in idaho an extremely conservative place and you know every
single morning on the announcements there was an lgbt club that was shoved in our our face every day
and a bunch of faggots doing little dances and plays on the announcements every single day in
idaho you know what it's no different here the public schools are trash in oklahoma as well and
you should do everything you can to homeschool them why deuteronomy six verse six says this
and these words which i command thee this day shall be in thine heart and notice this phrase thou
shalt teach them diligently unto thy children and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in
thine house and when thou walkest by the way and when thou liest down and when thou risest
up god says it is your responsibility to teach your children where did we get this idea when did
this happen in our country where we all just collectively decided oh it's actually the
government's job to teach our children that's communism folks that's ridiculous kids do not
belong to the government kids do not belong to public schools god gave you those children
and he expects you to raise them and look i am as pro education as it comes i love reading i love
knowledge i want your kids to be as smart as possible and i would not be recommending
homeschool if i thought it would be damaging someone's education i don't believe in unschooling i
believe in giving them the best education you possibly can but let me tell you right now that
is not found in the public schools today you will not give your kids a good education in the public
schools if they get out of the public school unscathed it's in spite of it not because of it
and they probably have damage that you don't know about you should avoid it and let me tell you this
private schools are not safe either and there's been some stuff recently in the news that has
blown my mind let's see if i can find this article if i brought it up here yeah so this happened
literally super close to where i live this is terrifying here's the article former uconn
private school principal arrested once for child pornography is back in jail facing more charges
this article was posted april 5th so yesterday uconn oklahoma a former private school principal
arrested last month for allegedly having explicit photos of minors including one of his students on
his phone is back in jail again this week facing additional charges and a much higher bond so last
month this guy was already arrested for having pornographic pictures of one of his students
on his phone now i believe this is the covenant it's called like the covenant school or the uconn
covenant school isn't this a christian school does anyone know this is a christian school right
private school so he got off on bond last month now he's back in jail with a higher bond says
investigators say they've uncovered new evidence leading them to arrest him on suspicion of
clandestine photography so you know taking pictures of kids without their knowledge without knowing
what's going on the principle of a christian private school is doing this type of sick stuff
and this is not the first uconn teacher in like the last two months that's been arrested you know
a couple months ago there was a public school uconn teacher that was arrested for inappropriate
texting with a minor some sodomite now it's the principle of this christian school canadian county
sheriff's office deputies first arrested kevin cobs on march 25th i hope every inmate in prison
knows his name kevin cobs after investigators discovered a nude photo of a teenage boy in a
hidden folder on cobs's phone how disgusting what a reprobate you think your kids are safe you think
oh it's great i'm going to send my kids off to a christian school because the public schools are
bad hey i understand that mentality but that doesn't mean that the christian schools are
safe either this is terrifying that a principal would engage that i mean just think of how you
would feel it's like you send your child to school and you find out the principal's taking pictures
of boys inappropriately clandestinely that's disgusting then it says this as news four reported
at the time of his arrest cobs was working as a high school principal and boys basketball coach
at southwest covenant a private christian school in uconn you know when we go christmas caroling i
believe that this is the church that we go and meet up at right there or the school as investigators
searched deeper onto his phone they found an additional folder with more explicit pictures of
miners one of the miners was one of his own students at southwest covenant deputies booked
cobs into the canadian county jail later that day on march 25th on possession of child pornography
charges cobs posted his 25 000 bond and left the jail last week southwest covenant fired
cobs last week so you know what happens this guy he gets fired he's probably going to go to trial
who who knows what type of punishment he's going to get but you know we as a nation and as a state
need to stop allowing this stuff from happening and anyone caught on child pornography charges
you know taking pictures of kids child molestation any of that stuff offending children you should be
executed immediately being fired is not enough this person can never be trusted around kids again
it's not enough to have a sex offender registry so you can look at your phone and see all the
disgusting pedophiles that live by you they need to be in the dirt they need to be buried
we need to preach this stuff so that fags are scared again that they're they're going back in
