Building for three generations
Building for three generations.doc SD22
June 21. 2009 File: M5b
Building for Three Generations
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My hero—My Dad!!!
Deuteronomy 4:9
Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them.”
Legacies are different from inheritances
Inheritances involve estates, and plans, and businesses, and bank accounts…and real estate…
Legacies involve character—truth, courage, right living, sacrifice, determination, patience, loyalty,
Conviction, commitment, conversion, compassion
Faith, fortitude, focus
Disappointment, disillusionment, discouragement
Obedience, optimism, overcoming
Purity, purpose
Your legacy is your life and your life is the measure of a million small things that add up to make you who you are—your decisions…between right and wrong…
The measure of a man is not in the things he own…but in the things that own him…
The things (people) that he would give his life for…
What is the last thing that you would be willing to give up in life?
That is what possesses you!
Is it worthy of you!
Is in God??? Is it Christ???
On this fathers day think about your legacy!
Your influence will outlast your lifetime and will touch your children and your grandchildren and the stuff you have put in them will stretch to their children and grandchildren…
Some of you are striving to overcome some of the negative influences that were put in to you by your father…
Even if you are not married—think about what you are building into your life NOW!
Are you building what would be considered just wood, hay, and stubble or the lasting values of faith—of God? Of eternity???
Where are you going---you will very likely take your family with you!!!!
Our legacy is what we live…every day…after every tedious day…consistently…with faith, hope and love!
You are building for three generations…
The son of one missionary once made the statement… “My parents sure loved the heathen, but just wasn’t sure they loved me.”
Tragically, he rebelled against God and everything they believed in…and as a result their vision of the future died with them…
One thing your wife and kids need to be sure of is that you love them…How is that happening in your home????
Live the legacy with love and compassion…
Three generations—look and Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
Abraham prayed for everything he received, Isaac inherited it, and Jacob schemed and took shortcuts to get it.
But when trouble hit Isaacs’s life he remembered and returned to his fathers God…and so did Jacob…
Because they knew the faith of Abraham
What do they know of your faith---?
It doesn’t have to be perfect, it just has to be lived out in the normal routines of life and death…
Cover your children with prayer
Cover your grandchildren with prayer
Cover your great-grandchildren with prayer if you should live long enough to see them born.
Sow the word of God in their life—read it to them! Teach it to them…learn it yourself!!!
Do you read the Bible—then read it to your kids!
Not out of a sense of legalistic routine but a faith that reveals itself in a love for God and His Word and His church.
Remember you are building for three generations!!!
Dt. 4:9
Be careful—take care…make it intentional
And watch yourselves closely—pay attention to your life first, don’t be so concerned about how your children are acting but how you are acting in response to them…pay attention to yourself
So that you do not forget—the reason we must be daily diligent is so that we will not forget
The things your eyes have seen—your own experience as you have sought to draw near to God.
Or let them slip from your heart—the heart is the guardian place…it is the treasure house of the soul…what are you treasuring in your heart. What are you nurturing in your heart?
As long as you live—this is not a part time job and it is not for the faint of heart. Be courageous. Take up the challenge. Fight for your family. Be the man! Pray!
Teach them—God’s Word. His stories with your stories of what God has done and how you have experienced Him through your life.
To your children and to their children after them—your kids and grandkids…never stop telling the story…
William Fisher must have been thinking about this when he wrote the words
“I love to tell the story of unseen tings above, of Jesus and His glory, of Jesus and His love. I love to tell the story, because I know it’s true, it satisfies my longings, as nothing else can do
Tell me the story of Jesus; write on my heart every word…
It is the need of every generation…lest we become as those of who it was said… (Judges 2:10)…after the death of Joshua, and the elders who outlived Joshua, “…there arose a generation who knew not God…”
Tell it to your kids…tell it with your life…not just your words…
Live the legacy!
Forget the inheritance…you can go ahead and spend that…because if you have left them a legacy of faith they won’t mind at all…