the closet again and realize that we see them for who they are and by the way every single person
that offends a child let me help you with something they're faggots oh it was just oh it's a straight
man and he offended a little girl no no no there's straight and there's crooked and anything outside
of two consenting adults of the opposite gender is crooked and if you're an adult and you lust
after little girls you're faggot and if you're an adult and you lust after little boys and take
pictures of them you're a faggot and you should be shot in the head it's disgusting we need to
stop tolerating this in our society it should never even get to the point where we have to find out
about a christian principle taking pictures of little boys you know this is absolutely
untolerable in our nation it says this on thursday deputies arrested cobs again booking him into the
canadian county jail on an additional charge of buying procuring or possessing child pornography
so that's his extra charge buying procuring procuring or possessing child pornography
and a charge of using photographic electronic or video equipment in a clandestine matter
so there's your there's your really safe you know christian schools want to avoid going to
the public school there's you know really expensive reputable school in a nice town i mean uconn
oklahoma is a great town seems real safe but i'm telling you it's not safe enough it's not safe
enough to trust someone with your children your children are too precious they're too valuable
god loves them god gave them to you you are the person that could protect them more than anyone
else you are the person that's going to be willing to do anything to protect your child more than
anyone else that is a responsibility that god gave to us go to proverbs chapter number 13 proverbs
chapter number 13 another way that children can be offended that we need to be on the lookout for
is bad friends and bad relatives proverbs 13 verse 20 the bible says he that walketh with wise men
shall be wise but a companion of fools shall be destroyed you know a lot of times kids end up
going down the wrong path getting violated going down a path of sin because they were around wicked
friends or wicked relatives and you know us as parents we ought to be able to control the
influences in our children's lives to the best of our ability and don't have this mentality that
it's like well I have to give my kids to uncle so-and-so because he's family you don't have to do
that you don't have to give your kids to anyone and you know what you even with family you should be
very careful who you give your children to I'm not saying that you can't have relationships in your
life where you do trust people that much you know I would trust my kids with my parents I would trust
my kids with Jasmine's parents but you know I'm just not going to drop my kids off at the uncle's
house or the cousin's house or just some random person's house that I don't know super super well
because hey things happen it only takes one image being shown to your child to change them for the
rest of their life it only takes one bad friend to get them to make a stupid decision and drink that
booze or take that drug to mess them up for the rest of their lives it only takes one whore to
mess up your teenage son for the rest of his life only takes one whoremonger to violate your precious
daughter for the rest of her life you know what you ought to make sure that bad friends and bad
family are not being an influence on them and obviously it goes without saying that if someone
is a sodomite in your family you need to cut that person off from your children period i've heard of
many preachers many liberal preachers saying oh yeah you know involve them show them the love of
christ but if they start kissing each other then tell them that's too far no no no if they're
sodomites in your family cut them off yesterday if they're sodomites in your family i don't care if
it's your dad your mom your brother do not let them around your children they are predators they
are pedophiles they will defile your children they'll do it through their words through their
actions or through physically god forbid but they will do it if they can go to matthew chapter number
19 matthew chapter number 19 and so you know that's jesus's mentality towards children he loves kids
he loves them they're precious he wants us to protect them that's why he says hey if someone
offends a child they should have a millstone tied around their neck and be drowned in the depths of
the sea jesus does not believe in a three strikes and you're out when it comes to child predators
it's you do it once you should be executed that's jesus's view on the matter number four biblical
views on children children are to be welcomed in the house of god children are to be welcomed in
the house of god matthew 19 verse 13 then were there brought unto him little children that he
should put his hands on them and pray and the disciples rebuked them but jesus said suffer
little children and forbid them not to come unto me for of such is the kingdom of heaven so jesus
wants the children to come unto him this is one of the reasons why we believe so strongly in the
family integrated church model is because hey the kids went up to jesus jesus received them he
wanted them to be a part of his ministry to hear his preaching to be around him you know we want the
same thing we want kids to be in real church and obviously we know that babies aren't going to
understand but you know what as a child they're absorbing a lot they're learning what a real
church looks like they're learning what real hymns sound like they're learning what real
preaching sounds like and just that alone being instilled into their heart at a young age
is going to stick with them on top of them growing and maturing and learning learning the word of god
and the goal is that hopefully they won't grow up and seek for Joel Osteen and Andy Stanley and all
these weird pastors that are out there you know I can't imagine just like being raised in this type
of church and then growing up and visiting one of these liberal churches it would be a shock to these
kids to most of the kids that grow up in the new ifb my prayer is that they're going to visit maybe
their friends liberal church when they're in college someday and realize wow that's terrible
i'm staying in an independent fundamental baptist church but you know what happens often in these
other churches is that there's all these kids programs and church is kind of a joke for the
kids it's a play time it's a babysitting time it's a watch movies i remember of the very few
times i did visit church as a child i went to the kids church and there's just like the whole wall
is just lined with xboxes and there's just like stations of kids playing xboxes and there's
basketball there's all this stuff going on and that was church and is it any wonder where a
child is being raised in that environment from being very young to being 18 years old now we're
just expecting them to put on a suit and tie and sit up in church and pay attention to the word of
god and have the character to have daily devotions reading their bible and praying and going soul
winning it's not going to happen it's not going to happen and the old ifb and other churches are very
misguided in trying to reach the youth what's the point of reaching all this youth if you don't win
them to fundamentalism if you don't win them to keeping the torch when we actually pass it along
someday we don't want to just reach children and then when they take over everything becomes a fun
church look at the state of churches in our countries you know millennials are in the past
right now millennials have took over and a lot of churches are just a complete joke it's a complete
fraud and it's because i think largely in part to the kid church movement we want kids in the real
church service because they're going to grow up they're going to like it they're going to keep
liking it when they grow up that's what we want for our kids go to if you would nehemiah chapter
number eight now of course there's obviously challenges with a family integrated church
there's going to be times where the kids are crying where the kids are loud and hey that's
fine i'll do my best to to be loud and preach over it it doesn't bother me obviously if it gets
extreme we have mother baby room we want you to be able to take the kid out of the service
we encourage that if it gets too bad but at the same time you know i expect everyone in here to
be uh mature and not freak out when they hear a baby crying you know this isn't some you know few
people high steeple methodist church where you hear a baby cry and everyone's like oh what is that
thing over there it's like it's babies man it's all good you know we're gonna deal with it we want
the kids here keep some safe they're with their parents we do we want to encourage that nehemiah
chapter 8 verse 2 nehemiah chapter 8 verse 2 it says in ezra the priest brought the law before
the congregation both of men and women and all that could hear with understanding upon the first day
of the seventh month so if you notice all the people are involved here men women and those that
can understand and you know what kids could start understanding at a pretty young age like i told you
my eldest is six years old and we ask her all the time what was the sermon about and i was preaching
that one sermon god's not playing games i said what was the sermon about she said the wrath of god
the anger of god i was like that's right that's exactly what it was about now could she understand
every doctrine could she you know show you every verse no but she's starting to understand some
things and kids can start understanding at a young age but we need to actually give them the
opportunity to learn by them being in church we're not giving them opportunity when all it is is a
movie day a play day a candy day an ice cream day no bring them to church real church and it's so
funny how so many people all the time ask oh what's your kids program like and it's like the kids
program is show up hear god's word being preached sing hymns pray go home just like the program is
for everyone else that's the program the kids program is called the new testament local church
the kids program is called soul winning it's called preaching it's called fellowship the kids are
actually involved here and you know what i believe that we're going to raise some spiritually mature
children that's what we're aiming for god willing with god's help with god's grace that's the goal
but i think that this is a better plan than the alternative just keep them children for as long as
possible don't challenge them with hard preaching feed them a bunch of candy and junk and then just
pray that somehow they're going to be super mature that seems like a bad plan to me okay this is the
right thing to do that's what nehemiah did go to nehemiah chapter number uh 12 nehemiah 12 ezra
excuse me ezra did that go to nehemiah 12 nehemiah chapter number 12 verse 43 it says also that day
they offered great sacrifices and rejoiced for god had made them rejoice with great joy the wives
also notice and the children rejoiced so that the joy of jerusalem was heard even afar off so this
is the dedication of the wall and everyone's rejoicing the adults the women even the children
are rejoicing at the dedication of the wall you know what that tells me is that the children to
some extent understood what was happening and they understood some of the significance at least
of this event and so they were rejoicing and i think another great thing about involving the kids
in the day-to-day activities of the church is that when we do have big events when we have things like
baptisms ordinations conferences guest preachers you know easter all these big days these big days
these big events could really make a lasting impact on them people who grew up in church
you probably remember big days like that it probably has made a deep impression on you
and why well because kids can understand more than we think and by by joining them in these
events it could be a great spiritual blessing to them go to joshua number eight or joshua chapter
number eight joshua chapter number eight and look at verse number 34 when you get there notice what
says and afterward he read all the words of the law the blessings and cursings according to all that
is written in the book of the law there was not a word of all that moses commanded which joshua read
not before all the congregation of israel with the women and the little ones and the strangers that
were conversant among them so notice here the children everybody in the congregation was being
exposed to both the blessings in god's word and the cursings you know i've heard this mentality
from a guy named steven crowder he said like the book of revelation is inappropriate to read to
children says what bible verse i mean here they're getting the cursings they're getting the blessings
again it's this mentality of just keeping kids kids for forever we want to show them the truth
of god's word and the bible teaches that every word of god is pure there's nothing you could
read to a child in the bible that's going to defile them and if there's things in the bible
that kids can't understand well they'll understand when they get older right if i preach a sermon
about due benevolence kids don't know what that is folks knowing due benevolence it's going all
over their head and that's good right but we're not we're not going to be ashamed to preach the
word of god there's nothing rated r in the word of god there's nothing that we should you know shy
away from or not be able to speak about in their presence god presents everything in the bible in
a very pure way to where if we just stick with what the bible says anyone who's too young to
understand those things it's not going to defile them it's not going to hurt them in any way and
when they get older they'll start to understand those things i mean you think about the story of
noah and ham doesn't get real graphic does it the bible doesn't really get graphic about anything
in that nature and that's good we want to keep it that way but we shouldn't sit here and think like
oh we got to watch out certain chapters of the bible kids can't listen to no we could all hear
all of it it's all pure it's all good matthew chapter number 19 matthew chapter number 19
but you know we should also think about this i love this thing that pastor Jimenez
always says is that we're not raising children we're raising adults and that's the mentality
that we should have as a church is that hey our goal is to produce god-fearing zealous serious
christian adults so our mentality our programs the way of running things should be aimed towards
that goal whereas again i think that a lot of these kids programs it's thinking of children
as children and the goal is just kind of to keep them children just to kind of keep them docile
during the service but we want them to grow to adults we're going to keep them having the word
of god number five this evening children should be reached with the gospel matthew 19 verse 14
but jesus said suffer little children and forbid them not to come unto me for of such is the kingdom
of heaven hey children are naturally receptive to the gospel we should reach children with the
gospel of jesus christ they are so easy to get saved we should do that and here i think that this
is the best strategy on how to reach kids is first reach your kids reach your kids with the gospel
and train them to become soul winners this is the best way to reach children you know every church
kind of has different demographics but when i was attending sure foundation baptist church around
2017 there was like an army of children soul winners and it was great because whenever we
go out in public and there's kids playing around at the park it's a lot easier and it looks a lot
better to send a pack of kids to the kids than like six foot eight pastor thompson like hey kid
you're gonna die today it's like that could be a little intimidating right but when you got an army
of kids it's great to send them and you know what we ought to have discretion as soul winners in
dealing with children i want to get kids saved i'm four people preaching the gospel to kids
but the best way to preach to kids is when their parents are there okay if you knock a door and a
little kid opens the door like eight nine ten years old my first question to that kid is going to be
hey are your parents home and if they say no i'm going to leave that's what i'm going to do because
i'm going to treat people the way that i want to be treated and i teach my kids not to answer the door
but if they did i would not be happy if an adult was speaking with my little child alone it's not
a good look it's not a good idea but here's the thing what's great is if the parents are home and
you're knocking the door hey is mom or dad home then you can start preaching the gospel to the
parents and if the parents let you you could then start preaching to the kids or if you're in a
public place where adults are around and especially if you can even ask the parents that's even better
but at least be in a public place or something like that if you're going to be preaching to kids
you know you need to be sensitive of how things look avoid the appearance of evil we live in a
twisted time where unfortunately there's a bunch of sodomites and a bunch of predators and i do
not recommend going to some dark apartment of an in a dark corner of an apartment and just having
a conversation with a six-year-old i don't recommend that whatsoever i don't think it looks good and if
i get a call about someone doing that i'm probably be like hey i'm sorry i will ask that person to
stop okay because i don't like that at all i want to get kids saved but here's the again here's the
best way to do it let's reach our kids and let's teach our kids to preach the gospel or you go and
talk to their parents and ask for permission or you go in a very public place where there's tons
of people and everything's above reproach and preach them the gospel there that's the best way
to preach to kids don't take kids off into some dark corner by yourself that's not appropriate
obviously you don't mean harm obviously you're never going to do anything to kids but just realize
that we live in a crazy time and if i saw that if you saw that about your kids how would you feel
now what does piss me off when here we are out in the open and i knock on some door and mom and dad
talk to me and mom and dad doesn't want their kid to hear the bible being preached that does piss me
off and there's nothing we could do about that unfortunately but you know at least we did our job
we showed up we asked we are ready to preach to them that's what we should do go to psalm 78 psalm
78 psalm 78 verse 4 it says we will not hide them from their children showing to the generation
to come the praises of the lord and his strength and his wonderful works that he hath done verse 5
for he established a testimony in jacob and appointed a law in israel which he commanded
our fathers that they should make them known to their children verse 6 that the generation to come
might know them even the children which should be born who should arise notice and declare them
to their children so the bible here is kind of describing this generational handoff of preaching
god's words showing his wonderful works so that the next generation which should be born are going
to arise and they're going to declare it to their kids right and so we want to keep passing these
things off and in our church we have a lot of young kids you know in the next five to ten years
we're going to have a lot of kids coming to the age of being able to be soul winners and we should
start thinking and investing and planning for that time right now you know this is why I try to take
my kids out soul winning as much as possible it's not because it's easy because it's hard it's a
burden kids are kids right so them just like standing by a door for 15 minutes doing nothing
while you preach can be difficult but we want to train them so that when they are of that age where
they're getting saved where they can learn to preach the gospel we could use them as a tool to
go get other kids saved and even other adults saved we need to start thinking about those things now
and taking it seriously you know i would love to have like sure foundation did just an army of
young kids ready to preach the gospel that is a great tool and that makes me feel a lot more
comfortable than asking brother cameron to go preach to a six-year-old they're asking me to
preach to a six-year-old you know i mean like all the parents in here know what i'm saying is right
right now we don't want to be appearing to be weird with kids it's not good we need to prepare
for it so number one this evening children are a blessing number two children are a great example
of faith number three children need to be protected number four children are to be welcomed at church
number five children should be reached with the gospel every once in a while we need to make sure
that we're renewing our mind not just getting our philosophy about parenting child rearing or just
view on children from the world or from backslidden churches that don't use the bible you know everything
tonight was right from the word of god we need to make sure that we have a biblical view on children
and pray that they grow up and become assets in the house of god let's have a word of prayer lord
we thank you for our church and we thank you for the blessing of children i pray that we would
treasure the blessings that you've given us that we would steward them well that we would do our
responsibility of teaching them training them warning them of the pitfall pitfalls of sin
keeping them safe where we can and we pray that you would show us lots of mercy and grace to make
up for any of our errors or mistakes as parents and i pray that the kids in here would grow up to
love you to want to serve you with all of their heart to become soul winners and to be assets in
our church we love you in Jesus name we pray amen right at this time we'll go ahead and sing one
last song to conclude the service if you would take your hymnals and turn to hymn number six
beneath the cross of Jesus hymn number six in your hymnals go ahead and start there right on the first